The Pantheon, Rome (WIP)

jopsa2 · 30 Jun 2009, 17:43

Hi everyone! I've been lurking for ages now, and love the stuff you guys make, it has inspired me and made me evolve a million fold in skup and vray.

Now I've put myself into a pretty ambitious project, and it's becoming obvious I'm going to need some help and critique.

I've started replicating the interior of the Pantheon, from pictures I took last year, and from the infinite source material the Internet provides.

I'm quite happy with the modelling for the moment, but realise I haven't yet reached the difficult bits (not looking forward to the Corinthian columns!).

This render below worries me a little, I was testing the textures and I'm not too happy with the result... The sun is extremely bright because of the low shutter speed. The only light source in the Pantheon is the oculus at the top, but I would like it to disperse more around the space if possible.
Also, I don't understand why I have a rectangle of light at the top right hand corner, somehow light seems to be seeping in.

I am obviously in very early stages, but any help would be greatly appreciated. I wanted this to be my "Eye Candy," this building fascinates me!

Daniel · 30 Jun 2009, 19:48

Wow, this is quite an undertaking. I've thought of modeling it myself. Look forward to seeing this as it progresses.

smokinbakin · 30 Jun 2009, 21:00

Good start, the second render looks very real!

jopsa2 · 1 Jul 2009, 08:26

After posting yesterday I decided to concentrate on the modelling rather than textures and materials, so I'm going to stick with clays for the moment.

Progress is really slow, I'll keep you guys posted!

Gaieus · 1 Jul 2009, 14:11

@jopsa2 said:

I'll keep you guys posted!

Please, do. I'm also fascinated by this building but your model is definitely fascinating itself, too.

I'm not a Vray expert but I'm sure there's a way to soften those lights/shadows cast through the oculus. Also, how about placing some "artificial" lights to make the lighting more interesting/complex?

artysmedia · 1 Jul 2009, 17:33

There are a lot of polys! How much?
This model is a master-piece of work!

jopsa2 · 1 Jul 2009, 17:58

Thanks for the compliments guys!
Unfortunately I'm absolutely OCD about detail so it's going really slowly. Also trying to keep it as clean as possible, so when it's more advanced I won't go crazy.

artysmedia, I'm making it as componentized as I can, so I can afford giving it some detail without killing my processor. Here are some numbers:

181 component instances (for 13 component definitions)
Edges 838305
Faces 333109

(por cierto ya tienes otro español en el foro!)

this is all I've done for today, not much, it's harder than I thought.

artysmedia · 1 Jul 2009, 18:03

@jopsa2 said:

Edges 838305

Y crees que te queda mucho? Muchos edges me parecen ya a mí...

@jopsa2 said:

(por cierto ya tienes otro español en el foro!)

Hello, españolito! I'm from San Sebastián, and you?

jopsa2 · 1 Jul 2009, 18:26

@artysmedia said:

Y crees que te queda mucho? Muchos edges me parecen ya a mí...

Tu crees? De momento no se queja el ordenador, son solo 13 megs.
I think I'm around half done, considering I only wanted to do the interior (plus texturing and rendering).
13Mb doesn't seem that bad, I've done worse

Soy de Madrid por cierto!

artysmedia · 1 Jul 2009, 20:11

@jopsa2 said:

I think I'm around half done, considering I only wanted to do the interior (plus texturing and rendering).

Ahhh!

I do not pay attention to how much memory occupies my files

When my model arrives at 1.4 million edges is when I begin to be nervous. It's at this time when i start to put the last details.

@jopsa2 said:

Soy de Madrid por cierto!

Pues tienes ahí un buen cacerolo para hacer el cocidito madrileño!

jopsa2 · 4 Jul 2009, 23:15

The going is slow, especially since I spent yesterday outside in the sun. Still, I consider I've finished the middle segment and should start with the bottom (ie. the crazy Corinthian columns)
I like how it's starting to look like a monumental space, but still don't know why light is seeping in. I'll have to work around that.

thanks everyone for your comments and critiques!

andeciuala · 5 Jul 2009, 06:40

thats very good job!!! thanks for sharing the proccesses.

massimo · 5 Jul 2009, 10:26

Nice job indeed! For this kind of work this plugin for photoshop is a must.
http://amicoperry.altervista.org/luce/index.html
It's a volumetric light generator that works on images.
Here is a quick try i made with your last image.

jopsa2 · 5 Jul 2009, 10:52

@massimo said:

Here is a quick try i made with your last image.

That looks awesome! thanks massimo, I was wondering how to create the "God-ray," and that's perfect

pichuneke · 5 Jul 2009, 15:24

¡Que me dices! Otro español y con uno de los proyectos que me gustaría hacer si tuviera vidas suficientes

Well, let's start to speak in english. jopsa2, I have a neverending model of the roman theatre of Cartago Nova that you can see here:

http://forums.sketchucation.com/viewtopic.php?f=81&t=8057

I really like your textures. A lot...

And the level of detail that you are reaching, is the level of detail I would like to reach one day with my theatre. I can't model it now, I have not time.

Are you considering to put inside the "squares" of the ceiling (I don't know the english name, the spanish one is "casetón") the lost ornaments of bronze?

Puma · 5 Jul 2009, 20:59

Looks really nice, I hope you get the lighting well at the rendering part. A month ago I was on a schooltrip to Rome and there was this American man at the entrance asking someone who worked at the Pantheon: "Where's the pantheon?" while he was standing inside the Pantheon for God's sake. We laughed to death...

How do you make those highly detailed models? I got a pretty good, recent PC but when I'm modeling big and detailed things, SketchUp is really slow..

jopsa2 · 6 Jul 2009, 07:31

@pichuneke said:

I really like your textures. A lot...

jaja hola pichuneke! I'm not that happy with the textures myself, it's something that really needs work IMO. Still, I'm happy to share my source, http://www.cgtextures.com, there's plenty of marble under the "Stone" subsection. Not tileable sadly, which is the root of my unhappiness right now.

Your model looks very impressive! I'm curious about your corinthian columns, they look pretty good, any tips? I'm currently modelling them in my model and it's killing me.

In my model I've decided to go for the most contemporary look, since it's what all my source images are of, and because going for the original Roman construction would mean re-doing everything from the dome down

@puma said:

How do you make those highly detailed models? I got a pretty good, recent PC but when I'm modeling big and detailed things, SketchUp is really slow..

From my experience, Sketchup can work with pretty big models even with slow computers, it's just a matter of keeping the model clean and organised. Components are the key, anything that's repeated more than once, I make a component, and then I can give it as much detail as is needed. Also when you reach the point where the computer starts misbehaving, stick whatever you don't need in a different layer and switch it off!

jopsa2 · 6 Jul 2009, 07:40

Also, a quick post before I leave for my first day of work experience (nerves!!!).
I'm not 100% sure about these, but they'll have to do for the moment. I believe my problem is that I don't fully understand the composition of the capital. There seem to be several rows of leaves, but I don't know how to give that feeling of depth the real ones give

pichuneke · 6 Jul 2009, 08:11

You have a very advanced chorintian capital.

The only thing you must do is what I did with mine: Make some holes The problem is that my model is very heavy.

Alternatively you can use a texture, or better: with the photo of the real capital, you must render the 3D capital with a Bump Mapping using that texture (the black holes are deeper), only Bump Mapping. For the texture of the 3D use a tileable white Marble (Carrara kind). You'll save A LOT of polygons. I don't know which software you use to render. I use Kerkythea (although is discontinued now), but I pretend to move to Luxrender in a future, through blender if they don't release a plugin for sketchup.

I make tileable marbles very fast with Gimp. I open the texture, then (SORRY for the english speakers, I have the spanish version) Filtros -> Mapas -> Crear sin Costuras. Very good results for rocks.

My capital took me a month to model, but with your squared capital you can make easily a cilindrical one, put the leaves into the right places.

And you can find some optimized columns in these models:

Error 404 (Not Found)!!1

(sketchup.google.com)

Error 404 (Not Found)!!1

(sketchup.google.com)

jopsa2 · 25 Oct 2009, 14:31

just a quick bump for this thread, because I promise I'm still working on it! Admittedly, I'm taking my time- I have loads of things going on right now- but it's coming along.

Here are the latest renders: