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Here's a preset that will apply all of MelissaGT's steps. You still have to create the SSS maps and apply them manually.
@Hylas, Thanks for providing the shader preset. @MelissaGT, Thanks for sharing your technique for all to view. This technique may very well elevate the renders in the Daz gallery. There goes our edge.
@Hylas Thanks, this will make things faster.
You do know that it should not. Joking aside, This is clearly a case of "Give a 'man' a fish" vs MelissaGT "Teach 'him' to fish' approach.
@Hylas we definately appreciate the work you have put into the hands-on shader file you have shared with the community. You both combined have given the users a blueprint to work from where as you have materialized her concept and allowed it to become easily accessible.
As Melissa said for the maps you can simply save a template file with the 3 layers and replace the image for the base and sss layer.
Doing this makes the conversion very simple.
BTW to share the missing pieces, a similar process can be done right inside DAZ Studio using Layer Image Editor. no third party application needed.
You may get better results with third party apps since LIE has been know to be unstable at times.
Using Photoshop gives you the ability to play around more, such as blending in pieces here and there to make up a frankenskin. These eyes, this mouth, those cheeks, etc. There is also a kind of secret technique I sometimes use with the high pass filter to borrow the details from one skin to apply to another. What I showed in the tutorial is only the very bare bones basics. Down the road I'll likely write more that will be way more deep in terms of technique.
Also yes, the preset is nice, but the entire point is to get in there and see what the different colors and settings do, because all skins behave differently. One looks good on one might look awful on another.
Agree! The use of LIE was to show beginners who do not have Photoshop, Affinity or GIMP that DAZ Studio has a limited use image blender that can be used to achieve a limited use version of the modified SSS maps. It was more of a way of saying you have all the tools so no excuses to learning to build a similar map for your renders.
BTW using the LIE method has merits since it can be scripted to apply the settings to the various body parts. For those who want a few click solution.
As MelissaGT pointed out you are best to acquire a layer manipulation program at least GIMP but best Photoshop, Affinity, Paintshop Pro or PDHowler.
Looking forward to see what users will do with this information.
Facebook is out of the question for some folks, but deviant art is a great place!
Never mind, I was in a hurry and posted this when it was already suggested!
If one uses those settings as a starting point, it's just a quick way to get to that starting point.
True, but there is also a large portion of users who will see a preset and forget that it's just a starting point and then blame the preset when the results don't look good.
That didn't even occur to me.
Do you want me to remove your name from the file?
Not it's fine...just wanted to point out that there is a huge subset of people who don't read and then get upset when things don't pan out as expected, lol. Kind of like the huge number of people who called me when I put up an old car for sale and apparently missed the multiple times I said in the ad that it needed a transmission...in caps...and underlined. Multiple times. :P
Hi all! Just wanted to post an update that I'm working on expanding my tweaks guide to include spectral rendering!
Thanks so much for these tutorials. Really helpful in getting me off my butt to start changing these settings, for the better I hope. But please don't use Facebook for further tutorials as some people (like me) don't have a Facebook account.
Great news!
Can't wait to read what you come up with.
Since the new Iray update changed the way spectral rendering works I'm completely lost.
It'll likely go up on my DeviantArt.
Thanks again @MelissGT Here is one of the characters using your process with spectral rendering.
Yeah, I noticed that my current process makes characters come out too washed out when turning on spectral rendering. I've revisited steps for creating sss maps as well as sss color and the results are much better. The only downside is that the results end up too dark with standard rendering. So like with Rosawyn pictured below, I now have two skin presets...one for standard rendering, and one for spectral rendering because the sss maps and sss colors/settings are completely different in each...but that also does make sense considering how different the renderers work...one set of settings won't work right with the other -
I'm just curious. When in your images you have touches of color in the shadows or the areas of the skin that have a little less light in them, are they a function of the reflections from surrounding objects or can these colors be induced with certain of the settings you've discussed? Maybe slight tone patches of green or blue which make the skin more real.
Do you have a specific example? There are details in the sss map that are meant to simulate vessels, etc underneath the skin.
I tested yesterday afternoon with spectral rendering (faithful/cie1931) and without spectral rendering. I used the same character with an indoor studio lighting scenario, an outdoor with Sun-Sky only, and an outdoor (including some trees) with an HDRI, but in all three lighting scenarios, the difference between the with/without, was barely detectable. Am I doing something wrong? I'm using 4.16.
Melissa, the more I look now at photos of nude bodies the more it seemed like the slight color tints on the body were a result of reflections off surrounding objects so it is environmental rather than anything else. Also, I find that my eyes each see color differently (one a little warmer, one a little cooler) so what I may see might not be what others see. At any rate really appreciate your help in sorting out all the various parameters for skin surfaces.
It's hard to say without seeing the skin your working with. All skins react differently.
I was curious what effect spectral rendering would have on my custom characters. So I recreated this one from the source image (a five-minute redo, lacking fine-tuning, morphs, etc) and tested under the circumstances noted. This is obviously the "HDRI with trees" test version. This is the output with spectral rendering turned on and the only difference from the "without spectral rendering" version was a very slight reddish tone on the skin. The difference was similarly negligible in all three scenario tests.
The skin is from Face Transfer - created from the original source image and tweaked with Altern8. I haven't researched the topic in detail, but I thought that the files created with Face Transfer are based on stock Daz files.
(Please ignore the ugly fingernails. I don't know yet how to fix natural nails.)
I've never used Face Transfer so I honestly have no idea how maps are created with it. Spectral rendering seems to wipe out a lot of sss scattering (without correction). It also results in a slightly desaturated image, as well as creating visible seams. You can see the slightly washed out scattering and colors in this example and very very light seams (click image for larger size) -
The lighting below illustrates the slight desaturation as well as seam issues (click for larger size and then take a look at the UV seam across the chest and around the lips). I don't know why it happens, but the transmitted color needs to be adjusted to avoid the seams (which I take into account in my updated process for spectral rendering)(any color other than .99 .99 .99 will result in seams, but only when spectral rendering is turned on). The downside is that the color correction for sss results in bad skin if you don't use spectral rendering...so we're back to what I said above...that I have two skin presets here, one for spectral rendering and one for standard rendering. If you stick with one or the other, then you can avoid the need for multiple presets and skin workflow...now that I know how to make Rosawyn's light skin work nicely with spectral rendering, I will likely be sticking to it. I just need to do some more testing on other skin tones to make sure the process is good before I can share a guide -
It should be mentioned that the latest changes to Iray introduced color profiles to spectral rendering and unfortunately none of them looks like before.
We recently talked about the topic in the old Photorealism thread.
I'm still on 4.15 and will be staying there for the forseeable I think. I might install a newer version just to see, but all the changes lately are making me want to stick to an older version.
*edit* Yeah, I checked out 4.20...it honestly looks like they may have fixed the seam problems with having a color set in the transmitted color channel. If that is the case, then my original skin tweaks might actually work with spectral rendering (and might be why paulawp isn't seeing a difference). It is a shame though, in one way, because I did like the different look I got with the new settings and spectral rendering in 4.15. It brought out more realistic detail. I'll have to keep playing with it.
Yup same here. Mainly for the above mentioned reason.
i can handle the "not working ghostlights" in the new version but I refuse to stop using spectral rendering which I would have to do with 4.20 due to messed up colors in all aspects of my scenes.
Just wanted to bring it to your attention before people are complaining that your settings do not work in their version of DS.
Yeah, and more than just the coloration, but I noticed that the backlight shaders I live by for hair aren't as effective in terms of refraction. Upping the refraction weight doesn't work as a fix because it changes the look of the hair dramatically in the places that aren't backlit.
Ok, just did some testing and a bit of tweaking to my skin shader workflow and I think I have some good results with spectral rendering for 4.20. Only odd thing is that in some lighting, spectral and standard look exactly the same with the same skin settings! Not sure if that is by design, or a bug with the render engine -
And now the postworked 4.20 examples -