2023 Collab: Week 20 “Library” - VOTE CLOSED

@VVruba A real library, the feeling of the kingdom of books is 100% conveyed
Thanks for the explanations. I manually arranged the books, now I’ll try to figure out how to do it smartly

My version of the library. Do not ask who burns candles next to books. Obviously, this secret person is up to something.

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Haha thanks, but I think manual arrangement works better for your scene since it’s much smaller and we’re closer to the books. It is the smart way to do it in this scenario.
In my case, I wanted to make a “grand library” and the book count in the scene is probably in trillions at this point, so manual arrangement just wasn’t an option for most of it.

Summary

I still hope to add some manually placed elements though. Don’t really have much time left but hey, FedPete doesn’t usually start the poll until the next day morning so I may work on it through the night lol.

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heres mine didn’t get to finish it but still looks good i think

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gotta correct the uv coodinates and haven’t done any real lighting yet :frowning: … still tho for the limited time i spend on it , it coming along rather well

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This one was harder than I thought. I changed my idea several times only to come back to this original scene. Lighting was a bit difficult. But in the end, I feel it tells the story I’m trying to tell.

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Well I played with a downloaded book generator, geo nodes, it is not very good really. A different one as an add on would not install, mystified about that. That did book covers etc. Simplistic last min entry.
Could not scale the hdri. Must look into that, wanted the wall elements smaller, perhaps it is not possible?


Cycles, render time 24 seconds.

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We @BlenderCollab have a few days to vote. You can vote fast but also think slowly about design, colors, technique, difficulty, subject, realism, etc. Choose consciously and not on your own entry.

And the new subject week 21 “Crime scene” has already started. The winner of this week’s “Library” challenge may select a subject for next week 22 and wins a badge.


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@VVruba I didn’t go for “grand library” because I didn’t know how to arrange lots and lots of books automatically :sweat_smile:
In such a round hall, something round suggests itself. For example a globe. Many libraries have globes.

I think I will also share how I made books.

Summary

my books


For the covers, I used a printable for mini-books covers to which I added an image of the side of the book.

The initial 18 copies differ in cover, I just moved UV map, the rest of the books are linked copies (Alt+D) with variable height and thickness.

@ShadowFireSage Everything is like in a real library. An open path to the librarian and the feeling that if you turn aside, you will get lost in the realm of knowledge.

@visionary5 A robot reading a paper book. Some things are eternal.
Lighting still needs some work. There are not enough contrasts to see the figure of the robot well. And the fire in the fireplace is too bright, it attracts the eye in the first place, distracting from the rest of the room.

@NP5 Somehow it reminds me of my school library (although it was much smaller and cramped)
Using the mapping node, you can change one of the scale values, the ndri seems to be stretched, and one side goes into the distance. but then the world is noticeably distorted on the sides of the distant side. (sorry for the clumsy explanation)
What is the name of this book generator? The spines of books are somehow strangely made, the shadows lie, as if they are tapering to the bottom like a cone

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Blend Swap | Generated Books (Geometry Nodes) is the one I used. There is something wrong with the shading and I could not fix it. It is in the supplied set up. It is all geo nodes and not me friendly to fiddle with to try and fix.

https://ko-fi.com/s/9879a091a9 Is the one that just did not install, perhaps it needs an update to latest Blender versions?

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The shading problem in the first one is most likely due to full smooth shading being applied as opposed to partial one, without properly segmenting the mesh. I’m too lazy to make an account and look into how the add-on works or fix it but that’s what it looks like to me.

The second one wouldn’t install because it’s not a plug-in, it’s a zipped blend file with a geometry node tree. You have to extract it and either use that file as a base or append the geometry nodes and related textures to another file.

Summary

Screenshot 2023-05-21 202740

AH so simple! Thank You; It was worded as an add on so I treated it as one. :man_facepalming:t3:

Just tried selecting the generated books and flat shading but nothing happened, I guess it is smooth shaded somewhere in the geo node spaghetti. It is generally not very good, scaling them in the provided way just makes them cut into each other or have gaps.

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Yes if it’s generated geometry then setting smooth/flat shading to the object holding it will do nothing since geometry nodes override it, you’d have to use the shade smooth node and check/uncheck the boolean:
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That said geometry node objects still adhere to AutoSmooth when using the smooth node so if you use the Auto Smooth option and make sure the angle is not something like 180 degrees in Data Properties, it should work, I think:
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Auto smooth made no difference, Set shade smooth, not in there that I can see.
Image may not be big enough to see the details, I expanded a sample of each node possibly relevant that were compressed.

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Ugh… I’ll just make the account and try to solve this. Why do I hate myself…

Edit:
Ok, this is just… this is not an easy fix. I’d be quicker making a node tree from scratch, but basically, they just merge too much stuff mindlessly and this shading is the result. I’d say their node tree is also way more complicated than it needs to be.

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LOL. Good to know someone with some idea of these geo node agrees. I was not impressed, it just did for a one evening quick function. As you will see it really does not work well when you just want to use it, sizing and maintaining spacing etc.
A case of it is practically easier to just do a selection of full shelves by hand and vary their distribution. Auto stuff is not always that good once you are fussy.

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Yeah, I’m still not super familiar with geonodes but I do understand enough about them and geometry to have an idea of what’s happening.
In this node setup, they’re generating geometry from curves to which auto-smooth does not apply to, so it’s either all smooth or flat-shaded based on the smooth node. This means you have to be clever in how you make and merge your geometry but I can’t say that they are, unfortunately. They also use curve “cylinders” as a shortcut for making the edges, without even connecting it to the rest of the geometry but that just results in more glitchy shading

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i know its post challenge but thought id share the changes i made today after work

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The wood grain texture on the arches seems a bit too large in this version. Also, I can see you fixed the “lip” at the top of the front arch but it seems to still be broken on the ones behind. Good job fixing the book texture.

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Better. And lighting, and floors. Books now look very real. :heart_eyes:

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@Kzanna , congratulations on winning the collab “Library”. It has a nice vibe, based on good compositing, book textures, and lighting.

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