Iray shaders n stuff
Oso3D
Posts: 15,085
Figured this warranted a separate thread... quote:
nonesuch00 said:
Mind you, skin is a bit tough to pull off. The skin default I have relies on two very similar colors, and I've already learned a huge amount more since I first played with the shaders.
I'm starting to contemplate a new shader with something like toggle noise or something, and then more options, like top coat color and whatnot.
I've external searched in hope of finding some clues as to how to approache it but it's still seems beyond what I could manage in the Surface Tab.
e.g. this link - http://www.orbolt.com/asset/_danylyon::PBR_skin
So starting at your pale skin shader and looking at the pictures in the link above (didn't buy it because I don't have Houdini) and also using a Gimp 'color picker' from a set of reference photographs from also a very pale person I found there is a deeper layer of quite a few slightly varying closely alike colors that make a visibly discernable mottled pattern (I think people call that look commonly being flushed). I think it must be related to fat and blood distribution and the similar pattern should be there for everybody but not as easy to see with the eye. I'm just going layer by layer from what I've learn so far and that's not even considering pores, sweat glands, hair follicles, load bearing areas like the clavicles, sheen and so on.
I looked at the pale skin.duf you made and was surprised to see it was so long. You mention perlin noise & such but I guess until I read how to modify the DAZ Studio shaders I will be stuck at the Sufaces tab messing around with colors and sliders and drop down tabs. I'm kind of curious now though so I'll read about DAZ Shader tomorrow I guess from their documents. :-)
It took me a while and I'm learning. ;)
One problem is that the Iray Uber shader is... clever. There are modules that aren't loaded unless you turn certain things on. Like, top coat and emission items don't appear in the shader block unless they are on (emission to non-black, top coat to weight > 0)
If you just copy Iray Uber shader to the shader mixer and start working, it will be permanently missing these modules. I had to redo the shaders a few times, because I didn't realize stuff had shut off. As it was, you will notice that my stuff is missing a top coat. Doh.
Now, this mutability is nice because it hides options you aren't using. The problem with the approach I took (which I think I pretty much had to without having 4x as many shaders)
I'm contemplating a new procedural shader that lets you switch on/off procedural whatever to a wide variety of things. Again, the approach I took is limited, because it ended up hard coding each combination of procedural whatever.
THEN the problem becomes that the bigger the shader, the more time it takes to process...
Tentatively, I'm hoping to also have two sets of noise so you can have one going to one place, another to another place, and maybe even various combination options.
(Of course, with free stuff, it's 'whenever I'm sufficiently motivated to do a lot of work for my own amusement')
Daz 3D is part of 
Connect
DAZ Productions, Inc.
7533 S Center View Ct #4664
West Jordan, UT 84084
Licensing Agreement | Terms of Service | Privacy Policy | EULA
© 2025 Daz Productions Inc. All Rights Reserved.
Comments
It took me a while and I'm learning. ;)
One problem is that the Iray Uber shader is... clever. There are modules that aren't loaded unless you turn certain things on. Like, top coat and emission items don't appear in the shader block unless they are on (emission to non-black, top coat to weight > 0)
If you just copy Iray Uber shader to the shader mixer and start working, it will be permanently missing these modules. I had to redo the shaders a few times, because I didn't realize stuff had shut off. As it was, you will notice that my stuff is missing a top coat. Doh.
Now, this mutability is nice because it hides options you aren't using. The problem with the approach I took (which I think I pretty much had to without having 4x as many shaders)
I'm contemplating a new procedural shader that lets you switch on/off procedural whatever to a wide variety of things. Again, the approach I took is limited, because it ended up hard coding each combination of procedural whatever.
THEN the problem becomes that the bigger the shader, the more time it takes to process...
Tentatively, I'm hoping to also have two sets of noise so you can have one going to one place, another to another place, and maybe even various combination options.
(Of course, with free stuff, it's 'whenever I'm sufficiently motivated to do a lot of work for my own amusement')
Well since the forums SW didn't properly quote...
++++++++++
OK, I am helping someone else test a UI and I suggested they change the available options 'automagically' according to the active selected item because for the average use and for screen size all of them at once was overwhelming so I understand their motivation. I noticed the other day options in the Surfaces sometimes being changed when I adjusted a slider or changed a dropdown or added an image.
I will definately need to read the DAZ sections on how to use Surfaces rather than just play around and likewise with Shaders.
What I am now interested in doing, is figuring out how to subdivide the DAZ Surfaces, let's say first for the G2M & G2F, into smaller areas for the hands - palm, back of hand (or maybe instead knuckle), finger segments, and finger tips. Currently it is only hand and fingernails, which isn't enough. And likewise for the face and elsewhere. And then modifying your approach as appropriate for the new Surface regions can give much more procedurally relevant and possible results.
I think that means I will need to look at the Groups and UVs on the models in the Viewports and create the new Surfaces Groups.
I think it maybe isn't as potentially complicated as I posted in the 'No Eyebrows' product request regarding numerical analysis and fractals and using those to extend PBR...or maybe it is but there is a good chance the work has been mostly already done.
I'm tempted to download the Houdini shader product I posted elsewhere in the forums to see if they are completely procedural or not.
I also have other things I like to do and have to do too so no time commitment but maybe we can hash out a good approach and incrementally save out work. First thing I need to do is refine the surfaces available on G2M & G2F and I'll start on the hands. Actually 1st thing I need to do is go mow the lawn.
So, Will, can you back up a little and explain how you get to the point where you can even edit the shaders? Because I haven't even figured that much out yet. How do you even load the freakin' editor. I assume there is one in DS like with the Shader mixer for 3Delight. Mini tutorial would be nice as I have no clue where to go.
It's actually just shader mixer. You open it and use it just like 3Delight.
However, the Iray stuff uses MDL bricks rather than RDL (or whatever the 3DL stuff is called, I THINK it's RDL).
I suggest just starting with a basic Iray Uber shader (with none of the extras 'on') and import it and look. I basically worked it out that way. It's very visual, which may be a plus for some.
Unfortunately, you know documentation, so you basically have to figure out a lot just by messing with it. There's a lot of bricks that don't necessarily work any way that's obvious, or don't work in DS at all, so... yeah. And which outputs hook to which inputs can take some time to suss out (and I still don't know what a good 80% of the stuff is/does)
Yes, well I'm looking at the documentation for DAZ Studio 4.x from the Help Menu now and it's sparse and it's wrong.
eg I think the Polygon Group Editor tool in the documentation is now the Geometry Editor.
I've even managed to add a new group called Fingerprints unders Surfaces that has 0 polygons. It looks like it will make me choose the polygons in that group individually rather be able to toggle between Polygon or Bone selection modes. It offers Polygon, Edge, or Vertex Selection though.
At least it looks like symmetry will let me mirror the selections to both hands although I think in this case I don't want that.
Hmmm...I do see something interesting in the Geometry Editor.
The is 3 'Group Name's
Face Groups - these list bones, at least the names used for the elements listed in the Face Groups suggest they were created from mesh polygons being assigned to rigging bones
Surfaces - these are a list of polygons assign to a Surface name for use in applying textures and maps as well as PBR & 3DL settings for renderings
Regions - No ideal but there are fewer groups than Surfaces and seem to be things maybe related to clothing or posing. eg. Lacrimals, Iris, Pupil, and so on just become Eyes.
Selection Sets - empty but I think this is a way to save partial edits before assigning them to one of the other groups.
...but yes, I'll just have to try them...see what they do...and correct myself if I'm wrong. eg I think I can use the Face Groups as a faster way to select polygons to assign to a Surface but I'll just have to try & see. Sometimes I know that won't work, eg Fingertips, because I want to keep the Fingernails out of the Fingerprints group. Ultimately, I'll need two groups I think for the Fingertip - the fingerprint side and the outersode of the fingertip.
+++++
So you can select by Face Groups and deselect too and assign to Surfaces or other type groups. The ability to select and deselect is in the Viewport with the right mouse button and the menu that is brought up too, not just in the Tool Settings Pane. DS might start to be a bit more fun now.
Ctl-Z select / Alt-Z deselect
+++++
Also, as I go and create new groups to assign Shader Presets too I'm pretty sure adding smaller groups of relevant polygons to new groups doesn't take those polygons out of the group they already were assigned too. I will have to look at the polygons assigned to the Hands and Fingernails Groups to see if they removed the Fingernail Group polygons from the Hands Group polygons and have to figure out how to remove polygons from already existing groups.
I'll give that a try. As for documentation, yeah, the newest documentation I was able to find for the Shader Mixer was using DS 4 so that's been awhile ago and even then there were some changes I hadn't been able to figure out where they put stuff because things were moved around and not where they were when the tutorial was done. So, I mostly just play around looking for stuff. Luckily, it is similar to show how things are done in FF, although there are some differences. But, playing with FF has enabled me to figure out more things in the Shader Mixer. However, I couldn't figure out how to get to the Iray stuff. I'll take a look soon for these MDL bricks. Thanks, Will.
Will, what about doing something like tan lines in the shaders? I know it's possible to use a geoshell with different UV maps to do it, but what if I didn't want to do it that way?
In order of ease:
1) Geoshell would be easiest, imo.
2) LIE would be next easiest. A layer of a tan pattern that's slightly redder (maybe?) and darker, and you can adjust opacity to dial in the amount.
3) You could go into Shader Mixer to create new shader with extra channels. Like, say, a color input and 'mix value' setting so you can plop in maps with your new shader and tweak how much of those colormaps are used vs. the base colormap.
They've already Surface Groups defined for us that match different tan lines for most people so that part is done.