The demystification of dave hill! let's all help!

[julianmarsalis]

http://www.smashingmagazine.com/2008...d-water-drops/

http://www.entheosweb.com/photoshop/rain_effect.asp

http://www.tutorialman.com/rain_effect_tutorial.html

http://www.photoshopessentials.com/photo-effects/rain/

So many ways to create rain and water to enhance an image Dave is a king of compositing in his images if you watch his background videos...

[tetragramaton]

Not that I'm in pursuit of Dave Hill retouching, actually I'm more interested in his lighting and concept work with the models, but here I've done some think this Saturday .... and I've been watching a lot of Dave's behind the scene in attempt to understand the overall lighting concept.

[Adrian Payne]

Using 5 lights sure helps the process...

http://www.flickr.com/photos/adriand...5581/lightbox/

[julianmarsalis]

Man 2 ring lights nice I need to get me one one day...

[danny_kino]

Probably the best yet Adrian Payne

[danny_kino]

The photo from Adrian is far more DH than MTmm

[julianmarsalis]

Also never forget the best is http://www.davehillphoto.com/

lol I like AP work and MTmm work in the genre..

[JohnnyL]

I really would like to know how that rain is made so pristine. Any one have ideas other then the ones posted.

[julianmarsalis]

Knowing what I seen from Dave Hills background videos he could have shot the rain and then blended it in his image he is a master at compositing just check out his background videos from the shoots on his site.

[julianmarsalis]

Ugh watching Dave Hill latest behind the scene videos has me now wanting a ring flash again ><;; maybe just break down and get the alien bee one.....

[JohnnyL]

Yea i watched this video a couple dozen times. He is a serious inspiration, yet i couldnt see anything about rain.

[MikeWindle]

I use a similar style in my workflow. DH's style is a bit more heavy-handed than my liking, but I threw this together in about 10 minutes to try to duplicate.

Before:

http://farm5.static.flickr.com/4102/...b121c233_b.jpg

After:

http://farm5.static.flickr.com/4094/...512618dd_b.jpg

[kkamin]

Originally Posted by JohnnyL

I really would like to know how that rain is made so pristine. Any one have ideas other then the ones posted.

He might have used a particle generator in After Effects and matched the perspective. Or perhaps it was done in a 3D program.

Here is an example that I just did in After Effects. It's not perfect but you get the idea.

edit: The thing I like about using After Effects with the filter CC Rain is that you can set parameters like 'Varying Angle', so that the drops are not uniform in angle (I think it helps to sell it), and you can of course set Size, Length, Intensity, etc. I know there is another forum dedicated to integrating 2.5D or 3D software with Photoshop, but I am just getting into it and it blows my mind the possibilities it opens for still image compositing and still image effects. Check it out if you haven't!

[kkamin]

I had to play around with rain now on an actual image.

Here is a crude rain effect applied to one of my photos. I created two types of rain in After Effects: long drops and short drops using 'CC Rain'. (I also added a slight fast blur in AE) I brought them into PS in different layers and masked the short drops off the magician to help create some additional depth--it doesn't make any literal sense, but I think it was a quick and dirty way to add subtle depth.

I should have reduced the opacity or removed the rain drops going directly over his face but I did this in about 3 minutes.

[JohnnyL]

interesting, ive never thought of using anything other then photoshop

[misho]

Maybe this help someone. Enjoy :-)

http://www.billsimonephotography.com/wordpress/?p=28

[egnoc]

what fools! you'll are crying over rain drops! thats the least thing he'd expect you'll to worry about - you get very good results with custom brushes - why does everything have to be a shortcut - or a noise applied with motion blur - why cant you see that every splash added is painstakingly done? with accuracy! Use your heads - not the filters and shortcuts!

If you'll think youve seen the behind the scenes, watch them again! he's has in particular shown how he has added the water trails in his latest series, learn to watch carefully! not just assume a davehill effect with a filter

Im no smartass over this whole davehill effect shbang, but daymn, atleast try and understand its a process and things done with a reason and not overly done!

[jsojunkie]

Dave Hill work is so interesting!

[kkamin]

Originally Posted by egnoc

what fools! you'll are crying over rain drops! thats the least thing he'd expect you'll to worry about - you get very good results with custom brushes - why does everything have to be a shortcut - or a noise applied with motion blur - why cant you see that every splash added is painstakingly done? with accuracy! Use your heads - not the filters and shortcuts!

If you'll think youve seen the behind the scenes, watch them again! he's has in particular shown how he has added the water trails in his latest series, learn to watch carefully! not just assume a davehill effect with a filter

Im no smartass over this whole davehill effect shbang, but daymn, atleast try and understand its a process and things done with a reason and not overly done!

There are countless ways to achieve any effect. I don't think there is anything wrong with sharing ideas on how a particular effect might have been done. Dave Hill isn't Jesus Christ, and there are perhaps better techniques out there than he uses. I personally think it is more interesting to not know how he did something and have people share their ideas on how to achieve something similar. The process expands our understanding of digital manipulating and compositing by looking at it from different angles.

[egnoc]

Originally Posted by kkamin

There are countless ways to achieve any effect. I don't think there is anything wrong with sharing ideas on how a particular effect might have been done. Dave Hill isn't Jesus Christ, and there are perhaps better techniques out there than he uses. I personally think it is more interesting to not know how he did something and have people share their ideas on how to achieve something similar. The process expands our understanding of digital manipulating and compositing by looking at it from different angles.

I totally agree with you - but what I don't agree is with people asking how to achieve realistic rain drops as HE did - i mean there are a billions ways to do realistic rain drops, the last thing you'd want to know is how he did his variation on the rain drops - for which he dave hill has already said, he has used a custom brush for that....

i mean, alright, after effects- shove in the particular plugin, move a couple of frames ahead - voila, you've got tons of rain simulating programs and plugins, custom brushes, even better, slow your camera shutter and take a photograph of water sprinkling - you want ideas on how to make rain drops - there are a million!

[JohnnyL]

are you serious?

[Boneappetit]

Originally Posted by superkoax

eternal: Thanks for replying! Well the layer 1 copy is the dodge and burn layer! If you push up the opacity to 100% you'll see it's all black and white "painting"...This is painting on the picture without destroying it...

My workflof is as follows:

- duplicate original picture...
-get the right colurs you want in curves
- on the duplicate picture i made it b&w in channel mixer. Adjustments-channel mixer. Push the monochrome button. then play with the channel buttons there...try to get more shadows and more light without the picture looking wierd(overexposed or underexsposed)



Gerry

Hi Gerry: I know this is a very old post, I just decided to use your workflow, as written above, but I got a doubt here. When you check your monochrome button the pictures turns to B W, OK... After that, do you change your blending mode or what? How do you get color into the picture again? The only thing I could do in order to put color back was change the blend mode to soft light, but the results are not that good. I'll appreciate your feedback... Thanx

[bakerser]

Originally Posted by Boneappetit

Hi Gerry: I know this is a very old post, I just decided to use your workflow, as written above, but I got a doubt here. When you check your monochrome button the pictures turns to B W, OK... After that, do you change your blending mode or what? How do you get color into the picture again? The only thing I could do in order to put color back was change the blend mode to soft light, but the results are not that good. I'll appreciate your feedback... Thanx

Try setting it to "Luminosity" and see if that does more like you think it ought.

[Boneappetit]

Originally Posted by bakerser

Try setting it to "Luminosity" and see if that does more like you think it ought.

Thanx a lot bakerser, it works just fine. Gerry skipped this step on his post.

[Fadewoodarts]

Oh my gosh, this thread still lives... of coarse it does..

http://www.fadewoodstudios.com/getfucked.png

[CARLOSGDAVILA]

wow.. it took me about 3 months of in-office, boss-watching-out-for time to get to this final post! its November 22 2010! this is amazing!.. and may I add, a very helpful post to boost PS skills. just by following the links on this post my pre and post production skills have seriously improved.. this is what these forums are all about people!

[Juice Box]

This is a good thread. A bit of arguing in the middle though lol

[Hyperviolet]

my attempt...

http://myfreefilehosting.com/f/fff37a00cb_10.4MB

[Hyperviolet]

Originally Posted by Fadewoodarts

Oh my gosh, this thread still lives... of coarse it does..

http://www.fadewoodstudios.com/getfucked.png

what techniques did you use for that image?

[Boneappetit]

Originally Posted by Hyperviolet

what techniques did you use for that image?

Check out the beginning of this thread.