Don't let the title of this feature scare you away. While this installment, and ones in the future, will take more of a basic approach, just about any animator can find some useful information contained within. On to our third installment.
"TVLogos 101" part III
Let's see now, where were we last month? Oh yeah... we were going to get into surfacing your logo in Lightwave's layout. And with that, we'll get right into reflection mapping. This is another one of those areas that quickly define a professional or amateur look depending on one's expertise.
First, we'll get into a basic anatomy of a reflection treament to achieve a metallic look. In Lightwave's Layout, you would first define a color for your surface in the 'Surfaces' panel. A nice gold could use rgb values of 255,230,130... or a good silver (with just a hint of blue) could use 235,245,255... or whatever you choose... there's no set rules here (I like metallic purple!). In this example, we're going to assume the usage of greyscale reflection maps... so with this in mind, be sure to turn on the 'Color Highlights' button. If the diffuse level is at 100% (which is default), go ahead and crank it back to about 20%. Some animators will take it all the way down to 0% but be careful, as this can make the resulting graphic difficult to key if you're creating logos over black to be used in a post suite. For these examples, we'll leave the specularity alone and let the reflection map give the look of specular highlights. You may or may not use luminosity. A good time to use it would be if your reflection map image is particularly dark. Pumping it up just a bit can help, but be careful - increasing this value too much will wash out the color of your highlights. A good starting value for your 'Reflectivity' level could be 85%. Clicking on the 'Reflection Options' button will alow to set the 'Reflection Type' to 'Spherical Reflection Map' and also allow you to define the 'Reflection Image'. You can use any image you like for this, but for our example, we'll assume a greyscale image with some good light to dark contrasts (such as the included rfl006.iff). If 85% on the 'Reflectivity' is yielding too strong a reflection, try backing off that amount until you have a more subtle effect. The problem here is that this will also darken the surface, so compensate by cranking up the luminosity a bit - but as before, be careful in doing this. There are lots of variables to this basic anatomy, but this is enough to get things rolling to our next step.
There's a couple of items that I feel are very important to a great reflection treatment... these being, the reflection image itself and the image seam angle of the surface to which it is applied. What makes a good reflection image? ... several things. I can tell you this: there is no single perfect image map that will work best in all applications. For example, I almost always use a different image map for the front, bevels, and sides of a logo. Why is this you ask? It's really simple. The front (or back) of a logo is likely comprised of flat surfaces, and thus requires an image map with a good deal of contrast variation in it... otherwise, you'll get a look that is too light or too dark. The bevels, because of their angles and curves, will reflect a lot more of a map's light to dark contrasts, so it's best to use one with a bit less contrast variation. The same can be said for the sides of your logo. But then again... there are exceptions. For example, the bevels and sides of the letter 'S' will pick up a great deal more reflected variation of a map than say, the letter 'T'. To put it simple, the side and bevel of curved edge characters reflect more of the maps contrasting light and dark variations. I know it may sound a bit complicated, but a little experimenting will quickly make things clear.
The other item of importance is the image seam angle (found in the 'Reflection Options' of the 'Surfaces' panel). You may have thought that this feature was only useful for hiding the seam (the point at which the left and right side of the image meet together) of your reflection map... but this is certainly not the case... besides, I usually use seamless images. In the most basic of explanations, a spherical reflection map for a surface is an image that is mapped onto the inside of a sphere surrounding that surface. You never actually see this sphere... only the reflection of the image mapped to it. Think of the adjustment of the image seam angle as a means to rotate this sphere. In doing so, we can rotate it until we find an area that is providing the best reflection for the surface. For the most part, I only concern myself with the front face of the logo, since the bevels and sides usually reflect enough variation without adjustment. Also, this only really applies to the logo while in a static position. For example, if I'm creating a simple 4 second logo flyin, I'll make sure to do test renders of the last frame (where the logo has come to a stop) and make adjustments to the seam angle of the logo's face until I get the best look. Once I find the right look, I re-save the object so that this setting is retained. In the following example, compare the identical logo renderings and make note of the difference that a seam angle adjustment can make.
In looking for that magic seam angle, I like adjusting its rotation in increments of 10. That gives me 36 steps to go through if need be. But to be honest, I usually find a good angle before I hit 60 degrees. Once I can tell I'm getting close to the look I want, I'll lessen the increments to 5 or 1. After you've done this a few times, it'll become second nature... but again, make sure you re-save the object once you've got it right. The included SurfacePro reflection images (.zip or .lha) will hopefully prove useful for you to experiment with. I've found that rfl006.iff often works well for the flat faces on the front and back of a logo... although you'll want to try different seam angles. Rfl005.iff is often my choice for bevels since I want the reflections to be just a bit more tame here... however, because this image is darker, you'll probably need to compensate by increasing the luminosity. Rfl004.iff usually works great for the sides of logos. It can however, get a bit busy if your text has lots of curved characters (as discussed earlier). Like I said, there's no single perfect reflection image, so experiment with these and others.
Until next time, live long and render.
Leo Martin is a full time artist/animator for WCLF TV in Tampa Florida and co-developer of several 3D-related software packages available through Visual Inspirations. Contact him via Email at: leomartin@usa.net and WWW: http://www.vionline.com/clm.
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elcome back! I hope it's been a good month for everyone, and that you've all been losing sleep sitting in front of your computer animating your brains out. If you're like me, you've been able to achieve a nice cathode ray tan... sure, it may have a green tint to it, but hey, it glows in the dark! But seriously... it's good to know when to take a break from it all. Burning yourself out in front of a computer has a way of sapping the creativity right out of your bones. Many of us make a living in computer graphics, and that often means we're in front of the CRT for considerably more than eight hours a day. Learn to step away long enough to maintain both your sanity and creativity! This might mean something as minor as a five minute break every two hours or so to give your eyes a rest and return with a fresh outlook. I've had to discipline myself to do this, and it always helps when I do. So if you're one that gets ultra-intensified when you work on a project, and don't come up to breathe until it's done (I've been there)... consider giving this advice a try. You may be able to keep up that pace for a while... perhaps even years, but eventually, it catches up with you. It may even be a good idea to step away from the computer for a full day... yes, I said a full day! It's important to do whatever it takes to keep from getting burned out... because after all, once you've mastered the technical, it is largely 'creativity' that you're getting paid for.
