Some of my latest renders

[jonnyd]

Very nice nick. Carl at Nelson butlers is a good guy they have got lots of decent timber there. If you go in the winter though take some wellies .

Cheers

Jon

[promhandicam]

Are the above images still renders Nick or the actual thing? That looks absolutely stunning and I hope the customer is suitable pleased. The only other comment is that if it were me who'd made it I'd be loosing sleep over what might happen when the central heating comes on.

[mtr1]

Really good work Nick, and Nelson Butlers is one of the best around. Has anyone else seen that burr oak log Carl has there? About twenty feet long and six feet across, must be the biggest burr oak log ever!


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[nickw]

Yes, Mark, I did see the burr.

Steve, I'm a little worried about it, but I'm not losing any sleep. Well I wasn't, thanks a lot for that.

[jrm]

Really excellent work. Great to see it come together.

Mark, I saw that burr. Fantastic tree but too big for his saw if I remember.

John

[mtr1]

I think Carl said he was upgrading his stenner the last time I was there in summer, don't know if that happened yet? He told me it was going to cost £250,000! Hopefully the big oak log will go on the new saw.


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[nickw]

Today, while waiting for timber to be delivered, I've been playing at merging my models with photos of the finished product using SketchUp's Match Photo feature in conjunction with Photoshop.







Fun, no?

[tusses]

Extremely impressive !

I like to notice ways to improve ... but it looks like you did that before you made it

[promhandicam]

You da sketchup man Nick! Those images are amazing.

[daver]

Nice work, Nick. Those are kind of fun to do, aren't they? I did some for a client a few years ago. It was actually interesting to see the comparison between my Sketc-drawn designs and his final product.

[woodsmith]

Amazing is the word!

[nickw]

Thanks Guys.

I've also had a quick play with Kerkythea.


This is from KT.


And for comparison this is more or less the same image done by Podium.

I've not done much work on the materials in KT so the finish levels are different, and the lighting is not an exact match either. KT looks like it is much more capable, but doesn't come with such a big library of materials as Podium. KT is a lot slower than Podium, but that seems to be because it doesn't multi-thread. On the plus side KT seems to have fewer artefacts in the finished image, and handles applied textures much more accurately, in that it doesn't re-position them as Podium is prone to doing.

[daver]

Nick,

That's nice.

[nickw]

I finally got the doors installed last week. Here is a very crappy photo taken on my 'phone. I will be going back once their painter has done his stuff to get proper pics of the whole lot.

[Meccarroll]

I finally got the doors installed last week. Here is a very crappy photo taken on my 'phone. I will be going back once their painter has done his stuff to get proper pics of the whole lot.

Nice doors, the proportions make the doors look elegant.

What was the method used between the glazing and bars. Stuck on or actual solid bars?

Your Sketchup drawings look very impressive. Do you mind saying which version you are using and is it a professional version.

Very impressive work both in sketchup and joinery.

Mark

[nickw]

Mark,

Stuck on! How very dare you! No they're real glazing bars with real fillets on the back side.

SU 2013 Pro

For those that can stand a bit of WIPery, with apologies that I didn't make a more complete job of the photography:


Frame set up, levelled, squared and out of wind.

... and screwed to the floor to stop it moving/falling on me.


Glazing bar emerging from second pass through moulder...

... and a faked up view of how the fence was set up to support it on that pass.


Loadsa glazing bars.


Set up for scribing the door rails. Not a great picture, sorry.


Dry assembly of door.


The glazing bars are tenoned into the frame and each other.


The architrave (125 x 50mm) was made in two sections and glued together. The top rail (one shown here) is 3.3m long. You can never have too many clamps.


All the architraves, and in the background there is a stack of glazing fillets.


Thanks to those who gave me advice on the making of these doors.

[Pinch]

Hi Nick, for whatever reason, I've missed this thread - how very dare I.

I do remember the very early stages, but I've just updated myself and read through.

Stunning work Sir! I absolutely love the window seat - beautifully executed!

[nickw]

Coming from you, Pinch, I'm honoured.

[Meccarroll]

I have not had any experience of using a vacuum bag, is there any possibility you could point me in the right direction so I can start learning. Eg suppliers etc? Equipment needed?
Looks like it could be handy for a project i have in mind.

Mark

[nickw]

Mark,

There are two major suppliers in this country AirPress and BagPress. As far as I can tell the major difference between them is the material used for, and therefore the price of, their bags. Airpress (which I have) use pvc bags which some reckon are more prone to damage than BagPresses rubbery ones. I have picked up a few punctures in my bags over the years, but I stick a bit of vinyl over the hole on both sides and things work fine again.

There are other, more DIY methods which if you search the forum you will find people talking about but I have no experience of these.

[nickw]

Having played a little with Kerkythea (KT) I got put off by its poor user interface and lack of development and support, so I thought I'd give Thea Render (TR) (which as I understand it is a commercial development of KT). I was immediately impressed with TR, it just seems better implemented and easier to use than KT.

Then, on a whim, I tried the Maxwell Render (MR) plugin for SU. The user interface is much cleaner than KT or TR and the way that you specify materials has been very much simplified, although of course you do loose out on fine control. Plus MR has a huge online library of ready made materials. I really liked the simplicity of MR until ... MR has only one rendering algorithm of the sort that makes a very grainy image to start with and the refines it over time. You can choose how many iterations that the engine goes through before it stops, or set it to max and stop it when it looks good enough.

Here is a render made by MR at 800 pixels by 300 odd.


You can see in the inner corner of the left hand cabinet an area where the pixellation is still visible. Now I left this image processing for well over 24 hours on my rather powerful (though I say it myself) laptop. This really is not acceptable.

Here is the same scene rendered by TR at the same resolution:

TR has 8 rendering algorithms, most of which have several sub-methods. This render was made with TR's Adaptive(BSD) algorithm using the Interior Medium option (there are 5 interior options, 8 exterior ones and a smattering of others) in just 7 minutes!

Now there are some differences in the images, and no doubt with a bit of playing I could reduce them, but for me the TR image is something I would be much happier sharing with even a very picky client than the MR one.

Cost? Maxwell is 75 euros,TR is currently on sale at a "reduced price" of 245 euros which includes the SU plugin and standalone Thea (you can't buy the plugin on its own). Both are available to try for free. There is a free version of MR which will only run an even slower version of its engine (yes I bought it in a rush before I had found out the big downside). The free version of TR puts watermarks in the images produced. As you can see I bought TR too, and that is the renderer I will be using from now on.

[nickw]

DaveR mentioned earlier that one of the giveaways of a render is the infinite depth of field. Well take a look at this:

which just rendered in 5 min 17 sec using Adaptive>Interior Medium.

[promhandicam]

Those images look incredible Nick but I have to say I haven't really got a clue what you are talking about

[daver]

That's nice, Nick.

[tusses]

good but ..
the glas door on the right , is a different distance from the end of the cabinet behind it.
If you sharpened up the glass and metal fitting a touch. it would pop right out and be more realistic IMHO

I only crit and a positive input for your strive for perfection

[nickw]

Sorry Tusses, but I don't understand what you're saying.

[tusses]

for correct depth of field ... everything in a set distance from the lens will be in the same focus.
things closer or further away will be blurred
the glass door is much further in front of the background, so the focus (blur/sharpness) should be different

[nickw]

Ah, so you're saying you don't like my choice of focus point and/or aperture. Well, I was only playing, and using an extremely wide aperture just to make the point.

Is this any better for you?

[Pinch]

This is very clever. If I didn't know, I would have thought this to be a photograph - the whole idea I guess. I'm a bit lost when it comes to clever computer stuff

[tusses]

Ah, so you're saying you don't like my choice of focus point and/or aperture. Well, I was only playing, and using an extremely wide aperture just to make the point.

Is this any better for you?

Yes
maybe slightly wider, but the bits you'd expect to be sharp, are.

[nickw]

Here's one of those projects that didn't come off - pew risers for a chapel. The pewter effect standards were designed to match existing candlesticks, and it was intended to have dimmable LED strip lighting in the light tubes. The risers were designed to be easily removable while at the same time not requiring any changes to the existing, listed, pews.

[mtr1]

That's really smart Nick, I must get my head around it one day. Photography this year, sketchup the next..