Display of our product : plastic and metal looking dull

[bioman666]

Hello everyone !

I'm having troubles getting a realistic render of the product we make. We're trying to get a photo like image since we can't afford actual photos in a studio.

Here is the best I can achieve so far : https://www.dropbox.com/s/ixom3k91wmrmy ... -iso-5.jpg

As you can see there are mostly plain materials, so I tried to work the plastic and metal bump... Here are my settings :

- for the plastic that the pipes are made of : I used the procedural bump provided by Galinette in his "scratched metal" material (scratchcoords 0.5 & 28, eval 0.001), color 0.51 0.51 0.52 brightness 0.69, IOR 1.7, exponent 10000
- for the metal of the octagonal fittings : I used the scratched metal by Galinette (eval 0.003), exponent 10800, IOR 1.80
- the plastic that remain are 2 materials sharing the same base : phong with fbm bump.

I'll upload the scene soon so you can toy with it. Can you guys tell me why it still look so dull and fake ?

[pixie]

You should pay atention to the lighting setup. It seems that your studio setup has an homogeneous light which gives it that dull aspect. Here's a simply setup from Cotty that may help you get what you look for:



Taken from the 'simple rendering thread'

[ENSLAVER]

All materials (nearly all) are slightly reflective and you should use phong with low exponent. The lighting is quite flat which is ok for product renders if you use a film response with more contrast or add contrast in post.

If you search around there are lots of studio setups in google images. You can even copy proper photography studio setups. HDR Images are also useful for this purpose. There are some pre-made studio HDRIs around the web or you can find one that is of the interior of a building. They will give slightly more interesting light variations.

Some studio setups:
http://www.3dm3.com/forum/attachments/f ... second.jpg
http://www.evermotion.org/vbulletin/sho ... hp?t=50407

Some examples of studio environments (google for the HDR versions):
http://blender3d.org.ua/forum/rendering ... dio010.jpg
http://www.mrbluesummers.com/wp-content ... brella.jpg
http://www.doschdesign.com/images2/Red-DH-StuAtm-1.jpg

[Hannes]

If I could help, I posted a recent simple studio scene here

My setup

[CTZn]

- the plastic that remain are 2 materials sharing the same base : phong with fbm bump.

Also try to minimise the fbm height and frequency. While values too high will still render consistently over flat surfaces, they can suck the lighting down a great deal.

Follow the advices on the environment before checking the materials.

[cotty]

Do you have a photo from the real material/object?

[bioman666]

(I don't know why but my last message got lost)

Thanks all for your insights ! Indeed lightning setup DOES matter. I overlooked this so far, and now I've made a studio of my own : much better results ! Env. map were not a success to me, but I'm not that skilled with it.

Here are my renders so far, I'll keep you informed soon as the commercial kickoff is due Jan 7th.

Thanks again !

Hugo.

[Headroom]

For shots/renders like this the lighting setup is essential and quite different results can be achieved with different lighting.
The question is what are you trying to achieve. Are looking for a neutral look for a catalog image a more dramatic look perhaps using depth of field to focus on particular features ?
Or yet another setup might be required if you want to bring out particular surface texturing details.
The broad general lighting I've seen so far in this thread is rather aimed at a general catalog image.

[bioman666]

Yes, I'm actually looking for a general catalog image. I'll try other lightning setups when I'll be fine with my materials.

[cotty]

You can get some ideas about studio light setups with google image search...