|
|
 |
|
"The Labyrinth" Added on: Sat Aug 12 2000 |
| Page: 1 2 3 4 5 |
Inspiration
I have been fortunate enough to travel around the Mediterranean, and love the way the afternoon sun there plays against the warm tones of the weathered local stone. I'm also fascinated by the notion of architecture so vast that it becomes a mystery of sorts,
as envisioned by Piranesi and realized, for example, in the repetitive arch motifs of the Great Mosque at Cordoba.
So I wanted to create a labyrinthine structure which combined sandy stone with structural repetition, and a simple arrangement of stacked arches came to mind. I would take my background and lighting cue from an atmospheric ocean vista I photographed on Crete and color-corrected in Photoshop (Figure 1). And in order to retain maximum control over my
final image, I decided to render my image in many passes, which will be shown with each section below.
Figure.1
Modelling & Camera Setup
My modelling skills still have a long way to go, so I kept the geometry pretty unambitious as I started my Softimage scene.
All of the arches in my image are just instances of a single NURBS revolve which has slightly rounded corners. In order to show an interesting space that seems to repeat indefinitely without using indefinite amounts of geometry or raytraced mirrors, I knew I had to position my camera carefully and build the scene around it. So the only arches in my scene are the ones you see in the render and a few to the left which cast shadows into the frame. As far as the visual composition is concerned, I spent some time experimenting to find a framing which broke the background counterspace into nice shapes (Figure 2).
Figure.2
|
 |
|
|
