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zpaolo β LEGO Classic Space scene 1
Published: 2010-04-19 10:38:24 +0000 UTC; Views: 12877; Favourites: 72; Downloads: 2494
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Description
This image is part of a project aimed at reproducing in 3D the classic space era illustrations found in LEGO sets.First I modeled all the first 10 classic space era sets (about 1978-79) brick by brick in Pro|ENGINEER, then the scene was set up according to the image found in the instruction book of sets 442, 452 and 462 (in the U.S., sets from Europe had different scenes).
The rendering was done in Lightwave using a single main light (as in the real scene) and a dome light for ambient diffusion. This scene was HUGE: each model has all polygonal details like the LEGO marking on the studs so I had to setup and render the top and bottom half separately (the bottom half was more than 2 MILLIONS polygons alone!). It did not took too long though, less than an hour with global illumination and "soft" shadows.
I hope you'll enjoy it!
Paolo
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Comments: 44
Dear Paolo, I just used your picture on my website to promote a MoonCity that is going to be build by Erik Laan in the city of Delft, the Netherlands. Is it allowed I use your picture for this purpose? If yes, i will use:Β Copyright photo by @zpaolo.deviantart.com-Β as photo credits in the facebook post. If not, I will remove it immediately.
Here is the link to our account:www.facebook.com/sciencecentre⦠ post will be uploaded on the 2nd of june.
With best regards, Lonneke.
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This is perfect, thank you for adding the proper credits!
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Dear Paolo, I just used your picture on my website to promote a MoonCity that I am going to build in the city of Delft, the Netherlands. Is it allowed I use your picture for this purpose? If yes, do I use the correct credits? If no, I will remove it immediately.
Here is the link:Β www.eyeonorbit.com/2018/03/legβ¦
With best regards, Erik Laan
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Yes, it's fine, the credits and link are correct so feel free to use the image 
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I had most of these, some of them I got as an amazing Christmas present from my sister a couple years ago
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I only had the rocket launcher 
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go on ebay! Β or do you own them all now?
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I don't have the room for lego sets now, and I don't own any lego set anymore (except some Blackstar that I kept for refernce). I only have virtual models
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Nice. Must've been quite some work. But what kinda disturbs me are those thick shadowlines. Is it severe ambient occlusion? Something seems to make the whole picture look somewhat soft. Could also be Depth of Field. I can't really tell, but it contradicts to your usual sharp style (which I actually prefer).
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You mean shadows on recessed areas? There's almost no ambient occlusion in this image, so shadows came out of the lighting setup.
As for "softness", first be sure to look at the picture at its nominal resolution. There is no DOF, maybe anti-alias setup softened a little, but what I think is that the sense of "softness" is related to the fact that in my usual pictures each model "takes up" more pixels as there is usually only one set in the image. Here we have a lot of sets on the set, therefore the "pixel detail" for each set is reduced.
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I just noticed that I had earlier works of yours in mind. Obviously your style of rendering has changed. Still, the amount of details and the nostalgic character are awesome
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If you mean _very_ earlier works, the ones rendered in Alias Imagestudio or early Hypershot renderings, you are right. The older pictures were more or less just "showcases" of the model, they had very simple ambient lighting and very simple environment. This rendering was more a way to mimic real LEGO manual photographs, which means a little less "polish" and a little more realism.
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These sets are still the best in my opinion. Much fun!
Beautifully done.
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They had lots of exotic parts but nothing so specialized that you couldn't find different uses for them.
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Absolutely. Those were the days.
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YOU FOUND THOSE OLD SETS!!! I remember those! (barely, but still)
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NVM I thought it was the old space sets from the mid/late 1980's at first glance
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It is, sort of
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This is an awesome image. I had to do a double take...I thought it was a photograph of actual sets at first. X3
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I remember almost this exact same scene in those little catalogs that came with each tiny set. I used to have only the 2 spaceships in view. This brings back so many memories.
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The idea was exactly this: replicate the old images from the catalog
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Wow, this is epic! And a massive blast from the past = I used to have set 452 'Mobile Tracking Station' when I was a kid (it came out in 1978, so I was 6) I only had the one Space Lego set, but I played with it loads. Awesome work dude!
:iconLegoStar-Wars-Club:
'Do not underestimate the Force... of the Brick!'
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'Do not underestimate the Force... of the Brick!'
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Nice work.
I have a booklet that has all these old sets in them, so I recognised this pic
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How long did this take for you to create, I wonder?
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Well the hardest part of the work is modeling each LEGO piece, but this is a task already accomplished, I can't remember how long it took because it was spread on many months in my free time or in pauses from my main work... Assembling them together to build the various sets is fun and quick if you have the instructions, let's say about an hour of assembly work for each set. In this case the crucial point was the number of sets involved and therefore the number of polygons to manage in the scene, I had to reduce the polygon count for the sets that are not too close to the camera
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Brilliant, I used to love my classic LEGO space sets.
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I hate to say it, but it probably would have been easier to buy the original sets and set up a photoshoot.
If you like Lego, you should check out my contest, linked in my sig.
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Maybe, but having modeled each brick and special piece I can model every set from the past, they are not too easy to find now, and I won't have a place to store them
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This is amazing 
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Thank you
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Well I personally hope you invest in a 64 bit system. 
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Maybe with a bit of scene splitting I can render this one at 1600x1600 or more, so you could see better the fine details like roundings and LEGO logo, that are almost invisible now
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