what are skin shaders?
assmonkey
Posts: 0
as the topic...I don't know what they are
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That depends - shaders (that is, instructions to the renderer on how a surface reacts to light) specifically made for skin, or possibly just material settings 9including which shader to use) for a figure's skin.
Does it just change the skin tone (meaning...like Pale or tan) or are they a whole new "texture" in a way?
Which? The latter would be for applying a set of textures and the rest of the settings, the former would be a shader 9like the DAZ Default Shader or uberSurface) that would normally be used with a texture set. Changing skin tone would be a specific thing done with a materials preset or by adjusting settings, regardless of which shader was used. What a skin shader would offer would be sub-surface scattering, perhaps some kind of procedural fro faking skin details (in which case it might not need textures), and probably other things to evoke the look of skin.
guess I can't tell, the photo examples really didn't help with showing any extra details
Might be helpful if you tell everyone exactly what product you are talking about. I'm sure then someone will be able to answer your questions better for you.
In general, I can't tell
I was looking at different products, and they weren't doing any comparison pictures to show the difference
Yes.
A shader is a program: it can be as simple or as complex as its creator desires. It can simply reflect light from the point a ray of light hit it, just changing "skin tone" by changing hue. It can emit light from someplace other than where the ray of light hit it (subsurface scattering) making skin look more translucent and luminous. It can generate patterns randomly according to statistics to produce pores or freckles on skin. It can tile patches of texture. I've seen fractal shaders do some very sophisticated math to get complex patterns.
do shaders work outside the program?
like...if I apply a shader to a character (do something to the skin), would there be anyway that can be visible in like...a game?
The explanations you're getting are accurate, but they're also a little confusing. In DAZ Studio or other 3D programs, the shader is basically all of the settings that, combined with a texture, make a surface look a certain way. They can be really complex or really simple, and all of the different parts of them (like how shiny or bumpy something is) can be adjusted by you. All of those settings in the Surfaces panel, like specularity, reflection, ambient, and diffuse are what make up a shader.
Most shaders that you can buy in the store here usually have extra features, like sub-surface scattering (which helps skin look more real) or additional layers where you can put two textures on top of each other. The 'shaders' that come with a texture that you buy are really just presets to load the texture, they don't add additional features.
Shaders really just determine how your surfaces will render in the program you're working in, so there's not a lot of use for them outside of Studio. I'm not sure if you mean to export the 3D model itself to a game or to render images to use in a game, so I can't precisely answer your last question. However, if the model is going to a full-3D game environment like Unity, you're better off setting materials and using that software's shaders for accuracy.
SnowS
Yeah, planing to use Unity
thanks for taking the time to explain it to me
No problem, although I think you need to check with DAZ for commercial use of their models in gaming. I don't know exactly what the licensing terms are now, and it's REALLY important that you have proper permission for any model use before you get too far into making a game.
Take care!