Part 17 - the (close) Encounters Project

Posted by RW Groothuis · December 04, 2020

The (close) Encounters Project - Part 17 - Denis Pontonnier - HDR Panorama portrait

About the ( close ) Encounters project

This is a ongoing *) project that started about 2009 and is called the ( close ) Encounters.

The HDR ( High Dynamic Range ) portrait panorama’s are made out of 63 pictures (minimal 9 exposures per angle, 7 angles so 63 images are used to make a HDR portrait panorama.

That makes taking the image with some thrill — it could be ruined due to the fact that if the people are moving the portrait could fail. That idea makes it fascinating for me to do it, Its always exiting to shoot. Warn the "customers" *) in advance: “we will see in the final image who moved, so do not dare to move!” Until now ( almost ) everyone has listened very good in the portrait shoots from the last years.

More background about this project please see here.

*) this is a non - commercial project

( close ) Encounters project - Part 17 - Denis Pontonnier

This edition is a very special one and "a bit" different then previous ( close ) Encounters Portraits. There was no possibility to record a HDR Panorama portrait of Denis so brainstormed a alternative one: a exclusive cg rendered HDR Panorama portrait. Denis recorded the beautiful sky, positioned the kerstrel and created/rendered the 360°/VR scene.

Websites

a) Personal website + ( Free ) Lightwave 3D Plugins

b) The round of seasons and its animal totem - info page

The round of seasons and its animal totem - Short film documentary-animation 52mn

ENGLISH

FRENCH

SPANISH

c) The round of seasons and its animal totem - Making-of

You can read all about the making-of here.

Panorama

First just show the panorama. Below those you can find some more info how this project started and other background notes.

view 360°/VR

ATTENTION!:

when clicking on view 360°/VR another browser window opens so if nothing happens check the Block Popup window.

Technical Notes:

Asked Denis to send to notes on how he made this:

1) Layout_Pano

Below a screenshot of the pano scene, rendered in a few hours in one pass with an Advanced Camera of the Layout, so the preview shows the direct spherical projection of the camera. Lightened with LightWave 3D Sunsky Sun and Sky Lights matching the background sky and radiosity.

The (close) Encounters Project - Part 17 - Denis Pontonnier - LightWave 3D - Layout Pano

2) Layout_Pano

Below a screenshot of the Kestrel scene, rendered separately faster to compute, so easy to modify, You can see the bird skeleton used to set the pose. Here I use a Perspective Camera at the same position, for adjusting the pose, then rendered a limited region around the bird, with the same Advanced Camera used for the pano.

The (close) Encounters Project - Part 17 - Denis Pontonnier - LightWave 3D - Layout Kestrel

Render was 32 bit, exposed with a slight level correction, no Color grading, just a few other passes for a subtlet fog and bloom.

Both images have been composited later.

Colofon:

Many thanks to Denis Pontonnier!

Last update 4 December 2020:

Next HDR panorama portrait adventure is not known yet. For sure there will popup a new one somewhere in the future.

Other Editions ( close ) Encounters

Note:

Not had the time to put all older ( close ) Encounters back online. Below you can see all HDR panorama portrait 's that are currently online. The rest will appear later.

More background about this project please see here.