Thank you for the compliment on my car design. And while I have achieved a modest amount of recognition, I definitely do not consider myself "famous."

For those who know me personally and professionally, and if one looks at what I've written about the art and design of others, it is core to my belief and work ethic not to publicly criticize another artist's work. I might make unfavorable comments privately, amongst friends and colleagues, but never in a public space.

No offense - I disagreed with you, because I think you spoke without thoughtfully considering [or knowing?] exactly what you were looking at.

As someone who is often putting his work in front of the public, I know how easy it is for others to advise on something they themselves have not mastered, or to judge prematurely when they are not taking the risk of putting their own work before lots of discerning, and sometimes condescending, eyes and minds and tongues.

I have lived in several major US cities, and presently live in San Francisco. And one of the things I know beyond a shadow of a doubt is that you never know who you are talking too.

I have been an artist and writer all my life. I'm almost entirely self-taught. I consistently work very hard, and I'm good at what I do.

Putting your work on a forum intended for learning requires one to be vulnerable to a certain amount of constructive criticism,
as well as the understanding that others aren't necessarily obligated to adhere to your personal ethical standards.

It isn't like you invite friends to your home to admire your work and everyone is expected to be polite
and if you are lucky, stroke your ego. It's better not to have a thin skin, but I know how you feel.
I guess the trick is to swallow your pride and try to learn from the experience, even if the comment
isn't on the mark.

I think you may be right about the HDR image causing pixelation on the tubular surfaces.

If you know a way to avoid that problem, perhaps this issue can be turned around
into something positive and used as a catalyst for learning for the whole community.

Here is something that i am working on at the moment. This model is a hybrid model part Rhino Render Mesh and Part MoI/Pure Nurbs. What was surprising here was that the Rhino NURBs imported fine and although the meshed surfaces were not displayed they were obviously imported by MoI as the saved file still contained the meshed surfaces. I am now intrigued if MoI touched the NURBs surfaces or if it left them untouched - as in no re-modelling - and just applied styles to the parts :\

The point of this exercise is to produce a catalog style render for a piece of Jewellery purely using Keyshot - No retouching at all



Martin Spencer-Ford

Just to clarify what i was trying to get across and not too well i fear.



The red ellipses are what i perceive to be tell tale signs of not enough mesh density, I would be very surprised if that was purely down to HDR aliasing but of course i could be mistaken, without seeing the model.



Again on this image red is as above, green is HDRi reflection aliasing from a HDR that's potentially too low in resolution for the scene it has been applied to, this is fine as most render engines give you the option to blur the reflections and to a certain degree this can be fixed with using anti-aliasing.

I hope this clarifies the points i was raising.

Martin Spencer-Ford

TpwUK,

Wow. Are you kidding? Those are stunning renders anyone would be happy to have in their portfolio and you're picking them apart? Sheesh.

cool gallery!
https://www.flickr.com/photos/maxeternity/

Hi chipp, I am not trying to inflame anyone, they are good renders and if Max is happy at that level of quality then so am I. The discussion was/is based on how to get the best out of MoI and Keyshot not the quality of the renders parse - I really don't seem to be getting my point across without upsetting someone. My comments are purely there to try and help others, not to offend.

Martin Spencer-Ford

Hi Martin,

OK, I understand. I thought you were just being hyper critical.

For me, I like rendering NURBs in Keyshot except for when I need to use the edge bevel render tool, which doesn't work on NURBs-- only polys.

I suspect a lot depends on what you want to do with the final render. If it's for print publication, then higher resolutions subdivides are necessary when exporting to polys. If it's for a website, then I think Max's renders are super. Only the most studied of professionals can find any sort of fault with them. Frankly, I can't really see the edge artifacting on many of the red circles of yours-- and if I can't see it, I doubt others can-- or care.

More important to me are the workflow issues-- like how to go back and forth between MoI and Keyshot with as little disruption as possible. One nice thing with NURBs is you can assign materials to just about all the different objects, including ones which have the same 'style' in MoI.

Hi Chipp,

No probs with misunderstanding - I have autistic traits so i sometimes come across that way without intending to :/

I love NURBs surfaces, and i get frequently pulled apart by so called 'real' modellers who work at prestigious companies like DreamWorks, that say NURBs are a dead technology and that SubD has effectively pushed NURBs into the realm of the hobbyist and geek - What blasphemy I say.

I have spent over thirty years working with graphics and 3D, going way back to Atari 800xl days and designing alternate character sets for doing animations and games set design. However, I struggled to get consistent work and moved into garden design professionally but still stayed with 3D as a hobbyist. I myself, like Max, am self taught, but have been coached by some great poly modelling guys that have given me some real confidence slaps, but i am grateful for them as they make me try harder. I won't ever abandon NURBs they are clean to me, and with my OCD they work for my smooth surfaces fetish.

Workflow wise, I drop down to low poly from MoI if i need to add further details via ZBrush, where i change the angle setting down to 40, export as quads and tri with divide all set to produce an easy on the eye mesh. Then it goes into another poly modelling app for further linear sub-divisions before importing into ZB for adding details. This way i keep control over the mesh and can remove vertices where they are not needed before they are imported.

If i am doing just smooth surface renders then all i do is set the angle and divides to give a nice dense mesh and export as triangles only, I will zoom into the mesh generated by MoI and make adjustments as needed to make sure I have nice curves before doing the final export as Obj or LWO or FBX.

If working with NURBs directly in Keyshot, then i keep my model open in MoI, and if i see something that needs fixing whilst in KS i will bounce back to MoI, do the repair and then on the import dialog with Keyshot i select update geometry and it's done, no loss of materials, it works great :) Like you I love the way Keyshot keeps the surfaces as objects, makes assigning materials a doddle with nice speedy results.

Martin Spencer-Ford

Hi Martin,

> What was surprising here was that the Rhino NURBs imported fine and although the meshed
> surfaces were not displayed they were obviously imported by MoI as the saved file still contained
> the meshed surfaces.

Yes, that's a feature in MoI's 3DM importer - if it finds any Rhino entities that it does not deal with directly itself (like meshes for example), it still reads them and stores them in an internal data table and writes them back out again when you save back to 3DM format.

That's so that data in files can still "round trip" back out of MoI instead of having things purged by opening and then just resaving a Rhino file.

- Michael

I got an email from KeyShot. (I have the Alibre .bip import version, which seems to me to be inferior, and "outdated".)
They do not say what the deal is...
- Brian

The KeyShot Black Friday Event


Friday, November 28th, 2014


Be ready Thursday night. At midnight, our exclusive one-day only event to bring KeyShot to you at a special price begins. Discounts start on Friday, Nov. 28th at 12:00 AM PST. These deals are good for one day with online purchases only. At midnight, coupon codes will be sent out to use for discounts on both purchases and upgrades of KeyShot. Keep an eye out and mark your calendars. You won't want to miss this special pricing.

Thanks Martin for sharing your workflow. Very interesting and gives me some ideas to play around with.

Hello,

Those furniture issues look like they're due to insufficient resolution on the HDRI, perhaps a lack of mesh density on the model itself, but it could also be that the image is so blown out that it's drawing attention to those problem areas that would be overlooked with a more balanced lighting setup. Those highly reflective and transparent materials can be unforgiving.

I upgraded to Keyshot Pro 5 today, with the black Friday special. :-)
It is "node-lockecked"

- Brian

Way to go Brian - Will be looking forward to viewing some renders from you :)

Martin Spencer-Ford

To Michael Gibson and to Michael Spencer-Ford: Since I made no request(s) and granted no permission for anyone on this site to take my images and mark them up with digital ink and then re-post them with subjective notations, I request that those images marked-up images by Michael Spencer-Ford be taken down from this forum page immediately, as I consider it vandalization of my original artwork. My work is owned exclusively by me, and I have never granted permission to anyone on this site to add their artwork [red ink] to my art/designs.

Like everyone, Michael Spencer-Ford has right to his opinion. However, Michael Spencer-Ford is not my lord and saviour, or mentor, or anything. He has nothing of interest to say to me--and in my view he is envious and childish, and his opinions are dead and hollow. I don't need anyone shoving their viewpoints down my throat, which Michael Spencer-Ford seems to think is a great idea.

Furthermore, I'm on this site to enjoy the creativity of others and to share my own, so beyond that I don't care whether or not anyone likes my work. So, Michael Spencer-Ford, I ask that you delete the vandalized images of my work from your forum posts, and to Michael Gibson, if Michael Spencer-Ford does not or cannot do this, because it is something admin must do, I ask that you delete said images immediately.

An additional parallel though: Michael Spencer-Ford, I noticed you posted a image of a ring you created. To that I have no comment.

In all the years I have been writing about the work or others artists, architects and industrial designers--whether at Art Digital Magazine, The Huffington Post, Truthout.org, Artworks Magazine, Triangle Modernist Houses, MaxEternity.com, or elsewhere--I have NEVER ever written a single negative word about anyone's artwork. However, on many occasions, I have said "no comment."

Figure it out.
__________________________________________________________________________

Moving on:

While I hold MoI in high esteem, I accept the fact that MoI is not a perfect program, and neither is Keyshot. This really doesn't matter, as for myself and the full-time, career artists that I know personally who's work has been presented all over the world--some of whom work in museums, some of whom are college professors, a couple who are Guggenheim Fellows, and a few who are published authors, editors, curators and publishers, like myself--for us perfection is never the goal...creativity and beauty is.

I can always find a "flaw" in the work of artists, architects, authors and designers, no matter how experienced and professional they are. Yet to have my mind focused on perceived imperfection, would be to totally miss the point.

Beauty is the ideal.

- Just as a sidebar, BTW, I often do screenshot captures, and not full renders, in the interest of time and CPU usage. Full renders and screenshots each have their own place, in my view.

What now follows is a re-post of my original thoughts about the title of this thread, which is "MoI export file for KeyShot." My original comment on that is followed by the images that I originally posted along with said comment. Thereafter, what follows are images of my latest line of supercar designs...is being: VTV E79 (version C)

I have been using MoI and Keyshot together for a couple years. To render a MoI file in Keyshot, what I do is first create and save a MoI .3dm file. Then I save that file as a Keyshot .obj file, selecting the "quads and triangles" option in the MoI popup menu. Then I open Keyshot, and drag and drop the .obj file. When I drag and drop, an "import" popup window opens in Keyshot, and in the "Materials" section I always check the box that says "Keep individual parts" and on the drop-down menu in that same section of the popup, I select "Group by "Materials"." When I follow these steps exactly, I never have any problems.

Here is are images of some recent furniture designs...from my imagination, to MoI, to Keyshot:







...and the latest supercar iteration:

Keyshot called this morning. Unfortunately Alibre/KeyShot3 doe not count for much for an upgrade to Keyshot Pro5
so I had to pay $560 more, for a total of $1196, plus $400 maintenance. Still saved some money.
Keyshot 6 may be released "late next year."
One seat is allowed, but, for example, Home PC seat can be deactivated (on-site) and then laptop or office pc can have an install. & vice versa.
re-activation is "easy." In an emergency, by a call to KeyShot business, if they are open, they can deactivate remotely.

Purchased Camtasia Studio and upgrade to SnagIt for 30% off today.

- Brian

you will have also a special Keyshot for the new ZBrush for 249$! ;)
http://www.zbrushcentral.com/showthread.php?190182-A-Sneak-Peek-at-the-ZBrush-to-KeyShot-Bridge

""""""""""He has nothing of interest to say to me--and in my view he is envious and childish, and his opinions are dead and hollow. I don't need anyone shoving their viewpoints down my throat, which Michael Spencer-Ford seems to think is a great idea. """""""""""""

Boy did you miss the boat Max. A complete misreading of what has been discussed regarding that....

It would be interesting though, to confirm if KeyShot 5 is "actually rendering the NURBS data" or just "doing their own meshing of the model upon import"..... BY FAR, the first one would be a superior result. If it was the second method, then Meshing in MoI would be preferred IMO.......

Ok guys this thread is getting a bit out of control, I'm going to lock it for further replies.

Please remember that it's very easy on a forum like this where you are not able to see facial expressions or other communication cues that it's particularly easy to misinterpret things.

- Michael