Hi
First of all - my name is Vali and I'm a "greenie" in 3D. Had no experience whatsoever until I started to play with Google Earth Studio several months ago. Trying to improve the visual aspect of the clips I've made I've found HitFilm. Playing with HitFilm I've started to enjoy is 3D model support, but I've got quickly frustrated for not being able to do more. So about a month ago I've found iClone and I was - and I am - really, trully impressed how powerful, rich and easy to use it is. Apart from its user manual, I've watched many of RL tutorials, two favorite YT channels - WarLord and Adolf Antareus - and, voila, this is what I would call my "Hello, world!" in iClone. It's only 1:35 - I'm doing this as a hobby, you know, after work, weekends - and, since has no sound, I've called it "Body Language". I hope that by the end of the month to finish the whole "take". Thanks and congratulations to RL team for their great software!

Edit: link updated to the most recent version:




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Software developer. iClone hobbyist since January 11, 2020. Best work so far: Robots among us: The Lab and The sad end of a legend
In progress: Black Mamba
AMD Ryzen 3950X 16C/32T 4.2 GHz, 64GB RAM, RTX2080 11GB, 2TB Samsung 970 Pro SSD, 8TB Seagate BarraCuda HDD, Win11 64-bit, iClone 8.12

Hey welcome to the forums, and well done first little clip!

If you want some critiquing, the lighting could be better. Have you tried adding a candle, and using natural light? IClone has IBL lighting but in some scenes I've had better results with it off.

Maybe add a few candles or something to spice it up, and darken the scene more? Just a thought, anyways can't wait to see more of it.

Also I'm having an issue with eye sparkling just as you are in the end. In the scene I'm working on it looks really bad, but in yours it's not that noticeable. However if anyone knows how to get rid of the eye sparkles altogether, please let me know!

IMDB: James Muia
Aviticus Dragon on YouTube

Computer Specs:
Intel® Core™ i7-7820X Processor (8x 4.30GHz/11MB L3 Cache)
Corsair Hydro Series H115i 280mm
Liquid CPU CoolerASUS ROG STRIX X299-E Gaming Motherboard
32 GB DDR4-3200 GSKILL Ripjaws V Memory
NVIDIA GeForce GTX 1080 Ti - 11GB - EVGA FTW3

Thank you very much, James!

I know, there's a lot to learn before, and also I'm trying to "steal" some of cinematographer's techniques from movies I watch. In this particular clip the lights were (intended to be) influenced by the old BBC Thames series and old italian movies - the dark, but not overly dark, heavily furnitured rooms. Apart from this, the critic in me is very unhappy especially about the walk and facial expressions; the walk start/loop/end in iClone are great for outside walk, here I had to implement only two steps to the bed and the guy was moving like being late for work. I've tried to slow down the clip, to lower exaggeration, to apply ease-in and accelerate curves, but he still looks very mechanical. And the face expressions... well, if you saw Terminator Genisys, Schwarzanegger's attempted smile was a cute, childish one compared to what I've done, my smiling characters looked even more horrifiying than Cats, if this could be possible. But, as I said, a lot to learn - and I'm enjoing it.


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Software developer. iClone hobbyist since January 11, 2020. Best work so far: Robots among us: The Lab and The sad end of a legend
In progress: Black Mamba
AMD Ryzen 3950X 16C/32T 4.2 GHz, 64GB RAM, RTX2080 11GB, 2TB Samsung 970 Pro SSD, 8TB Seagate BarraCuda HDD, Win11 64-bit, iClone 8.12

Thanks for providing more detail on the scene, that does make more sense!
What's most important is that you're enjoying yourself. 
I'm still learning too. There's always something new that I want to 'try' and need to figure out how to do it in IClone. There are also many different ways to achieve the same results. As you said with the facial features, it takes time to make them look less mechanical. Sometimes slowing down the movements, or applying fade ins/curves, or a combination of both is the remedy.
Just keep at it!

IMDB: James Muia
Aviticus Dragon on YouTube

Computer Specs:
Intel® Core™ i7-7820X Processor (8x 4.30GHz/11MB L3 Cache)
Corsair Hydro Series H115i 280mm
Liquid CPU CoolerASUS ROG STRIX X299-E Gaming Motherboard
32 GB DDR4-3200 GSKILL Ripjaws V Memory
NVIDIA GeForce GTX 1080 Ti - 11GB - EVGA FTW3

I just added another couple of seconds - it nears now 2 mins - to my clip and, before going outside, I will have to move the cameras around a bit and I will need a bit of advice with props, if somebody knows or has an idea:



I wanted that room to had that kind of single-guy-mess look resembling a college dorm, if you get the picture. So I plan to throw around some clothes, like on the chair, for instance. Well, here I hit the following problem: I didn't find out how to use/export a cloth as a prop - tried a bit with 3DXChange and CC but no avail. So for clothes I'm thinking to use the following trick involving iClone's physical cloth feature:
- from CC export an image of desired cloth (shirt / jeans). Then in iClone I will create a physical cloth, using that image both as diffuse and opacity textures in order to get a transparent backgroun and have the cloth only. Then, being a physical cloth, it will quite realistically be "thrown" on that chair and any irregular static prop.

For shoes I don't think this could apply, so I'm thinking to use billboard plane feature:
- I will create a separate iClone/CC project (careful with lights) with the character wearing the shoes, then I will hide character's body. I will export the "3D image" then in the main project I will use it as a billboard placed next to the bed, or wherever would be necessary.

I haven't tried yet any of these but, according to what I've read so far in RL tutorials, seems to be possible.
Thanks!

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Software developer. iClone hobbyist since January 11, 2020. Best work so far: Robots among us: The Lab and The sad end of a legend
In progress: Black Mamba
AMD Ryzen 3950X 16C/32T 4.2 GHz, 64GB RAM, RTX2080 11GB, 2TB Samsung 970 Pro SSD, 8TB Seagate BarraCuda HDD, Win11 64-bit, iClone 8.12

Beautiful lady. She reminds me someone. Was it a head shot of anyone in particular? Viper?

To separating cloth subject. It is very easy to separate any cloth/shoes (even without an export license for it): https://forum.reallusion.com/FindPost324962.aspx

Thanks!
Indeed she's beautiful, we'll have to thank Dorothy Jean (I saw she's member of the forum), she's the one who made the original, me I bought it from RL marketplace, here's the link:

https://marketplace.reallusion.com/addison_220144



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Software developer. iClone hobbyist since January 11, 2020. Best work so far: Robots among us: The Lab and The sad end of a legend
In progress: Black Mamba
AMD Ryzen 3950X 16C/32T 4.2 GHz, 64GB RAM, RTX2080 11GB, 2TB Samsung 970 Pro SSD, 8TB Seagate BarraCuda HDD, Win11 64-bit, iClone 8.12

Your clip looks fantastic!! Love it!! And Thank you for the compliments on the character face.  I created her skin by combining facial features from photos off 3DSK.com  I use photoshop's "Auto blend layers" feature to mix and match different eyes, nose, and mouth from different photos. I also hand paint the makeup onto the skin with photoshop or substance painter. I created the head morph by just tweaking the base female head in Blender.

@4u2ges I just followed your advice and it worked like a charm, thanks again! I've added a pair of boots next to "bed", and a jacket and a shirt on the chair (well, the shirt is so torn apart by the gravity it reminds everything but a shirt, but in this visual context is even better, lol) I think I've succeeded also to smoothen a bit those motions so they could look more natural, but still room for improvements - as I said, this is my "Hello, world!" in iClone.

@Dorothy, thank you very much, glad you like it! I promise I will take care of her - she's / will be a positive character, obviously

So this is the latest update, just passed 2 mins barrier (2.03) The whole "take" is a one single piece, done entirely in iClone, no video editing, image enhancements and so on - iClone is holding steady




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Software developer. iClone hobbyist since January 11, 2020. Best work so far: Robots among us: The Lab and The sad end of a legend
In progress: Black Mamba
AMD Ryzen 3950X 16C/32T 4.2 GHz, 64GB RAM, RTX2080 11GB, 2TB Samsung 970 Pro SSD, 8TB Seagate BarraCuda HDD, Win11 64-bit, iClone 8.12

Yes, I also was into other softwares (a long time ago) and one day also I discovered this software while searching the internet and I quickly bought it.
I find it great also although the way I see that its how well people understand using it is what makes good videos'. I definitely see your understanding it well enough already.
Yes we need to continuously learn to use everything in it and I am still learning how to use all of it well too....mostly because it keeps getting updated really well with new things to learn to use well. I started with iClone4 and it has improved so far from there.


i7-3770 3.4GHz CPU 16 GB Ram   
GeForce GTX1080 TI 11GB
Windows 10 Pro 64bit