Image Dump: Experiments

I have a number of test renders sitting on my hard drive that I'm too busy or too preoccupied with other work to ever revisit. Each one of them needs work: some adjustment, maybe some additional content, and most importantly a lengthier, better quality render. Some of them were just experiments that led to a final image. Some are just alternative camera angles. But between the Raiders of the Lost Eye comic, the Test Lab serial, and the other, newer images it strikes my fancy to create, I probably won't get back to these anytime soon... or ever. Rather than leave them alone and unappreciated, I'm sharing them here.

This first image is one of the earliest pictures of Candy/Duster I ever created; I don't think I'd managed to create her costume by this point. Obviously I had to put her in a peril situation. Obviously. If you look closely and compare her body here to more recent images (such as the Test Lab series), you'll notice that I changed her "skin" to a more realistic, less plastic-y looking version.

Just to give you an idea how much difference a skin makes, here are a couple of test images of Candy/Duster with different skins. In the first one she's wearing the skin from the Lorraine for Genesis 2 Females figure that I eventually decided to use for her. I definitely like the realistic look of this skin—the freckles on the chest, the puckering of the aerolae, the pores on the skin of the breasts. But when I acquired the Olympia figure I thought I'd try out her skin on Duster just to see if it looked better. It didn't, as you can see in the second image. It's nice but it's a little too smooth and featureless, I think. Also, look at how her expression changed: she went from having a look of mild determination (which is appropriate for a superheroine) to morose sadness (which is not). I stuck with what was working. (Interestingly Rita/Whirlwind uses the same skin but is completely based on the Lorraine figure. You'd have to look very closely at both characters to realize this, I think.)

These next three images feature Duster, still with her initial skin and with earlier versions of some of her costume elements (such as the visor), in the clutches of a villainess I have since named "Short Fuse" (thanks to RenderPretender for the suggestion). I was still learning how to do things, such as positioning figures. Look closely (especially in the third picture) and you'll notice (a) the thugs don't really have a firm grip of Duster's limbs and (b) Short Fuse's fingers are embedded in Duster's flesh. You probably wouldn't notice those things without having them pointed out to you but for me they're glaring errors.

The next sequence of images are all experiments that eventually led to a strip club scene I wrote for "Motor Control", the new novella I added to The Domination Variations, as well as this image posted at DA which illustrates said scene. I was experimenting with coloured lights (and how they affected the colours of Duster's skin and costume) as well as with a reflective shader in order to create a mirror. The eagle-eyed among you may recognize some of the thugs from the Short Fuse series above. What can I say, I recycle.

Finally here's a couple of extra images of Duster in her different harem outfits. The first one is an alternative angle of this image. The second one is of Duster in the exact same pose but with a different costume. I was still experimenting with its accessories, though, and left the arm bands from the first costume on—but the right one is penetrating her bicep. Aargh.