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Who said Blender was hard?

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  • wolf359wolf359 Posts: 3,929
    edited October 2017

    @J cade Excellent !!.. very exiting

    I real hope teleblender is updated 

    my I ask how cumbersome would it be to use teleblender with the princpled shader in ist current iteration??

    I Dont have time to delve into 2.79 atm

    Post edited by wolf359 on
  • BradCarstenBradCarsten Posts: 856

    Wow, that looks amazing. I may end up having to learn cycles after all. 

  • mCasualmCasual Posts: 4,607
    edited October 2017

    if i can complete the kinect v2 for daz studio script+exe 

    i'll improve teleblender's support for the ( i almost forgot the name ) principled shader, and the realtime (GLSL?) preview renderr ( forgot the name )

    note that a made an important update to teleblender back in July 2017

    https://www.daz3d.com/forums/viewthread/2877/

     

     

    Post edited by mCasual on
  • ArtiniArtini Posts: 10,302

    Thanks for the heads up, mCasual. It is only getting better and better.

     

  • marblemarble Posts: 7,500
    edited October 2017

    For the somewhat less than expert users of Blender (and shaders), here's an explanation of the Principled Shader.

    https://www.blenderguru.com/tutorials/2017/6/21/how-to-use-blenders-new-ultimate-shader-principled-bsdf

    Which includes this video:

    Post edited by marble on
  • j cadej cade Posts: 2,310
    wolf359 said:

    @J cade Excellent !!.. very exiting

    I real hope teleblender is updated 

    my I ask how cumbersome would it be to use teleblender with the princpled shader in ist current iteration??

    I Dont have time to delve into 2.79 atm

     

    I wouldn't want to do it with *every* object in a scene, but that's more because editing every object of a scenes materials is kind of painful on blender, especially stuff with lots of mat zones. However, if you are planning on tweaking a material, unless it's something super simple like a plain diffuse backdrop, or super complex, like glass with caustics and dispersion (I still love my giant node trees), I'd switch to the principled shader. The most time consuming part is loading/connecting the maps, but once that's done it does make adjusting materials really quick and easy. (also helpful, using groups. If you sick a pricipled shader in a group you can edit it on multiple materials at once. Really useful for skin)

     

    ...and I put this in the Michael and friends thread as well but its worth sticking here, to show off Cycles skin on a face not just a hand, also HAIR. Hair is the thing thats really making me consider switching back to Blender for rendering. I love blender's hair tools so much its easier to use than either of the Studio options IMO. Also the render times for final renders are signifigantly faster than Iray for me rendersize of 2000x2600 and it took 1 1/2 hours The eqivalent in Iray (with a similar non-strand hair) is probably taking 4 to get fully degrained (and making my computer overheat more while I'm at it. My gpu is super overheat-y, for Cycles I just use my CPU)

     

  • marblemarble Posts: 7,500
    edited October 2017
    j cade said:
    wolf359 said:

    @J cade Excellent !!.. very exiting

    I real hope teleblender is updated 

    my I ask how cumbersome would it be to use teleblender with the princpled shader in ist current iteration??

    I Dont have time to delve into 2.79 atm

     

    I wouldn't want to do it with *every* object in a scene, but that's more because editing every object of a scenes materials is kind of painful on blender, especially stuff with lots of mat zones. However, if you are planning on tweaking a material, unless it's something super simple like a plain diffuse backdrop, or super complex, like glass with caustics and dispersion (I still love my giant node trees), I'd switch to the principled shader. The most time consuming part is loading/connecting the maps, but once that's done it does make adjusting materials really quick and easy. (also helpful, using groups. If you sick a pricipled shader in a group you can edit it on multiple materials at once. Really useful for skin)

     

    ...and I put this in the Michael and friends thread as well but its worth sticking here, to show off Cycles skin on a face not just a hand, also HAIR. Hair is the thing thats really making me consider switching back to Blender for rendering. I love blender's hair tools so much its easier to use than either of the Studio options IMO. Also the render times for final renders are signifigantly faster than Iray for me rendersize of 2000x2600 and it took 1 1/2 hours The eqivalent in Iray (with a similar non-strand hair) is probably taking 4 to get fully degrained (and making my computer overheat more while I'm at it. My gpu is super overheat-y, for Cycles I just use my CPU)

     

     

    Just out of interest, have you tried with your GPU in Cycles and, if so, how does the render time compare?

     

    Fantastic render, by the way.

    Post edited by marble on
  • j cadej cade Posts: 2,310
    marble said:
    j cade said:
    wolf359 said:

    @J cade Excellent !!.. very exiting

    I real hope teleblender is updated 

    my I ask how cumbersome would it be to use teleblender with the princpled shader in ist current iteration??

    I Dont have time to delve into 2.79 atm

     

    I wouldn't want to do it with *every* object in a scene, but that's more because editing every object of a scenes materials is kind of painful on blender, especially stuff with lots of mat zones. However, if you are planning on tweaking a material, unless it's something super simple like a plain diffuse backdrop, or super complex, like glass with caustics and dispersion (I still love my giant node trees), I'd switch to the principled shader. The most time consuming part is loading/connecting the maps, but once that's done it does make adjusting materials really quick and easy. (also helpful, using groups. If you sick a pricipled shader in a group you can edit it on multiple materials at once. Really useful for skin)

     

    ...and I put this in the Michael and friends thread as well but its worth sticking here, to show off Cycles skin on a face not just a hand, also HAIR. Hair is the thing thats really making me consider switching back to Blender for rendering. I love blender's hair tools so much its easier to use than either of the Studio options IMO. Also the render times for final renders are signifigantly faster than Iray for me rendersize of 2000x2600 and it took 1 1/2 hours The eqivalent in Iray (with a similar non-strand hair) is probably taking 4 to get fully degrained (and making my computer overheat more while I'm at it. My gpu is super overheat-y, for Cycles I just use my CPU)

     

     

    Just out of interest, have you tried with your GPU in Cycles and, if so, how does the render time compare?

     

    Fantastic render, by the way.

    *Currently there isn't a way to do gpu and cpu together its either/or and my gpu is a very underpowered laptop one, so its pretty signifigantly slower (when it doesn't conk out alltogether)

     

    * a patch was recently introduced to enable the option to use gpu and cpu together, apparently it should be in the next official 2.79

  • marblemarble Posts: 7,500
    edited October 2017
    j cade said:
    marble said:
    j cade said:
    wolf359 said:

    @J cade Excellent !!.. very exiting

    I real hope teleblender is updated 

    my I ask how cumbersome would it be to use teleblender with the princpled shader in ist current iteration??

    I Dont have time to delve into 2.79 atm

     

    I wouldn't want to do it with *every* object in a scene, but that's more because editing every object of a scenes materials is kind of painful on blender, especially stuff with lots of mat zones. However, if you are planning on tweaking a material, unless it's something super simple like a plain diffuse backdrop, or super complex, like glass with caustics and dispersion (I still love my giant node trees), I'd switch to the principled shader. The most time consuming part is loading/connecting the maps, but once that's done it does make adjusting materials really quick and easy. (also helpful, using groups. If you sick a pricipled shader in a group you can edit it on multiple materials at once. Really useful for skin)

     

    ...and I put this in the Michael and friends thread as well but its worth sticking here, to show off Cycles skin on a face not just a hand, also HAIR. Hair is the thing thats really making me consider switching back to Blender for rendering. I love blender's hair tools so much its easier to use than either of the Studio options IMO. Also the render times for final renders are signifigantly faster than Iray for me rendersize of 2000x2600 and it took 1 1/2 hours The eqivalent in Iray (with a similar non-strand hair) is probably taking 4 to get fully degrained (and making my computer overheat more while I'm at it. My gpu is super overheat-y, for Cycles I just use my CPU)

     

     

    Just out of interest, have you tried with your GPU in Cycles and, if so, how does the render time compare?

     

    Fantastic render, by the way.

    *Currently there isn't a way to do gpu and cpu together its either/or and my gpu is a very underpowered laptop one, so its pretty signifigantly slower (when it doesn't conk out alltogether)

     

    * a patch was recently introduced to enable the option to use gpu and cpu together, apparently it should be in the next official 2.79

    OK, so those with a reasonably powered GPU (I have a GeForce 1070 8GB) should be able to take advantage of the power. I'm guessing that similar restrictions on scene VRAM apply so, for larger scenes, decent CPU performance would be welcome. Ideally, Blender would be able to utilise both VRAM and system RAM but I realise that is probably a wish too far.

     

    OK, I found this information on Cycles in 2.79 which answers many of my questions. Interesting that denoising gobbles up VRAM.

    https://wiki.blender.org/index.php/Dev:Ref/Release_Notes/2.79/Cycles

     

    Post edited by marble on
  • agent unawaresagent unawares Posts: 3,513

    Wow. J cade your renders are exceptional.

  • Joe.CotterJoe.Cotter Posts: 3,362
    edited October 2017

    Technically, VRAM is a type of dual ported video memory that doesn't exist anymore, but since so many have appropriated it for a generic term for video memory... I guess it's like kleenex now.

    and yes, your skin, hair, etc.. all look very nice jcade. Only thing I notice really is the lack of veins in the whites of the eyes (and color in the lacrimal area.) Other then that it could pass for photographic.

    Post edited by Joe.Cotter on
  • MechavenMechaven Posts: 76
    j cade said:
    marble said:
    j cade said:
    wolf359 said:

    @J cade Excellent !!.. very exiting

    I real hope teleblender is updated 

    my I ask how cumbersome would it be to use teleblender with the princpled shader in ist current iteration??

    I Dont have time to delve into 2.79 atm

     

    I wouldn't want to do it with *every* object in a scene, but that's more because editing every object of a scenes materials is kind of painful on blender, especially stuff with lots of mat zones. However, if you are planning on tweaking a material, unless it's something super simple like a plain diffuse backdrop, or super complex, like glass with caustics and dispersion (I still love my giant node trees), I'd switch to the principled shader. The most time consuming part is loading/connecting the maps, but once that's done it does make adjusting materials really quick and easy. (also helpful, using groups. If you sick a pricipled shader in a group you can edit it on multiple materials at once. Really useful for skin)

     

    ...and I put this in the Michael and friends thread as well but its worth sticking here, to show off Cycles skin on a face not just a hand, also HAIR. Hair is the thing thats really making me consider switching back to Blender for rendering. I love blender's hair tools so much its easier to use than either of the Studio options IMO. Also the render times for final renders are signifigantly faster than Iray for me rendersize of 2000x2600 and it took 1 1/2 hours The eqivalent in Iray (with a similar non-strand hair) is probably taking 4 to get fully degrained (and making my computer overheat more while I'm at it. My gpu is super overheat-y, for Cycles I just use my CPU)

     

     

    Just out of interest, have you tried with your GPU in Cycles and, if so, how does the render time compare?

     

    Fantastic render, by the way.

    *Currently there isn't a way to do gpu and cpu together its either/or and my gpu is a very underpowered laptop one, so its pretty signifigantly slower (when it doesn't conk out alltogether)

     

    * a patch was recently introduced to enable the option to use gpu and cpu together, apparently it should be in the next official 2.79

    I noticed this change the other day in the nightly build.

    new.JPG
    254 x 179 - 16K
    previous.JPG
    254 x 175 - 14K
  • ArtiniArtini Posts: 10,302

    Great render, j cade. Just excellent.

     

  • wolf359wolf359 Posts: 3,929
    j cade said:
    wolf359 said:

    @J cade Excellent !!.. very exiting

    I real hope teleblender is updated 

    my I ask how cumbersome would it be to use teleblender with the princpled shader in ist current iteration??

    I Dont have time to delve into 2.79 atm

     

    I wouldn't want to do it with *every* object in a scene, but that's more because editing every object of a scenes materials is kind of painful on blender, especially stuff with lots of mat zones. However, if you are planning on tweaking a material, unless it's something super simple like a plain diffuse backdrop, or super complex, like glass with caustics and dispersion (I still love my giant node trees), I'd switch to the principled shader. The most time consuming part is loading/connecting the maps, but once that's done it does make adjusting materials really quick and easy. (also helpful, using groups. If you sick a pricipled shader in a group you can edit it on multiple materials at once. Really useful for skin)

     

    ...and I put this in the Michael and friends thread as well but its worth sticking here, to show off Cycles skin on a face not just a hand, also HAIR. Hair is the thing thats really making me consider switching back to Blender for rendering. I love blender's hair tools so much its easier to use than either of the Studio options IMO. Also the render times for final renders are signifigantly faster than Iray for me rendersize of 2000x2600 and it took 1 1/2 hours The eqivalent in Iray (with a similar non-strand hair) is probably taking 4 to get fully degrained (and making my computer overheat more while I'm at it. My gpu is super overheat-y, for Cycles I just use my CPU)

     

    Thanks for the explaination, great render!!
    and I agree  completelyon the hair

    I have given up on DS hair solutions and will be using the hair system in Cinema4D on my animated genesis  meshes

    going foward.

     

    Here is a time lapse video of  the intuitive hair styling in C4D.. its eight minutes but worth the watch

  • Joe.CotterJoe.Cotter Posts: 3,362
    edited October 2017

    Strange, posted a draft without me clicking 'save' anyways.. had decided not to post the draft so, empty comment here. ;)

    Post edited by Joe.Cotter on
  • nekyonekyo Posts: 57
    edited October 2017

    I've started playing with importing Daz characters to Blender - have a quick noob question. I was looking at setting up a character using the new principled shader, and I was trying to understand the subsurface scattering option. I'm a little confused because Daz genesis 3 female usually has 3 maps - the base, the bump, and a third one that I assume is for the SSS, but I'm not really sure how to use it properly. Do you just add it as an image texture, then run it through the Bump to control the strength, the attach it to the Subsurface Radius? Also, I'm curious why this particular map is not used at all after I import the character using the Teleblender script?

    Thanks for any help...time to watch a lot more tutorial videos...

    Post edited by nekyo on
  • MendomanMendoman Posts: 404

    Wow, those renders look amazing j cade. I especially love the hair. Any chance you'd be willing to share your node setups?

  • DaremoK3DaremoK3 Posts: 798

    Beautiful renders, j cade.

     

    Technical question for you all  --  One can quickly open the Last Operator Panel (Emulated with F6) which resides underneath the Toolshelf Tabs by pressing the ' + ' sign, and it pops open to your last saved size/state.  I loathe having to drag it back down every time, and would like to know if there is a quick way to close it like how it is opened.  I use a non-standard ' Left-click select ' with 3-button mouse emulation, so some things don't work for me like they do for others with standard setups (Alt + Right-click/double right-click for border selection as an example).  I have tried all variables that I can think of to no avail...

    So, is it just not possible, or do any of you know how this can be accomplished?

    I'm seriously considering looking into coding the ' + ' sign to remain available (which boggles the mind that the devs did not do this), and usable for quick closure if this is not doable, but I don't want to reinvent the wheel.  Any help is appreciated.

    I really miss the operator function in 2.49 where I had it available in the viewport at all times, but just reduced to a single horizontal bar with a quick click to both open and close it...

  • ArtisanSArtisanS Posts: 209
    mCasual said:

    if i can complete the kinect v2 for daz studio script+exe 

    i'll improve teleblender's support for the ( i almost forgot the name ) principled shader, and the realtime (GLSL?) preview renderr ( forgot the name )

    note that a made an important update to teleblender back in July 2017

    https://www.daz3d.com/forums/viewthread/2877/

     

     

    Eevee is the name you are looking for....by the way that won't be official until next year march or sometimes after that due to delays and delays on delays (but what else is new in programming).

    greets, ArtisanS

  • Joe.CotterJoe.Cotter Posts: 3,362

     Sorry Daremok3, not sure what you are asking. I understand about f6 but not sure about the rest.

  • LotharenLotharen Posts: 282
    edited November 2017

    @mCasual   Maybe its time to make teleblender a paid (constantly) supported plugin? I'm tired of seeing stuff for other renderers (like Maya) that are to expensive for your average user. Blender is free and a devoted plug-in would be very useful and I wouldn't mind paying for it.

     

    Just sayin' ;)

    Post edited by Lotharen on
  • MechavenMechaven Posts: 76
    edited November 2017
    DaremoK3 said:

    Beautiful renders, j cade.

     

    Technical question for you all  --  One can quickly open the Last Operator Panel (Emulated with F6) which resides underneath the Toolshelf Tabs by pressing the ' + ' sign, and it pops open to your last saved size/state.  I loathe having to drag it back down every time, and would like to know if there is a quick way to close it like how it is opened.  I use a non-standard ' Left-click select ' with 3-button mouse emulation, so some things don't work for me like they do for others with standard setups (Alt + Right-click/double right-click for border selection as an example).  I have tried all variables that I can think of to no avail...

    So, is it just not possible, or do any of you know how this can be accomplished?

    I'm seriously considering looking into coding the ' + ' sign to remain available (which boggles the mind that the devs did not do this), and usable for quick closure if this is not doable, but I don't want to reinvent the wheel.  Any help is appreciated.

    I really miss the operator function in 2.49 where I had it available in the viewport at all times, but just reduced to a single horizontal bar with a quick click to both open and close it...

     

    Pressing t will toggle the tool shelf open and close. There is no need to click on the + symbol for opening unless you prefer it and as you say it isn't available for closing.

    The only other option I know of is in view / tool shelf.

    It would be nice if the + symbol remained or even better if it changed to a - symbol.

    Post edited by Mechaven on
  • DaremoK3DaremoK3 Posts: 798
    edited November 2017

    Joe:

    I was hoping you might know a hidden command that I don't, but it's okay...

     

    Mechaven:

    You missed it completely.  I thought I was very thorough in my description, but I probably should have stated "it resides at the bottom of the Toolshelf" instead of "which resides underneath the Toolshelf Tabs".

    Yes, I know, and use daily the Toolshelf shortcut 'T', as well as the Properties shortcut 'N', and even the modified Sensei Format shortcut that uses 'T' to open/close both of them simultaneously.  That is not the issue.

    I was hoping someone knows of a hidden shortcut that I am unaware of to quickly open/close the Operator Panel like the T/N do for the Toolshelf/Properties.

    It's looking like they just didn't code a shortcut for the opening/closing, and only coded the Pop-up (F6), so I am probably going to look into how they coded the shortcuts attached to Toolshelf/Properties after I finish coding my Dynamic Cloth Creation Addon that I am currently working on.

    Thank you, Mechaven, for trying though, and I love your idea for turning the ' + ' sign into a ' - ' sign when open to click on for closure.  I am going to try and use it...

     

    xscreenshot-20171103T223750.png
    202 x 145 - 4K
    interface_undo-redo_last.png
    624 x 448 - 33K
    xscreenshot-20171103T224534.png
    725 x 252 - 20K
    Post edited by DaremoK3 on
  • Joe.CotterJoe.Cotter Posts: 3,362

    For anyone who might have missed it, the 2017 Blender Conference videos are up now.

  • KharmaKharma Posts: 3,214

    I have added the bolt  addon to Blender.. I was wondering what are the best addons to use and are they all listed in the preferences or do you have to get them from various sourceson the internet or blender site?

  • ebergerlyebergerly Posts: 3,255
    Kharma said:

    I have added the bolt  addon to Blender.. I was wondering what are the best addons to use and are they all listed in the preferences or do you have to get them from various sourceson the internet or blender site?

    Wow, that's a tough question. I guess it all depends on the type of stuff you do regularly. Do you do architectural, or landscapes, do you use lots of external images, do you like having lots of primitives of a certain type, and so on....

    Or maybe you do certain steps on a regular basis that gets tedious. Or you do a lot with the node editor and materials.

    So maybe if you give an idea what you might need we can be more specific.

    Personally, I tend to like to make my own add-ons using Python. It's really far easier than it might sound, and often is not much more than copy/paste existing code. That way you can customize how you want. I just added a tab and button in the toolbar that automatically loads a base character OBJ that I always use for designing clothing for the DAZ Studio (VWD) cloth sim. One click and voila, it loads. And another button that deletes everything from the scene. And a bunch more.  

     

  • ebergerlyebergerly Posts: 3,255

    Another example...

    Just this afternoon I brought a model into Blender, and had to go thru the steps to change the 3D View to shaded mode and then select a "matcap" texture for the model, and choose the specific style that looks just like the default in ZBrush (the one thing I like about ZBrush). So I already have python code that made a new tab along the left hand side, and a new panel with a bunch of buttons under that tab to do all kinds of custom functions. 

    So I just manually did the 3 steps to convert to matcap, copied and pasted them into the existing python code to make a new button, and BAM, now when I start Blender I have a new button in my addon to convert to matcap whenever I want. Took me all of 5 minutes.

    Though I'm not a fan of Python, I much prefer C#. But still it's real easy, especially since there are existing templates you can use and just tweak them. Pretty awesome.  

  • MarkIsSleepyMarkIsSleepy Posts: 1,496
    Kharma said:

    I have added the bolt  addon to Blender.. I was wondering what are the best addons to use and are they all listed in the preferences or do you have to get them from various sourceson the internet or blender site?

    Yeah - that's really tough to answer without knowing what you are doing in Blender. Most of what you might need is already packaged with Blender and just needs to be turned on when you need it, so it's worth going through the included list and taking a look at some of the extra options you can turn on.

    Some I use all the time:

    • Retopoflow (available free from cgcookie, but there's also a paid version - paying for it helps support continued developement) adds a ton of retopology functionality and really speeds up some parts of the process
    • Import Images as Planes (included in Blender)
    • Ivy Gen (included with Blender and super fun to play with)
    • ANT Landscapes (included in Blender)
    • Sapling Tree Gen (included in Blender) - this is another fun one to play with, even though I mostly make my trees more manually now
    • UI Pie Menu Official (included with Blender) - makes switching between Edit/Sculot/Paint, etc modes super quick and easy
    • Cell Fracture (included with Blender) - great for making quick piles of rubble - keeping this turned on seems to really slow startup for Blender for me, so I just turn this on when I need it
    • Node Wrangler (included with Blender) - if you plan to render with cycles a lot then this is an essential tool
    • LoopTools (included with Blender)

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

  • ebergerlyebergerly Posts: 3,255
    MDO2010 said:
    • Retopoflow (available free from cgcookie, but there's also a paid version - paying for it helps support continued developement) adds a ton of retopology functionality and really speeds up some parts of the process
    • Import Images as Planes (included in Blender)
    • Ivy Gen (included with Blender and super fun to play with)
    • ANT Landscapes (included in Blender)
    • Sapling Tree Gen (included in Blender) - this is another fun one to play with, even though I mostly make my trees more manually now
    • UI Pie Menu Official (included with Blender) - makes switching between Edit/Sculot/Paint, etc modes super quick and easy
    • Cell Fracture (included with Blender) - great for making quick piles of rubble - keeping this turned on seems to really slow startup for Blender for me, so I just turn this on when I need it
    • Node Wrangler (included with Blender) - if you plan to render with cycles a lot then this is an essential tool
    • LoopTools (included with Blender)

    I also have and use the ones highlighted in yellow. I think Node Wrangler and Loop Tools and Import Images as Planes are especially popular. Also there's a nice architecture add-on that allows you to quickly create walls and doors and windows, etc. that I use. 

  • KharmaKharma Posts: 3,214

    I am very new to blender, still learning the basics, I have played around in it and followed various tutorials to see how it works.

     I have looked through the add ons that are there and was most interested in what those who used blender regularily would add beyond the basicsof the program to make their workflow easier. the reason I added the bolt was because I had gone through a tutorial that needed to add it which peaked my interest on what else was available.  The ivy generator looks interesting altho I will need to find  a tutorial that uses it to see how to incorporate into a project.  I also noticed one that seems to be a cloud generator of sorts...not sure how it works yet tho.

    Many of them don't give a good explanation of what they do so hard to know at this oint if they would be useful to me or not.

    @ebergerly  where would I find the architecture add-on?  that sounds interesting.

    @MDO2010  when you say ..just needs to be turrned on..where do you go to do this and how would you know if something needs to be turned on or off in Blender?

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