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SupahPOW31 β Minecraft: Depth Based Fog Test
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Published: 2014-10-25 20:58:55 +0000 UTC; Views: 3011; Favourites: 47; Downloads: 55
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Description
A couple of days ago, I discovered how to use the Blender compositor. It's basically like a post effects software, (like photoshop) that can use the depth calculations from the render to add things like depth of field, and in this case fog. I made this little render while I was messing around with it.I think this picture can hold it's own compared to some of my previous renders, but it's still not my best. What do you guys think? (It's been so long since I made anything..... xD)
Programs Used: Blender 2.72 with the Cycles engine, JMC2OBJ for world export, and Gimp for the color space conversion and some color enhancements.
Render Time: 5 minutes. (I optimized the scene for rendering this time xD)
**EDIT**
Somebody pointed out that this looks very similar to Minecraft with shaders. When I was designing this scene to use for testing the Fog effect, my reference was actually a screenshot from minecraft with the shaders mod turned on, taken from the exact same location. Shaders Fog Test Reference
I welcome you to check it out, and compare the two. A hand crafted render ( ) VS. the Shaders Mod. After comparing the two, what do you think? Is it similar enough to make this render a waste of time, or does the physically accurate render still prevail? I welcome all feedback, don't be shy to point out anything negative you might find. Negative feedback is the most helpful, as it's what helps you to not make that mistake again.
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Comments: 34
Custom modeled by me and then added one at a time by hand to the scene. I wasn't happy with the look of the exported flat 2d ish tall grass for this photo. So I made my own 3d grass xD
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XD I have no idea how to use blender, only c4d XD
ur very talented though
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Some of my best images are made in Cinema 4D. I only started using Blender because it was no longer a challenge to make anything I could think of in Cinema 4D. xD
Thank You! Β
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I'm such a n00b at Blender, you're very talented and your work is AWESOME!!
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Blender is very strange to try out when your used to Cinema 4D, their designs are exactly opposite. Everything is hidden inside menus for Blender, and everything is out in the open in Cinema 4D. I had the advantage of starting with Blender. But, thank you! Β
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Ya, I started with mine-imator, couldn't figure it out, downloaded Blender, that was worse, so gave up and months later someone said C4D, so I tried that, watched some tuts and here I am over a year later. 
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I never did understand why so many people like mine imator. Its just not that good. xD And I actually use 4 programs. Blender, Cinema 4D, 3DS Max and Maya. I just don't use 3DS max and Maya too often. I don't like their interfaces.
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Ya I don't like their interfaces either, to complicated XD, Mine-Imator is pretty terrible and I don't like the idea of a MC only program. C4D is my fav, just not the render times XD 56 days of rendering for a 4 min animation! I rly need R16 and octane renderer thingy
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All depends on your processor. Lots of people who try animation don't have nearly powerful enough processors for rendering. It can also depend on how much quality you need to have. Animations need a lower quality settings than a single image would, because people are less likely to pick apart little details and such while the camera is moving, or their focus is drawn to something that is moving. And when the quality is lowered, so is render time. This is also why I'm messing with Blender. It has GPU rendering built straight into it. No need for an external render engine like octane.
And even GPU rendering will not help render times unless you have a decently high end GPU. For me though, I have an AMD HD 7950 gpu. And it only supports OpenCL for gpu computational tasks. Nvidia GPU's support OpenCL and their proprietary CUDA. Blender supports CUDA by default, but has OpenCL rendering in a beta mode. So, GPU rendering doesn't do much for me unless it's a scene that fits perfectly into the size requirements of my GPU. (Aka the scene size has to fit inside the dedicated memory built into the GPU. My card has 3GB at it's disposal.) And this holds true for every other GPU render engine. 1-2GB of memory isn't going to cut it if you plan to use GPU rendering for decently sized scenes. 3GB is barely enough for me.
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ya... i need a new pc, I have i5 @2.7 ghz and 8mb cashe, 16 gb of corsair ram, and a (old perthetic) NVidia gtx 470 1gb, ya ikr, also it 720p to hight or low for animations?
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Depending on how old that i5 is, you really wouldn't benefit from upgrading it. Intel hasn't really done anything earth shattering in the performance department for the past few gens. I would recommend upgrading that graphics card. And I have 16GB of ram aswell. (more than you will probably need for regular animation xD) And 720p at this point probably is the bear minimum you should be rendering at for animations. 1080p is becoming the new standard for YouTube and such, so I would render out at that if you can. By lowering quality settings, I meant turning down Global Illumination, and/or Ambient Occlusion. Those are the two most resource intensive effects in Cinema 4D that nearly everybody uses. You can even get away with turning them off in some cases if they don't really do that much for the scene. I would recommend comparing renders of different quality settings for the exact same scene and frame, and figure out how much render time you can live with, in exchange for quality.
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Ok thanks for all the info, I am considering moving to AMD for my processor and prob andΒ GTX780 titan lol, ik thats overkill but who cares! Ya I will do comparison renders to find what works best for me.Β
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What is it bruh?
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This is epic
Doesn't the texture pack hawkeye with the shaders mod have this exact effect though?
Im not trying to be mean this truly is Amazing βΊ
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It probably does come close. Modded minecraft is getting closer and closer to what premade renders are capable of. But, it still will never be nearly as physically accurate as this.
When I was designing this, my reference was actually a screenshot taken with shaders, and it still doesn't look as good as this.
Here is a link to that screenshot: sta.sh/0129ztgimacx (I'm aware the sun is at a different angle, but that's what I was using.)
The water is one major thing that can't be done in minecraft. Along with the 3D tall grass, which needs minecraft 1.8, which doesn't have the shaders mod yet afaik.
Even something as subtle as the depth of field isn't possible in Minecraft to the extent of this. The depth of field is using the same depth calculations as the fog, so the Depth of fields intensity increases at the same speed as the fog. The Shaders mod's Depth of Field just focuses wherever your cursor is, instead of a distance based boundary line.
The fog itself was actually designed to look like the fog used in minecraft. That's why it looks so similar ; )
So yeah, minecraft shaders can definitely come close, but it still can't touch a real render in terms of overall quality.
Also, Thanks! Β
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lol no prob, and you bring a very well put argument. β¦
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I'm glad you liked it xD
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That water though. XO
I'll never know how the hell you do that. XD
Great job on the picture too.
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lol, I have so many pre setup effects that I can just drag and drop into a scene it's not even funny. It's no longer really a challenge to make something for me anymore since I've become so good at this.
I could honestly just send you the Cinema 4D water effect I have. It's literally just a material you apply to the water. (Its what I used to make Minecraft: The River) The water in this picture goes more in depth with displacement mapping and complex blender material node trees.
I really am considering just making a journal with a tutorial for each and every effect I have done, and a download for the reference file I have for it. Considering that I no longer really make too many renders. Because I've got physical skies for Cinema 4D, various materials, custom modeled items and blocks. This fog effect for blender, this sky and sun setup, and various other things I've done. But, what would be the fun in that? ; ) Half the fun of making renders is figuring out how to get the exact look you want through many many hours of trial and error.
Thanks btw! Β
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Your welcome
Having your presets and tutorials would be nice, and would help a ton.
I really am interested in the water physics, fog, and physical skys, but I honestly don't even know where to start. I do appreciate your tips though. I'll experiment as much as I can just to see the outcome. Β
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Is dis good WOW or bad WOW? XD
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OMG SUPAH
IT'S SO AWESOME
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