Posted on February 25, 2015

A few items to report this morning. First, I’ve added dual and triple-screen versions of “Hexagram” to the Members Gallery. The multi-4K versions, however, are still rendering. Check back in a day or two and I should them available (along with smoother renders for the lower-resolutions). Since I used Lightwave for this render I have the luxury of letting Fprime “refine” the render while I use what I have.

Next I wanted to mention that Google will no longer accept payments for “digital goods” after March 1. If you want to use your Google Wallet funds to purchase a Membership or Renew you have until the end of the day on 3/1 to do so. This one hurts because quite a few Members have used it in the past year and I thought it was working really well.

Lastly I wanted to mention that my new Vue d’Esprit projects is rendering on Bucephalus right now and I hope to have it up before the end of the week. Things would certainly move faster if I had another workstation…

 

Posted on February 17, 2015

“The Promise of Spring” is new in the Members Gallery this morning. Hard to believe it has been 7 years since I posted the original. I was never quite satisfied with how blocky and chaotic everything came out in the first version. I think this one has a bit more pop.

I am not totally satisfied with how Vue d’Esprit’s DOF came out this time. Some areas are great but others have a few artifacts (which are less noticeable at the lower resolutions). I do think it’s looks nice enough to share in my gallery while I make any necessary revisions. Dual and triple-screen versions are available too!

You might recognize my cherry tree model from Sakura (2013).

This render is for anyone ready for Winter to be over…

Shadowfax Update:

Thanks so much to everyone who decided that last week was the right time to support my work and help me along towards my new workstation. I would say that I am about a 10th of the way there however so I still need your help!

A lot of folks have suggested that I set up a crowdfunding effort for the new machine so here goes. Let me know if you have any questions!

 

Posted on February 9, 2015

A couple of items to mention. First, “Hexagram” is new in the Members Gallery tonight. Continuing my education with “Structure Synth”. I have a new Vue d’Esprit render going as well, but it is still a ways off…

Second, I’ve put together a page for “Project Shadowfax“. That is a name I’ve chosen for my next workstation. I hope you will take a look and help me make it a reality!!

 

Posted on February 5, 2015

I’ve added “Recursion” to the abstracts gallery tonight. I am still learning to use “Structure Synth” and this structure spoke to me for some reason. I should be able to do a multiscreen fairly soon as well. Speaking of multiscreens…

I received an email from a fan this morning that may be of interest to multiscreen users… My name is Jake, long-time fan and lifetime member. The last 5 wallpapers have not had the dual screen options, what’s going on? Those are the only ones I use. I have 3 dual screen setups, and I use display fusion to rotate every 15 mins between your most recent 30 wallpapers. Are the most recent wallpapers going to be offered in dual screen format anytime soon? Thanks man, much appreciated.

My reply…

Thanks for writing! I apologize for the slowdown in dual-screens. The simple answer is that I don’t have the hardware right now to render multi-5K scenes in Vue d’Esprit. The single 5K renders are taking between 7-10 days at this point so multiply that by 3 (rendering for 2 extra 5K screens) and you see my problem. Lord help me when 8K monitors come out…

I should be able to bite into my backlog when get a new workstation later this spring. Then I can set my current rig to start rendering Vue multiscreens. Until then you might want to try using the 5K single screen image and see if you can find an interesting crop to fit your config?

PS: I would add that I am working on a couple of Lightwave scenes right now (while rendering the multiscreen version of “Moondance”) so there should be a few new multiscreens coming soon!

~Ryan

All hardware and software purchases, of course, have to be approved by the DB Master of Coin (Jessie). She tells me that a lot more people need to sign up and renew before we can lay out for a new render-beast.

You can help by signing up or renewing today or you can visit my new Patreon page.

tldr — I need your help so I can get a new machine to keep up with the 4K/5K (8K?) monitors to come!

 

Posted on January 29, 2015

Moondance is new in the Members Gallery this morning after around 72 hours rendering at 5K. Those of you who checked out the Members-Only WIP preview will notice that I’ve added quite a few more light sources to the scene. Let me know what you think in the comments!