New Version Announcement Dear Friends, The latest version of Fox Renderfarm Desktop Client, version 5.0.6.5 is released! Let’s check out what's new in it! 1. Allocate GPUs (cards) 2. Batch adjust jobs’ priorities 3. Download speed, packet loss, network latency were added in Line Speed Test 4. The number of concurrent Upload or Download files is adjustable 5. Predict the upload and download time 6. Resubmit Timeout frames 7. Rights Management for Sub-account 8. Render Parameter Setting for Houdini Windows versionUPGRADE Linux versionUPGRADE Exclusive Interview Creating the Sophisticated Chevrolet Corvette 1960 in 3ds Max Hum 3D ‘Car Render Challenge’ is one of the fantastic render challenges. As the sponsor, Fox Renderfarm is so glad to have an interview with the first prize winner Mr. Ehsan Darvishi. Read more → Hum 3D ‘Car Render Challenge’ is one of the fantastic render challenges. As the sponsor, Fox Renderfarm is so glad to have an interview with the first prize winner Mr. Ehsan Darvishi.Read more → Most-Viewed Stories TOP 116-year-old 3D Artist's 6-year Exploration in Blender TOP 2Disney Studio CG Supervisor Revealed the Production Secrets of Frozen 2 TOP 3Creation Process of Gorgeous Gladiator-style Centaur TOP 4Interview with SIGGRAPH 2021 Conference Chair, Pol Jeremias-Vila

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In this case, we show the use of 3ds Max to create 2D animated movie-style scenes and will focus on explaining the -style picture performance. From his animation works, we can feel a strong personal style, exquisite light, and shadow applications, strong light and dark contrast and gorgeous colors are the biggest features of his works, these features make his works look more real. Reference material from Makoto Shinkai’s animated film "Koto no ha no niwa". Some pictures material comes from the 2D animated film "", and some screenshots are found for reference. The whole idea: 1. Composition layout and lighting test 2. Material adjustment and rendering settings 3. Use of channels 4. Color comparison and synthesis Composition layout and lighting test It is very important to make scene lights in this style, often in small details, such as the bright and dark junction of very bright objects, reflections in small details, the color gradient of objects under the influence of light, and the objects interspersing and blocking, the resulting changes in light are all things we need to pay attention to. Every time I watch an animation, I am always moved by these nuances. The models used in this tutorial are very simple. When doing interior scenes, it is often to build a simple BOX first and modify the approximate shape to test the lights to see if they meet the expectations. But when making, it is better to have an imaginary picture first, so that you can judge whether you have achieved the desired effect when you are done, but you must know what kind of effect you want before you do it. This is a scene from the animated movie "Koto no ha no niwa", which is real in Shinjuku Gyoen Park, Japan. What I want to do now is to make the 2D animation feel with 3D. First, use a simple model to determine the main pavilion. And the location of the surrounding trees, place the camera, as the picture shows: Then we can see through the original animation that the light is shining from the bottom left corner. Here, a standard target parallel light is used as the main light source. The angle of light and the attenuation range of the illuminated area are adjusted. The shadow length and direction of the trees are observed and adjusted to a suitable position. Adjust the UVW in the shadow parameters to blur the tree projection to make it unreal. Open the environment and effects panel, add a VRaySky map to the environment map, drag it to the material panel by example, check the first column, pick the target parallel light in the scene, and set the map light intensity to 0.03. You will get a sky environment that matches the scene lighting, making the rendering more realistic. A high light and dark contrast picture is needed here, so no ambient light is used in this scene. In addition, a VRayLight was created in the direction of the light to simulate a small range of strong sunlight. It can produce more intense light and shade. The parameter settings are the shape of the light is spherical, the intensity is 200, the color is warm, and the light is not visible. Open GI and test the lighting effect, as follows: After the lights are almost well, we start to refine the scene, and finally, it looks like this: In order to simulate the feeling of the rainy season in the original animation, I used the 3ds Max particle system to simulate some raindrops, created a standard particle flow source, and added a random rotation to make the raindrops have some random changes. I also used the MultiScatter plugin to plant some grass. Material adjustment and rendering settings In terms of materials, I will focus on the material of the pavilion and the surface of the water. The material of the pavilion must be rendered wet and wet. Because the scene is rainy, I chose mirror high reflection on the material. I did not check Fresnel. The top will be completely reflected in the surrounding trees, plus the projection of the tree occlusion to get a similar effect. The water surface did not make it reflect the sky and clouds like the original painting, but chose a green that matches the scene, as shown in the following figure: The material of water is as follows: Next, we can adjust the rendering parameters. Anti-aliasing uses Catmull-Rom with a certain sharpening effect, which can make the details of the trees richer. Turn on the reflection environment. A VRayHDRI map is added to the reflection environment. The exposure selection is the last one. The term Reinhard mixed exposure is similar to the combination of exponential exposure and linear exposure. Set the blend value to 0.7. VRayHDRI is displayed as a sphere with an intensity of 4. Using the VRayHDRI map can increase the reflection details of some scenes. Turn on the GI and use the Irradiance Map for the first bounce. The first bounce is the first global light calculation for the direct light. The second bounce uses the Light Cache. Actual calculation, turn on display calculation phase. As the picture shows: Open the rollout of the light cache, set the light subdivision to 1500, and check the options in the figure. The rendering effect is as follows:

Blender vs Maya vs Cinema 4D, which one is the best 3D software for animation? As the leading in the CG industry, Fox Renderfarm will answer this question in a personal opinions. As we know, Blender, Maya and Cinema 4D, all are 3D production software, and they can all make 3D animation. The concept of 3D animation is actually very wide, and the movement of 3D objects can be called 3D animation. Therefore, this software should be distinguished according to their areas of expertise, and cannot be generalized. Maya Maya can also be said to be a resource integration platform, which is mainly used in the production of film and television animation and the integration of related resources. Maya's 3D animation, modeling, simulation, and rendering modules provide a powerful integrated toolset. Can be used for animation, environment, motion graphics, virtual reality, and character creation. We can see the figure of Maya in the major movie screens. Cinema 4D C4D, full name Cinema 4D. One of the major features of C4D is the integrated package. Using these packages can quickly produce good quality effects and animations. Relatively speaking, novices are relatively easy to get started with C4D. C4D can be seamlessly connected with AE(After Effects), and C4D scenes can be directly imported into AE, so C4D is still very popular in the production of short films and film packaging. Blender Blender is a free and open-source, cross-platform, all-round 3D animation production software, providing a series of animated short film production solutions from modeling, animation, materials, rendering, to audio processing, video editing and so on. Blender has a variety of user interfaces that are easy to use in different tasks, with built-in advanced video solutions such as green screen keying, camera backtracking, mask processing, and post node synthesis. There are also built-in cartoon strokes (FreeStyle) and GPU-based Cycles renderer. Python is a built-in script that supports multiple third-party renderers. It is favored by the majority of graphics enthusiasts in short videos and game production. All in all, the three software cannot be compared without any restrictions. Each of them has its strengths. It depends on which area you want to develop and then choose the best software tool from them.

This is a rainy scene performance of building exterior, from 3D artist Han Shilin. The software used is SketchUp, 3ds Max, V-Ray for 3ds Max, Photoshop, and Substance Painter, etc. How to be "realistic"? "Realism" doesn't just give each material a very accurate parameter that can be applied to any environment, so that it can render a very realistic effect. It also refers to realistic performance = according to your own visual experience, controlling parameters to make the map in line with expectations. The difference between the two understandings is that the former has no control and expectation of the final result, and is based on the idea that "parameters are correct.". Reference The reference picture is very important, this is an expectation of the final effect, such as light and shadow, atmosphere, composition. And it is recommended to combine all the reference pictures into one plate. In order to show a sense of tranquility and quietness, a darker, rainy weather was set. The architectural details of this scene are not many, the atmosphere of light and the treatment of the ground part are very important. Modeling Grasshopper makes the appearance, imports SketchUp to make the main body of the building, and then imports into 3ds Max, and rendered with V-Ray. The process is very simple. The important thing is to do a good job of layering, otherwise, it will become more troublesome when importing into 3ds Max. As for the composition, a very low angle was used, as much as possible to expose the ground material and the wider sky. Texture The main body of the building is far away from the lens, so only ordinary materials are needed, and the texture of the materials can be maintained. Taking the skin material as an example, the rest of the building materials are very basic. Sidewalk and road eaves: indoor concrete texture package, because there will be a lot of dirt in the outdoor scene, so the concrete texture and the dirt texture are mixed together. The area in the close shot is relatively small, so the repeatability of the material is serious. Since it is a rainy scene, the roughness value is also very low. PS. The main building can be modeled in SketchUp and then imported into 3ds Max. The environment and settings of the scene are best created with 3ds Max because the SketchUp model will have some problems when imported into 3ds Max, such as the UV will be messed up. Performance details (Substance Painter draws some textures) From the perspective of the camera, the pavement greatly affects the picture, so its material is very important. You need to import this pavement into Substance to draw textures. Import the mesh file that needs to draw textures into Substance Painter. Remember to turn off the channels other than the natural color when drawing the natural color map. After drawing the natural color map, create a new layer and draw the bump. Then you can add some standing water to both sides of the road. There are many ways to draw. One of the simpler methods is to add a material to adjust a very flat height and then apply it several times with a dirt brush to get a better random effect. Because what to do is a rainy scene, there is no wet feeling. So adjust the level of the roughness layer. One thing to note is that if you want to get the same effect in 3ds Max as in Substance Painter when importing the texture, adjust the blur to 0.2. For sharper effects, lower it. In addition, the imported map gamma needs to pay attention to, the map color of the natural color is selected automatically, and the rest are all 1.0. Then it is relatively simple work and found some model-rich scenes from Evermotion's model library. Such as the middle and lower left cars. After that, I used V-Ray rendering in 3ds Max, and finally adjusted it in Photoshop.

Fox Renderfarm Unveils a New Look Hello, dear friends! We are happy and proud to announce the launch of the new Fox Renderfarm logo as part of the ongoing evolution of our brand. Fox Renderfarm has grown and evolved over the years with the endeavor of our devoted teams and the love and support from every one of you. At the beginning of 2020, we have altered our logo that reflects who we are and symbolizes our brand culture and the bright future ahead. Starting today, you will see the new look everywhere. Meanwhile, our business partners are welcomed to use the new logo. The new logo and usage guidelines can be downloaded . Finally, Fox Renderfarm is so thankful for your trust and love, our friends. And we look forward to a better future together with you! Fox Renderfarm Highlights 2019 At the beginning of 2020, let’s look back at our journey in 2019Read more→ Interview withPol Jeremias-Vila SIGGRAPH 2021 Conference Chair, A Man of Many ResponsibilitiesRead more→

On January 6th, 2020, was invited to participate in The 2019 Licensing International Asian Licensing Awards ceremony, organized by the Licensing Industry Merchandisers’s Association(LIMA) in Hong Kong. Relying on the performance and innovation of authorized cooperation projects such as "Boonie Bears", "Boonie Bears: Blast into the Past" and "Boonie Bears: Boonie Cubs", Fantawild Animation obtained the "Entertainment Property of the Year – ANIMATED". Regarding the award, Shang Linlin, the Executive President of Fantawild and General Manager of Fantawild Animation said: "Thank you for the recognition of the Licensing Industry Merchandisers’s Association. At the same time, I also want to thank the many partners who have worked with us for their trust in "Boonie Bears" and Fantawild Animation. In the future, Fantawild Animation will continue to innovate and breakthrough, and work with more high-quality partners to promote the innovation and development of the authorized industry, and create more high-quality "Evergreen Carnival IP" brands for consumers in China and the world, and bring a world-class entertainment experience. " In terms of movie IP authorization, Fantawild Animation is an enterprise that was started earlier in mainland China. Starting from the second big movie of 2015, “Boonie Bears：Mystical Winter”, Fantawild Animation has successively cooperated with various well-known brands such as INFINITI, Mengniu, China Resources Sanjiu, QQ and other types of movies to design various types of cooperation. A series of market initiatives, such as movie exclusive gallery, movie clever implantation, joint marketing during CNY, and advance planning and production of main props, allow the products in the movie to enter the major sales channels simultaneously when the movie is released. In the coming Chinese New Year, the seventh major movie "Boonie Bears: The Wild Life" will meet with mainland Chinese audiences. The audience can not only see the Logger Vick that become handsome and strong, but also appreciate the magic and various natural landscapes that people have transformed into various animals. https://licensinginternational.org/news/winners-of-2019-licensing-international-asian-awards/

On January 6th, 2020, Visual effects facility Spin VFX released version 2.0 of Nuke Gizmos, a popular open-source collection of Foundry compositing software. Former Spin VFX lead compositor Erwan Leroy ’s video overview of Nuke Gizmos, the studio ’s open-source collection of compositing tools. Version 2.0, released late last month, updates the spill correction tool. Here is a video about version 2.0 of Nuke Gizmos, These tools are all available in studio production and cover a range of common tasks including camera projection, relighting, light wrapping, color matching and spill correction. A versatile collection of Nuke tools for production of hit TV series Spin VFX is known for its work on shows like The Expanse, Stranger Things, and Game of Thrones and its first made its Nuke Gizmos open-sourced in late 2018. The toolset comprises 13 individual tools and gizmos designed to extend or replace Nuke's native functionality. Highlights include ReProject_3D, which does camera projection based on render point position pass; and Relight_Simple, a relighting node that requires only a normal map to begin. Light wrap node Lightwrap_Exponential provides "more physical response" than Nuke's default settings. When expanding the mask, Erode_Fine provides better control than Nuke's Erode filter. The collection also includes tools for matching black and white points between images, suppressing specific RGB or CMYK colors, or adding synthetic camera grain, glow, or color aberration to the composition. Version 2.0 of Nuke Gizmos also has an updated version of Spill Correct, which can be used to eliminate color overflow artifacts when locking blue-screen or green-screen footage. The files can be downloaded on GitHub here: – Releases

Hello there! My name is Huangsong Zhang, I really like things with Chinese style. This creation refers to many pictures and restores an old house that has gone through vicissitudes. The software used is Maya, PS, Nuke. Modeling I have always used 3ds Max software. Later, because I needed to switch to Maya for my work, I also tried to make creative works while learning, so the models in this work were completed with Maya software. It is not difficult to create a model, no special modeling skills are used, as long as the overall wiring is reasonable. The created model is placed, but the screen feels a bit empty. So a lot of small things were added beside it, such as screwdrivers, cigarettes, sticks, stones, etc. to enrich the picture. UV UV is made with the UVLayout plugin. UVLayout is really easy to use in making UVs. Here, as long as UV production is focused on the classification of materials, similar materials are classified under the same UV, and 4 sets of UVs are divided. Texture The drawing of the texture is all done in PS. First, the basic texture is roughly drawn according to the output UV. Then slowly add details on the basis, and add some feeling of wear and age, and add some effects of falling gray. An AO layer was superimposed on the material. The last is the processing of highlights and bump mapping. Material adjustment The hot water bottle placed in the scene is a kind of plastic with a light transmission effect, and the material is VRayFastSSS2. The wood texture material has been processed by PS before each texture, so it is relatively simple. The intrinsic color map links the diffuse color channel and the highlight map link reflection color channel. Using the layered texture material node of the Maya and the highlight map, the gloss map is simply created and link to reflection glossiness channel, bump map to Bump mapping channel. Other materials are also adjusted similar to the above, and so on. Lighting In this scene, I want to create an atmosphere of dusk. Therefore, a spotlight is used as the main light source, and then a surface light source is used to supplement the light to avoid dead corners and darkness. Or use the Color channel of the spotlight and the black and white map of the tree branch to simulate the effect of sunlight coming in from the window through the shade of the tree. Then enter the color gain under the color balance of the texture channel and adjust it to warm yellow to look closer to dusk. Light effects. Finally, I added some small fill lights, in order to add some texture, make the details richer, and the dark parts more brilliant. Final render and synthesis For the convenience of adjusting the post-production, layered rendering is used. There are a total of 15 layers including diffuse reflection layer, GI layer, lighting layer, highlight layer, reflection layer, normal layer, AO layer, etc.. This project uses PS composition. And for compositing, layered rendering was performed in the early stage. Now you can grade all individual layers, which can enhance GI, enhance reflection and highlight effects. PS layer overlay method I basically use color filter, in Nuke is the plus overlay method under the merge node. The left image is directly rendered, and the right image is the effect of layer synthesis, is it a big difference? Thank you for reading.

Today, we will share a production process of a 3D game scene. This project uses the standard PBR process, and uses 3ds Max to complete the basic modeling, determines the proportion of objects. Finish sculpting in ZBrush for high poly, topology in Maya, baking in Marmoset Toolbag 3, finish making PBR materials in Substance Painter, and finally use Marmoset Toolbag 3 for rendering. The production is divided into three parts: 1. Modeling 2. Material production 3. Rendering Modeling Before production, determine what materials, objects, and overall proportions are in the scene, and then determine the production order according to the proportions. Most of the scene in this scene is walls and stones and wooden furniture, so they are the focus of the production. Quickly set up their approximate proportions in 3ds Max. Complete the medium face number model After establishing the proportion of large objects, continue to build the remaining objects in the scene. And further enrich the details of the model. There are a large number of repeated objects, and several different shapes can be made. Taking the above book as an example, many different types have been produced, which can reduce visual repetitions very well. There are two pieces of cloth in the scene. Here we take the pillow as an example, This production uses the cloth calculation that comes with 3ds Max. The specific process is as follows, Create blocking objects: Create a pillow base model (the higher the number of segments, the better the simulation effect), Squash and find the cloth in the modifier, Simulation The end result is a simple pillow model. (The shape of the wrinkles of the fabric should be well organized, and the top is a simple demonstration. Similarly, curtains may have better effects). Finally in 3ds Max medium face model, Next, import the model into ZBrush for sculpting. High Poly sculpture Here is an example of a house's walls and stones: The medium face model was imported into ZBrush because of the irregular shape of the stone. You can use Dynamesh (dynamic mesh) in geometry editing to edit the model. Brushes 1, 2, and 3 are used for large-scale carving of stones. Brush No. 4 adjusts shape to prevent penetration. Finally, brushes 5 and 6 are used to flatten some edges and corners to make the structure hard. Thus reflecting the texture of the stone. The big ideas on the wall are the same. Finally, use the surface noise, adjust the curve, and the noise ratio to simulate the graininess of the wall and stone surface. Finally, add some details such as cracks and bumps to enrich the picture. Use the brush No. 6 mentioned above to suppress it again for better results. Take the wooden table as an example below, first determine the material to be carved, and then look for the corresponding reference picture. Because the wood in the scene is too old, you need to find some pictures of old wood when looking for reference pictures, for example, The sculpting process needs to be combined with actual life, so as to achieve a more realistic effect. In this scene, the wooden table is a little bit decayed, so the edge of the table will not be made into a hard, right-angled structure, so when carving, you can use the brush to make the right-angled portion of the edge more rounded, so reflect the texture you want to express. With appropriate deformation, it can increase the visual impact more vividly (adjust the place with the Move brush a little). The wood in the scene needs to have an old feeling, so cracks are a good way to show that the objects are worn out. At this time, you need to use the reference picture. For example, a crack on a window plate can be carved according to the crack in the reference figure. This can better and more realistically and quickly reflect the material. The final High Poly display, Low polygon model and baking The final low-poly model was reduced using ZBrush, and then imported into Maya for final low-poly model production. This can get Low Poly models faster, but the wiring will be relatively less neat. Note that it is important to distinguish between the smooth group and split UV where the angle is close to 90 degrees. The final baking uses Marmoset Toolbag 3. 2. Material After baking all the normals and IDs, import Substance Painter to make the material. It is worth noting that the normals baked in Marmoset Toolbag 3 and Maya use Opengl mode in Substance Painter, and the normals baked in 3ds Max use DirectX mode. After successfully importing, bake the rest of the textures in the texture set-baking model textures. Wall material basic process First of all, we make the natural color of the material, and the natural color layer can add filters appropriately to increase the details. Add a dark color and use the Dirt generator. Partially unsatisfactory add a drawing layer to fix it. Add bright colors and color variations to create the approximate effect of wall decay. Here, it is mainly modified by hand-drawn layers. Continue adding color changes and roughness changes. Try to be as close to real effects as possible. Finally, you can add an adjustment layer to increase the brightness. The material made in Substance Painter should be imported into Marmoset Toolbag 3 and the brightness will be a bit lower than that seen in Substance Painter. The wall material production is complete. And because the furniture in the scene should reflect the old feeling, the overall color is grayish and dark. The damage and abrasion are to reflect the original color of the wood, so the color saturation will be higher than the surface color. 3. Rendering Finally, before importing into Marmoset Toolbag 3, you need to set up the lighting, the main light establishes the main light, and the auxiliary light supplements the light source to maintain the brightness of the picture. And to turn on high DPI and oversampling, turn on GI global illumination and AO environment occlusion. I hope this sharing will help you. Source: Thepoly