In-Depth Tutorial for squeezing the best of 3Delight?
mwasielewski1990
Posts: 343
Hi!
I just started learning Daz3D and I really like the software. But, I have a couple of questions about rendering in 3Delight.
I know 3DL is not as powerful as IRAY, but currently I'm working on a laptop with GTX960m gpu card. Rendering images with Iray, even on very low settings (like 500 samples) takes hours and the final effect is really grainy. So, for now, I'd like to learn abit more about 3Delight, but I'm a total noob at 3d rendering and I don't even know where to look.
I rendered a couple of test images, and despite setting the lights myself (adding spotlights etc), the rendered image and figures look "flat". So, I assume, the thing I'm missing are shaders, am I correct? But let's take for example, a prop I downloaded for free from the net: like a chair or wardrobe. It comes with pre-packed textures, but how do I create/apply a shader for it so it looks better? So the wood texture, for example actually looks like wood and not just a flat .png texture?
Also, I noticed you can choose "scripted 3Delight" mode. There are some pre-defined scripts there, I used the one called "occlusion ....something", and the rendered image turned out to have slightly better shadows cast by the lights. Any advice on how to use them, where to find such scripts, how to install them?
So, TL,DR; any advice for a total noob on how to use 3Delight so it renders a bit better images? Maybye some tips for render settings?
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I'd say this is the best place to search for in-depth information about 3DL, it's unfortunately almost a 100 pages long, but you could take it as a project:) And you can ask very simple and specific questions there, somebody will have an answer.
https://www.daz3d.com/forums/discussion/55128/3delight-laboratory-thread-tips-questions-experiments/p1
I think what you're missing is some sort of global illumination/ambient occlusion, which is used to simulate light bouncing around the scene. You see, with the default implementation of 3DL in DS, you have to use a source for indirect light, just adding spots or distant light won't do more than direct light. If you want 3DL to behave like IRay, you need to use scripted pathtracing along with aweSurface. This will give you physically plausible light bouncing. If this is what you want to do, check out this thread and product, you'll get both the script and the shader: https://www.daz3d.com/forums/discussion/280441/awe-shading-kit-for-daz-studio-and-3delight-commercial/p1 The shader is free if you just want to play around with it to see if you like it: https://www.daz3d.com/forums/discussion/277581/awe-surface-shader-a-new-physically-plausible-shader-for-daz-studio-and-3delight/p1Just understand that this is a product under development, there will be an update in the near future, but it's fully functional with the current build;)
If you just want to work with the regular 3DL renderer, you can use the UberEnvironment 2 to create indirect light/ ambient occlusion, it ships free with DS. Or you can purchase this: https://www.daz3d.com/advanced-daz-studio-light-bundle This is great for getting plausible occlusion and renders very fast compared to the UE2.
Another great product which I suggest you'll have a look at is https://www.daz3d.com/ibl-master-for-daz-studio It makes it easy to use HDRI lighting with 3DL and produces very nice looking ambient occlusion + renders fast.
There are several 3DL shaders included with DS, find them in your content library/shader presets. Most commonly used is the DS default shader, AoA SSS shader and UberSurface. To give a sense of depth to the surfaces, 3DL uses bump- displacement- and normal maps just like IRay. (although it uses displacement differently than Iray). So you need those control maps to create "roughness" or depth to your surfaces. If they are not included with the props you need to borrow some maps from another product or create them yourself in PS or GIMP.
Pointbased occlusion is actually the only script that actually does anything, and it's not very useful IMO:) It's hardcoded for the UE2 in bouncelight mode, so if you use that, you might want to try it, otherwise forget those scripts. The only useful script is the raytracer that comes with aweShading kit, makes pathtracing within DS possible.
My advice is: first get the AoA advanced lights, learn to use them, that's pretty straight forward, and learn to use the shaders to get the most out of them, will go a long way.
One thing that is extremely important if you ask me: Use a linear workflow! That means in plain English: In rendersettings editor set gamma correction on and gamma to 2.2!!! This should be the default setting but it is not atm. If you don't do that you will never have correct shading.
Always render through a camera with depth of field enabled if you want 3DL to take into account every detail of the mesh in your scene!
In the render settings editor/sampling I use these settings as default:
If you up the shading rate it will render faster at the expense of less detail/sharpness, maybe 0.5 is enough for what you do?
Well I tried to make a long story very short, feel free to ask:) Hope you can find something useful in here!
Will AoA advanced lights work with AWESurface? I thought you should use the lights provided by wowie in the AWESurface kit. Or is it a workaround?
No they won't. Yes using the provided lights is the fastest way, as aweSurface has been highly optimized for those. Standard DS lights will work, but optimization is lost, so will double rendertimes (roughly).
Thanks, Sven!
...attached is a sample of one image using just IBL Master (I also used a low intensity distant light under the ground plane with shadows turned off for the primary bounce lighting). The original scene in Iray took several hours (CPU rendering as I only had a GPU with 1 GB of VRAM). In 3DL it took around 11 minutes.
I have the AweShader, but before I could start working with it I had a major Hard Drive meltdown that took my entire custom library and runtime set up with it as well as about three years worth of scene files (some still works in progress) that will have to be rebuilt from scratch again. Still in the process of rebuilding the system which includes several hardware updates).
Oh gosh, thank you for this extensive answer. I'll certainly look up these products, I don't mind paying some extra bucks :) I'll certailny will have more questions though later when I try some of the suggested options :)
Okay, so, after another test renders more questions popped up :) I used the settings for the Render Options panel you suggested.
1) How do I work with the UberEnviroment? If i'm correct, they're under the Smart Content -> Lights tab? Generally, with nothing selected in the Scene tab, I just double clicked one of the UberEnviroment2 lights and it loaded itself onto the scene. Is this the correct use of them? Should I use both UberEnviroment2_base and UberEnviroment2_bounce at the same time? Is this correct to use both UberEnviroment and regular, for example plain spotlights at the same time? Is there anything I should know about messing with the UE light's parameters in the Parameters tab? Generally i loaded two lights mentioned and the render was abit too bright and grainy.
2) I tried to use Depth of Field on one of the cameras in my scene. It drastically increased render time. After 10+ minutes, in the render preview i just saw tons of grain (it looked like a pile of sand) as opposed to rendering without it. Without DOF, render time was around ~5 mins. Is this normal? What are the normal render times for you when you use Depth of Field?
3) About the commercial Awe shading kit - how does that work, I install it and load a shader of my choice onto a Figure or Prop, and thats it? Or is this more complicated? If so, are such shaders enough to, for example increase the overall quality of human skin for Genesis 8 models, or do I have to buy something else that is especially designed for this?
PS. sorry again for all the noob questions, hope it's not a problem :)
Yep, or in your content library/light presets/Omnifreaker/UberEnvironment 2
You just use one, doesn't matter really which one you load, one loads with a parented environment sphere, which you can delete or hide, the UE2 bounce light loads without the sphere IIRC. The UE2 serves as a global "fill" light (ambient light). It has a number of modes you can select in the parameter pane/light. The ambient mode just gives you fill light without any shadows or occlusion, renders fast of course, since it doesn't use raytracing, but will look very flat. I suggest you use occlusion with soft shadows, that will produce ok looking occlusion and still render pretty fast. The heaviest mode is the bounce light. It is the most realistic but renders very slow so be warned:) If you use it, enable progressive mode in the render settings tab, that will speed up rendering considerably. So yes, use UE2 for global illumination and add distant lights or spotlights as needed.
The graininess is because it loads with very low shadow sample- and shading rate- settings (to speed up rendering I guess) so you need to adjust that. Here is a good setting to start with:
Example of using only UE2 with occlusion and soft shadows:
Same thing but added a distant light and loaded a skydome:
To get proper color bleed you need to use the bounce light mode:
Same thing but increased indirect light to 200%:
Depending on the other lights in the scene you need to adjust the UE2 intensity, with some practice you will find a good balance, trust your eyes, not the settings:)
DoF increases rendertimes somewhat, but should not be a problem. Search the forums (google) for tutorials on how to use it, there are several threads where it is discussed. You probably overdid some setting so everything was blurred to death;)
No problem at all! To be frank, awe may not be suited for beginners, it's a new product and there are no one click presets available as of yet, so to get a good result you need to learn the shader and tweak all your surfaces to your liking, basically create your own presets. On the other hand it's free, so it's up to you. Workflow would be: Load Genesis 8 either with Iray or 3DL mats, convert to aweSurface and start modifying skinsettings. There are base character presets for all generations from M4/V4 to G8, but they are just starting points at this stage. Same goes for environments, they need to be converted. The new build, which will be released in the near future, will include an Iray to awe converter I've been informed, but for now you have to do it manually.
Another thing about UE2 I forgot to mention...it doesn't output any specular light, only diffuse light. This means you might want to add a number of spotlights to your scene and in parameters/light set them to specular only and no raytraced shadows. Otherwise skin and eyes may look a bit dry. Experiment with directions, light spread and light color for those specular lights! Won't affect render times very much. The AoA ambient light doesn't have this "problem" FYI
Feel free to visit https://www.daz3d.com/forums/discussion/130611/show-us-your-3delight-renders#latest in the art forums if you want to check out 3DL renders or post your own/ask questions!
There is also the https://www.daz3d.com/forums/discussion/284366/the-official-awesurface-test-track#latest for discussing aweSurface&3DL
Thanks, this is great!! Really helped with the grainyness of the image. Another question about "Load Genesis 8 either with Iray or 3DL mats" - what did you mean by "mats"? When I select Gen8 female, in the smart content tab there are some materials to load on the model, but I can't figure out which are ment to be for 3DL and which for IRAY. And, I have no understanding of the "convert to aweSurface and start modifying skinsettings" part :( . How do I do that? I installed the free aweSurface shader but i clearly have no clue how to use it, I managed to load it as stated in this tutorial:
https://helpdaz.zendesk.com/hc/en-us/articles/207530433-How-to-Apply-a-Shader-in-DAZ-Studio
I loaded it on the entire GEN8 model just to look how it works, I loaded the "metal" preset but the whole Figure just renders as a solid, 100% white "mass" :D
Also, to save some time. Are there any "noob-friendly" bundles on the store with actual working Smart Content presets for applying better skin, pre-made shaders that look good "out-of-the-box" for 3DL specifically? Generally I already found some packs on other website (erotic-related) which come with full suppot for G8 female model, but only in terms of pre-made poses (they also come with props, whole enviroment scenes etc.). I'm mainly interested in upgrading the human skin quality, but as far as I see, most pre-made shaders and skin textures for G8 are for IRAY. Any suggestions on this? I really don't mind spending $200+ on some good looking stuff that works well for a noobie.
I meant materials presets, 3DL materials are called RSL and Iray materials are MDL. If you go to the content library/people/G8F/materials I think there are 2 folders, one with 3DL presets and one for Iray presets. (Don't have G8 installed so not 100% sure). If you want to use aweSurface, it doesn't really matter which version you load, as they both share the same textures.
Well convert= apply in this case:) Not 100% sure, since I use the commercial pack and you have the freebie, but there should be scripts included in your pack to apply aweSurface to G8F. Load your character, apply a materials preset (3DL or Iray), go to content library/shader presets/wowie/aweSurface/base characters presets, with the character selected double click the G8F preset (this is a script so no need to have surfaces selected at this stage). Now you should have G8F with aweSurface properly applied to it. Granted, you can apply the awe base shader to anything, just like any other shader. And, as I understand it, the raytracer rendering script should be included in the free package, if installed correctly, it should be found in the render settings tab/scripted 3DL drop down menu. Always use that with aweSurface!
As I mentioned, those base characters presets will do a pretty good job applying awe, but, in my experience, you will have to adjust a number of settings to make it look great;) That's what I meant by "modifying settings". Awe is no different than Iray or 3DL in that regard, you need to tweak things to your liking, right:)
You also should have an awe quick start scen with an included environment sphere and an awe emissive light. Use that lighting as a test scene when working on skin settings, you can save it out as a sub set if you like. It should have the proper white balance and intensity.
I'm not the right person to answer this, as I'm a "do it yourself" guy
Generally, you need good lighting, that's 99% of the secret in my very honest opinion. Find a good light setup, then start tweaking skin settings. You probably know there's an Iray to 3DL converter in the store, haven't used it myself, but maybe worth a try?
PS when using awe, don't mix it with ANY other shaders, everything in the scene should use awe! For example, the DS default shader renders pitch black with scripted pathtracing.
Many, many thanks for all your advice. I applied almost all of your instructions, only tweaking abit the UberEnviroment light. Generally i was experimenting, and found out that best combination is:
a) set up a regular spotligh with deep shadow map to enlighten the Figure (in the attachment, the light is above the character)
b) in exactly the same place, I set up another spotlight, without any shadows and in specular only mode
c) of course, i messed up with the depth of field, because I was always forgetting to choose the actual focal point :P after reading a tutorial it is all good now.
And this is whai I came up with, applying your render settings.
Render time was under 2 minutes on Intel i5 6300HQ.
But, unfortunately, I can't figure out the awe shader - the .zip file does not come with any scripts (or maybye i'm too stupid to find them) . In the content library, there are 4 'presets' (attachment 2). I couldn't find any scripts for loading it onto G8 Figure in the zip file. Probably I'm still doing something wrong :/
You're welcome:) Nice render, good to see you got things working:) Hmm it looks like those scripts only come with the commercial pack then...what about the render script? Did you find it?
mwasielewski1990 you can find render scripts as well here and more instructions. https://www.daz3d.com/forums/discussion/277581/awe-surface-shader-a-new-physically-plausible-shader-for-daz-studio-and-3delight/p1 wowie put them on Google Drive for the freebie.
Tks Kevin, that's what I thougth:) The next commercial build (1.3) will be released through DIM, btw.
Thanks for the update, Sven!
Ok guys, It turned out the shaders didn't work because of my own stupedity, I've put the script files into the wrong folder structure...
So, the awe shader works, I can apply it to any surface I want, the image renders OK however, the renderer outputs some erors:
3Delight message #46 (Severity 1): The subsurface() shadeop should be specified with an "irradiance" channel for correct rendering and better performance when using global illumination. (in shader 'brickyard/{407f8e5c-3a9b-4708-b5e5-799ff1fe7c1d}/shader_Surface' on object 'shapematerial_Legs_3174_7c6')
3Delight message #46 (Severity 1): The subsurface() shadeop should be specified with an "irradiance" channel for correct rendering and better performance when using global illumination. (in shader 'brickyard/{407f8e5c-3a9b-4708-b5e5-799ff1fe7c1d}/shader_Surface' on object 'shapematerial_Fingernails_3635_7c6')
I used UberEnv lights for this render. Any ideas what this error message mean?
Hmm, if you use the UE2 with awe, don't!
That's the point of using pathtracing, you get global illumination for "free", just like with IRay. The aweSurface automagically creates the effect, and shadow samples are specified per surface (Irradiance samples at the bottom of the surface tab, default is 128). For best performance use the included awe PT area light shader for emissives! (That's what the included awe lights use). As mentioned, awe is highly optimized for using that. What you can use as GI is the awe environment sphere, which has the awe environmental shader applied to it. That's a simple emissive shader, makes it possible to use any jpeg, png or .hdr as global illumination (HDRI lighting). You can freely combine awe emissives with HDRIs, even use several env. spheres if you wish to. Turn off visibility if you wish to make a sphere invisible to the camera (camera on/off toggle button at the bottom of the surface pane).
Ok, back to your question:) Not sure what they mean, do they go away if you delete the UE2? If not, post your question in one of the threads I linked to, and I'm sure wowie or Mustakettu85 will explain what's happening;)
Just pointing this out one more time: for best performance, use only awe PT area lights and/or awe environmental shader to light your scene. You can use all the DS standard lights, just enable raytraced shadows, but optimization will be lost, rendertimes will roughly double.
Edit: Ok, saw your post in the awe commercial thread:)
Okay, I promise, this is my last set of questions regarding the awe shader :D (besides, in my previous question I was referring to the freebie - I didn't get the commercial product yet)
But now let's say I got the commercial product, and I have a scene consisting of:
1) Do I have to do anything before the initial render? Like converting all surfaces to awe or something like that? Or just select the appropriate script from "scripted 3Delight" panel and just hit render?
2) So what your saying is, I don't have to use ANY global illumination if I don't want to? And, when using the enviromental sphere - what types of .jpg's and .png's are you referring to, are there any free ones on the internet just to download and apply to the sphere? How does this change the overall look comparing to "no GI" at all when using awe?
3) Let's say I want to use the "Skin" preset from the commercial product on a e.g. Victoria 8 model. Does this override all textures, or just the shaders? Will I see any improvement out of the box?
The reason why I'm asking so many questions is because I've read the manual for the commercial product and it seems really complicated to me. The thing is, I don't have much time do dig in the topic of making my own lights, shaders etc so I'm looking to pay for an universal and versatile solution. Maybye I should stick with what I know now, and just buy some noob-friendly light packs from the DAZ store instead (for global illumination and such)? :)
You have to apply aweSurface to everything in your scene, and probably make adjustments to stuff before you are ready to render.
Figures: As mentioned, the awe commercial kit comes with scripts to convert figures (M4/V4, Genesis, Genesis2F/M, Genesis 3F/M and Genesis 8F/M, + a skin settings preset for generic figures. So you simply select your G8F, apply the G8 base character preset by double clicking the script.
Props and stuff: You need to apply aweSurface by selecting the prop and the surface(s) and double clicking the base awe shader. Or one of the included presets. There are presets for dull, rough, glossy, reflective, fabric, metal(gold, silver etc)glass, hair (3 presets) and a few other materials. So concrete would be rough or dull, a mirror would be chrome, water would be glass (you need to change refraction value from 1.5 to 1.33 for physically plausible), well you get the picture? So you will need to go through every surface and adjust things. All presets are starting points, many things work by just selecting the proper preset, many won't.
Environments: Same as props, no presets for plants as of now, I usually start with the glossy preset, then add translucency and SSS (Sub Surface Scattering) where needed;) For things like neon signs and light bulbs you can apply either the awe environmental shader or the awe PT area light, to make them emissive/glowing.
So...as I said, awe is no one click solution, you have to make your own presets as you go along. Eventually someone will start making presets for products and more awe shader presets, but this is the current situation.
Say you have an enclosed (indoor) environment, you can just light it with the awe emissive lights and/or DS standard spots, the light will bounce around and create indirect light, so no need to add an environmental sphere, as its light won't be seen anyway, unless you have windows or openings, of course. For outdoor scenes I would recommend using the environmental sphere as a skydome that actually emits light, creating physically accurate GI, but you don't have to use it, you can create a sun from a primitive plane with awe area light applied to it, or from one of the included awe lights.
A 3DL skydome usually loads with a diffuse texture in jpg format. You can load one into your awe scene (if you own one), plop the skydome texture into the awe environment sphere diffuse color slot and then delete the sky dome. It will work quite well, but nothing beats a high dynamic range (.hdr or HDRI) image. There are numerous HDRI products in the store and many sets come with included HDRIs, they can all be used to light your scenes using the env. sphere. Google free HDRI, there are many good ones out there. Start with HDRI Haven, they are generally of very good quality;) Create a folder and save them there, makes it easy to browse to that folder from within DS to load them into the env. sphere.
Generally, for the most realistic result, use HDRI lighting for your outdoor scenes, definitely the easiest route to go IMO.
The preset just applies awe Surface with basic skin settings, all maps will transfer.
Probably, very much depending on the lighting of course. But to be honest, I don't use wowie's settings out of the box, they may work for you, I tend to always change certain things like diffuse strength, specular strength and SSS settings. And every texture is unique, that's what the sliders are for, you need to adjust things
Well that's because...it is=) CG in general, not a walk in the park
Not necessarily a bad idea;) Look into IBL-master, it works both with all the regular 3DL shaders AND aweSurface. Nice GI and easy to use, same HDRIs can be used, and it also makes working with Iray easier. If you need really fast rendering, the AoA lights are hard to beat. Oh, IBL master needs true HDRI, won't look good with jpegs.
As you said yourself, this is a complex matter, be patient and just...make stuff, run into trouble and ask for help...that's what I do.
One of my first awe renders:)
Correction. it will still work, but there's really no need (at least) for the Advanced Ambient. The Advanced distant one can still help if you want to emulate sun in your scene.
At the risk of being pedantic.
Shaders are actual code that computes what you see in the render, usually with a lot of settings to change the output/how it looks in a render.
Material presets are just saved shader settings for surfaces in a figure or prop. Shader presets are saved shader settings per surface area of a figure or prop. So think of material presets or MATs as a collection of shader presets for a figure/prop/scene.
For 3delight, shaders (not materials or shader presets) are written in Renderman Shading Language (RSL) that tells the renderer what to do with a surface. In iray, these would be written in Material Definition Language (MDL). But RSL actually covers a bit more than just materials, since it also used to write light shaders, camera (imager) shaders etc. It has a more 'complete' access to all the capabilities of a renderer.
Unfortunately, since most vendors are focusing on iray and DAZ never bothered offering equivalent toolsets for 3delight, 3delight users have to rely on themselves to figure out settings. Luckily, this isn't very difficult now with AWE Surface. AWE Surface basically uses the same approach as iray uber in describing materials. Hmm, I do need some one to test out the iray uber to AWE Surface conversion. Feel free to PM me and let's see what can be done.
Tks, wowie for clarifying:) And sorry Kevin, I'm not to be trusted
Well, ok. Thanks for all the tips and advice, I will try the AoA light pack first as it seems abit easier to use. Also I have another question specifically for 3Delight users:
What is your favorite/best looking pre-made content available for 3DL on the Daz Store? I mean mostly Figures and scenes :)
I personally found the AoA lights the best 3dl investment ever.
It produces a fair amount of quality lighting with lightning speed. Anything even slightly more realistic gets incredibly slow.
I made a scene a couple of days ago with 18 fully dressed Genesis1 figures, most of them with hair, and 16 HD bust figures, some props and emissive lights, no scene optimizer used, with awe and scripted pathtracing, full HD pixelsize rendered in about 45 min, quite ok in my opinion.
I get itchy at renders over 10 minutes.
Another big advantage of AoA lights is simplicity; 90% of the time a distant light + ambient will do the job, and I can set that up in a couple of minutes. It DOES get tricky if I want, say, candles or whatever, but that's hard no matter which way you go.
Umm ok, but that was not my point
Well, yesterday I tested the AoA with this product:
https://www.daz3d.com/the-heart-of-darkness
I used one distant light and one ambient light with 0.5 meter radius for each set of candles (placed directly on top of them). The setup wasn't really fast for me considering the amount of options available in AoA : p One thing that bugs me, is even using higher occlusion samples and lower max error rate etc, the AoA setup still produced abit worse (and slower) result then UberEnviroment with regular Daz lights. But i guess it's a matter of practice :D
You can certainly use the ambient light that way, but basically you only need one ambient light in the scene for global illumination, with the radius set to 0 (or enough to cover the scene). Try using spotlights for the candles, with 360 degree spread, customize the fall off to your liking. That would be a more efficient way of lighting the scene IMO.