Let me ask you something, when you slave away for hours in Blender, what are you trying to achieve?
To make cool stuff? Nope. Think bigger.
Give up?
Whether you realize it or not, the sole purpose of all 3d art is to make something look believable.
That’s it. There are no exceptions.
If your image doesn’t relate to the real world in some way, the audience will feel disconnected and become disinterested. It doesn’t matter if your rendering an architectural fly-through of a house or an orc warrior fighting his way out of a volcano, you are still taking something that exists in your mind and producing it as a picture and hoping the audience believes it.
You’re doomed, unless…
Let’s say you spend hours intricately modeling each and every nail of a door frame, you piece together textures to create flawless materials, and you spend a solid week on the lighting setup. Well guess what? If you hit render now your scene is still going to look fake. The reason for this is simple: You haven’t added camera imperfections.
It sounds like a joke, but it’s absolutely true. Photography is the single most important thing to understand when it comes to learning 3d, but for some reason most artists choose to ignore it.
When you take a real photo with a real camera, do you realize how many flaws are being built into the photo?
Just to name a few:
- Chromatic Abberation
- Vignetting
- Soft Glare
- Light rays
- Reflecting glare
- Bloom
- Lens Flare
- Glare burnout
- Ghost glare
- Depth of Field
- Motion Blur
- Lens Distortion
- Lens dust, scratches, sweat, fingerprints
- Film developing artifacts
- Color grading
Now guess how many of these flaws occur when producing a computer generated image?
NONE. ZERO. ZIP. NADA.
When you hit F12 you will produce a perfect still. Every. Single. Time.
For example, take a look at this image by the talented artist, Marek Denko:
Aside from the perfect lighting, flawless modeling and impressive materials. What else has he incorporated?
Effects. And lots of them.
- Depth of field
- Chromatic Abberation
- Lens scratches, dust & dirt
- Color Grading
- Bloom
- Reflecting glare
These are all things are done outside of the 3d viewport and added in post production. That means that after he slaved over every piece of detail in the scene, he flipped to the compositor and continued working. That is what pushed this scene over the edge.
Have you ever wondered how Pixar achieved that authentic film look in Wall-E?
This was actually the result of many months of work. Before they began working on the meat of the production, they focused entirely on trying to replicate the look of live footage in their 3d software. They even went as far as to consult the Director of Photography from No Country for Old Men, on tips for creating real camera and lighting setups.
“We rented some equipment and used the live-action DP [Marty Rosenberg] who eventually shot some of the live-action elements. He helped us do some lens tests. Our depth of field, our cameras never look as we expect them to.
“Life is nothing but imperfection and the computer likes perfection, so we spent probably 90% of our time putting in all of the imperfections, whether it’s in the design of something or just the unconscious stuff. How the camera lens works in [a real] housing is never perfect, and we tried to put those imperfections [into the virtual camera] so that everything looks like you’re in familiar [live-action] territory.”
-Andrew Stanton
(source: AWN)
The result was a very slick, very believable environment for Wall-E to explore.
Why using the compositor is crucial to your artistic success
The most common question people ask is, why would I want to incorporate camera flaws into my renders? After all camera flaws are exactly that, flaws. So wouldn’t an image that is clean from these flaws look better?
Nope. Let me explain why.
When you look at a white car sitting in the hot sun, your eyes expect to see a reflecting glare. When you look closely at your spoon during breakfast, your eyes expect the bowl of cereal in the background to be out of focus. And at night time when you look at a street lamp, your eyes expect to see rays of light.
I could go on, but I think you get the picture.
Our eyes have become so accustomed to seeing these imperfections that it looks odd when they aren’t there.
Now don’t get me wrong, lighting, materials, textures and lighting are all important and I’m not pretending they aren’t. But unless you learn to take camera effects seriously, you can kiss believability goodbye.
If you are interested in exploring this topic further, I have written an eBook called The Wow Factor, which you can purchase here: http://wowfactorbook.com
I don’t want to be quarrelsome here, but what about abstract art? =P
Anyways, great article as usual, and discusses a important aspect of cgi, getting dirty..
Im looking forward to the ebook. the sun lensflares you showed me earlier looked really good!
Nice article.
Artorp, abstract art is not something you are trying to sell as being believable. Andrew is talking about the creation of possible real world scenarios.
If you are talking about abstract art such as a statue which you end up modeling in 3D and then place in a scene, the same principles discussed in the article apply. The gist being the eradication of computer perfection in the creation of the work.
looking forward to the book as well. i love photorealism in cgi
The question I have as someone new to Blender and more experienced with After Effects – are there reasons to use the compositor in Blender over After Effects?
Eric, completely true, I just thought about line 4-5 in the article
anyways, sorry for foolishly dragging the focus off-topic, the article is great and I completely agree with the .
I’m too looking forward to your ebook Andrew!
Very nice article Andrew! Looking forward to your amazing eBook!
And while your eBook is still in the process, I might as well try a few things with my renders (even though I’m a total noob) with this article in my head. Thanks a lot and more power!
@Nate
By using Blender’s compositor you are eliminating the need for any file saving, and opening in another program. It’s all completely local, and extremely fast.
The other advantage is render layers. If you wanted to isolate something and you were using after effects, you would need to color it (red, green, blue etc) so that you can split it up and work on separate things. Blender’s compositor removes the need for that. Out of curiosity, what do you use After Effects for?
As I’m already in your mailing list(which was a very good decision by the way), do I have to “re-register” my interest?
Just to mention it: sorry for my bad english
@Andrew Price
I use After Effects for motion graphics. It’s definite strength is it’s faster workflow with Photoshop files, and other 2D graphics – but it’s only so-so when it comes to anything 3D.
It’d be cool to see more tutorials geared toward integrating with After Effects – but I can see the benefit of Blender effects if you can isolate parts.
Exactly!.
That’s why besides learning Blender I’m learning photography and video theory. If, like me, you’re trying to make animations more realistic you should consider learning topics such as exposure, aperture priority, shutter speed, DOF, color grading, camera movements and angles to get better 3D animations. As Andrew said the brain takes the information from what you observe and interprets it as it SHOULD have been. That’s why for example under different lighting conditions something that has a white color stays white after being processed by your brain. If you do not take that into consideration when you’re rendering the shots will look fake or less real.
Hi!
Really nice article. I’m digging into compositing and video post-processing with 2.5. Your ebook is really going to help me. Tanks and saludos from México
@ Andrew
I really appreciate your article. It tackles the topic that I try to focus on during all of my works. Regarding After Effects: Well – I personally use blender for everything that is real 3d, but when it comes to compositing – I rather use After Effects. Why? After Effects has some tools that are easier to use during compositing process. It is possible to hammer in the nail using a screwdriver, but isn’t it easier to use a hammer?
@ Nate
Integration of blender and After Effects is now very easy. Check out my website and creativecow.net for more info
Great article, but I have to disagree on the “There are no exceptions.” rule… Somewhat.
Like mentioned before, abstract art (fractals for instance) do not need to abide by this rule.
Then comes my second points: Imperfections do make believability. It can contribute to, but it isn’t always the most important aspect. Take BBB for example. Would that have looked better with grains or noise in it? DoF, perhaps. But chromatic abberation?
By the way, I did thoroughly enjoy this article and photography is definitely a field that needs more attention from CG artists, but yeah.
Andrew,
Whilst what you say is completely correct, even to the point of adding effects that would not exist in the real world unless they were added by the photographer/director e.g. additional lens flares added to the latest star trek movie, above an beyond what happens normally. The image will also depend on the “story” that is trying to convey, the look should match the “story”. What I have noticed in all good pictures (Photographes, computer generated, and films), is that the image needs to tell a “story”, and the composting should enhance that story and not distract from it. A perfectly composited image with all the “real world effects” but doesn’t have that “story” just comes across as “fake” to me.
The “story” however is a hard element to define, as it is what happens in the viewers head rather than what the artist plans. Hard to explain but you know it when you see it.
As I said I agree with what you have written, but there always that certain something that put that picture from “fake” to “wow”
Good article!
I guess.. in the real world, there are no really sharp edges unless they are really sharp (perfect sharp).. so that, there are some outlines.. right?
Shaping up to be a very inviting ebook!
I think you’re right about the use of camera imperfections; though another one to consider is lighting too… often when you’re creating things in 3D (at least in Max, don’t know how it works in Blender yet) the default light looks very sharp, and the shadows/lines are really crisp. That doesn’t happen often in the real world either.
wow o___o that’s alot of techniques. Makes me want to study them =p
“The other advantage is render layers. If you wanted to isolate something and you were using after effects, you would need to color it (red, green, blue etc) so that you can split it up and work on separate things.”
This is not accurate. Multilayer EXRs can contain object ID passes that allow AE and other compositors to use mattes to isolate objects or operators/filters/effects. RenderLayers may also just contain separate parts of the scene for access in AE and RenderLayers may also be split out into multiple image sequences for those AE compositors who don’t like the EXR workflow (like a couple of guys I do freelance work with). While I agree that Blender’s compositor is pretty cool and I do use it a lot, it offers few technical advantages to commercial compositors thanks to EXR. The compositor can also screw up renderfarm renders if just the “No Overwrite” and “Touch” (2.49) options are used.
god blender guru. you always catch my attention and teach me more about using blender for in the professional world to get professional results. Keep it up man! I will buy your book when it comes out, if you charge that is.
Awesome, I can’t wait to see your new book!
thanx for this articles Andrew – it was a nice read and i certainly learnt something
Hey man, this is an awesome post… thanks so much!
Another area, often overlooked. Good topic and interesting list of effects to further explore.
@David Johnson
You brought up a great point that is so overlooked when talking about any art form. I think in this day and age, we are slowly becoming a mutant race of “emulators”. I’m guilty of it myself. I do agree with what Andrew is saying, and to abstract anything, you first need to understand what you are abstracting but telling the story should be the first node in the chain. I use After Effects every day and I couldn’t get by without it at my job, that is why I am so intrigued by the built in compositor in blender. I read “Blender Compositing”, but felt it was written more by an engineer than an artist (no offense). From following a few tutorials by Andrew, I really think he’ll bring a sensibility to this topic and I’m really looking forward to breaking out of the blender intermediate stage with his book.
LOL. You said lighting twice there at the end…which is appropriate, because of it’s importance. I can’t wait for you new ebook. Like you say, layering different effects is very important. Even when it’s just a test render, I tend to do some color correcting and such.
I totally agree, and it will depend on what you want to achieve and the story you want to tell. Its also a personal preference, some like it darker, some like it lighter, some colourful… blurry… The story teller’s gift of exciting the audience.
Then for games is too a way for? maybe for “YO Frankie!”?
If you cannot see the exceptions, that does not mean
they do not exist! All you people see are orcs, cars, and big
breast girls, …grow up!
“All you people see are orcs, cars, and big
breast girls, …grow up!”
Says the guy calling himself Tarzan lol…
I’ll go a step further with this Andrew, I do a little bit of image manipulation using some 3d elements and blending them with photographic elements on a more abstract basis and it goes both ways; sometimes the best way to make a photo manipulation piece work is to process the piece to make it less believable overall.
In one case I was depicting a psychedelic trip using photos, 3d and painted elements and Photoshopped it to look like the photo elements were as fake as the rest of the elements.
When trying to produce a dreamlike appearance it can help a lot to know how to make the real stuff look like it isn’t!
Fantastic article man, could you recommend some sources on the various process techniques you mentioned?
-Rob
@Andrew
Good. I definitely agree with you and i’m looking forward for the ebook. That said, I’d like to stress that I love 3D CG for its absolute novelty in the field of artistic (yes, artistic) expression and that I think that it is something between picture and sculpting, never seen before.
Photorealism is good, as long as you’re aiming at “cheating the eye”, obtaining a shot with details not so easy to obtain with a real camera (as is usually done in still life advertising, architecture, etc.). But I really hope that 3D keeps being also different from this, with stunning shapes and fx non present in real life and sought for with awereness and good taste, Being compositing-wise is very useful anyway, ofc
Realmente creo que usted es un genio. Estas cosas a aprender más y más. Espero que algún día, nuestros resultados son buenos como el tuyo …. ja, ja, ja: D. Gracias de nuevo y suerte con tu libro …
subscribing with this site was one of the best decissions to take for me:)
thanks a mile for keeping us update and preparing al those tuts and information on image creation for us…
gonna subscribe to wowfactor since I’m much interested in getting renders that look somewhat believable!
Anyhow great contributions Mr. Price, i learned a huge ammount of stuff from blenderguru so far!
Much appreciation and best regards from Berlin!
I’m accord with you, the camera camera flaws are really important thing. And I think, Even if we have bad modelling, materials and lighthing, our render can looks real with camera flaws!
Great explanation! Like allways! I’m eager waiting your e-book!
Cheers! Happy Blending!
I think it isn’t always necessary to mimic camera imperfections for believability. Your eyes don’t have camera imperfections, but you believe things you see through them. The human eye has it’s own “imperfections” (if you want to call them that). The human eye has depth of field (focus), a form of motion blur, etc., but not all of the imperfections that a camera has.
Good stuff. Basic artistic technique like composition also carries an image a long way.
hey.
just a quick question.
how do you put different scenes together? I don’t know if there’s a way to do it directly in blender. And I tried with both Movie Maker and Pinnacle studio and they just made the quality a lot lower.
I’m new to Blender but from what you’re sayin in your article about the need for distortion and abberation I’m wondering if Luxrenderer might be worth checking out. It’s opensource software and works with just about everything on Windows, Mac and Linux. It uses totally different algorithms to Blender’s render engine and from what lttle I’ve seen of it it creates some amazing looking stuff. I’ve not gone into Blender’s compositor as yet but I totally agree from some experience with After Effects, that using things like DOF, lens flares, grain and scratches etc. can completely sell your animation.
“Let me ask you something, when you slave away for hours in Blender, what are you trying to achieve?
To make cool shit? Nope. Think bigger.
Give up?
Whether you realize it or not, the sole purpose of all 3d art is to make something look believable.
That’s it. There are no exceptions.”
Sorry, I have to disagree that that is the sole purpose.
So far this sounds like an ad
“If you are interested in exploring this topic further, I am writing an eBook called The Wow Factor. It’s not available yet, but you can register your interest here: http://wowfactorbook.com”
WOW, what do you know, it is an ad!
Stop insulting people, art, and creative freedom
You’re obviously right handed, and a left brained person.
PS: the car on the cover of your book is very fake looking, you might try doing something a bit more realistic since you seem so obsessed with it.
@Wasa
Stop being a jerk.
Quote Wasa: “You’re obviously right handed, and a left brained person.”
Stop being a moron.
Andrew wrote:
> If your image doesn’t relate to the real world in some way,
> the audience will feel disconnected and become
> disinterested.
Actually, you mean ‘uninterested’. Disinterested means neutral. Wouldn’t mention it if you hadn’t gone and italicised the word to emphasise it.
As for the commenters who read the word ‘believe’ and see only the narrowest sense of the word, replace that term with ‘buy into’ or ‘accept’.
If you’re watching Star Trek no-one’s expecting you to literally believe that the Enterprise is real. You’re expected to go into partial disassociation and in one part of your mind, ‘believe’ the story.
If you’re looking at abstract art, no-one’s expecting you to literally believe the scene is real. But the artist is hoping that the execution of the scene won’t distract you so much that you fail to buy into what they’re expressing.
Believe that.