Digital Art Zone

After updating to 4.5 PRO I can’t see any difference. Are there some that might be interesting even for beginners?

To my knowledge DS 4.5 is only offered in the Pro version

No, I had the 4.5 standard version (as shown in the headline of the program window), after registering with the serialnumber it immediately changed to 4.5 PRO !

DS will run without a serial. Several features are disabled then, assuming it’s the same as 4.0: the content creation tools, ZBrush Bridge, Photoshop Bridge. Texture Atlas. I’m not sure about Shader Mixer (though presets will still work) or some of the other shaders - the various uber shaders were part of the paid for version of DS3 but I think are now included in standard.

Another disabled feature is the Layered Image Editor which can be invaluable for adding decals, scars or even tears to models. As an old proverb once said, better to have and not need than to need and not have.

HOF, you just volunteered to create a LIE tear tutorial… so sez aye!

Aye Second!

wancow - 21 January 2013 07:26 PM

HOF, you just volunteered to create a LIE tear tutorial… so sez aye!

If I could ever figure out how to use the LIE and still have it work alongside Reality and Luxrender, I might just. As it stands, I’m still a beginner myself, so it wouldn’t be a very in-depth tutorial.

HeraldOfFire - 22 January 2013 05:19 AM

wancow - 21 January 2013 07:26 PM

HOF, you just volunteered to create a LIE tear tutorial… so sez aye!

If I could ever figure out how to use the LIE and still have it work alongside Reality and Luxrender, I might just. As it stands, I’m still a beginner myself, so it wouldn’t be a very in-depth tutorial.

I have this vague feeling that Realtiy is LIE compatible HeraldOfFire…I am fairly sure I just read that the other day. I maybe be wrong though LOL

Always creates blank white textures whenever I used multi-layering in Reality, either that or entirely overwrites it and removes the overlay entirely. Never really had much luck with it myself.

HeraldOfFire - 22 January 2013 07:02 AM

Always creates blank white textures whenever I used multi-layering in Reality, either that or entirely overwrites it and removes the overlay entirely. Never really had much luck with it myself.

Have you tried the “collect textures” option in the Reality output tab? You also need to change the default compression so the collected textures are not compressed (as this will affect quality). I think the issue is that Studio keeps the LIE textures in its temporary cache and they become inaccessible to Lux when DAZ is closed (and possibly at times even while it is still running).

I can’t check any of this at the moment because I don’t have a computer with Reality available. I’m sure I’ve used it successfully.

HeraldOfFire - 22 January 2013 07:02 AM

Always creates blank white textures whenever I used multi-layering in Reality, either that or entirely overwrites it and removes the overlay entirely. Never really had much luck with it myself.

The best way to use a layered image in Luxrender is to not use one…take the overlay and the texture into an image editor and combine them.  This is because, instead of looking at it as a layered image, it is most likely being interpreted as a layered texture…sort of like hair. 

Also, the ‘collect textures’ option should be the default, because Lux works best when it doesn’t have to hunt down the textures.  (from experience, it seems that no matter what, it will have problems finding something if they aren’t all in one place).  Another advantage with the collect feature, everything is one folder, so setting it up for a network/distributed render is a lot easier.  And if you need to, you can edit any of the lx files…

lxs=Lux Scene File…it’s the description of the ‘world’ and the render settings.
lxm=This is the materials file…and the one that will need to be edited if you give the combined layer/image a different name.
lxo= Geometry definition file.
flm= the ‘progress’ file…it stores a ‘film’ of how far/what has been done so far so that the render can be paused/stopped/resumed…not really editable.

As to how LIE works, yes, it stores the images in the DS TEMP folder…