All, thanks for the kind words. I hope to post some workflow / process stuff on how I tweak textures, light and render my different passes and combine them for animations. Stay tuned.

I finally completed this animation project, and thought I would share. Hope you like it!

[flash=600,300:1jfl70ql]http://vimeo.com/moogaloop.swf?clip_id=13939914&server=vimeo.com&show_title=1&show_byline=1&show_portrait=0&color=ffffff&fullscreen=1&autoplay=0&loop=0[/flash:1jfl70ql]

It probably took 2 months to complete from start to finish. It was modeled entirely in SketchUp. Then imported to 3ds Max 2010 for texturing and lighting. It was rendered with mental ray. I used After Effects for the post work and shot editing. It's a composition of 11 different cameras. For most shots I rendered 5 different passes and combined them together in post. People have been asking about my "After Effects" work. I basically use the same process that Alex Roman uses in his Third & the Seventh project.

These are some other renderings and shots from the SketchUp model:

Thanks for all the comments and kind words! Everything was modeled in sketchUp except for the diving platforms, diving boards, lane donuts, and water. They were modeled in 3DS Max 2009. Of course I could have modeled them in SU but I already had them modeled in Max.

As Jon requested I have posted this in the gallery forum:

http://www.sketchucation.com/forums/scf/viewtopic.php?f=81&t=16903#p133985

Someone had posted this in the "Corner Bar", and had asked me to post it in the gallery, so here it is. This was modeled with SketchUp 7 Pro, exported as a .3ds, imported into 3DS Max 2009 for texturing and lighting. It was rendered with mental ray. I used only A&D shaders with GI and FG. As some have pointed out, I could have spent more time refining the caustics, but I was on a tight deadline, and this was completed from start to finish in less than 40 hrs.

Comments are welcome!