Author: Massimo Righi

Date : May 2010

Description

A quick illustration with my squirrel model.
The model had been made for animation purpose, the mesh is pretty lowpoly, around 6k and it uses about 220k hair prims.
For an HD rendering it takes about 3 minutes, the original hires image is 3k and it took about 15 mins.
Modelled with Maya, rendered with MentalRay.Shave and a Haircut for fur. The grass is fur matched with the background photo.

Author: Massimo Righi

Date : April 2010

Description

Another wildlife portrait, this time is a night shot of a leopard.
I' ve tested a pose/camera that could possibly better represent the feline.
I wanted a scene a bit over saturated even if taken in the night.
Modelled with maya, rendered with MentalRay. Shave and a haircut for fur. Photoshop for contrast and color enhancements.

Author: Massimo Righi

Date : April 2010

Description

A shot of a lion in a cage, I know I can be boring but I love that theme so much.
The title made me laugh the first time I' ve red it googling for image references:D.
The lion is made with Maya and rendered with MentalRay, Shave and A Haircut for fur, about 300k hair primitives..
Some postwork within photoshop for contrast and color gamma.

Author: Massimo Righi

Date : April 2010

Description

I wanted to test my horse model in B+W with dramatic/hard lighting.
The base mesh is lowpoly, around 4k quads + normal map made in Mudbox.
The background is a mix of photos and 3D elements (water splashes).
Some postwork in Photoshop (layers compositing, contrast and enhancement).
I rendered it using Maya/Mentalray with the "3" for geometry approximation.
The mane and the tail fur is made with Shave and a Haircut. The original rendering is 2500x3500 and it took about 1 hour.
Here you can find an HD turntable of the horse base mesh: Running Turntable .

Author: Massimo Righi

Date : July 2009

Description

Just another illustration with my wolf model. I' ve tried to achieve my childhood vision of it.
Maya for modelling, rendered with MentalRay, Shave and A Haicut for fur..
The background is 3D, I' ve used a textured sphere with self illumination for the moon. The trees are polygonal.
The rendering is made in a single pass and the hires version is 3636x2567 and took about 30 minutes to render it out.
Rendered in two passes and composited in photoshop, where I' ve played with contracts and color gamma.
The highres rendering is 2544x3588 pixels.

Author: Massimo Righi

Date : May 2009

Description

I' ve made this guy just for fun trying to focus on his expression, testing and learning some skin shading, texturing and fur on a human character.
The original head mesh is about 6k polys, here I' ve used a smoothed version (about 26k polys) just to avoid jegged edges.
The skin and clothes shaders are SSS and the hair/fur is made with Shave and A Haircut.
The rendering is made in a single pass and the hires version is 3636x2567 and took about 30 minutes to render it out.
No post work on the character just a simple straightforward rendering.

Author: Massimo Righi

Date : May 2009

Description

The idea was to make an illutration about experiments with animals.
I think everyone hate that...
I used Maya for modeling, Mudbox for detailing the mesh and for refining the textures.
Shave and a Haircut for fur and Photoshop for the textures and the final compositing.
No postwork on the final rendering, just a few colors and contrasts adjustments.
The background was made in Photoshop.
There are three 4k textures and the shaders are SSS.
The rendering time is about 1 hour and 30 minutes for the highres image 2657x3636.
I think it's pretty good considering the fur.

Author: Massimo Righi

Date : January 2009

Description

The wolf mesh is about 17k polygons and there are four hair systems for a total of 60k hair primitives.
I used Maya for modeling, Shave and Haircut for the fur and Mental Ray for rendering.
My goal was to have an animatable wolf model with fur keeping an eye to the render time per frame.
For an HD 720 rendering it needs about 10 minutes per frame.
I rendered the image in one single pass and there is no post work but some contrast enhancement in Photoshop and the compositing of the background image.
I had a great time working on this guy!

Author: Massimo Righi

Date : August 2008

Description

Just a bear illustration.
The bear has been modeled with Maya and rendered with MentalRay.
The bear mesh is about 15k maya faces and the textures are 4k.
I used Shave and Haicut for fur.
There are four hair systems (inner head, outer head, paws, body) for a total of about 350k hair primitives with multistrand of 4.
The image has been rendered in one single pass with alpha and Z-depth, than post processed in Photoshop for enhancing contrasts and for correcting the colors gamma.

Author: Massimo Righi

Date : July 2008

Description

A screaming Mandrill.
The original image resolution is 3850x2500.
I didn't use raytracing/Final Gather but just a pretty default MentalRay preset for fur...
I really enjoyed playing with fur!

Author: Massimo Righi

Date : March 2008

Description

Just a portrait of a Neapolitan Mastiff.
Maya/MentalRay.
Photoshop for gamma and contrast adjustments.

Author: Massimo Righi

Date : February 2008

Description

Just an illustration with the lions.
I used Maya for modeling, MR for rendering and Shave and Haircut for fur.
Textures, compositing and postwork with Photoshop.
The original image resolution is 3800x2375 and it took forever to render it out!
For the main pass I used medium quality render settings with FG and DOF.
The shadow raytracing quality wasn't high enough so I had to do some postwork to fill some "black" pixel.
I blurred some hard edges and make some correction to the contrasts and color gamma.
Finally I 've rendered the occlusion pass in separate parts and composited in Photoshop.

Author: Massimo Righi

Date : November 2007

Description

A classic view of a young tiger from Sriracha Tiger Zoo in Thailand.
Modeled with Maya, rendered with MentalRay.
Fur with Shave and Haircut.
With Photoshop I added an occlusion layer pass, contrast and color enhancement.
The final image is 3636x2772.
Total of six hair systems for the head and the side parts of the front legs just to match the 4k textures of the body.

Author: Massimo Righi

Date : June 2007

Description

Blu and Yellow Macaw.
I tried to catch an unusual angle view following some reference photos I took recently....Sad to see it behind bars...
Modeled with Maya 8.0, rendered with MentalRay.
For lighting setup i used an HRDI probe and 2 point lights.
No Postwork, only contrast enhancement with Photoshop.

Author: Massimo Righi

Date : June 2007

Description

I' ve always been fascinated by giraffes.
After many angle view tests I went for this one.
Hope you like it!
Modeled with Maya 8.0, rendered with MentalRay.
The fur is polygonal (no Maya fur) I used HRDI/FG and Dof.
The background is a photo taken during a recent trip to Borneo and it's been rendered within Maya.
No Postwork, only contrast and color gamma enhancement with Photoshop.

Author: Massimo Righi

Date : February 2007

Description

My little green Iguana finally tested with a background.
I've slightly modified the textures and the geometry of the previous model.
Made with Maya 8.0/MentalRay.
DOF and background rendered with MentalRay.
No Compositing/Postwork, only the contrast and the color gamma enhanced with Photoshop.

Author: Massimo Righi

Date : February 2007

Description

A tribute to my lovely dog 'Ironie' (1994-2001).
Modeled with Maya 8.0. Rendered with MentalRay.
DOF and background rendered in MR.
With Photoshop I've slightly added and enhanced part of the fur and I've changed the color gamma and contrasts.
I didn't mean it to be photorealistic, I tried to achieve more the 'illustration' look...

Author: Massimo Righi

Date : January 2007

Description

I just wanted to enhance my old Rottweiler model, made with Maya7.0 and rendered with MentalRay.
DOF and background rendered with MR.
Some postwork in Photoshop for fur, color gamma adjustments and contrast.

Author: Massimo Righi

Date : December 2006

Description

Alligator.
Modeled with Maya 8.0 - Rendered with MentalRay.
All textures (2048x2048) made with Photoshop - DOF and background rendered in MentalRay.
No postwork on both images.

Author: Massimo Righi

Date : December 2006

Description

Just a Green Frog (male).
Mo eled with Maya 8.0 , rendered with MentalRay.
Texture/Bump/Specular/Diffuse maps are 2048x2048.
DOF and background rendered with MentalRay.
No Compositing/Postwork.