As some of you know, I create a lot of Automobile renders. This is tutorial of sort about how to turn a interesting car download into a beautiful addition to your renders.
(These techniques should be seen as a starting point; you will undoubtedly think of other ways to personalize your auto freebies.}



Part 1: Selecting a model
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There a few key things that i look for in a car model for use in Poser; firstly: is the model legally available & allowed for my chosen use; meaning... does the site offering the freebie have the right to do so; and can it be used in renders where profit will be made?



Secondly, I look to be sure the model is a file format that Poser will import, and import well. I have found that 3ds is usually the easiest to work with; although a properly grouped obj works equally well. If the model you choose is not "Poser friendly", it can still be made useable with Poser's tools, a 2D image editor, and/or a 3D modeling application.

What I mean by "works well" is, does the model import with all parts in their proper place; do the sufaces appear smooth, are the normals facing the correct way; does the model have the material zones properly seperated, and named; do image maps load correctly; do the images maps have "generic" names, like "tire.jpg", "glasstran.jpg", "Bump.jpg"? The perfect model choice will have 6 yeses, and 1 no; but what fun is that... after all this is about adding your own personal touch to the freebie.


I think the third thing I look for is, related information; knowing details about the realife car that inspired the model will help with things like adjusting scaling,  and making color and texture choices. For most modern autos, a quick visit to the manufacturer's website will get you the needed info; for older, or rare vehicles a Internet search will likely return fan sites, or photographs.



One of my favorite places to find auto freebies is: http://dmi.chez-alice.fr/models1.html; so for this tutorial we will begin by choosing a car from there. I chose the peugeot 206 from http://dmi.chez-alice.fr/models10.html; because it was the first one that i noticed had a file size over 1Mb; to me this indicates that it will have a high enough poly count to fit in well in the type of renders that I usually do. (Higher polygon count usually equals better rendered surfaces.)



So that's all for part one; next time we'll import it to Poser, and prepare it to be personalized.
Feel free to post any questions, comments, or critisisms her in this thread.

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It's not what you look like, when you're doing what you're doing;
It's what you're doing, when you're doing what it looks like you're doing.

Thank you for the tutorial Whazizname   , it looks like the beginning of an interesting one

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When preparing to import a model to Poser I start by opening the archive (zip, rar, sit,...) and looking over the contents. I'm looking to see what files, as well as what file formats are included; sometimes potential problems can be found and corrected before the model is imported. In this case, there are only two files in the zip (a .lwo, and a .txt readme). (Because I use Poser 5, I must be careful with lwo files newer than version 5; because newer versions of Lightwave files can contain features that are foreign to Poser.)


Open Poser:
It is good to have Poser figure in your scene; it will aid in getting the correct scale. ( I usually leave Don standing there; and assume that he is about my height;  but if the final scene will feature a greatly different character, then i use it instead.)

At the "Prop Import Options" screen, I usually don't change anything; but checking "Place On Floor" can be helpful. If I am working with a model by an artist who's work I've used before, I already know the scale of the model and will change the "Percent of Standard Figure Size" value. With a with a new or unknown model, I leave the value at 100.0, and make all changes to the prop's scale after importing.

This particular .lwo is a version that Poser 5 does not import; so I'm faced with a choice... either try importing this file to a 3D modeler, or file converter; and then exporting it as a .obj; ... or choose a different model for use.

I tried conversion:
 Cheetah3D identified the file type as lwo2; but it could not import it.
 Blender 2.40 {version 2.44 now available ... http://www.blender.org/} imported it as a Lightwave Object, and exported it as a Wavefront obj, and mtl; which is perfect for Poser.

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It's not what you look like, when you're doing what you're doing;
It's what you're doing, when you're doing what it looks like you're doing.

Now that we have our model into Poser, we begin the second stage of determining a the model's usefulness.

1.) adjust orientation, and scale:
This props axis are different than Poser's; so rotation on a axis does not cause the expected change. I could re-export the model from Blender with the correct axis orientation; but since this auto will be use in static images, I'll just use the prop's trans dials. I  normally now go to the manufacturer's website to get info about the vehicles dimensions; but in case, I'll just guess, and choose to increase the scale to 225%; use drop to floor command ; and compare to Don. ( ... making the "ground" visible is helpful at this point ...)

2.) look at model from all sides to check the quality of it's mesh, and probable material zones. I prefer to rotate the model; but since this model has origin issues, I'll move the camera. The mesh of this car looks good; no puckers or ripples. All material seem to be logically placed.

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It's not what you look like, when you're doing what you're doing;
It's what you're doing, when you're doing what it looks like you're doing.

I like it; so on to the next step...

3.) material room:  

I start with the windows; so I can see if there is a modeled interior.(Some "game quality" low poly cars do not have an interior), (This model has a cube inside; I have seen this with other Lightwave models; I do not know what causes it. It can be solved by either making the cube's surface transparent, or using a 3D modeling application to remove the cube group.) (I find it helpful when trying to find what material zone affects what part of the vehicle to first change the diffuse color to something obnoxious like "hot pink", then it is easy to see what parts use that material.)

Go through the materials one by one modifying the colors & textures to suit your tastes. (I'll tell about the choices I made for this model in the next section of this tutorial.)

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It's not what you look like, when you're doing what you're doing;
It's what you're doing, when you're doing what it looks like you're doing.

When you are satisfied, return to the pose room, and render a few test images. (Take special care to look for bulging or curving of surfaces when using the Firefly renderer; uncheck "smooth Polygons" in the prop's properties window to eliminate any.)

Now you can save your personalized auto to the Poser library.

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It's not what you look like, when you're doing what you're doing;
It's what you're doing, when you're doing what it looks like you're doing.

After less than one hour's work, this car turned out to be a nice "mid to high polygon" addition to the virtual garage.
It was fairly painless to import. It has a good mesh,  and good clear material zones & zone names. It will be useful for both featured & background use.



Next time, I'll show a few of the material room techniques I use for my renders; and take a look at the differences when importing a "higher quality" or "higher polygon" auto.

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It's not what you look like, when you're doing what you're doing;
It's what you're doing, when you're doing what it looks like you're doing.

Whew, what a busy week it's been... Niece's wedding, young daughters (ages 6 & 10) home an extra day, several product testings (I am supposed to be finishing one right now in fact; but wanted to post this, so i can move on to the next phase in my mind...), dealing with a head cold, and on top of all that my inspiration has been leaning towards Aiko 3LE...  

but here at last is the next part of "Making the most of a Freebie Auto".

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It's not what you look like, when you're doing what you're doing;
It's what you're doing, when you're doing what it looks like you're doing.

As I stated above, I modify textures/ materials starting with the glass (Windows, headlights, taillights, dashboard panels,...). This is where the manufacturer's site will give good info... some vehicles have clear glass, some bluish glass, and some greyish glass. I usually choose greyish glass, and an transparency value of about .7; because I tend to prefer a "Customized street" look. (For reflections, I use a raytrace node with default settings; and a reflection value of about .3.)

For vehicles that have modeled headlight, and taillight parts under the glass care must be taken to color each part correctly. On headlights & reverse lights, I use a very pale blue diffuse color, a slightly darker blue ambient color, and perhaps a transparency value of about .1. For taillights, instead of blue tones, I use reds; and for turn signals/ blinkers, I use oranges. (This is another place where a visit to the manufacturer's website will come in handy; because not all vehicles use the same blues, reds, or oranges in their lights.)

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It's not what you look like, when you're doing what you're doing;
It's what you're doing, when you're doing what it looks like you're doing.

I then move on to the car's body & chrome pieces. I prefer a dark grey diffuse color, light grey specular color, and a raytrace reflection node with default settings for chrome.  I set the reflection value to a fairly high number (since most chrome is very shiny), somewhere between .7 & 1.0.

Car paint techniques is a subject worthy of it's own tutorial; so I will only give brief suggestions about it here. I have found that using a lighter version of the diffuse color for the specular color is more interesting than using white for specular color.(In low light scenes try using the diffuse color in the ambient color channel, with a value of about .2.)
 
For Body paint reflections, I tend to use a raytrace node; either with default settings, or with an attached sphere map, and image map. For reflection value something between .3 & .7 is realistic looking (but higher values are also interesting).

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Then the tires. Most freebie autos that I've used need to have the tire diffuse color darkened; so I choose an almost black greytone for the diffuse color, and a slightly lighter greytone for the specular color. If the model has a bump map for the tire, I attach it to the bump channel.
    (If there isn't a bump map, you could try to attach a bump map from a different vehicle's tires...)
    (Some models use image maps for the tires; these tips will also work for those cars; but the colors used will be lighter.)
    (Try using another vehicle's rotor & caliper image maps; this can add a lot of realism to the wheel/ tire area of a free car.)

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Then on to the interior (seats, carpet, ...): This usually come down to selecting your favorite materials. I usually choose a leather shader, or image for seats and door panels; and treat all shiny metallic parts as if they were chrome.

Usually this will be enough for a "freebie auto". (In some cases this will be all the available material zones; and in other cases, you will not see some parts of the vehicle up close.)

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It's not what you look like, when you're doing what you're doing;
It's what you're doing, when you're doing what it looks like you're doing.

THINGS TO CONSIDER:


1.) I tend to use raytracing on all metallic and glass parts. This greatly increases the realism of a render; but will also greatly increase the render time. A good compromise is to use a full scene (a room, a skydome, or several props & figures surrounding the vehicle, ... ), and a raytrace node with default settings (maybe .1 for "softness").

However; if the vehicle is in a partial scene, I use a reflection image. I attach a raytrace reflect node to the reflection channel, then attach a sphere map node to it's background color channel, and then attach a image map to the sphere map's color channel. Usually the reflection image is related to the background elemets or image.
 (Lightening the reflect node's background color will increase the amount of image that is reflected in the car paint; I tend to use a dark grey for this.)
The downside to this method is that there are more textures for your computer to handle, and the preview display becomes unreliable. Some scenes will also require much trial and error adjustment to get the color & intensity of the raytraced reflections to match the colors & lighting of the other items in the scene.

2.) A visit to the Peugeot website (http://www.peugeot.com/en/default.htm) has uncovered a couple of detail problems with the 206.  
  1.) the body moldings should match the paint color.
  2.) the front logo should be surrounded by black. (in the 206 model the moldings and logo black are the same material zone. Also consider the vents in the hood...)

These are small detail problems, and can be easily solved by either creating new material zones in Poser, or even better by assigning a material to the particular group in the 3D modeler before importing to Poser. (Materials assigned in a modeler will probably still need to be modified after importing to Poser; but each part will have it's own zone.)

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Next time I'll take a look at how to add or change a model's material zones, and / or make it's "normals" consistant in Poser. (Perhaps I'll also get around to the comparison of higher polygon/ higher detail freebie autos)

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It's not what you look like, when you're doing what you're doing;
It's what you're doing, when you're doing what it looks like you're doing.

     Thank you for the great tutorial Whazizname       I'm waiting for the next part, it looks like a good plaything for the incoming cold days at home   !!

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PART 3: Using the Poser Grouping Tool
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For this portion, I've chosen to use a model from SMCars.com's "Unfinished projects" forum. This forum is dedicated to automobile models that are being abandoned by their creator, and offered to others who may want to finish them.

i sometimes use cars from this forum for background filler (generally they were designed for games, and are therefore very low polygon models).

The model was in a 3ds scene; so first I had to import it into a modeling application, and remove the walls/ reference images; then re-align the auto's parts, group it together, and export as an obj. (I could have chosen to assign materials to all the model's groups at this time; but did not for the sake of this tutorial.)

After importing to Poser (and increasing it's scale), it is clear is clear that this model will need to have some of it's normals flipped. (Notice the right side door, and sections of the right side skirt/ rocker panel.) {Image 1}

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It's not what you look like, when you're doing what you're doing;
It's what you're doing, when you're doing what it looks like you're doing.

I start in the Pose Room by activating the Grouping Tool, then selecting from the pulldown the group that contains the problem normals (in this case "Door"). I then confirm that this is the correct group by looking at the problem normals from the opposite side. {Images 2 & 3}

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It's not what you look like, when you're doing what you're doing;
It's what you're doing, when you're doing what it looks like you're doing.

I then create a new group containing all of the "Door" group (I chose to name this group "D_Door"); and using the "-" tool, select and remove the problem normals from that group. {Images 4 & 5}

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It's not what you look like, when you're doing what you're doing;
It's what you're doing, when you're doing what it looks like you're doing.