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You aren't looking close enough - have a look at the left hand hair (her right!) and you can see where it is most obvious but there are strays across the hair model - I have a developed a fairly complex hair shader in Carrara that does this automatically, with variable amounts of strays.
I think this is the closest I've come to photorealism (as I perceive the concept - others may disagree) so far, except for the hair (I did not really intend photorealism, otherwise I'd probably chosen a different hair (like an OOT), just chose a hair that worked well with the pose etc.). Daz Studio Iray.
Note btw that the forum recompresses the pictures, so whatever you post will lose some quality. Resizing does too I can see, so click for full size.
So I guess photorealism can mean different things -- if you're trying to emulate a high-definition close-up view of a human and achieve realism (in Daz) then I think you're out of luck. Sure, fellow Daz'ers on here can post some pretty awesome works that get 'close' to it, but the casual observer will easily identify them as fake. As others have noted, from a purely "Daz" perspective the main shortcoming is the fidelity of the eyes -- and not just the eye material per se, but moreso in the whole eye and eye-socket/lids/fat geometry...it's simply not sufficiently detailed. Just head over to ArtStation and check out some of the custom modeled faces...there is way more detail provided to make convincing eyes. Another hurdle, also as noted, is skin texture and maps (for Daz marketspace, it is ALWAYS way too clean, without blemishes, which leaves a plastic false look. I know some vendors have made blemishes texture sets but they do no go far enough, including appropriate bump/normal mapping, etc). That said, Genesis 8 improved in this area a lot. Lastly, for me the other major hurdle is hair. It can make or break and almost always breaks the realism. I could go on and on about this topic, but I won't bore you! Basically, if its not OOT and like 1-2 other vendors, the hair just won't do it. I spend a lot of time trying to create photograph-like realism (i.e. mimic the look of a photograph, with all its graininess and artifacts -- see attached samples done in Daz). I think they're 'relatively' convincing as real...but I have to rely on grain, and purposeful low-quality to cheat ! :)
Totally agree. Looking over allot of my old poses I made I see how stiff they are. Even the positioning of the hip and pelvis adds so much more to the realism of the pose. I often stand in front of my full length mirror and see how my hips are positioned and WOW... I go and look at my pose I made in DS... totally stiff in this area, nothing organic about it. Hands and nakid feets/toes play into this too!
I also agree that the eyes give it away every time for me, probably because being part of the 3D community close to 15 years now.. you just know on an instinctual level.
Hairspray dear! Hairspray!
You asked for it
. More contrast so she pops out of the background. Her focus also seems a bit soft.
People keep talking about "graininess" to make an image seem real, but modern cameras are so far beyond grainy pictures, even at super high ISOs, that grain in a photo is a sure sign of post-processing. IMO added grain is most often as poorly used as over processed skin.
jeffam112368_9a28fbd572 those look great!
You, my dear sir (madam?), have totally nailed it. By mooting all the texture and geometry related limitations and stripping the render to its basic elements (color, composition and form), you have captured reality better than any Daz artist I have seen. The first pic, I thought you were presenting a photo. Only the girl's shirt sleave in the second pic gave it away for me. By the time I got to the third pic, I realized the jig was up and you had me "fooled". Of course after second and third glances,our eyes can adjust to your sleight at hand (the bedsheets, the mugs on the table...) but such trickery is a common occurence in all art and even in reality. In this case, it has allowed your artistry to set the limitations instead of your tools. So its possible to make more convincing work by going "low fi". Have you done any experiments in pushing the envelope? In other words, how much detail can you add before you start losing the battle with reality?
Cannot fully agree on the low fi thing. Yes it can make stuff look more real at a glance, but then you also have to take into consideration a few other things. Hardly any photo looks like that any more these days. It may have in the 80's and maybe 90's, these days we have brilliant little cameras in every smart phone. The other aspect that I find a little ironic is that in order to make something look more realistic, you are removing realism like a crappy photo would. Essentially you are only showing realism insofar that you're "faking" a bad photo. It's purely about simulating something that was unable to capture realism in the first place.
It's a bit like putting a doll behind thick milky glass and pretending it looks more real like that, rather than trying to make the doll more realistic. You are concealing the shortcomings, but that only further removes actual realism. It's a trick and it may work purely because of people's imagination, but realism it is not. The real challenge is the doll, not the glass.
Oh and don't get me wrong, those low fi renders do look excellent! I understand the only goal there was to get around the limitations that you felt currently exist and the result is pretty cool indeed.
I am coming from an artistic/creative standpoint while you appear to be coming from a technical one. The two are often incongruent. For example, what is real? This is not just a Matrix question. Our memories record the events of our daily lives, yet the ones that feel more "real" to us are the ones that have emotions attached to them. At the same time, those very "real" memories are often flawed and dissimilar to what actually happened. From an artist's viewpoint, a successful work evokes emotion to the observer. I've seen a few fine technical realistic renders in Daz gallery, but rarely have I seen a series of pieces that portrays the emotion of a human the way these works do it. I wish the artist would identify him(her)self and point me to more of their work. Look at the facial expressions in pic 1 and pic 3. They appear to be very similar if not the same (technically), but the emotions they portray are very different. The first pic seems to be a genuine smile while the third might be sarcastic or ironic grin. The depictions actually make me wonder and speculate what the girl is thinking. The artist was able to portray that oh so subtle difference even underneath the graininess of the render. You can bet that wasn't made from a push button expression morph. This is a person who is a master of their craft. So what is real? It is the experience that gets the participant emotionally involved. When an artist can get the viewer emotionally invested in a piece, when enough of the pixels are in the right place, the observer's mind will "finish" the render on its own, thus adding their own perceptions to the artwork and making it "real". When an artist creates a technically well done and perfectly converged render, but it lacks the emotion and soul of a real person, sure he can boast about the eye SSS being perfect but in the sterile search for "reality", they have left the viewer out of the experience. We are only left with the task of nitpicking the technical flaws of the piece. I have seen too many Daz artists take this route. In short, a technical artist (such as a Daz PA) are more concerned with the questions, "does it look real? does it measure real?". While the end user of their work might be concerned with an additional question: "does it feel real?"
Can there be a convergence of technical mastery and artistic soul using a Daz Studio product? I would like to think so and I sure would like this nameless artist to keep trying. Please identify yourself and make yourself known. @jeffam112368_9a28fbd572
BTW, you might want to try this experiment. Using a digital camera in manual mode, close the iris near its limit for its lens (like F22), then compensate for the lack of light by boosting ISO very high. The resulting picture might be very similar to this render series. As a filmmaker, I am often faced with the tradeoffs between unwanted depth of field and light requirements. Such graininess is often the result. His renders, though extreme, are very possible in real life.
Too much hairspray dear! Too much hairspray!
I was reading through the thread and have generally found it interesting. But then I noticed something that I found even more intrigueing. I noticed PhilW's avatar. I do not think anyone would question that that is a legitimate photograph of Phil, despite the fact that it is very small and cannot be "zoomed" to look for details without becoming pixelated. So what is it about Phil's avatar that makes it so obviously real? Not most of the stuff being discussed here, insofar as I can tell, because at that resolution most of that wouldn't really be discernable anyway. I don't believe that it is a poor photograph or one that has been in any way deliberately manipulated to make it "more real". So what is it about that little picture that simply says "real". (Sorry to single you and your avatar out, Phil, but it struck me as interesting within the context of the thread - hope you aren't offended)
clean flawless,bends,wrinkles,color.
a black n white is a lot easier to get to look realistic.
make a .jpg look old with 2d app's
3D characters bends are getting better.but still the muscles movements aren't there.
all the skins wrinkles in a bent joints not there.
can apply with 2D app's for stills.
compare renders from 2018 to 1998.
check gallerys out at zbrush or mudbox max maya ya can learn stuff.
I made some changes to her face. I'm still not quite happy with it but I think she might be getting closer. ...Maybe. lol
SixDs - no problem about commenting on my avatar photo. If you have to have an example, best to have a good looking one, eh?!
I think you are right that even in a small image, certain things shout "real" and certain things shout "3D" even if they are good images in their own right. I find the same with scanned 3D models - they can often look very real, whereas a similar Daz figure (and I say this with the Daz figures being the best available IMHO) looks more artificial. What is it about a scanned model that beats a Daz model in realism? You could say that it is the pose, or the fit of the clothes and the natural way they hang and fold, but the same can be true of just a head, so it's not that, or at least not just that. (dForce by the way is a great step forward on this aspect). Scanned hair can look great too (provided you don't get too close) because it fits and sits just right with the model. I'm not really sure what it is, but I wish that I could bottle it! Maybe Daz will move into having models based on scan data of real people that will close the gap in the future (at the possible expense of versatility?).
Diva - that is a big step forward on the realism. I think maybe the lighting is a bit flat. You either have the headlamp turned on or a light source placed near the camera, and I think getting rid of that (and adjusting other lighting or exposure) would help even further.
Hair often kills a scene before the eyes, unless very close-up.
Skin looks killer but the hair .maybe paint the hair in a 2D app
Thanks for the explanation, makes more sense now. I do think, however, all the things you mentioned like subtle expressions should also work without hiding behind grain. And since the thread title includes "photo-real characters" I don't think this approach qualifies. I can make my render black and white and throw a ton of other filters in the mix and suddenly have something that might fool people they're looking at a scan of an old photo, but that doesn't mean I did anything to increase photorealism. The thread isn't about artistic value. Artistic value is often linked to decidedly not showing realism. There's usually more artistic value in a good painting than a photograph from a war journalist whose goal wasn't to create art but to show the horrors of war. We can certainly make a thread and discuss artistic value, my reactions would be completely different as I do find very little of it in many Daz renders including my own. That is a somewhat touchy subject though and highly subjective.
She looks fantastic, Diva! Always thought your work with skins was excellent.
- Greg
Well I AM a hairburner by trade so yea, ALLOT of hairspray! Teeheehee
compared to the first version... I was commenting on the effect of the filtering relative to the first. And I do think the lows are too dark.
This is a good watch for those chasing realism; there is a lot still needed.
nicstt - cool, we just need Daz to build this into their next generation figures!
True, subtle expressions, body postures, and good composition should work even without the grain, but..... what the added grain does is release the viewer from the possiblity of being distracted by the trivial or problematic, thereby freeing them to concentrate on what's really important. The grain takes texture and geometry issues out of the equation so that his work can stand on its artistic merits. This is sort of like what Captain Kirk did in The Wrath of Kahn, when he guided the limping Enterprise into the oort cloud during the final battle. By negating his weakness, he could use his strengths to beat the enemy. Some people might equate this with "cheating". I think that's nonsense. This is art. It's all a cheat. This discussion about realism has already been had. Most people agree that Daz figures are too low poly with low gamut textures and the only way to get to real photorealism will come at a price that Daz customers are unwilling to pay. This mystery artist's solution to the artistic problem (and let us not forget that Daz figures are tools for solving artistic problems), while not novel, (Picasso took this method to its extremes), it is certainly a breath of fresh air. At least to this viewer's eyes.
I sent you a PM. You have a good eye for realism, you might be interested in this.
That is beautiful work on the texture, Diva! I must make one observation regarding the render, though, that just jumped out at me, vis-a-vis realism. It is not anything to do with either the character or the texture, but the lighting or rendering. There are two relatively dark shadows on each side of the nose that seem somehow incongruent. Although possible, depending upon the lighting I suppose, I'm not certain most photographs would show that. If you revisit the photos that you showed earlier in the thread you'll see what I mean. There is also a gradient of differing shadows across the various facial features as well that tend to be more distinct. Again, that would seem to be lighting or render settings perhaps. I guess, as others have said, that the quest for photo realism (however you might define that) must involve a variety of factors all coming together. And I think that that is true no matter how detailed or finely crafted the textures may be. Get anything else wrong in setting up a scene, and the jig is up.
While dark shadows can and do appear in some human photographs, again depending upon the lighting, they tend to appear in areas where the direct light is blocked and where indirect or reflected light is directed away from that area. In the case of the dark areas appearing on both sides of the nose, that would seem to suggest that little or no light falling on the adjacent areas of the cheeks is being reflected into those areas, despite the fact that the facial geometry there would suggest that it should. Again, this is not an issue associated with the facial details built into either the model or the textures, but would seem to suggest an issue with the render settings and\or shaders, assuming that the render engine is bouncing the light correctly. I am not suggesting in any way that you need to take your textures further, just something that contributes in some way to the difficulties in duplicating photographs in 3D renders. It is like trying to push your way through a giant marshmallow: at first it is relatively easy, with steady progress, but the further you progress the more resistance you encounter, and the time and effort required to reach your goal begins to increase exponentially.
This was my point as well. Its not just the eye geometry itself, the eyelids are a problem also, particularly when you move away from the stock shape either with shaping morphs or expressions. The eyelids on the DAZ models don't hanlde it well because there isn't sufficient detail/polygons in the Genesis line at least. I always use the cornea bulge, iris depth morphs. They should really be standard and dialed in out of the box.