Happy New Year to you all!
Wow! The Holiday Sale at Daz was crazy good. December is usually one of the worst months for my Daz wallet, but this time was especially brutal. The thing that really got me was the temporary PC+ 1.99 items. In particular, there were many older ironman13 and goldtassel items, all of which were irresistible at such a low price.
There were also some great new releases, which together with the loyalty discount made them extremely tempting. Some of my favorite Holiday Sale products –
Mousso released some superb new girls including an elf girl, a vampire girl, and sexy Macarena. I am super into fantasy and vampires, so all three went into my cart. I also took the opportunity to grab Corin HD from my wishlist. Very excited to try out all these new morphs!
Next, The Pirate Cabin by Ansiko caught my eye right away. There are so many detailed and awesome looking props in this set, making it an instant buy. I can render the environment as is, or combine the props with other scenes. Will be wicked fun using them to create a variety of pirate or medieval images.
And while we are on the subject of amazing environments, there is ThePhilosopher’s Infinite Sands – Desert Environment. I already have his ULTIMATE Grass & Meadow Worldbuilder, which works wonders for large outdoor settings. Therefore, I quickly snatched the new desert landscape as well as Ancient Mystical Forest. Another large environment item that looks incredibly useful is DA Big Ocean. The water looks marvelous and there are many cool options, so it should be very versatile. So many new environments, so little time. 😀
Last but not least, there was a fantastic new Orestes sky-dome – Angry Heavens. At this point I was running low on funds, so I had to decide between Angry Heavens and Fantasy Moon. I finally decided on the latter since it has been on my most wanted list for a while now. I do a lot of fantasy scenes, so having a set of moon-based HDRis would be useful indeed. Update – Just tried it out yesterday and like the results very much!
January 2019 Contest Vendors
This January, we will honor some of these most fabulous Holiday Sale vendors.
ironman13
Mousso
Ansiko
ThePhilosopher
Orestes Graphics
Images with the newly released Eva 8, and Nix 8 will also qualify.
January contest entries.
1st Place – Boots
Artist – secret77
This image is truly special because it is so evocative. As soon as I saw it, I felt something deep and strong, which made me come back to it again and again.
Even though it is night and raining, the girl stops and rescues the little cat. She shelters the cat from the rain and gives him some much needed affection. He snuggles deeper into the girl’s embrace and purrs with satisfaction. The girl feels less alone, stronger, and more able to face tomorrow’s challenges. In this way, he rescues her right back. 😀
Excellent work with the rain effects, puddles, and rain coat. I also like how you made Mousso’s Lexy look younger with the ponytail hair and putting her in school uniform.
The back alley environment, trash bags, and bins, further enhance the darker mood and adversity faced. It creates a wonderful contrast with the warm kindness and love between the girl and her new friend, which makes me think of this song …
I believe that somewhere in the darkest night,
A candle glows.
I believe for everyone who goes astray,
Someone will come to show the way.
I believe,
I believe.
~~[Excerpt lyrics from I Believe]
It is a song of hope, and so too does this image brilliantly capture hope and kindness.
Bravo on creating a very moving image and a true work of art.
2nd Place – An Age of Heroes
Artist – VortigensBane
This is epic! You must have tons of memory on your machine and graphics card.
Superb feature of ThePhilosopher’s ULTIMATE Grass & Meadow Worldbuilder. You really show off the scale and realism of the set. I also like the lighting and haze effects, which gives further depth to the image.
Outstanding posing of the knights and use of instancing. You did a fantastic job in making them all look natural, dynamic, and different. We can almost hear the thundering of hooves as they charge toward the opposing army.
Special cheers for using items from three of the featured artists! Definitely a heroic effort to create such a heroic scene.
3rd Place – Infinity Gate
Artist – napalmarsenal
Awesomely creative composition!
Love the character, pose, and concept. Her face is captivating, and one cannot help but be drawn by those large dark eyes. I also like the jet-black wings which frame her beautifully, together with the round stone gates.
Great combination of Miellyn for Genesis 3 and 8 Female(s) and Dark-Sin Outfit, to create a look that is unique, stylish, and totally bad-ass. Adding the pink flowers from Melidae Crown is a brilliant touch. They balance out the scene by adding some softness, femininity, and a splash of color.
The judges also liked Dragon Hunt. Very clever way to use the shield from Dragon Hunt Weapons as more of a throne, especially when combined with the glowing red effects from Ron’s Impressions.
3rd Place – Golden Corner Of Life
Artist – Shozai
What a magical image!
Mousso’s Albany looks gorgeous here and Classic Long Curly Hair suits her perfectly. I also like her pose and the hair simulation. It drapes very well.
The golden light reflecting off the water is enchanting. It creates exactly the right ambiance for our fairy girl and her foxy companion. A spellbinding scene that gives me a peaceful, warm, feeling.
Landing Squad is another judge favorite. Marvelous use of ULTIMATE Grass & Meadow Worldbuilder together with Planet X-2 to construct a foreign landscape. The robots, spaceships, guns, and outfits, do an amazing job in capturing the authenticity of a landing force.
3rd Place – Red Kite
Artist – Kibosh
A totally charming picture!
Sunny skies, a red kite, and wildflowers, what could be better than all that. Another great use of ULTIMATE Grass & Meadow Worldbuilder, to create the grassy field.
As usual, superb attention to detail. I notice the pretty girl first, picking wildflowers; then the boy flying the red kite. But then, there is so much more, like the dog chasing after the moving kite, the old couple by the bench, the beautiful glow of sunlight through the leaves of the trees, and the quaint village buildings beyond. A terrific snapshot of a happy sunny day.
I also love The Princess And The Moth. Fabulous camera angle, rich colors, and magical composition. Your storied images are always delightful to study.
Honorable Mentions
Red by BavarianR
Fantastic feature of Xenoman for Nix 8. Marvelous space wreckage backdrop, alien lighting, and environmental effects. I especially love how you integrated Ron’s 2D brushes into the 3D scene.
Excellent job!
Out of Southampton by dawnydawny
This looks like an oil painting!
Incredible feature of Orestes Iray HDRI Skydomes – Witches Twilight. The colors are vibrant with detailed texture strokes that look like they come from a brush.
The ocean is amazingly dynamic. Magnificent work combining DA Big Ocean and the iREAL Animated Ocean Water System. The splash effect from Ron’s Waves is seamlessly integrated, and enhances the movement of the sea.
Outstanding detail on the Licorne ship, with wonderful textures on the sails and everything else.
Catching Some Z’s by Vueiy
Wow! Love this character. She is super cute and looks very peaceful lying there with the light trickling in through the curtains.
Arki’s Rune Outfit and Christina Hair fits her splendidly. Fabulous job with posing her and the hair in a lying down position.
Misty Night by Stalest
Superb mood and lighting. A private eye, femme fatale, and a late night meeting. This is a movie that I want to watch.
Terrific use of Render Studio 2.0 – Volumetric Plus to create the mist and environmental effects. It looks fantastic with the street lighting and creates a thick air of mystery. Great use Ladybird by Ansiko, which fits perfectly with the mood and scene. In addition, the sig on the car door is totally brilliant. 🙂
Congratulations to Our Januray 2019 3D-Art Contest Winners!
Thank you very much for looking and participating in our first contest of 2019!
To claim your Daz GC, please post a comment below with a valid e-mail in the comment e-mail box. I will use this to send you your gift card code. Please feel free to message me on Daz or Deviant Art if there are any issues.
Congratulations to all the winners and a big thank you for selecting my work also. It’s always fun and the images entered are always so good! Thank you Shiba for your usual thoughtful comments on each piece selected.
Congratulations to all the winners and a big thank you for the HM.
Wow, stunning work by the winners, the choices are all very well deserved!
Congratulations to all, awesome work by all!
Thank you so much for the thoughtful comments. It is always interesting to hear what others see in the images.
Thank you, Shiba, for continuing to put together this contest every month and all that you do, It is always such a blast to participate.
Congrats to all and thank you!
Congratulations to all winners and
Honorable Mentions 🙂
I am thrilled that you liked “An Age of Heroes” so much, but I do not have a super computer at all; it took a whole week to render the scene after two weeks of constant crashes trying.
Yeah, my computer has problems with just the meadow grass. Did you use special settings etc to limit memory?
Apologies for butting into the conversation, I also couldn’t run the meadow grass without crashing when I purchased it (old computer) but selecting “memory” under Render Settings – Optimization and using ‘Scene Optimizer’ has been a massive help for me. (still using the old computer) Mind you, volumetric lighting always seems to quadruple the render time also 🙁
Like Kibosh said, selecting “memory” under Optimization (why you can’t set that as the default and make it stay that way I don’t know) and reducing all the texture maps to 1/4 original resolution with “Scene Optimizer” were the two biggest, but also, reducing figure resolution to “base” with 0 subdivisions, decimating most of the figures by probably 70%, setting the viewport display to “bounding box,” hiding all body parts which were covered by armor, stopping 90% of the other processes running on my computer, etc., and then just waiting a really, really, long time… 🙂
Thank you both for those useful tips. Will need to collect all that together sometime and put it in a tut. 🙂
Amazing images this month. Congratulations to all the winners.
Thank you for the HM 🙂
Many grats everyone!
Thank you very much Shiba 😀 Im happy.