Sorted out the lighting – exposure to 5, sky strength at 1 but added some AO. Can’t avoid it really. Plus I had to make the duck slightly emissive to prevent the underside of the tail from being too dark. Plus I added an extra window on the right behind the camera (as there is in the actual room this is largely based on. It’s added a nice highlight to the copper bowl.

I tried a particle rug but Blender crashed, so I had to do with a diffuse texture and a magic texture at high scale for the bump. A bit too regular perhaps. Must remember to add in some distortion.

I bought the curtains from BlenderMarket for about $10. Added skirting board and architrave around the window using curves. Not too hard to do. Looking around the room I’m currently in there’s a massive amount of ‘stuff’. I guess I’ll have to add quite a bit to this scene to make it look a bit more realistic. Something in the bookshef for starters.