Sign In
Sign in
English

TopBanners12070903.jpg

July 9, 2012 12:00 AM

How good can Blender be for photorealistic food visualizaiton?
What's the advantage of using 3D renders for food advertisement? Does it worth it effort?
Here's an interesting observation made by Tommy Helgevold.
Tommy is an 18-year-long veteran in the CG industry
and is the creator of the 3D hot dog featured on the article
Blender & Food - the Possibility published last week here on www.BlenderNews.org.-Editor in Chief.

by Tommy Helgevold 

The company I work for (crbyra.se) is a small ad agency. We do everything from catalogs, local magazines to film and 3D product visualizations. 

Even though we have a full 3D studio Max 2013 suite with Mental Ray and Vray Advanced, we feel that Blender is an important part of the diversity of possibilities. Personally I've been using (and compiling the latest breed of Blender software) for years, all the way since NaN and where Blender had to be bought to unlock it for web publishing work, and was bought free later on to become the awesome alternative to the expensive commercial packages it is now.

Open source is important because it pushes the limits of what can be done, rather than producing something meant for sale only. It makes it possible for many people to participate and innovate without corporate boundaries and limitations, this of course means that there may not be much money to be made to start with, but the experience and speed of development is unheard of, and very often lead to real work as there are many talents working with and for the development of Blender.

At home, Blender is my personal choice, I don't even bring the cumbersome 3D studio max license transfer with me home, as I'd need the Vray license dongle and transfer the license for 3D studio max all the time, that is just bothersome and restricting, with Blender I can work anywhere under any OS. At work we have mostly MACs but I work on a fairly powerful PC with 2 large touch screens. I feel that the "hands-on" approach for sculpting and painting is the way of the future even if I am one of those veterans that origins from the good old DOS days (or in my case - Commodore 64 / Amiga days). 

At work we use Blender when it's important to get a fairly good result really fast. I know of NO software on this planet that can be used to get a finished result as fast as Blender. I've been using 3D studio max for MANY years, all the way since v1.2 to 2013, but NOTHING beats the workflow of the Blender interface and system, it's modelling tools are just that much more practical and well though out. I've won quite a bit of speed-modelling contests because of this little (still unknown fact, to most professionals). Most professionals just want to get the job done, but a lot of them doesn't really believe in free (open source) software alternatives, maybe that will change one day, but until then - we at the company really enjoy this little "secret." 

Tommy-Helgevold.jpg

A Little About the Story Behind the Hot Dog

We had this client that came to our office one day, and I overheard one of my colleagues having a discussion with him about the photographed hot dog that came from one of our professional photographers, something about the hot dog looking too sloppy ... too ... dry ... too old, and the ketchup just didn't come out right, and it wasn't even delicious looking as it didn't have any grill marks, etc ... .

...Then I suggested that we could to it in 3D, the client rolled his eyes and shook his head at this, 3D food? Yeah right. And he's right of course, it's VERY difficult to make convincing food in 3D, just do a search on google on 3D hot dog and see how many realistic 3D images of hot dogs you can find, I bet this will change since some of us made the first step but for now, you can see for yourself. 

So I decided to take up the challenge, and 7 hours later I came up with the above result. I could go further and improve it of course, but time is a luxury, and we feel it was okay for 7 hours of work, after all - this "photo" could be taken from any angle and no re-shoot, or photo setup would be needed, the hot dog would always remain fresh and "edible" looking, this is one of the major advantages with 3D ..., if you do it right.

competencereklam.jpg

Don't kid yourself though, I've got 18 years experience in the 3D industry, it takes practice, and there is an old saying that still goes - everything can be improved, I'm nowhere NEAR as skilled as many of the artists you'll eg. find on Cgtalk.com (just take a look at their 3D choice gallery, and you'll get the picture). But it goes to show that there is a niche for everyone out there. Just because you're not the hottest thing in 3D pixar style, doesn't mean you can't make a living out of it, I've done that for years, and I'm still not "pixar material," but I am a professional, I make a living of what I do, and so are many of you out there.

So many things can be done with 3D, and Ad agencies all around the world are just barely beginning to get the point, they STILL work the old fashion way with photography and photoshopping, this is changing now, but it's hard work. My boss works really hard to get the clients, and the clients doesn't always see the possibilities the way we see them. In fact, it's not unusual for us to have to provide some example work for our new potential clients--featuring THEIR stuff--just because without 3D modelling experience, the clients are unable to understand that modelling is just modelling no matter what you're making. If you can model a human, I can pretty much promise you that you'll be capable of modelling a camera. The other way around, however, is not so easy.

But it's coming, people are becoming more and more aware of this, and we're getting more and more customers, we even made an entire smoke house (for smoking sausages!) with the entire factory process animated just to help a client of ours, tell HIS customers how this infernal super machine (the size of a small house) actually works, and he sold more machines that he expected on this. This is how VALUABLE 3D illustrations are!

Related links:
1. http://www.competencereklam.se
2. http://blendernews.org/xe/index.php?mid=Feature_Articles&page=1&document_srl=1561
3. http://blenderartists.org/forum/showthread.php?247686-Hot-Dog-(food-in-3D)&highlight=food

List of Articles
Subject Date Views
Blender Retrospectives 2020 Blender Retrospective Feb 20, 2021 211079
Tutorials Free Online Blender Tutorials Released in 2019 Worthy of Your Note - for Animation & VFX file Jan 25, 2020 563207
Tutorials Free Online Blender Tutorials Released in 2019 Worthy of Your Note - for CG, Games & Viz file Jan 25, 2020 426303
Tutorials Top 12 Free Online Blender Tutorials Released in 2019 file Jan 25, 2020 432047
Tutorials Top 15 Highest-Rated Free Online Blender Tutorials Released in 2019 file Jan 25, 2020 375962
Tutorials Free Online Blender Tutorials Released in 2018 for Blender 2.8 file Jan 23, 2019 345112
Tutorials Free Online Blender Tutorials Released in 2018 Worthy of Your Note - for CG, Games & Viz file Jan 23, 2019 684397
Tutorials Free Online Blender Tutorials Released in 2018 Worthy of Your Note - for Animation & VFX file Jan 23, 2019 408483
Tutorials Top 12 Free Online Blender Tutorials Released in 2018 file Jan 23, 2019 345014
Render of the Year Render of the Year Awards 2018: Winners Annouced file Jan 02, 2019 381751
Blender Retrospectives 2018 Blender Retrospective file Jan 02, 2019 376145
Tutorials Top 12 Free Online Blender Tutorials Released in 2017 file Jan 09, 2018 969087
Blender Retrospectives 2017 Blender Retrospective file Jan 01, 2018 696879
Render of the Year Render of the Year Awards 2017: Winners Annouced file Dec 26, 2017 550845
Tutorials Top 12 Free Online Blender Tutorials (Videos) Released in 2016 file Jan 16, 2017 765494
Blender Retrospectives 2016 Blender Retrospective file Dec 29, 2016 1060403
Render of the Year Render of the Year Awards 2015: Seven Winners Annouced file Jan 20, 2016 790650
Blender Retrospectives 2015 Blender Retrospective file Jan 12, 2016 762364
Tutorials Top 12 Free Online Blender Tutorials Released in 2015 file Jun 26, 2015 805716
Render of the Year Render of the Year Awards 2014: Five Winners Annouced file Jan 02, 2015 813938
Tutorials Top 12 Free Online Blender Tutorials Released in 2014 file Dec 11, 2014 852804
Render of the Week '... Reality TV?' by Didier Barreteau - the Winner of the Week of September 22, 2014 file Sep 22, 2014 37431
Product Visualization PRODUCT VISUALIZATION IN BLENDER for the week of September 22, 2014 file Sep 22, 2014 33264
Render of the Week 'Twenty Thousand Leagues under the Sea' by Grant Parsley - the Winner of the Week of September 15, 2014 file Sep 15, 2014 37492
Architectural Visualization ARCHITECTURAL VISUALIZATION IN BLENDER for the week of September 15, 2014 file Sep 15, 2014 39869
Product Visualization PRODUCT VISUALIZATION IN BLENDER for the week of September 8, 2014 file Sep 08, 2014 34664
Render of the Week 'Mercenaries' by Kalinin Dmitrii - the Winner of the Week of September 1, 2014 file Sep 01, 2014 36098
Architectural Visualization ARCHITECTURAL VISUALIZATION IN BLENDER for the week of September 1, 2014 file Sep 01, 2014 32584
Render of the Week 'Rainy Day in the Forest' by Niko Maisuradze - the Winner of the Week of August 25, 2014 file Aug 26, 2014 34705
Product Visualization PRODUCT VISUALIZATION IN BLENDER for the week of August 25, 2014 file Aug 26, 2014 32621
Render of the Week 'Green Basilisk' by Michael Grebstad - the Winner of the Week of August 18, 2014 file Aug 18, 2014 38290
Architectural Visualization ARCHITECTURAL VISUALIZATION IN BLENDER for the week of August 18, 2014 file Aug 18, 2014 33050
Render of the Week 'The Waterfall House' by Mateusz Kociolek - the Winner of the Week of August 11, 2014 file Aug 11, 2014 37717
Product Visualization PRODUCT VISUALIZATION IN BLENDER for the week of August 11, 2014 file Aug 11, 2014 33232
Render of the Week 'Fiend of Chaos' by Kfir Merlaub - the Winner of the Week of August 4, 2014 file Aug 05, 2014 33868
Architectural Visualization ARCHITECTURAL VISUALIZATION IN BLENDER for the week of August 4, 2014 file Aug 05, 2014 34628
Render of the Week 'Gladiador de las arenas' by Pablo Rethemias - the Winner of the Week of July 28, 2014 file Jul 29, 2014 34739
Product Visualization PRODUCT VISUALIZATION IN BLENDER for the week of July 28, 2014 file Jul 29, 2014 32058
Render of the Week 'Construction Site' by Roberto Dailey - the Winner of the Week of July 21, 2014 file Jul 21, 2014 38416
Blender Whiz The Artist Behind 'Creek:' Abdul-mu'min Smith file Jul 21, 2014 49357
Render of the Week 'Nectar: Media Center Bar' by Enrico Cerica - the Winner of the Week of July 14, 2014 file Jul 14, 2014 36268