@majid !!!
Nice to see you here. Thanks for the compliment!

Steampunk Station Scene 18

Scene 18 B

Reference: Thea Render and SketchUp Screenshot

Diffusion:

Scene 18 A

Reference: Thea Render and SketchUp Screenshot

Diffusion:

@rich o brien said:

@unknownuser said:

But, even with something as simple as a round, circle port window, Diffusion translates the geometry into something seen in a Salvador Dalì painting.

A very accurate description of the diffusion model currently. A bad dream type of detail in my opinion.

I think its good to concept but not suitable to be used as final output. It can only get better to the detriment of those that spent years perfecting their skills.

@Rich, I agree!

I spent three days looking at over 1000s of variations, selected a hundred+ of those I thought were reasonable as the others were just NUTS! Then, from those, my family helped in a day selecting their favorites which I weeded down to those the family mutually agreed on and a few of my own favs.

But, even though this is not my best Thea Rendering effort, which wasn't the point of this exercise, preparing the materials alone for render took three days with edits and test with two days Just to make 10 quick renders? Part of me is screaming, "not fair" while the other part is crying that the world don't care one way or the other and this is the future as this tech improves. For myself, I see this as the DJ that took bands out of bars, concerts, weddings and parties by owners that could have a night of music at 1/8th the price or more!

However, before I ranted too much in public on the issue, I knew as well I needed to immerse myself in some practical tests to wrap my head around the subject enough to have an opinion, thus these tests. Alas, the future looks bleak, exciting fun and cheap. I guess those who are celebrating are those who can work faster and cheaper for those who discern less for quality, talent and experience... with the exception, as you mention, for concept work. If I can vomit out an idea to get an agreement for work to be done, than I have no moral issue with using this tool, as it does that very well. But, with this tech in the hands of newbies who have no understanding of the challenges with getting realistic results, expectation of clients will change as well, accepting the one click solution as equal to the sweat, experience and passion of rendering they had to "pay" for. I may be a bit slanted or prejudiced but, I think I'm being rather realistic in my assessment as well.

As we saw digital music replace musicians, the more this tech advances, I believe we will (or are) seeing the mortality of the technical expertise of the artistry and profession we've known. The day that AI produces "controlled" work in perfection under direction (or automated), is the day that the masters' and gurus' end has come in this game.

LOL! And all that after all this "fun" becoming familiar with the tool. I believe you and others who share this perspective, are spot on.

Seriously fun exploration here!

@majid !!!
Nice to see you here. Thanks for the compliment!

@bryan k said:

Damn cool model!

Very interesting the way Diffusion interprets the model. Some very cool, some kinda impressionistic, but I like the variety.

Your Thea renders are very cool.

Thank you Bryan. Much appreciated.

Impressionistic is a good word to describe the interpretation-ism happening here.

@jo-ke said:

I hope you like the result

Reminds me of Disney Animation movie backgrounds from the '70s. Cool stuff.

@jo-ke said:

Very interessting post.

Su diffusion is quite good but there is little opportunity to influence the result.

I took your Sketchup output and tried to create an image with Stable Diffusion and controlnet. Here you can have a much bigger influence on the image.

I hope you like the result

And until Trimble adjusts the parameters to allow a bit of control, more than text prompt suggestions, it will remain a sort of "toy" for concept. I'm still rather curious as to why SketchUp is not allowing more control over the effect of the plugin on its interpretation of geometry or simply extending the limits of respecting geometry to not malform the geometry and lines in its output. Perhaps a license thing... don't know.

@rv1974 said:

there are examples that look virtually the same but one took 1 hour while other - 19 hours.
Why such HUGE gaps? I never realized all this AI generation is so time consuming
Is this done locally?

These are final selections out of a collection of a hundred+ images saved over days of testing with different settings. The gap does not indicate the time to create the image, it is only the designation given when saving out an image. So, after going to bed and starting the next day, that's already many, many hours between tests, let alone series of tests before finding something I felt worthy of saving. Then, when finished, the family helped select their favorites, which means allot of saved images are not presented. So, it takes no time at all. But, to find something worth saving may take allot of time and myriads of tries, which explains the difference in the gaps between shots.

I hope that makes sense anyway.

@panixia said:

@duanekemp said:

not a solution for "on purpose" projects.

The robot proposed 4 different machines similar to a coffee grinder (static models, with only base color map, about 1m x 1m x 1m large, with no tracks or roller whatsoever).
Two were blue and two were green.
None of them was at least orange.

So yeah.. that's it

Marcello, that just made me laugh out loud.

@mike amos said:

I have just spent several minutes smiling like a loon. Thanks mate.

Loon: North American waterfowl, primary character from "On Golden Pond" that forebodes doom and gloom.

Loon: a relative of Daffy Duck and/or Woody Wood Pecker, characters that laugh at doom and gloom.

In either case, I assume that is a positive thing.

Just read the article. Yes, he sums up rather well the advantages and weaknesses, especially that of control.
Good for initial concept ideas, but... not a solution for "on purpose" projects.

@marked001 said:

Thanks for doing these comparisons.. very cool to see.

Glad you appreciate them for that reason. Thanks.