3D Photorealism Toolkit (Paperback)

by Bill Fleming (Author) "What makes an images photorealistic?..." (more)
Key Phrases: photorealistic credibility, photorealistic surfacing, fractal bump texture, Object Galaxies, Object Galaxy, Boolean Subtract (more...)

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com Review
Written for those who work in 3-D graphics and want to create photorealistic-looking images, this book helps you increase both your artistic and technical expertise. The author, Bill Fleming, doesn't focus on any one specific product, so you don't need to worry about having the right tool. However, there are a few advanced topics, such as some surfacing and lighting techniques, that you can only explore to the fullest in higher-end packages such as 3D Studio Max, SoftImage, Alias, and LightWave.

The book first teaches you about photorealism, the art of making images look as close to real photographs as computer-generated art can appear. Fleming puts forth the 10 principles of 3-D photorealism, which encourage you to create clutter, familiar objects, and details, and credible textures, edges, and lighting. He continues to explore these principles in the second part of the book, where you delve into hands-on projects and read his detailed advice. The book helps you to add basic details, such as seams, to your objects; reveal an object's construction by adding screws and cables; add mechanical details to your objects that allow for believable motion; and create beveled edges, scratches, and dents.

The third section covers surfacing techniques, teaching you that all objects have some degree of aging and some degree of specularity (light-reflecting capability). You learn to avoid stretching image maps and repeating patterns and how to create the look of water and of glass. Next you create image maps, such as color, luminosity, diffusion, secularity, glossiness, reflection, transparency, and bump maps, and you also use procedural textures to create surfaces.

The fourth section helps you plan your scene and even create interiors that reflect the personality of your subject--and add clutter. Finally, the last section gives you practice with camera angles and lighting and emphasizes radiosity, which is the indirect light distributed among objects in any given environment.

Appendices include resources for modeling and surfacing source material; tables of attributes for metal, plastic, and rubber; and an index of refraction values for transparent materials and light colors rated in Kelvin. The book thoroughly discusses core photorealism concepts and the techniques for addressing them. There are also instructions for working along with the book's projects, which include everything from simple models to intricate scenes. A companion Web site offers support materials, including images, for the book's exercises, as well as free models and textures and links to related resources. --Kathleen Caster

Product Description
Quickly master the skills, techniques, and tools you need to create cutting-edge photorealistic 3D images

Cash in on the booming market for 3D photorealism with the 3D Photorealism Toolkit, written by the head of a successful West Coast 3D photorealistic modeling studio. You'll quickly master all the modeling, surfacing, staging, and lighting techniques needed to create images and scenes that look realistic enough to fool the most discriminating eye. With the help of dozens of examples executed in LightWave, 3D Studio Max, Form Z, ElectricImage, Alias, SoftImage, Strata and more, Bill Fleming shows you how to:
* Add realistic imperfections, bevels, seams, nuts, bolts, and wear and tear to models
* Create a wide variety of material textures, including woods, metals, glass, plastics, paper, fabrics, skin, and more
* Enliven surfaces with color, luminosity, diffusion, secularity, glossiness, reflection, transparency, and bump
* Use camera position and focus to create the right mood
* Create lighting effects for every occasion

The 3D Photorealism Toolkit also contains a gold mine of valuable artist's resources, including a comprehensive listing of resources for visual modeling reference; an index of surface attributes for 30 common metals and 15 types of plastic and rubber; an index of refraction values for transparent materials; and a comprehensive chart listing light sources and their Kelvin ratings. * Demo versions of several 3D imaging programs
* Tutorials on modeling, staging, and surfacing
* Photorealistic models and image map textures you can download and use
* A 3D photorealism gallery
* All the images from the book detailed and in color
* Links to dozens of photorealistic resources

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Product Details

• Paperback: 352 pages
• Publisher: John Wiley & Sons; 1 edition (April 21, 1998)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0471253464
• ISBN-13: 978-0471253464
• Product Dimensions: 9 x 7.4 x 0.9 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.4 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 4.0 out of 5 stars See all reviews (20 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #1,010,923 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

16 of 16 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars EXCELLENT content, but grating prose idiosyncrasies, & no CD, March 16, 1999

By A Customer

The principles set forth in Bill's book and his in-depth explanations will be invaluable to any 3D artist/creator/animator. Anyone doubting his abilities need only view the very impressive gallery at his Komodo Studios website to be convinced.

That said, I feel compelled to also note that I personally find Bill's prose style extremely annoying. Rather than staying on point and sticking to the technical, he goes out of his way to write in a very conversational style. A lot of "let's take a minute and stretch our legs before we begin on the next chapter, shall we?" type of stuff that I can't stand. And one paragraph in particular stood out. He uses the phrase, "let's take a look" four times within six sentences. Sorry, ex-English major venting.

But worse, if you want color versions of the black & white illustrations in the book, and the accompanying 3D mesh and map files to follow along with his examples, you have to download all 30MB of them from his publisher's website. To NOT include a CD as so many other reference books now do (including some of Bill's other books) is inexcusable, especially considering how visually-oriented his subject matter is.

In the final analysis, I'll not hesitate to buy more (if not all) of Bill's books. Again, the content was phenomenal, I'll just have to grin and bear the way it's presented.

13 of 13 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars The Quest for Reality: A Primer., January 28, 1999

By A Customer

Bill Fleming's 3D PHOTOREALISM TOOLKIT is a valuable resource for anyone with a 3D rendering program. The book is a guide to creating realistic images with whatever program you are currently using. I was enticed into buying this from good things I had read elsewhere, and I must say I was not disappointed. The software I use (Caligari's trueSpace) is often ignored by writers of these sorts of books, who tend to focus on 3D Studio Max of Lightwave. Even though Mr. Fleming obviously uses one of these packages (3DSMAX, is my guess), this book is quite usable for people with less expensive packages. Most of the book centers on how to percieve your world and then translate this into your images. This fact, is the most important element that makes the book appropriate for any 3D package: reality isn't platform specific. Along with the many concrete examples and tutorials given, this book absolutely indespensible to anyone wishing to take their images to a new level. Only one thing detracts from the experience of the book: the black-and-white images are less than useful in showing what the author is talking about. Thankfully, all the images are available in the internet to be downloaded in full color (along with sample textures and models for the tutorials). However, considering the download times for some of the zip packages, I would have preferred a CD-Rom of the information. This book is a thorough and engaging primer for those seeking to create more realistic 3D images. The only thing missing from the book is the experience of reality: something no book can offer.

12 of 12 people found the following review helpful:

2.0 out of 5 stars Get Jeremy Birn's book first, November 16, 2000

By A Customer

Before you even think of buying this book, you should first read "Digital Lighting & Rendering" by Jeremy Birn. Birn's book covers many more subjects in much more detail. Fleming's book presents some useful theories about clutter. Other than that, compared to the Jeremy Birn book, "3D Photorealism Toolkit" has little to recommend it.