Closing down the blog

It’s time. Lots going on in the real world now and I just don’t have the time anymore to do this. And so much has changed in the DAZ Studio/Poser/Other Rendering Programs world that what I have here is, frankly, out-dated and not terribly useful anymore.

Also, my hosting provider has increased prices and it’s become too expensive for me to justify continuing.

I’ll keep things open for a month or so. Anyone who’s interested can download the zip files and you have my permission to redistribute them and related promo images. After I close down the hosting account the zip files and some images will no longer be available for download off redeyecat.

I won’t delete anything in the freebie section at Renderosity.

I will be closing down comments too though I’ll keep the blog open for reading.

It has been a lot of fun and I’ve met so many great folks who shared my interests. Hope you all will keep rendering and making pretty pictures! I know I’m going to try buy (horde?) less and render more too.

Edited to add: Okay, it occurred to me that I could dump all the zip files on Google Drive. Duh. I think this link should do it. It’s a lot, but at least they’re alphabetical!

Freebie: 10 expressions for Babina 8

OMG, I made a freebie! It’s been a while…

I really like Babina 8 and had been making expressions for her for various projects. Thought I’d share them. They might work OK with other G8F characters but I haven’t tried them out on any others. Kinda lazy of me!

Facial expressions only, no eye poses.

Here’s a few renders of what they look like with some basic eye and upper body posing.

Download here: https://www.redeyecat.com/rec_babina-8-expressions.zip

🙂

Totally failed at Halloween

😦 Sigh…there was too much going on and so not much happened with me. Due to the virus, Halloween eve was pretty low-key. We had all of two trick-or-treaters this year. At least they were cute little ones!

This was as far as I got with my ghost lady kit-bash. I suppose it can wait until next Halloween, or when I’m in the mood to play with it again.

Not a bad start but still needs a lot of work. Good thing I have many months to get things done.

So while I was off doing other stuff, DAZ released a new version of Studio with yet another render engine, though one I don’t think will be of much use to me. Hivewire is closing their store, but at least a number of their products will migrate over to Renderosity. That’s a relief.

The family isn’t getting together for Christmas and the winter holidays won’t feel very festive this year — though the cats are having way too much fun with the tree skirt and ornaments. Cats just being cats; the whole house is their playground.

I think I’ll still make cookies for the holidays and we’ll do our annual drive around to go “oooh!” and “aaaah!” over the light displays. Brief visits to drop off presents and wave hello. My son and his girlfriend acquired another dog — her name is Ripley — so I’d like to meet the newest fur child.

Maybe we’ll get lucky and have snow — driving around to look at light displays feels more festive to me if there’s snow, but it’s been a while since we had a white Christmas in southern Wisconsin. Quite a change from when I was growing up. I suppose climate change is to blame.

Anyway, a “happy holidays!” to the visitors to RedEyeCat! I sincerely hope 2021 will be a much better year.

Halloween 2020: Kit-bashing a spooky mirror

So my creepy curio cabinet kit-bashing is side-lined a while due to a shortage of creepy bits and pieces. I have enough to do a curio case, I think, or a small cabinet, so I’ll come back to the project when I have more time to go trawling through all my stuff for things I may have missed.

And now I’d really like to put together something like these:

 

The second one is more of a glass and mirror mix, but it’s the same general idea. The first one looks doable with any combination of these resources and props I already have:

Mirrors:

I probably have more standing mirrors in other environment sets, but it’s a good start. And a mirrored surface can be added to any picture frame prop too.

Resources: The Forgotten Refuge; Baroque Mirror (free); Everyday Frames & Mirrors; Mirror/Frame (free); Swing Mirror Set (free), Vintage Frames.

Ripple FX:

 

The first one has round and square ripple versions.

Resources: Liquid Pack and DS4 version of the Spacebones Liquid Objects set (free.)

Shaders:

Resources: Subsurface Goop Shaders; Metalized Glass Shaders; Subsurface Workshop – SSS Shaders for Iray; Anodized Shaders for Iray; Subsurface Gummy & Plastic Shaders.

The last one, Iray Gelatin Shaders, was a freebie by AllenArt, but she deleted most of her freebies from ShareCG so it’s no longer available. There is an iray wax shader at DAZ, but I don’t own it.

So going to try and get a test version done by tonight or tomorrow. Will report back on my success or failure!  👻

Halloween 2020: Bone decor

Not a lot of bones, true. There seems to be a lack of single bone props that aren’t skulls. So just a skull and an ulna (I think) from Them Bones and a free ram skull by Mortem Vetus. If you’re more serious about bone decor, check out their freebies. Those folks do bones!

Also used the (still) free Fantasy Banquet Set, which I acquired ages ago from RuntimeDNA. I applied different wood and metal shaders to the table and chairs and gold dishes. Eating utensils and napkins from the Grandeur Dinner Service set. Food: really old grape props, the Poser-version of Exnem’s Fruits (I bought it before there was a DS version), cupcakes and platter from A Curious Tea: Eat me, and a wine bottle from Wondrous Wares. The panicked-looking pumpkin is from Halloween Whimsey Props. Environment is DM’s Secret Chamber, sky dome from Flink’s Sky 2 Sunset, with a Vanilla Evening HDRI added to the Architectural Lighting Rig’s UE light, along with an AoA ambient light (specular only) and a couple of extra spotlights. I was going to add point lights to the candles but this had already taken me all day to set up and so I skipped it. Too lazy! Oh, and Cato forG8 Male and the Jasper Black outfit.

Originally I’d planned to place an entire skeleton on the table, somewhat disarticulated, and then arrange food around the bones. But the table was a little on the small side for all that and I figured maybe such a scene would be a bit much. 

Other decor ideas for displaying bones (and whatever slightly or very creepy bits and pieces collected over the years) involves filling a curio cabinet or curiosity case. Something like these:

I’m not sure what might available to kit-bash the curiosity case, but there is a free Curio Cabinet and a Letterpress Case available. Probably not too hard to make one yourself from cube primitives — has the advantage of being able to custom fit your props.

I thought there had been a vampire hunting kit that came with a box, which might be kit-bashable into a curiosity case, but I can’t seem to find it now.

Any recommendations for separate bone parts, human, humanoid, or animal? Free or commercial is okay. I’d like to use a hand without having to load an entire skeleton and then hide all the bones I don’t want to be visible.

Somewhere along the line I acquired a free dinosaur (T-Rex?) skull and a free cow skull, but I can’t remember where I found them. The dino skull is pretty cool tho:

Recommendations for other weird and/or creepy things to put in cases/boxes/jars welcome! I can always use more weird stuff.