Final Christmas Card Design

Here is the final Card design, I would have like some more time on it but i had to stop as it needs to be printed  and sent out to people for Christmas, anyway thanks for everyone's feedback.

Christmas Card (Update Four)

OK here it is update number four, quite a bit has gone in over the weekend, still would like to add in loads more but sadly time is running out and i need to render out a monster image big enough for 300 DPI. there are still a few tweaks i want to make / try before that. one is rendering out the snow at the bottom of the image with a mesh smooth on it. i originally intended to sculpt all the snow in Zbrush but I haven't had time. i think its acceptable as it is, not amazing, but time is a factor here.

The other thing which might not take that long is to add a few bits of snow on the door crevasse  this i think might add a bit and integrate the door and the scene more.

The falling snow needs work, but i quite like it, may add some turbulence although it presently does have a peaceful quality to it.

The next stage is to find some people to paint over. i'd really love to sculpt some but that would take far to much time. so i am on the hunt for some wintery silhouettes. the other option is that i dont add in two figures at all and just finish it up, this may happen.

Your welcome to post a comment, i'd love to hear people thoughts   

Christmas Card (update three)

As you can see I now have made the satined glass window and the wreath. this is probably going to also be the angle i make the final render, i may still take it from a higher vantage point. moving the camera up will lose a bit of the path which is a shame, but it should make for a better card which is that main purpose here.

Next to go in is the snow, the wood and improving about a million other things . the wreath is getting some lost now in all the light, i will therefore drop the brightness of the leaves and make specs for them all to offer more clarity. its funny looking back at update two its looking pretty bare now in comparison.

Christmas Card (update two)

I have been working most of the weekend on the card which has mainly consisted of Ambient Occlusion bakes on most of the large models this took a fair amount of time as I rendered them at a large resolution with a high degree of sampling. once that was finished then i started on the texturing. I still have a lot to do, eventually it will look much more wintery with snow on parts of the door and step etc. the areas next to the path will be snow covered with some missed shovelled parts still on the path.  I am thinking of adding a few lights along it possible coloured candles to give it more focus, it should also make it feel warmer and more enchanting.

I still haven't made a single specular map yet for this, that's on my list i also need to look into the lighting from the window, the Christmas wreath and a few other things that i am not to happy with.  

I have yet to decide upon which angle, however that is the beauty of modelling it I have the option to render it out at any angle to get the best looking christmasy feel :)  

Christmas Card Update

Here is a quick render of the porch, still loads of problems with this with a few inconsistencies. i am still contemplating which angle to use. originally i wanted to have it face on, but i'm not so sure, face on would suit a traditional Christmas card better but the view from the side would be more interesting.  For now I am just going to get the rest textured and make the reef and bring in a few bushes in for the pots. it was 2am last night when i rendered this and felt to sleepy to correct the issues and make another render. i will render a few more over the weekend and post them up with better lighting and the proper stained glass. so far so good though :)