July 2025 - Daz 3D New User Challenge - Portrait Rendering and L.I.E.

Linwelly · July 1

New User's Challenge - July, 2025

Beginner Challenge - July, 2025

"Portrait Rendering (Expressions and Lighting)"

This month's focus will be Portrait Rendering, with an emphasis on the character's expression and lighting. Portraits are the way we show off the unique aspects of each individual. Expressions should convey their personality. Good lighting will enhance your portrait and set the mood. Portraits don't have to look like yearbook headshots. Get creative, hone your skills, and have some fun in this months contest.

A portrait is a representation of a person, group of people, or even a pet, that displays the expression, personality, and mood of the subject. The focus of a portrait is usually the subject's face, although the entire body and the background or context may be included. Depth of Field is often used to blur the surrounding environment to draw the eye to the subject.

Inspiration:

Portrait Tips and Examples:

Tips for good portrait photos

Google Search - Portrait Expressions

Beginner's Guide to Portrait Composition

Foundations of Portrait Composition Part I: Framing Your Model

Lighting:

Portrait Lighting Patterns

Mastering Lighting in Blender (The first 25 minutes of the video are basic lighting theory and insights.)

Intermediate Challenge July 2025 - L.I.E. (Layered Image Editor)

What is the Layered Image Editor?

The Layered Image Editor (LIE) allows you to create, open, edit, and save DAZ Studio Layered Image (DLI) sets (*.dsi). A DLI is a composite of image layers into a single Studio material file which can then be applied to an object's material zone in Studio via the Surfaces tab. DLIs can be composed of any image file format supported in Studio (i.e., TIFF, PNG, JPEG, etc.). In addition, DLIs can contain other DLIs as part of its composition. The images composing the layers are not modified as the DLI file contains the pathname to the files and the opacity and blending information.

The DLI format provides a way of combining images without modifying the original images. For example, a tattoo could be available as an option on a figure. Usually, this might require separate texture maps for each skin color plus an extra set of maps with the tattoo. Using the LIE, a DLI file could be built layering the tattoo over the skin maps and the resulting .dsi file added to the material file to load via a MAT pose file. The original skin map can then be applied to the figure without the tattoo or with it, all without having to create two texture maps.

L.I.E. Video Tutorials

Daz Studio Layered Image Editor

DAZ Studio Tutorial - Layered Image Editor - Make your own Tattoos

Daz Studio Tattoo Tutorial

L.I.E Article Tutorial

Daz Custom Tattoos Tutorial

Forum Threads

https://www.daz3d.com/forums/discussion/19670/how-do-i-use-layered-image-editor-lie

https://www.daz3d.com/forums/discussion/191661/how-to-save-a-layer-image-editor-l-i-e-preset

And of course its always a good idea to check the LIE contests from the past years:

FromAdelaide · July 4

I have been away for quite a while and have started playing with DAZ once again.

First time using the LIE and I am happy with the result so far. Might tweek the pose and add something to the face so I guess it is still a WIP.

Would love some feedback on my progress.

Linwelly · July 4

FromAdelaide said:

I have been away for quite a while and have started playing with DAZ once again.

First time using the LIE and I am happy with the result so far. Might tweek the pose and add something to the face so I guess it is still a WIP.

Would love some feedback on my progress.

Welcome back, then and happy to have you here, I like the start and I'm looking forward to seeing where you go with this one. I already love the backlight you gave him.

Personal tip for tattoos when they aged a bit (if that is something you would want to try) is to reduce the strenght of the Tattoo map in the LIE to 70 0r 80% and add them as well to the tranclucency layer with the same strenght. this gives them depth and more being inside the skin optics.

FromAdelaide · July 5

Thank you, I spend a lot of time setting up the lights. Funny thing is that all the images in the LIE are already at 75% opacity. I am going to try 10 to 20 in the difuse channel and start bringing down the tranclucency.

Shinji Ikari 9th · July 10

Got something going as I type this. Desided to use the character that i had set up for last month, eventhough I didn't get farther then deciding his outfit and weapons so at least the time figuring that out wasn't a compleat waste.

Shinji Ikari 9th · July 10

And here's the first render for me this month.

Linwelly · July 11

Shinji Ikari 9th said:

And here's the first render for me this month.

Hey Shinji welcome back. As usual you tend to have very dark renders, so give the whole thing some light so we can see your character. Some of the light setting tutorials for the portrais might help you to see how to best sho them off

Shinji Ikari 9th · July 15

Here's version B with the Luminance raised on the various surfaces that I am using for my lights.

Elor · July 15

Did you try to play with the various settings of the Tonemapper options ? It's another a way to change how dark or bright a scene is.

Aki3d · July 16

intermediate

Daz Studio Iray

The guitar is modelled in Blender, the ornamentations around the soundhole and the logo are on different layers.

In that way I have many possibillities for variations. I can change the wood texture, the color and the ornamentations all seperately.

Linwelly · July 17

Aki3d said:

intermediate

Daz Studio Iray

The guitar is modelled in Blender, the ornamentations around the soundhole and the logo are on different layers.

In that way I have many possibillities for variations. I can change the wood texture, the color and the ornamentations all seperately.

very nicely done, the model. And I love the reflection of the window in the surface of the guitar.

Maybe the character can get a bit more attention by some small adaptions. You could experiment with godrays/ bloom or increase contrasts while adding a backlight to the character, of course only if you want

Aki3d · July 17

Thanks @Linwelly.

There was a little bit too much focus on the guitar in the first picture.

I've changed a few things now:

A new outfit for more structure, some interesting shadows in the bg and on the character for the contrast, a little bit of volumetric light and DOF for the depth, a darker guitar with different wood texture and a change of plants in the BG.

I think now there is more attention to the musician than to the Instrument and it looks generally more interesting.

Linwelly · July 18

Aki3d said:

Thanks @Linwelly.

There was a little bit to much focus on the guitar in the first picture.

I've changed a few things now:

A new outfit for more structure, some interesting shadows in the bg and on the character for the contrast, a little bit of volumetric light and DOF for the depth, a darker guitar with different wood texture and a change of plants in the BG.

I think now there is more attention to the musician than to the Instrument and it looks generally more interesting.

that is a lovely improvement! I like it very much

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