Shiny New Trees

Just a few trees that I developed recently:

Paper (White) Birch

I tried to construct the scene a bit more in the way I imagine it for the final version. I think the rocks are a nice touch, and I'd like to try a fallen log or two in the scene as well as some more varied ground cover. I still want to look into a more dynamic sky. Moving clouds would heighten the realism.

White Pine

This tree needs some work. For some reason the smallest branches ended up coming off the thicker ones in a spiral. I also need to refine the texture for the needles. It just doesn't look needly.

The more I think about it the more I like the idea of presenting each tree separately, filling a frame in the style of some of the older tree references out there. Anyway, sleep is needed for healthy bones or such and such...

Pretty Flowers

Finally rendered out an image of the Trillium model I made last week. It could be better, but it will mostly be filler for the undergrowth.

Breezy, Windy Gustamajiggers

I was messing around with creating a tree in the wind sort of movement last night. I think it was mostly a success...The only issues seem to be that I rendered from a bad angle to see what is happenening and the branches seem to dip down maybe a little too much. Also, I used some sort of procedural to define increasing rustling of the leaves but they don't seem to rustle at all. If seen from the right angle you would notice the tree bending in the direction of the wind and then winging back past its original location because of its elasticity. Oh well, good for an early effort.

Here's the link to a .mov

Sugar Maple Close Up

Just a detail of the sugar maple. I think it is by far the best tree I've made so far.

In with theLatest

Here is where I'm at with tree modelling/texturing right now. The rest is just temporary filler. Hopefully I'll have a render of a plant or two up soon too. From left to right: Sugar Maple, Alder, Mature White Cedar, Young White Cedar.

The Latest

Things are starting to shape up in the tree department.

Northern White Cedar: young version to the left and mature to the right. I also have animated versions of both which simulate blowing in the wind. Hope to have a video of that sort of thing up soon.

Refinements

I've further refined my workflow and created a new tree to do experiments on. Should be able to make better looking trees faster with this new method. My biggest obstacle will be keeping poly counts low enough for animated renders. Roughed out some lighting...