3D Reflection 52 - Experimenting with renders

I did some render shot experimentation with my character. I wanted to find the most suitable way to show off the character. I tried out a small room and placed in some rim and fill lights, as well as a post-processing volume.

I found that switching off all object visibility apart from the pharaoh resulted in a clearer wireframe.

One thing I liked about this setup was the warm brown light of the wall, and the glint of the gold on the pharaoh.

However, there were many elements that I did not like, such as how obvious the light source was on the walls, even with adjusting the settings and moving the lights around and off camera.

I also thought that the details on the walls took away from the pharaoh, and as these were meant to be character renders, this defeated the purpose of the shots.

I tried brightening the room, but found there was not enough contrast between the pharaoh and the surroundings.

I tried some photoshop editing to blue out the background further away and using post processing settings such as gaussian blur, but I still was not happy with how busy the render looked.

I did like some of the dramatic shots I acheived but this was not enough to convince me to use this setup. 

My room setup

I tried an entirely new approach to character renders in Unreal. I created a new sky sphere and used exponential height fog to create a more dramatic appearance. I also created a minimalistic environment that would not interfere with the detail of the pharaoh. This setting also presented more believable sources of light around the pharaoh, such as the light behind that could act as a rim light.

With some final editing in Photoshop, I managed to acheive some dramatic shots that I liked much better.