Shades of Life - Bark Booster
3Diva
Posts: 11,973
Does this product work with Iray?
And what about these two products also by DimensionTheory?:
http://www.daz3d.com/nature-s-variance-shaders-and-props-for-daz-studio
http://www.daz3d.com/ecomantics-efficient-ecosystems
Do they work ok with Iray?
Does anyone have them that could test them or let us know? :) It would be much appreciated!
Post edited by 3Diva on
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Comments
I can tell you that Ecomantics definitely works with Iray. It's not a shader like the other two products you listed. It's a bunch of tree, bush, and grass billboards, available as flat planes, semi-circular planes and full surrounds, designed to give you quick background filler that doesn't hog too much memory. Very convenient and helpful!
--MW
..I have Shades of Life Urban Shaders and while they basically work with Iray, I cannot get the proper amount roughness with textures like concrete, brick, or wood due to the way Iray handles Displacement and Bump.
The Bark Boosters apply and render, so far as the diffuse goes, but it looks like due to how displacement is handled that does not get through to Iray. I'm doing a comparison 3DL vs Iray for you, but as I'm out in a moment it'll be a while!
Ok, tried to keep the lighting as close as possible to each other (even if they do look nothing alike!). Genesis Female is wearing a bikini (in case of TOS violations) and also to highlight displacement effect.
There are several issues with translating shades of life to iray:
Shades of life use micro and macro displacement. Nothing like this in Iray.
Displacement, in general, is harder to use effectively in Iray.
The 'projection' mode of Shades of life just doesn't work in Iray, though you can fake it with Iray Decal. However, if you DO that, you then can't use displacement.
That said, at the very least you have access to all the texture maps to play with, and that doesn't suck. I'd suggest finding the displacement maps and converting them to normal maps.
I have Ecomantics too and it's definitely a good product! The surfaces do need a bit of tweaking, as do all 3DL to Iray conversions, but nothing backbreaking :)
Well, it wasn't so bad using displacement.
Here's a Genesis figure with Sculptural UV map ( http://www.daz3d.com/sculptural-genesis-ultra-fun-kit ) to help cut down on seams (they are still visible, but not ... sooo bad, and at least the scale is consistent across the figure)
Excellent feedback! Thank you all! I really appreciate you taking the time to leave feedback on how this works in both render engines! :)
Nice job, Will!
Wow, Will! That's really cool! And that was Iray? I know you like 3DL. But I'm looking at using this in Iray, so I need to be sure.
This looks great, Will! Even though the product page for Sculptural UV Map depicts the differences in UV maps using the checkerboard, I'd be really curious to see how the bark textures and displacements look using the standard UV map if it isn't too much trouble.
Sandman: I like both, really. There's a subtle delicate realism I enjoy in portraits in Iray. I sometimes bounce back and forth... sometimes 3DL grabs me more, sometimes Iray. Weird.
Here's another Iray render, again using Sculptural UV map.
The problem with using a regular UV map is that the seams become REALLY obvious, particularly with displacement. Decals are the easiest solution, but they cover up the eyes and can't use displacement. It's frustrating.
One possible solution is to export the model and use UV mapper to get a projection map from the camera angle, but ... that's a lot of work and tricky. ;)
I'll do another render with a regular UV map.
I'll note that in using Bark in Iray with displacement, I've found it useful to take the displacement maps into Photoshop to center the color balance. The default displacement maps are on the dark side, which is fine in 3DL but Iray is more finicky.
That's not quite the reason...
The maps generally are not made to operate in a linear workflow. They are not the proper gamma for it. 3Delight, SHOULD be used in linear 'mode' but most often isn't. In the 'non-linear' RGB world that 3DL, in Studio is usually used in RGB 128 128 128 is the 'midpoint grey', but in the linear world that Iray operates in, RGB 186 186 186 (or so) is closer to the mid point (yeah, there's an exact number...), which is MUCH 'lighter' than the typical maps used in Studio.
aaah. I stand corrected. ;)
For anyone else making corrections, what seems to work fine is using Levels and just shifting the midpoint to the peak of the graph. Boom.
That works, because the maps are 'lost causes' when trying to actually get them into a linear colorspace...and it's probably easier, too, to set the levels. Way too many conversion through too many colorspaces/color profiles...and it doesn't help that many of the are set to 'color' images instead of greyscale/black and white.
Control maps, such as displacement, should not be gamma corrected in 3Delight (with or without gamma correction on) or Iray. 128 (well, 127.5) is the mid-point of the linear grey space.
The point is IF they are set as color images they WILL be, by everything that opens them...and how ever many editors/color profiles/color space conversions they go through they end up totally uncorrected (or so out of whack it's hard to 'fix' them). If they were set as greyscale from their creation, then it would hold true...or are converted to greyscale at some point. Now if they are something other than jpg files, it's a different matter...unless they contain an embedded color profile (and many do!...yes, from the store packs).
Really, the only 'control' map that shouldn't be set to black and white/greyscale during its creation is a normalmap.
Got delayed by a bunch of other things, but here's an example using 'base male' UV map (I think. base male or michael 5 or something)
There are visible seams along the shoulders that make me grind my teeth, but them's the breaks. You can, and I have, export the figure, remap to a projection from the rough camera angle, and then apply the texture, but the edges can be a bit weird and you need to be very careful about lining up the camera.
Another thing about the seams, the more regular/more directional the pattern is, the more noticeable they are.
Thanks for this. Is there an equivalent UV map for minimizing seams that works for G3?
Unlikely, but I don't really pay much attention to G3.
At that point I'd consider exporting, using UV Mapper to do a planar projection from the 'front' or close, reimport, and try that.