I need some skin!

RexRed

I render my images at 10000 x 10000 and when I zoom in on the skin it looks like they have hives and are wearing makeup. 

Actually, these skin textures are very nice but they have many flaws at that resolution up close.

Can anyone suggest which figure has the very highest quality skin textures and colors and can be loaded on most Gen 8 male characters?

I need my characters to look as real as possible. I have a few skeptics who like to refer to my characters as "mannequins" just to insult the technology I guess...

They don't seem to realize that even photos and sound recordings are not actual people but they are digital recreations of real objects.

...and, video games are outselling movie and music.  That means more people are buying "mannequins" over real actors...

Of course, that is because in games CG characters are more interactive...

But I digress... back to my query... I need skin!  

Please suggest the character you consider having the best skin. :)

I probably already own them and just don't know they are the best.

Also, the Gen 8 male bundle says "starter pack" is there an actual Gen 8 bundle?

Thank in advance for any suggestions.

codex34_f5f1fb6f55

Why are you zooming in on a 10k image? Surely you need to zoom out....?

You might not get a single package, I use skins from one character, normals from another, HD details from another, and crank down measurement distance and/or translucency, but even then bad lighting can ruin a good texture and shader setup.

As for being manequins, it's probably is the plasticy shader look combined with eye divergence, gen 8 uses 1 degree (in each eye) divergence, making the characters look awful, RDR2 uses 6 degrees and most modern games use between 3 and 6. Not to mention the daz limits prevent decent eye geometry being used.

My suggestion would be to make your own frankentextures from parts of others.

fastbike1

@RexRed "even photos and sound recordings are not actual people but they are digital recreations of real objects"

I know I'm older than most, but that's not strictly true. 

I also echo @codex34_f5f1fb6f55 , why are you pixel peeping a 10Kx10K image? That's a foolish effort.

Richard Haseltine

I assume that the image is a close-up, rather than the image being zoomed - which is a perfectly legitimate thing to do, ultra-close ups are used for dramatic effect. hat said, if you are zoomed so that only part of the face, which occupies a fair proportion of a 4,000 pixel texture image in most cases, fills the render then it probably will show its limits (as, probably, will the details in any HD morphs). There are a few sets with 8,000 pixel textures though I think they cover a limited range of tones.

nonesuch00

I've rendered enough face portraits at 2K to know that is they are focused renders most skin materials don't hold up in a face closeup even without zooming in.

The female skin materials tend to do better in that regard because the lack the natural roughness and type details for the most part that are given male skin materials that make the male skin material sets a fail for face closeups so you could apply a female skin material set to your target model as most include options without makeup. Manually apply (or switch if the female skin materials have their own) bump, normal, and displacement maps to make them look again more like the original character. You'll probably have to manually reduce lip glossiness too. Sometimes they'll still wind up looking a bit androgynous or very young though.

RexRed

I am liking the Callan textures the most right now. Though I admit I have not really examined them all and I have quite a few figures. His hands seem realistic and his skin is very nice too.

"His skin maps have been crafted using high-quality photo references." this is written in the promo for him.

His skin seems a step above anything else right now. (no I do not work for the artist)

I came to this conclusion after I made this thread.

A lot of characters have HD morphs, but it seems that is for the geometry and not so much the texture quality.

I am going to subject these models to much more scrutiny.

Then there is the issue of how does one texture work over the geometry of another figure.

I have not worked enough with these figures (though I sure plan to) to know this answer yet.

Worse case scenario is their lips and eyes do not align and their eyebrows are way up on their forehead.

I do not think I have encountered this yet but it could be very subtle and not noticeable for a time until one day I see it. Something like oh wow his lip color does not cover his entire lips sort of thing. 

And then there is mixing face/head morphs. I am wondering if I can come up with some hideous combinations...

How in the heck does this geometry all fit together anyway? 

Currently it all boggles my mind.

It requires a lot of testing.

And to answer a few questions, why am I zooming in on pixels?

Well, if you put a 10,000 x 10,000 image on a wall tapestry it just barely fits without any enlarging or a bedspread...

When someone sees the art from across the room they see the entirety...

But when they walk up close to it on the wall that is when they see the model's skin looks like clammy clay and their toes are going right through the floor... hehe  :)

 

Catherine3678ab

Bluejaunte's characters tend to come highly recommended although they are [so far] for the ladies. As has been suggested, one could do some juggling for other figures. From the promo page: Realistic skin pores and a meticulously tuned skin shader preset.

Default load for the BJ Malika skin, light preset used from 'Easy Portraits'

nonesuch00

Well, I don't own it yet but in the forums this character got more raves for having the best skin details in a DAZ 3D Store release yet: Dain 8.  I think that character's thread may of had more posts then any of DAZ Originals Pro Bundle thread yet too. Personally I intend to buy it to see how it holds up to a face close up render with mitchell filter of radius 1.0.