026 - Smuggler's dock

Dim Sum wonders if the smugglers wouldn't mind if she smuggled one of their fish.

This dock was just beyond the door next to the jail.  There was a rock behind the door that refused to open for me, so I sat on something and was able to get out.  This space is actually still inside a cave with waterfalls covering the mouth of the cave, far to the left of the picture.  So it was really a secret dock.

location: The Realm of Mystara

Technical notes

windlight: [TOR] BIG SUN - Slips through walls 5 (modified)
water: Phototools- Ship Light (modified)

Depth of Field:
View angle: 0.75
FOV: 16
F-number: 1.75
Foc Length: 300
Foc Time: 0.0
CoC: 10.0
Resolution: 1.0
Aspect Ratio: 1.0

Glow Settings:
Quality: 8
Iterations: 8
Strength: 0.01
Luminance: 0.3
Warmth: 5.0
Width: 0.5
Alpha: 0.15

It took me two hours to decide on the windlight for this one.  It wasn't worth turning on the local lights because it was more dramatic without.

025 - Jail birds

Dim Sum wanders into a jail cell in the dungeon and slips between the bars to accompany the poor prisoner.

Cristalle Karami said, "There is a little camp on the top of wolf mountain that might make for some interesting scenery. ... It's in southern Krillian."

So, today, I clicked on the map somewhere in southern Krillian.  When I tp'd there, I ended up underwater (which is a lovely spot, btw, but let's just say I lost another life).  So I tried to climb up the side of the underwater cliff and somehow got stuck somewhere among the rocks.  So I cammed around to see what I could sit on to escape, but almost everything wouldn't let me sit.  Then I finally found a cot that let me sit on it.  Yay!  When I stood up, I realized I was inside a jail cell.

Meanwhile, I was in IM with Fingol because I was teasing him about waiting for the sunrise before he goes to bed (a man after my own heart :D  ).  He was saying, "Dim Sum, I have a fish for you!!"  I told him I escaped the underwater rocks but I ended up in a cage, but he just lol'd and said, "tp me!!"

Oooooooooooookay.

First, he landed inside the rock behind the cell.  So I jumped off the cot and tp'd him again.  He landed inside the cell.

He arrived as a merman (from Mer Betta, of course), and he asked, "Enough fish for you ??"  Thankfully, before my mind completely fell into the gutter, he started camming around and realized how pretty Mystara is.

Since he was already there, I asked him to put on a medieval outfit.... And the rest is history.

model: Fingol Greyhaven
location: The Realm of Mystara

Technical notes

windlight: [TOR] BIG SUN - Slips through walls 5 (modified)


Depth of Field:
View angle: 0.873
FOV: 22.4
F-number: 1.18
Foc Length: 178
Foc Time: 0.8
CoC: 7.0
Resolution: 1.0
Aspect Ratio: 1.33

Glow Settings:
Quality: 8
Iterations: 8
Strength: 0.62
Luminance: 0.301
Warmth: 5.044
Width: 0.531
Alpha: 0.15

When that photoshoot was all done, we tp'd out and he was playing with some animations where he knelt down and we came up with more photos. Here are mine:

023 - Arches through arches

Dim Sum jumps from one rock to the other, meowing as she almost falls into the water again.

Unlike most of the others in the series, Dim Sum is standing here and sideways, so she would be easier to find. Well, a little easier anyway.  ;)

location: The Realm of Mystara North - Stromness

Technical notes

windlight: Places Cornfield (modified)
water: [NB] Hidden Depths


Depth of Field:
View angle: 1.0
FOV: 20
F-number: 2.5
Foc Length: 250
Foc Time: 0.8
CoC: 7.0
Resolution: 1.0
Aspect Ratio: 1.33

Glow Settings:
Quality: 8
Iterations: 8
Strength: 0.62
Luminance: 0.301
Warmth: 5.044
Width: 0.531
Alpha: 0.15

Tanner mentioned the big waterfalls, but the waterfalls itself doesn't look realistic, but the arches and the water looked intriguing. Well, I love arches anyway. I took a long time with composing this one, then with finding just the right windlight. I wanted the face of the closest arch to be darker than usual to get a good dark/light balance.

Without DOF (where Dim Sum is a lot easier to find too):

022 - Twin falls

Dim Sum rests under a tree and observes the frog on the lily pad down below.

I was inspecting the yurts (see top left) and discovered this wonderful little spot. Again, there's a lot going on here. And I decided to focus on one of the waterfalls. I will likely do tomorrow's photo right in the same area.

location: The Realm of Mystara North - Stromness

Technical notes

windlight: Nam's Robots of Dawn (modified)
water: [NB] Sparkling Depths (modified)


Depth of Field:
View angle: 0.528
FOV: 19.2
F-number: 2.73
Foc Length: 1416
Foc Time: 0.8
CoC: 7.0
Resolution:1.0
Aspect Ratio: 1.33

Glow Settings:
Quality: 8
Iterations: 0.062
Strength: 0.301
Luminance: 5.044
Warmth: 5.044
Width: 0.531
Alpha: 0.150

I'm not quite happy with this one.  I see a problem but I don't know how to fix it yet.  If you look right in the middle of the picture, the rock of the waterfalls looks like it's a cutout pasted over the water.  I don't know why.  Maybe the focus length is too short, but at that distance, it's difficult to be precise. I think my mistake is that I'm focusing on objects that are too far away from the camera.

On the other hand, I'm happy how the windlight created different colors to make the scene more interesting.

Here it is without DOF:

021 - The cromlech

Self-contained, unexplained,
The cromlech in the clover field. 
~  "The Cromlech" by Louis MacNeice

And the existential question of the day is ... What cruel irony is it that some human would look at a plant that lives at the edge of the water and decide to call it "cattails"?!?  Seriously!  It's the only time you'll see any part of a cat willingly get that close to the water!


location: The Realm of Mystara North - Stromness

Technical notes

windlight: Pirate (modified)


Depth of Field:
View angle: 0.792
FOV: 28.8
F-number: 9.93
Foc Length: 337
Foc Time: 0.8
CoC: 7.0
Resolution: 1.0
Aspect Ratio: 1.33

Glow Settings:
Quality: 8
Iterations: 17
Strength: 0.212
Luminance: 1.31
Warmth: 13.54
Width: 1.549
Alpha: 0.513

There's a lot going on in this picture -- the cattails, the dolmens, the butterflies, the streams of sunlight.  It wasn't easy to decide what to focus on.  Eventually, dolmens got the DOF focus; however, I kept it mostly in shadow because I wanted the streams of sunlight to be among the brightest things.

And again, here's the alternative:

020 - Fire!

Dim Sum encounters the man with scars again, this time in the catacombs.  Then she looks over to the skeleton across the hall, then back to the man, then back to the skeleton, then back to the man.  "Did you come to meet your future, mister?"

Tanner ran into me again. When he arrived, I was already playing with DOF, so he looked like a red blob to me.  He thought his avie wasn't rezzing.  Anyway, he added a little bit of brightness at the right spot of the picture, so it was a happy accident anyway.

model: Tanner Ryder (realdarkknight)
location: The Realm of Mystara North - Stromness

Technical notes

windlight: [TOR] SCIFI - Albedo 0.39 (modified until it's barely recognizable)

Depth of Field:
View angle: 1.047
FOV: 24.0
F-number: 22.0
Foc Length: 266
Foc Time: 0.8
CoC: 7.0
Resolution: 1.0
Aspect Ratio: 1.33

Glow Settings:
Quality: 8
Iterations: 17
Strength: 0.212
Luminance: 1.31
Warmth: 13.54
Width: 1.549
Alpha: 0.513

It's always difficult to treat dark places.  Either they end up being too dark to see or too bright to be believable.  I was going to go back outside, but I decided to see if I could find the right windlight to make it look dramatic.  I ended up modifying the windlight enough to look entirely different.

I decided to stay and work with it when I saw that the windlight created the little bokeh lights on the wall where a bas relief of skeletons were.  I thought they look like charcoal embers.  Maybe the effect was caused by the sculpt or mesh being at a low level of detail (I kept it low).  But I had to max the particle count and add glow to this to make the fire look brighter.

019 - To the path beyond

Dim Sum lost one life when she fell into the water while walking across the fallen tree. She decided it wasn't so bad doing it the conventional way -- taking the bridge.


location: The Realm of Mystara

Technical notes

windlight: Phototools- Dorm Light 01 (modified)
water: Phototools- Ship Light (modified)


Depth of Field:
View angle: 0.873
FOV: 146.6
F-number: 9.35
Foc Length: 65
Foc Time: 0.8
CoC: 7.0
Resolution: 1.0
Aspect Ratio: 1.33

As I play with windlight and DOF, I find that I'm leaning towards nature settings, especially with water.  The play of reflections on the water surface fascinate me, like fractals do.

And as usual, after I get all done, I find another view that I like better.  *sighs*

018 - Vertigo

Dim Sum gingerly walks over the planks and pauses over the ravine.

Mystara seems to have a lot of very interesting characters. Another one followed me around again today, but by the time I found a spot, he had already logged off.


location: The Realm of Mystara North - Stromness

Technical notes

windlight: [TOR] BIG SUN - Awwyeah (modified)
water: Phototools- Ship Light


Depth of Field:
View angle: 0.6
FOV: 90.0
F-number: 12.0
Foc Length: 54
Foc Time: 0.8
CoC: 7.0
Resolution: 1.0
Aspect Ratio: 1.33

I had spent more than an hour photographing ... not this. Actually, the Chapel of Light, which was nearby. But the subject matter was boring, the composition was boring, the lighting was boring. Even Flickr thought it was boring, because it wouldn't finish uploading it.

So, I continued to cam around, and the water caught my eye.  Another watercolor-y scene.  I'm not completely happy with this one either, but, trust me, it's way better than the first one.

017 - A man's scars

Dim Sum meets a man with scars and wonders what big claws made those scars. 


I wanted to shoot the hanging bridges and I was looking for a good angle, then I saw Tanner walk into the meadow and he has a very interesting avie, so I asked his permission to include him in the photo.  He agreed.  After I got done, he asked if he could use it as his profile pic.  I agreed.  A fair exchange, I think.  :)


model: Tanner Ryder (realdarkknight)
location: The Realm of Mystara North - Stromness

Technical notes

windlight: Places Greed (modified)


Depth of Field:
View angle: 0.873
FOV: 9.7
F-number: 13.24
Foc Length: 337
Foc Time: 0.8
CoC: 10.0
Resolution: 0.78
Aspect Ratio: 1.33

It was a bit tricky having to wait for two AOs to cycle to the poses I want.  I don't think I can modify Dim Sum's AO, so I may have to contact the creator to get the poses separately, so I can manually do them without the AO switching to a new sit pose.

I couldn't make up my mind with the windlight here.  I was playing and taking preliminary photos, but I forget to write down what the windlight was.  Here are some of the earlier ones that I can't remember the windlight anymore.