Sunday, February 14, 2010

Rendering problems in 3D ... and fantasy horses!


3D art doesn't always go as planned. I knew I'd have to hit problems sooner or later, for which I am clueless about the case. It's not about the models or the interface, or anything to do with art, photography etc. It's something I never saw before...

I can put a scene together and it looks great ... until I turn on the deep shadow map to get the shadows to render. Then -- and here's today's Great Mystery -- when the image renders I'm getting a dither pattern in in. What the heck is a dither pattern, you ask. It's the same as an "interference pattern," the sort of thing than can make your eyes, or your video camera, go "wonky" when you look at a pattern on something.

Check this out:

This was about halfway through the work -- and I uploaded it full size, so you can see the, uh, dither pattern which shows up only when you turn on the deep shadow map. Hmmm.

My mission, should I decide to accept it, is to figure out that the heck causes this.

To get a version of the scene, I too the whole thing apart and put it back together ... the leader shot in this post. But I can't get a render on the VERY complex shot that was supposed to be the main, or leader, shot today. It's an ancient temple in a glade, with a gorgeous young man. And you guessed: as soon as I turn on the deep shadow map, he looks like he's wearing herringbone pattern longjohns ... but without the shadows turned on, it's just a photomontage.

Back to the drawing board, guys. I'm going to call it for today, because I've been chasing this around for waaaay too long. Incidentally, if anyone's following this blog, and knows the answer to this -- I ain't proud! Share what you know, let's all learn.

Otherwise, I'll track down the answer somewhere, and will let you know when I know myself!

I'll take another crack at the ancient temple in wooded glade and gorgeous male tomorrow!

Jade, 15 February