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Lol it's annoying, happens with every type of scripted rendering:) What I do is, when render window opens I click on the top bar of the window, (one needs to be fast) and if you hit the right spot the window will move to the front
LOL OK.... It's a DAZ Studio issue! I can deal.
Also, I know wowie worked hard on getting the SSS to give a good transmissive effect for things like ears, nose, finger tips but still not able to achieve that. I don't know if maps needs to be present or where to put them.
My updated SSS maps SHOULD have fixed that but perhaps I didn't do them right.
Again, I point out, I'm not a technical person. So all these internal maps and where to put them and how to create them properly alluds me allot of the time. Basic Bump and Normals I'm good with. Pretty good with Displacment but the rest of them.... meh! LOL
Backside Diffuse is used if you enable 'Use Face Forward' or have translucency enabled. This shades the back facing side of the polygon with a different color/texture.
Don't use translucency for object with actual thickness. Translucency will only be correct if applied to thin objects, like fabric, paper leaves, or hair. Use only subsurface for models such as figures, cream, marble rock ie everything that is an actual 3d model.
Ah, OK, good to know... to mention again, I've either done my maps wrong or I'm setting up the SSS for more blood translucency in the ears, nose and finger/toes to show up when rendered out.
Is there a basic test with a certain light set up or should the HDR image provide enough light to see if it's working once set up?
Translucency can still be seen in those spots, but lights need to be behind those areas with a strong enough intensity. I haven't found a way to boost them selectively though. You should probably not use a HDRI, since the light from an environment sphere isn't 'focused' enough.
Ah, OK. Which of the SSS script settings gives the best translucency in your opinion ... one of the 3 of the skin ones or ..... ? Lemme know...
They all will produce the same translucency when used with proper subsurface scale. The resulting color will be different, depending on the combo of input diffuse and scattering/absorption color. My advice is to start with the default values first, which actually are the same as Skin 2 SSS. Make adjustments as laid out in the tips and tricks.
OK, thank you!
OK, I wrote wowie but not heard back. I'm trying to get my promos done for Gino but I'm held back right now....
I'm having a devil of a time getting any reflection out of this plane he's standing on. Not sure why. I even created another plane, flipped it, put in a blurred image and raised it above Gino's head to try to get the bottom plane to have something to reflect but there is nothing. I've included the settings I currently have (after fiddling and finally threw my hands up) and the current Promo image for Gino (tweaked the skin settings some more, like them better now)
Lemme know if you have anything I can try to get just a simple reflective quality out of the plane. I want it sort of a muted violet purple to try to match what I got out of the iRAY promo images so I can keep some consistency. I have two of wowies rectangle emitters in the scene and using the HDR but have the camera for the environment turned off so I can do a bunch of PNG renders with him turning (like a turntable but in rendered out images that I will combine in PS...
Thanks for the help!
Not sure I understand what you're trying to do? Do you want the plane to look like a colored mirror or more like a glass surface? Metalness and transmission don't play well together. If you want it solid like a mirror, turn off transmission. Also backside diffuse is unnecessary if you don't use translucency. ( And you shouldn't in this case, as I understand it) So what's the problem? There are reflections:) Do you mean you want the HDR to create reflections without being visible to the camera? You can do that in the visibility section for the env. sphere, leave reflection/refraction on. To boost the reflections from the HDRI, increase Global Illumination exposure for the plane, (hope that was right, not able to check right now) To tint the reflections, try setting also specular edge tint to the same color as spec. color. If you want more diffuse color, turn off metalness, (or try decreasing it), increase diffuse strength and use both specular lobes if you want stronger reflections, you can try different roughness values also. Hmm don't think the coat will have any effect as long as coat thickness is zeroed. And you could also try changing the specular BRDF to AshikhminShirley Classic, I use it for highly reflective stuff like water. Without knowing what you're trying to achieve it's hard to give any more specific advice, let me know if this helps;)
Oh and btw, skin looks very nice:)
Sorry, my optical network transmitter / modem got whacked by lightning. Here's what I suggest.
Just those three settings - metalness, specular 2 roughness and specular 2 color.
OK, thanks for educating me. So sorry about your modem/router getting messed up due to lightning. Ain't mother nature wonderful? I love her to pieces unless she messes with me and my stuff! LOL
Quick question.......
What is the difference between the commonly used Diffuse and the newer (not that I've ever seen this) Base Color and it's various options below it?
Different shaders, I think the name in the Iray Uber Shader reflects common usage in PBR materials.
So using the Base set up is more for PBR then?
The names are just display labels, what properties appear and what they do depends on the shader in use. The 3Delight shaders fairly consistently used Diffuse for the basic colour of the model, the Iray Uber base uses Base Colour - and I think that's true of most PBR materials. The Iray material is - more-or-less - a PBR material.
AH, OK!
From the aweSurface 1.2 user guide:
Overview
The AWE Surface shader will render material consisting of a base layer and a toggleable coat layer. By default, the material is set to dielectric. To render metal, simply change Metalness to 1. For glass, change Transmission to 1. Metalness takes precedence over Transmission when both are enabled. Both parameters accept texture masks for blending between material types.
Unified Mode
For those who prefer a unified approach, Use Base Values allows most relevant base layer properties to be controlled with two controls – Base Color and Base Roughness. As per PBR conventions, in this mode both metal and transmission color will use Base Color and any texture inserted in this slot. Likewise, diffuse, specular/reflections and transmission roughness will use Base Roughness as input.Reflectivity level of each layer can be adjusted via each layer's Index of Refraction (IOR) settings, though this only applicable to dielectric parts of the base. This is set to 1.5 by default, which is common for glass and most dielectrics. Base Reflectivity can be used to additionally control the specular/reflection of the base layer. This is basically the specular/reflection strength inputs in Classic mode.
Classic Mode
For those who want more control, you can fine tune each section to get the material you desire. To do this, simply disable Use Base Values. This mode allows for robust flexibility in fine tuning the base layer to get various outcome. You can have fully reflective or glossy specular reflections, but keep a rough diffuse or transmission. Vice versa, you can get fully smooth diffuse or transmission and rougher, less glossy specular highlights and reflection.In this mode, metal Fresnel will be calculated from reflection color and edge tint. The resulting render will be pure metal and does not take into account Base Color or Diffuse Color. To override this, simply toggle Use Diffuse Textures so the shader takes into account the diffuse color and texture used. You can adjust the strength of the inlfuence by adjusting Diffuse Texture Strength until you get the look you want. This setting has a similar effect when Use Base Values is enabled, but uses the Base Color and texture.
Here's my understanding of it.
Base color is basically the material main color or albedo in PBR workflow lingo.
For non metal or dielectric this will be used as the diffuse color. For metals, this will be used as the the specular/reflection color. For glass or basically, dielectric with refraction, this will be the refraction color. In some renderers (when the developer implements it), the base/albedo color can also be used as input for subsurface.
When you enable 'Use Base Value' with AWE Surface, the Base Color will be used this way. Well, at least for metal/diiffuse and transmission (excluding subsurface).
The approach makes it easier for artist and workflow, since they can use one input - base color - and handle metal, dielectric, transmission and subsurface/translucency. Now all you need is roughness which is true for all the material regardless of type (metal, dielectric, glass).
Detailed rant:
Disney pioneered this idea because they wanted to present artist with a simplified approach to building materials. Unreal Engine (and Unity) made it popular. This is what everyone refers to when saying 'Principled Shader' or 'Principled BSDF'.
In its purest form, a principled material will only have these inputs:
I chose not to strictly follow those settings for a variety of reasons.
When written properly, an Uber shader will follow PBR rules even if you don't use the Disney Principled approach. The key is what 'proper' means. How all these settings interact with each other, so the amount of energy that is reflected/transmitted will always be equal to the incoming energy - Helmholtz reciprocity principle. Since the parameters translates to physical attributes (surface roughness, reflectivity/IOR values/Fresnel, absorption/transmission/scattering values), it is by definition physically based. That just leaves the actual diffuse/specular model used. Turns out, Oren Nayar and GGX is the closest we've gotten to actual physical phenomenon. Eric Heitz discuss that here - Understanding the Masking-Shadowing Function in Microfacet-Based BRDFs. There's the energy loss though (since the BRDF are all single scattering), but outside of hacking a compensation factor, there's no easy/fast new model or even a unified diffuse/specular model to replace Oren Nayar and GGX.
But PBR is becoming something of a misnomer, the same as 'unbiased'. Well, maybe I just need to make a distinction between 'PBR' and 'PBR workflow' or 'PBR Metalness/Roughness workflow'. But there's my answer and reasoning. Sorry for the rant - back to your regular post(s).
OK. WOW... I am assuming then that the Base workflow as mentioned is for PBR only (iRAY). The Diffuse workflow is for say 3DL and 3DL AWE. So then why include it in the setup if AWE is based more on 3DL which works best using the Diffuse set up?
As noted, AWE is capable of doing both and will be physically based either way (in 3delight). So you can use the PBR Metalness Workflow with AWE Surface if you prefer. I've put the option just in case users feel more comfortable using the PBR Metalness Workflow. Personally, I like using the Uber approach.
AH, OK!
Tks wowie for your very interesting "rant":) I love the fact that you've given us end users a lot of options
Here's Disney/Pixar breakdown of what base/coat )substrate/varnish) combination you can have. Consequently, this is what every shader employing base/clearcoat should support.
I implemented most of it. Only 'Bumpity' isn't used in AWE Surface. Not because I don't want to, but because Shader Builder don't accept RSL 2.0 shaders. I did try working around that and succeded, but the resulting project Shader Builder project will crash DAZ Studio on restart, though it will run and render just fine with DAZ Studio and 3delight.
Here's how reflectivity is done in alSurface (Anders Langlands shader for Arnold 4), which is also how it is done in AWE Surface.
His notes: The energy conservation model is simple and easy to understand.
This is different to older shaders, where the layers are just added together.
All stays true to the physically based rendering fundamentals.
Sven, wowie, or anyone else, I have a couple of questions, one regarding eyes, and the other about pbr materials. To start with, I am not yet ready to fully get into experimenting with all of the awe possbiliies, although I have been doing quite a bit of shader customization in my scenes lately (both using presets and manual tweaking), though still pretty novice level. Right now I need to spend some time learning fluidos, as I will be using a lot of water scenes; particularly I need to make nice surfing environments. Apologies if I missed the answers already being posted as I've gone through this thread.
Regarding eyes: I'm using Unique Eyes on some characters, for the heterochromatic ability, but as it was designed for iray, it does not produce a good overall appearance for eyes. Could you layout a basic idiot's guide using awe to fix this?
And I got the impression that using awe, it is possible to use pbr materials/textures. Is that correct, or did I misunderstand? It would nice to add some pbr shaders from elsewhere to my shaders in Daz (for example, some I have found that are labeled for Unity), but I haven't the foggiest idea how to do that.
Sven, one other thing - renders you have shown in this thread look so wonderful deep and gorgeous, could you show what render settings you're using on them?
Hi there! You are very welcome to visit my awe test track thread over here: https://www.daz3d.com/forums/discussion/284366/the-official-awesurface-test-track#latest
Post your questions, test renders or whatever, discuss aweSurface and 3Delight!
Hmm I don't have that product so not sure how it works. However, I see no reason why you couldn't set up the eyes textures in the IRay shader, then convert it using wowie's converter script for eye surfaces. Do you have the commercial package or are you using the free stuff? Not sure about the free stuff but the commercial package includes presets for skin, eye surfaces, nails, teeth and more. The skin presets need some updating though, as wowie has made a lot of changes to the shader since. In fact he's working on a major update, to be released soonish=)) If you don't have the scripts I can give some pointers on how to set up the eye surfaces (or wowie, when he sees this).
Yup, I do that all the time. My favorite texture source is Texture Haven, although there are several others. It's no rocket science, just DL the textures (typically diffuse, normal, bump, displacement, roughness, specular and metallicity maps), then load them into the proper slots in aweSurface and make a couple of adjustments and testrenders, and you're good to go. Save as a shader preset.
Oh wow, tks for that:) But it's really wowie's gorgeous shader doing the job. I use the raytracer final render script and adjust the quality settings as needed. Shadow- and SS samples are set per surface. Then in rendersettings I just set the pixel samples high enough, typically 8x8 or 10x10. With heavy Depth of Field I might use higher values, that's pretty much it. IMO lighting the scene is what creates a sense of depth.
The render scripts (among other things) can be downloaded here, in case you don't have the commercial package: wowie's free stuff
If you need help, just let us know;)
Thanks, I'll check that out.
The commercial version. Not sure at the moment if I already tried using the eye script or not (if so, it was only a quick try that must have not worked - user error - and I haven't had time to go back to play with it). Not being certain about what I tried regarding the eye script, does it work simply by selecting the target in the surfaces tab and running the script? (I'll check the manual again, but if I found it in there before, I must have missed something.)
In the past few days I finally discovered (ie typed the correct simple couple of keywords into a search engine) how to use the texture images in the surfaces tab, and was pointed to Texture Haven in a shading thread, to add to the few other site I've found some nice pbr textures.
I will check that out with awe.
Right on. I have to trying that render script again - when I briefly experimented with it, it was taking way too long for some reason, but I haven't spent much time with it. The regular sample settings I've been using are 2, 10, 10, 8 - and kick up the raytrace if I need more due to some glass or liquid objects. Btw, I'm working on a 2015 Macbook Pro 13", 3.1 Intel i7, 16 GB ram, Intel Iris Graphics 6100 1536MB.
On the topic of Lighting, I have found that some light sets work better than others. In some indoor scenes where sunlight is NOT shining in through any windows, I still use a daytime sky (sun) to improve lighting. One lighting set I like has the major drawback of having a greater tendency to leave spotty shadows, while I've found that the lighting of the skydomes that come with Ocean Wide make better shadows. Still, there's one I was rendering lately that still has spotty shadows in a corner that doesn't have the direct indoor lighting as the rest of the scene. Any suggestions on that? If I raise the shadow samples a little, it doesn't seem to do anything - haven't taken the render time to test raising it a lot, just moved on to other more important renders for the moment - but I have noticed that when I raised my standard pixel samples that improved shadows in general (10 x 10 isn't enough to perfect this shadow - I'm leary of changing pixel samples, when that scene will sometimes have characters, and different pixel samples will alter the appearance of the characters). I know this lighting bit isn't an awe question, so I'll try to refrain from asking non-awe-related questions on their own, but since we're here, and maybe there's something specific to awe regarding this that you could teach at the same time.
Thank you for everything here, it's definitely helpful.
The scripts work just like applying a shader, select the character and one of the eye surfaces and doubleclick the corresponding script (content library: shader presets: wowie: awe Shading kit: Base character MATs: Base character surface presets
Just to be clear... are you using the scripted 3Delight renderer? In rendersettings tab, select scripted 3Delight, from the render script meny choose RaytracerDraft or RaytracerFinal. But before that, in the standard 3DL pane, make sure gamma is set to 2.20 and gamma correction ON!
Don't try to use aweSurface with the standard 3DL render, it is slow and will not produce HQ results. For quick testrenders you can use it but with progressive rendering enabled. That will allow you to tap in to the built in 3DL raytracer, but with a number of limitations for fast preview, so will not produce optimal quality. The Raytracer scripts are used to access and take advantage of all the built in features of the raytracer. With the right surface- and light settings you won't need to edit the raytracerFinal at all, most of the time. 8x8 pixelsamples will be enough for most renders.
Not sure what you mean by "light sets". Generally, all the standard DS lights and AoA lights (spots, distant, pointligsh etc) will work with awe, but they are not optimized for use with the raytracer. I strongly suggest you use the awe Area PT light shader instead. Just load one of wowie's light presets, or create a primitive plane and apply the shader. It's really working well and renders fast. You can use it for lighting up interiors, simulate sun light or make light fixtures emissive etc.
The other main light source is the aweEnvironment. It can be used with HDRIs, which will give you both direct and indirect light, or with any jpeg, png or whatever 8 Bit image, those will of course not have any direct light, so just add some emissives to the scene.
So, if you don't use the standard lights you don't have to worry about the standard shadow samples settings. Just increase the number of Irradiance samples in the surface settings. 128 is the default. I suggest you start from 512, if not enough, try 1024. For really dark indoor scenes you may want to remove limits and go even to 4096. Doubling the number doesn´t equal doubling the render times!
Hope this helps, if I missed something, just ask;)
Thought I'd share one of my Awe sucesses.
The broken scripted 3Delight to rib is rather hampering my uptake of Awe as a Linux user. 3Delight through Daz is rather slow.
I am having some successes with getting skin looking as I want it after Awe conversion, but am having issues with some V4 skins and eyelashes, also slow renders.
I'll post some problem renders later.