Metallics

melanie

I'm creating a scene in DAZ Studio where an object needs to be metallic gold with a shiny appearance. It just keeps looking dull no matter what I do with it. Can a high reflective metallic surface be done in DAZ Studio?

Khory

If your using raytraced reflections then you need to be sure that there is something to be reflected. If you don't want to add in things to be reflected then you can use a reflection map.

XoechZ

Also glossiness and specular are very important for shiny surfaces.

sriesch

A skydome with some bright clouds, blue sky, and a dark ground combination works great for metallic materials. I would encourage you to do a quick side-by-side render comparison of some detailed object, temporarily set to a shiny metallic surface, with and without the full environment to see how critical the full environment is. See attached example, Pickup Dred with the default material for shiny metal bits replaced by the the Chrome shader. Left is default lighting, right is with a randomly selected skydome. (no attempts at good lighting, just trying to point out effect of environment here.) Huge difference.

One can also do a low-budget combination of a box for walls, a plane for a floor, and something on the ceiling for lights, although reflections could be missing. You might be able to improve the appearance of the reflections with a few strategically placed appropriately colored objects in spots that still seem dull, even if they are technically correctly dull in those places.

melanie

Thanks, I'll try these things. I tried a reflection map, but it didn't do much. Thanks for the suggestions.

Kerya

Take a look at these: http://www.sharecg.com/v/27568/material-and-shader/Ultimate-Shader-Pack-for-DAZ-Studio
or Fisty's shaders: http://fisty.blackraven3d.com/freebies/ FistysShaders1DS.zip

Erdehel

When I need shiny metals I use one of the metal shaders coming with the supersuit (sold here) and tweak it so it uses the textures I want. If needed I then adjust the glossiness and sometimes the specularity. I usually get very good shining metals doing this.

StratDragon

Kerya said:

Take a look at these: http://www.sharecg.com/v/27568/material-and-shader/Ultimate-Shader-Pack-for-DAZ-Studio
or Fisty's shaders: http://fisty.blackraven3d.com/freebies/ FistysShaders1DS.zip

the ones on sharedCG are the backbone of my metallic shader needs when I use 3Delight, but I didn't know about Fisty's shaders. Thanks for the link!

V3Digitimes

Hi, I've spent months developing metal shaders everyday, several hours a day... And I know how difficult it can be when starting. Metal aspect depend on light, shader, object shape (regarding camera), as explained here : http://www.daz3d.com/forums/discussion/41437/

I have a presentation showing different way to render metal, a short one here :
http://youtu.be/A3NuHSsf4Yk
In this one you can see how it behaves both with classical DS lights and with a ray trace dome, and see in your case which may be the more appropriate for you (I guess the ray trace dome for a car, it's a classical method).

I have many other videos actually, but this one is the shortest where you will be able to pick up the most informations.

You will not have all the dials for metal rendering in classical materials, but based on all these advices you can see if you have the free shaders working for what you feel like doing.

For you car, IF you do not manage with the shaders you are trying (it may be enough for your needs, it depends on what you feel like reaching), I would say the base version of my shaders (the shader version) should be enough, the "creator" is normally more oriented to content creators. You can check in these promos if there is something in the metals looking like what you want to have in your scene, these are two sets of metal shaders, advanced metal shaders ( http://youtu.be/glVl4Dx5cPc ) , and advanced metal creator ( http://youtu.be/eiu_jtGbfh8 ).

But in any case (my shaders, other shaders), I would recommend you a ray trace dome/ light dome + 1 infinite light at least, or just a strong "real" surrounding environment including at least a sky dome :
You have to "fill" the space around the car, so that there is reflection everywhere, and you have to set up your reflection and specular highlights properly, and this will be done :)