Tuesday, June 17, 2014

New step in realistic 3D (updated)

I subscribe to 3D Artist magazine, and this was on a recent cover. No photo, all computer-generated.
Woa.


(If you want it even larger than Blogger allows, get it here.)

(Pages from the article. Click for big pic.)

Page below is from another article, about the app Zbrush, which allows the artist to press and sculpt intuitively, like with a lump of clay, rather than with numbers and sliders. It was used for the basic head above. But notice that some even do the hair with Zbrush. There are a legion of techniques and clearly a ton of work involved in making 3D images...


14 comments:

David Evans said...

Amazing. If there were a visual Turing test, that would pass it easily.

Dan Park said...

Completely believable as a real photo. I agree with David.

Pat McGee said...

Hi Eolake,
By 'computer-generated', do you mean 'algorithmically' or do you mean 'painted using a paint program'?

I assume from your enthusiasm that you mean the first.

If so, that's truly awe-inspiring. They'll be able to generate an infinite number of different faces just by tweaking parameters.

Pat

Anonymous said...

I assume from your enthusiasm that you mean the first.

I don't think so. A big clue is that it's from a magazine called 3D Artist.

Anonymous said...

So...do you subscribe to it because you're a 3D artist or because you just want to look at the work?

Eolake Stobblehouse said...

Mainly to get inspiration from the work. I am not good at using very complicated software, so I doubt I'll ever have the patience to do 3D work myself.

Pat, it is made with a 3D app (three different ones actually). But seemingly built bit by bit, not with any face or skin algorithms to any great degree. (Although parts of making the hair is done like that.)

I will now post a page from the article in the post, to give an impression of it.

Eolake Stobblehouse said...

I've posted a couple of screenshots, which gives an impression of how complex it is. (And I'm sure that's just scratching the surface at most.)

Ken said...

Slowly but steadily the software is doing more and more. Eventually most stuff that we see will be computer generated. First stills, then extras in movies, supporting actors, and maybe stars. Extras are already computer generated for some crowd scenes where they are small enough not to need a high level of rendering.

Joe Dick said...

I am not good at using very complicated software, so I doubt I'll ever have the patience to do 3D work myself.

Not to mention it would require spending about $10,000 on the programs to do it - Z Brush, Maya, etc., probably aren't cheap.

Eolake Stobblehouse said...

I think Maya is quite expensive, but I looked up Zbrush, and it seems to sell for around $600, and has even been on offer for 300.

Bru said...

I think the whites of the eyes are a bit too perfect. No blood vessels, and the shape and shading are a bit too geometric.

Still, an excellent job. Coming to an iPad in 10, 9, 8 ...

... years, maybe! :-)

Anonymous said...

No blood vessels

There are. Look closer.

I doubt you'd have "noticed" the imperfection if you hadn't been told it's not a photograph.

Bru said...

Still not enough vessels, particularly on the inside of the whites of the eyes. And the whites still don't look right.

Yes, if I saw this image in a small size at the bottom of a web page with a bunch of other images derived from real photographs it would likely fit right in. You know the kind, with the teaser captions: “meet girls in your area” “housewife making $100k per month" “this weird old trick will give you cancer” etc.

Anonymous said...

Still not enough vessels, particularly on the inside of the whites of the eyes. And the whites still don't look right.

Maybe you need to get more sleep or stop doing drugs.

Yes, if I saw this image in a small size at the bottom of a web page with a bunch of other images derived from real photographs it would likely fit right in. You know the kind, with the teaser captions: “meet girls in your area” “housewife making $100k per month" “this weird old trick will give you cancer” etc.

Uh...if you say so...