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ZippyGuitar β Hymn to the Gathering
#apollo #artemis #daz #dazstudio #fantasy #greekgods #greekmythology #hermes #iray #olympus #zeus
Published: 2019-06-15 14:38:20 +0000 UTC; Views: 2287; Favourites: 46; Downloads: 0
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Description
As the sun sets across the kingdom of Olympus, Apollo delights an audience with a play of his lyre. Everyone except Zeus perhaps.
He is smiling, but really looks like he's more grumpy than relaxed. Facial hair can hide a lot of an expression. But I prefer him looking this way. It fits his character (my version of him anyway). For those curious, from left to right: Artemis, Eilithyia, Hermes, Leto, Zeus, Apollo, Prometheus. In the far distance is Hebe and Heracles, and Nike with open arms high atop the cliff.This was not my intended next scene. I've been working on re-texturing an older Poser medieval inn and had to take a break from it. Was driving my vision insane. So I decided to update a few of my Olympian characters and it turned into updating most of them. Updating them turned into "oh what the hell, I wanna see them all together." Six of the ten characters in this scene were updated/created using Genesis 8 as the base figure. Unfortunately, sometime within the last year I had accidentally deleted my Leto character subsets so I had to completely redo her look as well.
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Comments: 48
Great render, Glen. Perfect personification of mythic Greek gods, and, as usual, such perfect attention to every minute detail!
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No-one does groups of people with the right expressions and poses like you and dungeonmeister! The gold standard of story driven scenes once again!Β
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Beautiful colors. Your images always makes me think of classic paintings 
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Nice!
Image has excellent mood for the evening stories.
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All of your characters are so diverse and bring such a dynamic quality to your scenes! Great job!
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Thanks, man. I appreciate it very much.
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Tey all look great! Another stunning render! I love the lighting in this oneΒ Β Β Β Β
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Thank you much, Deanna. Glad you like it.
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You're very welcome
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You got the ancient greek flair in this render
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Beautiful image, perfectly capturing the feelings of the protagonists - genuine delight, attention, admiration, affection - creating a wonderful mood. I finally set up a folder where I can add masterpieces like this.
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Thank you very much, Ardalos. I really appreciate the kind words.Β
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Great scene all around..Very well done as always sir!
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Your welcome my friend
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Gorgeous image!! 
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Thank you very much, EbruKash.
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Incredible work you did on those characters. Though I guess such a gathering would cause all kinds of unpleasantness as soon as Hera catches wind of it...
Amazing picture and cool interview on digitalarts!
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Thanks, man, I appreciate it. As far as Hera goes, she'd certainly have something to say and do. In my universe she's dead, killed in the first war with the demon kingdoms. Leto is Zeus's second wife.
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You got rid of her! Good job, many tried and failed
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Awesome work, and BTW congrats to be the featured guy in digitalarts mag!
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Thank you, sir. I appreciate it!
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Like Snow-White said: perfection indeed! In every way! The characters, the scenery, the details, the mood, the fantastic lighting, the composition, all excellent! But what I love the most is that incredible beautiful troubadour! Although I very much would like to know how you created him (with what charectars did you mix him, what skin texture, etc.), I don't ask it, because if I would have created such perfection, I wouldn't give it away either. But maybe you could reveal what hair you gave himβ¦ I don't recognize it. Anyway, this is work of a master, Glen!Β Β
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Thanks a bunch, Rudy. I appreciate the kind words.Β
I'll let you in on a little secret: Apollo's new look (I had an older version that was almost 3 years old) is inspired by your male characters. I had an idea for his look, but for whatever reason, my mind immediately thought of your characters and I had to make some notes on lip/mouth design of your men, their eye sizes, etc. So the fact you really like him makes me happy. I don't think he compares at all to the wonderful realism of your men, but that's not the look I'm going for anyway. I used the Genesis 8 male and Landon 8 as a base with Joel for Landon dialed in at 70%. Their head morphs however are at about 50% each, and I also dialed in Owen's head morph at 50%. The rest is a bunch of morphs from Rarestone's face morphs and the 200 Plus Head and Face Morphs. I was pleased with his look and he's more in line with how I originally designed Apollo many years ago.
The hair is AprilYSH's Blair Hair:Β www.daz3d.com/blair-hair-for-gβ¦Β The only reason I bought it was for Apollo and I'm glad I did. April did an amazing job on the hair. There are a fair number of morphs and the hair has almost 30 bones which allow of for more posing and styles.
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Thanks so much for sharing your secret, Glen! And for the compliments!Β Β
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Perfection!Β Β
Wonderful scene and I'm glad to see a new work of yours !! Β As always, inspiring!
Out of curiosity, how long does it take you to do these scenes? Posing the characters, finding the perfect scenario and props, this phase is always the most annoying and stressful for me.
I loved the background too! This scene is part of the chapter of the gods, right? That lad down there doesn't seem very happy..hmm Β or maybe it's just me. ^^Β I keep looking at the image in search for details ... hehe
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FYI I updated with a description in case it might answer any question I didn't answer before.
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Hey, Juli. This scene took all week to work on. Not because of issues or anything. But EVERY character minus Hermes and Zeus (and two in the far distance...) are "new". I had older versions of them, but decided to use Genesis 8 and update their looks. That took the most time. And for some reason Artemis, the foreground lady on the left, took over 24hrs to render. She jumped to CPU and it was just sluggish. I haven't ran into that kind of issue in a very long time. Her hair was the problem and after 3000 iterations I stopped it. It wasn't getting any better.
I agree with you in your comments about the stress of posing, props, etc. Posing characters takes me forever. I really get fussy about it. But I want my best put into it and want them to look good. For example, Apollo and his lyre took an entire evening. I grabbed google image searches of people playing the lyre, studying how the fingers moved, and even researched old oil paintings of characters playing the lyre. It's not perfect, but hopefully convincing enough. And after everything was in place and more or less composited in Photoshop, I ended up rendering two more spot fixes of Apollo's head. Original version was "look up and away at the camera". Next spot fix was looking at his sister. I settled on him looking at his lyre. It seemed the most natural and pleasing to me.
Zeus doesn't look happy at all. It is so strange how facial hair changes a character's look. While working on his expression, I had the Iray viewport running so I could see the actual result. I had his beard hidden from the scene. He's actually smiling, but more of a side smile or smirk. I put his beard back on and he suddenly had this 'grrr' expression. I left it alone because that's more or less how Zeus is in my project. He's somewhat of a Mr. Grumpy Gills. Β He's not angry, but he just never looks like he's overly joyed.
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Oh I know very well those strange and unexpected problems that sometimes happen while using DAZ. With me, the following happened: it closed out of nowhere as soon as the rendering began, and then I discovered that what was causing the problem was a prop "X" that, for some reason, the program didn't like. Sometimes it was a sword, (but the same sword in another scene didn't cause problems), sometimes a hair...etc. It didn't happen anymore though, at least so far. These things are annoying. argh.Β Β
Oh the poses are great and the characters, amazing! I always look for references too, but sometimes I use one pose from a set and I modify it according to my need. It all depends of the scene. ^^Β
Glad you decided to put the description!
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WOW perfection, so many great characters and details.Β Love the light and environment.Β I can almost hear the music looking at it.
PS I just read your great interview in Digital Art Live magazine.Β Loved it
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Thank you very much, Joe. And glad you enjoyed the interview.
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So beautiful ! Perfect poses and such a great ambiance !
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Absolutely beautiful scene. Love the soft environment and lighting.Β
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Amazing scene. The setting and costumes are a great match. Β
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Thanks, man. I appreciate it!
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Back When People Valued REAL Music Performed REALTIME By REAL Musicians, No Radio Or Devices Streaming 24/7 , ..... It Seems In Our Society Abundance Lessens The Value Of Things, ..... None Of My Children Or Grandchildren Have Showed Enough Interest In Music To Create A Relationship With An Instrument, Making It A Conduit For Communicating Their Emotions, ..... I'm Afraid Soon It Will Become A Rarity, No Funding For It In Schools, ..... I Saddens Me, .....
Your Piece However Is JOYFUL And Fun Of The Patient Anticipation A Moment Like This Captures, ..... BRAVO My Friend ! ! !
WONDERFUL JOB ! ! !
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Thank you much, and I wholeheartedly agree. I wish I had learned how to play at least one instrument back in my younger days. I love watching live performances. When I helped with stage productions at the school I work at, they had a pit orchestra one year (actually they traditionally had a pit orchestra for years). It's difficult to find people with enough time and the talent for such a gift. Now it's all CDs and digital for their musical productions.
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