Wednesday, September 15, 2010

Welcome back, Captain Vaurien! Oh yes, and Sergei...






Do you remember these guys? It's been six months, and there were times when I never thought I'd get them back ... Richard Vaurien -- captain of the commercial salvage vessel Wastrel -- and the Freespace, mercenary, big, beautiful villain, Sergei van Donne. They're right out of Hellgate, and they're back, not just as large as life, but better. In case you're wondering, Mel Keegan is thrilled. Makes two of us, MK!

The last time I rendered this scene was before the computer got all those viruses, and before it was upgraded with a new video card and double its RAM. Back then, I didn't have the ability to load two characters, hair, costumes, and then load a set as well. This time?

Well, that's the Station 3000 standing set/prop, from Powerage. And they're in it. In fact, they're in a tiny part of it. In this context, it's doubling for the docking rings where the massive salvage ship has docked onto the ramshackle colony called Halfway. Nasty place! Shivers.

It's fantastic to have these guys back, after a lot of patience and hard work, in fiddling with the software. It's like Christmas came early!

Here's something else I was playing with last night...

[Nope .. the image has vanished, and I can't get it back...]

The wolf is a lovely figure, but even with the rebuilt computer I still only seem to be able to load half of it. It comes in two segments: the body and the fur. You load the body, then you load the fur and "slave" it to the body so that when you articulate the parent model, the "child" model goes along with it. Now, what you're looking at here is just the body -- all the fur effects were done with displacement maps, because no way can I get the fur to load. DAZ crashes, end of story.

So I dropped a line to the tech support guys at DAZ to ask if it's shortcomings in the system, or if there's a trick to this. Good question ... and I'll keep you posted, because this really is a gorgeous model. More tomorrow, folks... something waaaay exotic and sensual. I'm not telling what, but join me then and see!

Jade, 16 September