Update (Patreon)

Hey Folks! Sorry for the lack of a sequence this week. Rest assured I've been busy being putting some stuff together but have also been looking to make a load of technical changes. I've been using the same techniques to model, pose, light and render my pics for over a year now and changing stuff has thrown all sorts of spanners into the works meaning I'm having to relearn a load of stuff.

For any renderers out there, previously I've been using HDRs to light the scenes and putting in a few mesh lights to boost the specular; this works well but I've never really been satisfied with the end results and using clipping planes to get the light in always means i'm fighting with the environments to get a consistent result. I've decided to start using solely mesh lights for the main source with ghost lights boosting the ambient; I'm finding these results a little more consistent and also shows off the better 8.1 textures which i find HRIs tend to squash. I'm also trying a 'cam light' of sorts just to fill in when theres too much shadow around the face etc. 

I'd be really interested in understand other methods if anyone out there has any suggestions. Primarily i've always focused on posing and I think a decent idea of an image trumps 'photo realism' but as the models and software get more fancy, i might as well see what can be achieved.