3Delight Surface and Lighting Thread

ZarconDeeGrissom · November 2014

Nice render Kalazar, I like that.

Haven't been ignoring y'all. Just biting my tong. And buisy with other stuff.

Mustakettu85 said:
In all honesty, Zarcon, would you please listen to "us oldtimers" and please ditch that viewport dependency thing already! LOL The viewport is only there to show you _where_ to put stuff, (SNIP)

How do you do that when you can't see anything, lol.

O.K. Add an extra set lights that do make stuff visible while setting up placement of stuff, then turn them off before rendering. Is there a simple way to turn on a set of lights to adjust stuff and then turn them off? It just seams like an insane amount of work going from test-render lights, to make adjustments to stuff lights, and back again for the next test render.

(EDIT)
Case and point from a novice prospective. You first set up stuff in the scene to your liking. Then you add some lights and do simple test renders to make sure there aimed in the correct directions. Then you spend considerable time dimming them so it is not wash-out with GC on. At this point you realize the bottom of the high-heal is in the floor, and you have to fix the pose. Problem is, now the view-field is pitch black and you cant see where the floor is, let-alone if the sole of the high-heal is correctly adjusted or not.

wowie · November 2014

zarcondeegrissom said:
Nice render Kalazar, I like that.
How do you do that when you can't see anything, lol.
O.K. Add an extra set lights that do make stuff visible while setting up placement of stuff, then turn them off before rendering. Is there a simple way to turn on a set of lights to adjust stuff and then turn them off? It just seams like an insane amount of work going from test-render lights, to make adjustments to stuff lights, and back again for the next test render.

Looks just fine for me :)
Using the 4.7 build and IPR. Unfortunately, the IPR doesn't update when you mess with SSS settings. The same with UberArea lights . Haven't tried UE2 or AoA's lights though. Everything else (diffuse, specular, fresnel, reflection) will be previewed immediately.

ZarconDeeGrissom · November 2014

We doubled with my 'Edit' with exactly the example of why I gave up with GC on.

IPR is looking considerably promising for everyone, regardless of GC preference or render engine. :-)

It's even going to make things like some surface editing stuff, so much easier.

Szark · November 2014

zarcondeegrissom why not instead of turning lights on and off use CTRL + L to turn on the Preview light and then CRTL + L to turn it back off, yes CRTL + L is a toggle switch.

ZarconDeeGrissom · November 2014

Szark said:
zarcondeegrissom why not instead of turning lights on and off use CTRL + L to turn on the Preview light and then CRTL + L to turn it back off, yes CRTL + L is a toggle switch.

I'm going to tattoo that on my forehead. "O" I already have a million Studio interface config and pose control notes there, how about my arm... UE2 and Uber light settings, The other arm... Content Library tree, hmmm.
I new there was a switch to force that somewhere, and for the life of me, I couldn't figure out what icon in the top row did that. :red:
(EDIT)
Poke fun at ZDG time. I've been at this, and making cool renders for about nine months, and I didn't know how to turn on and off the "Head Lamp". lol.

Szark · November 2014

I wouldn't poke fun at you for that, something else maybe one day but not this. :P

wowie · November 2014

I love IPR.
Makes tweaking fresnel so much easier, since you can quickly switch between fresnel+specular and fresnel+reflection.

Mustakettu85 · November 2014

Kalazar said:
Hi, everybody. I guess I've come late to this party (lol) I am trying to learn lighting and getting good skin tone. Sigh...... I am posting a render I just did and I need all the help I can get to fix this. I am trying to read the thread but there's a LOT of info and my brain is having fits. So any quick tips would be appreciated whilst I'm reading. I did read a few recent posts and I'm clueless as to the gamma correction? Where is that?Any way here's my render. I used 2 spot lights and the skin texture for Meridiana. Thank you

This party never ends! Bring your own calipers =D
Your render looks quite nice, what exactly do you want to have help with? We'd also need to know what shader you are using on what surfaces (the Surfaces tab should say it on top, something like "Shader: DAZ Default" or "Shader: UberSurface" etc).
As for gamma correction, the magic switch is in the render settings (the "Editor" tab in 4.7): "Gamma Correction ON/OFF". If you set it to "on", the Image Editor becomes your friend (one of the items in the menu that pops up when selecting a texture), there you can adjust the correction value (generally it should be "1" for strength maps like bump/displacement/opacity/etc, and "0" for colour maps, but actually often you can adjust the correction value for artistic purposes; it won't add to render time because it only affects the preprocessing of textures which is done invisibly, behind the scenes).
Also, the output gamma should then be set to "2.2" so as to match the power curve of our eyes and monitors.
---------------

araneldon said:

Thank you for the invitation :) Taming the Scripted Renderer -- for multipass rendering among other things -- is one of my goals. I've only recently started looking under the hood so to speak but haven't gotten very far yet.

Welcome! It's not that easy to truly tame this thing because of... you guessed it... incomplete documentation! =)

Here is a link to my post that, in turn, links to my other posts with a crude how-to for making your custom scripts out of the standard example:
http://www.daz3d.com/forums/discussion/21611/P570/#650631

Right now I am a bit puzzled by the behaviour of the Color class, so the exact code to have your render script set you a background colour of your choosing will have to wait a bit. But if you just want to have a good alpha in your "scripted renderer" render, and you are using a script built off the "standard example" (as they all are!), then you should kill (at least, comment out) these lines in your render script:

starting with

// Set the background color; from the active viewport
if( BackDrop && BackDrop.getTexture()  ){

all the way up to these (including these!)

 Renderer.riImager( "background", aTokens, aParams );
}

Then the background imager simply does not get called, and we have a transparent background.

The annoying red that pops up now is the default parameter of the imager shader. The 4.7 update interferes with its picking up the colour from the Viewport (it's all different now), this is why it uses its default colour.

And here are the render script edits to make a render to an EXR file - put them between "Renderer.setCropWindow( oHandler )" and "Renderer.riWorldBegin();". The "homework" is: using my haphazard notes from older posts, figure out what properties should be added in the "first" script for this to work (I'll post the answer later, I just think it makes for a good task =D):


Renderer.riQuantize ("rgba", 0, 0, 0, 0);

// Setting up EXR test
// Zero path
var myEXRPath = "";
// Find the "EXR Path" property
oProperty = oOwner.findProperty( "EXR Path" );
// If the property was found and it's a file property
if( oProperty && oProperty.className() == "DzFileProperty" ){
 // Set the path according to the value of the property
 myEXRPath = oProperty.getValue();
}

 aTokens = [ "uniform string exrpixeltype" ];
 aParams = [ "float" ];

//  void DzScriptedRenderer::riDisplay  ( String  name,   String  type,   String  mode,  Array  tokens,   Array  params   )  


Renderer.riDisplay ( myEXRPath, "C:/Program Files/DAZ 3D/DAZStudio4/displays/exr.dpy", "rgba", aTokens, aParams);

}

What it does not is displaying the "progress". That's okay.

PS For EXR (linear) output, gamma should be set to 1 (but still with GC on, of course - GC switch is in the "normal" render settings). Tonemapping will take care of the curve.

---------------

Poke fun at ZDG time. I've been at this, and making cool renders for about nine months, and I didn't know how to turn on and off the "Head Lamp". lol.

Well, I've been at it for how long? Since mid 2008 at least? I didn't know this either.

But I don't use the headlamp at all. Maybe it's just my video card (all of them...), but any environment light in the scene (even set to 10%) floods the OpenGL preview with enough brightness for any purpose I can imagine.

prixat · November 2014

zarcondeegrissom said:
Poke fun at ZDG time. I've been at this, and making cool renders for about nine months, and I didn't know how to turn on and off the "Head Lamp". lol.

The only time I noticed a black viewport is when I add negative lighting.

p.s. if you need someone to make fun of you, I can do that ...for a small fee. :smirk:

Szark · November 2014

I won't charge any fee. :P

wowie · November 2014

Cool things from Siggraph 2014.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FcFcESxgUKI
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KHT82-KYhRw

I think the high resolution normal thing can be incorporated easily into DS.

Mustakettu85 · December 2014

wowie said:
Cool things from Siggraph 2014.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FcFcESxgUKI
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KHT82-KYhRw
I think the high resolution normal thing can be incorporated easily into DS.

That last paper (and related others on the guy's webpage) is daaaaaamn lovely. I've been struggling with making this sort of effects look any good, for years. I'm not sure that writing all this math shader-wise would be efficient, though. Let's hope the 3Delight guys implement something like this natively.

The good thing about Mitsuba - the research renderer those cool math guys all seem to be using these days - is that it´s actually free. The bad thing... well, I checked it out this summer last time, and it didn't support displacement, like, at all. I wasn't also particularly successful with importing DS-exported scenes.
http://www.mitsuba-renderer.org/

wowie · December 2014

Mustakettu85 said:
That last paper (and related others on the guy's webpage) is daaaaaamn lovely. I've been struggling with making this sort of effects look any good, for years. I'm not sure that writing all this math shader-wise would be efficient, though. Let's hope the 3Delight guys implement something like this natively.
I hope so too and let's also hope DAZ will update the shader mixer bricks and not wait for DS 5 to do it.

Slightly off topic, for DS6 my personal wish list are implementations of either of these:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KDvfFzFIruQ&list=UU_976xMxPgzIa290Hqtk-9g
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GyOwwNvHA1w

The good thing about Mitsuba - the research renderer those cool math guys all seem to be using these days - is that it´s actually free. The bad thing... well, I checked it out this summer last time, and it didn't support displacement, like, at all. I wasn't also particularly successful with importing DS-exported scenes.
http://www.mitsuba-renderer.org/

If I remember correctly, Mitsuba and Luxrender are pretty much exploration forks of PBRT, though understandably the math models and techniques have progressed quite a lot. Pretty much all of the major players have gone towards a more physicially based model for the reflectance model, differing only on light transport. Disney's new Hyperion renderer, used in BH6, looks extremely promising. I thought RPS18 was fast until I looked at fxGuide article on Hyperion.
http://www.fxguide.com/featured/disneys-new-production-renderer-hyperion-yes-disney/

Kevin Sanderson · December 2014

Wow! Anything would be fast in that huge render farm Disney is using... 1.5MW of power used!! They need to sell a lot of tickets just to pay the electric bill! I wonder how fast Hyperion is on a regular high end PC that we use.

Their hair and SSS looks really nice.

ZarconDeeGrissom · December 2014

That's probably the next gen of graphics card, they already exceeded two hundred watts. So the only way for them to make the next generation just as chin-dropping, is to go to the mega-watt class. lol.

My only wish for Studio 4.7 at the moment, is to not have the courser jump to the end, every time I try to type something in the render tab fields. I have yet to find the 4.7 aftermath wishlist thread.

makinng fun of me.... prixat and Szark. If you want me to pay you to make fun of my n00b-ness. You will simply have to put some entries in the RRRR contest, and win. lol. Assuming Totte dose not send my contribution another direction.

wowie · December 2014

zarcondeegrissom said:
That's probably the next gen of graphics card, they already exceeded two hundred watts. So the only way for them to make the next generation just as chin-dropping, is to go to the mega-watt class. lol.
.

I think you may have misread the article - they clearly stated they're not using GPUs. I believe each node is still basically off the shelf two socket 1U Xeons. In the article, they did a benchmark with a Xeon X5675, which is a much older Xeon based on Nehalem. Current generation is Haswell (preceeded by Ivy Bridge and Sandy Bridge). So it's about two generations behind. With an estimated 25% increase of performance improvements per generation, current generation Haswell is about twice the performance at the same power usage. I'd say about the same as a 4770K.

Looking at the relatively simplistic benchmark like Passmark, the old Xeon is actually slower.
http://www.cpubenchmark.net/cpu.php?cpu=Intel+Xeon+X5675+@+3.07GHz
http://www.cpubenchmark.net/cpu.php?cpu=Intel+Core+i7-4770K+@+3.50GHz&id=1919

Looking at this,tells me that most of Disney/Pixar are still based on Nehalem/Westmere Xeons.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k1DKFskGHvg
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gZK3poTRYUg

They are using a slightly lesser Xeon in those videos (Xeon E5646). If RPS18 is that fast with a processor that's about half the performance of current mid-end desktop processor like the 4770K, I'll say Hyperion is pretty damn fast. I would even say Hyperion makes GPU renderers unnecessary for Disney/Pixar.

ZarconDeeGrissom · December 2014

it was intended as a joke. we need the latest mega-watt class graphics card for the OpenGL used in the upcoming Studio interface, to say nothing of the requirements of the next OS.

I was just told this weekend, I needed to upgrade my CPU, because it is outdated. Sorry I have yet to convince IBM to make Daz Studio run on the Power8 instead of the month-old AMD FX-8350. lol.
(EDIT intended not interceded)

wowie · December 2014

zarcondeegrissom said:
it was interceded as a joke. we need the latest mega-watt class graphics card for the OpenGL used in the upcoming Studio interface, to say nothing of the requirements of the next OS.
I was just told this weekend, I needed to upgrade my CPU, because it is outdated. Sorry I have yet to convince IBM to make Daz Studio run on the Power8 instead of the month-old AMD FX-8350. lol.

Power8 are power hogs and unless you're using software specifically written for it, they don't make much sense performance wise or financial wise. The FX 8350 you're using is actually faster than the Xeons used in Disney's render farms.

As I noted on the post above, Hyperion's performance rivals those seen from GPU renderers. Hell, even RPS18 rivals those GPU renderers and that's on three generations older CPU. The newer Xeons packs about close to three times the performance per socket compared to the CPUs they're using. Just look at the benchmark for E5-2697 here - http://www.cpubenchmark.net/cpu.php?cpu=Intel+Xeon+E5-2697+v3+@+2.60GHz&id=2333

If they did the same scene with the new Xeons, the renders will be done in at least half the time. If they were using it for the render in those videos, it will take close to a quarter of the time and those already looks pretty fast..

With each CPU maximum power usage/delivery of 150 watts, even using two of those can still be less power hungry than using a single high end GPU.

Mustakettu85 · December 2014

wowie said:

I hope so too and let's also hope DAZ will update the shader mixer bricks and not wait for DS 5 to do it.
Slightly off topic, for DS6 my personal wish list are implementations of either of these:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KDvfFzFIruQ&list=UU_976xMxPgzIa290Hqtk-9g
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GyOwwNvHA1w

Those skinning methods would certainly be awesome to have. Or multiple collision items for a given mesh, in the very least.

I agree about shader mixer needing an update; I recently discovered that even though the bsdf() is there, it's not fully usable - since it treats all its modes as if they were specular, while Oren-Nayar is a diffuse model!

I don't know if it's feasible to expect trace() to be updated to its full capabilities, but at least adding an environment map slot should be feasible. Rigging trace() together with environment() via with a mix() function feels soooo outdated, when it can do it by itself in RSL code.

wowie · December 2014

Mustakettu85 said:

Those skinning methods would certainly be awesome to have. Or multiple collision items for a given mesh, in the very least.
I agree about shader mixer needing an update; I recently discovered that even though the bsdf() is there, it's not fully usable - since it treats all its modes as if they were specular, while Oren-Nayar is a diffuse model!

I don't know if it's feasible to expect trace() to be updated to its full capabilities, but at least adding an environment map slot should be feasible. Rigging trace() together with environment() via with a mix() function feels soooo outdated, when it can do it by itself in RSL code.

Technically you could make your own brick or write your own RSL code with Shader Builder. I don't know how portable the resulting shader will be (for exporting into .RIB and rendering externally).

Still needs finetuning, but I think it's nearly there. No textures used outside of opacity and maybe bump maps (they're optionally loaded by the original hair MATs). Works best on hair with lots of details in the opacity map or lots of layers. It doesn't look as good with hair that relies on diffuse maps to differentiate strands.

Mustakettu85 · December 2014

wowie said:

Technically you could make your own brick or write your own RSL code with Shader Builder. I don't know how portable the resulting shader will be (for exporting into .RIB and rendering externally).

Still needs finetuning, but I think it's nearly there. No textures used outside of opacity and maybe bump maps (they're optionally loaded by the original hair MATs). Works best on hair with lots of details in the opacity map or lots of layers. It doesn't look as good with hair that relies on diffuse maps to differentiate strands.

I have long switched to RSL coding via the builder - because of all the shader mixer bugs and deficiencies. But as of right now, distributing new DS shaders is a tricky process - and not just because of the DAZ Script licence that requires that redistribution request which can take a looooooooooong time to get processed in the tech support. There's also this issue: I don't know about Mac, but on Windows you have to have an admin account and put some files manually in folders like AppData or the default DS installation which is more often than not in another "protected" folder like Program Files. Not all end-users are comfortable with that.

Shader mixer networks get saved within a material preset file, so they only need to be put in content/library folders.

I'm thinking about submitting the bsdf() misplaced Oren-Nayar thing as a bug. How do you think, does it qualify as such?

And the hair preset looks neat! Does it translate easily to darker colours?

wowie · December 2014

Mustakettu85 said:

I'm thinking about submitting the bsdf() misplaced Oren-Nayar thing as a bug. How do you think, does it qualify as such?
You should. At least that way they will know there's a problem.

And the hair preset looks neat! Does it translate easily to darker colours?

I made presets for Red, Ginger, Brunette light & dark, Blue Black and Black in addition to Blonde and a darker blonde. All these preset do is load different colors into diffuse, specular, velvet and translucence channels. All the values are the same.

I saw some problems with some hair when I used anisotropic higlights, so I made an alternative shader preset without anistropy. There's also some problems with the hairline on some models - this can be avoided or minimized by changing the tiling offset.

My fake GI lights are almost done. The renders below are taken with the simplified one - one directional light and four UberArea lights.

ZarconDeeGrissom · December 2014

Very nice hair wowie, and the color options sound really tempting as well.

That simplified light setup sounds vaguely familiar, and I like the results. Again, very nice.
I've fused with lights in agony for a while, and agree with your choice of area lights (panels I call them), perfect balance of shadows and softness. Much more realistic results as well, as few real world lights are pin-point sources.

And as a side note, I do hope the op that started this excellent thread, Wancow, if feeling much better soon.

Mustakettu85 · December 2014

wowie said:
Mustakettu85 said:

I'm thinking about submitting the bsdf() misplaced Oren-Nayar thing as a bug. How do you think, does it qualify as such?
You should. At least that way they will know there's a problem.

I posted the "bug report"... What I didn't realise is that it's filed via the exact same system as all the other support requests. I hope it does not get lost in there.

I saw some problems with some hair when I used anisotropic higlights, so I made an alternative shader preset without anistropy. There's also some problems with the hairline on some models - this can be avoided or minimized by changing the tiling offset.

That's some neat ginger, and the lighting is great as well =) I don't recognise the hair model, though.

What problems did you come across with anisotropic highlights? Or is this not UberSurface but shader mixer?

Mustakettu85 · December 2014

zarcondeegrissom said:

And as a side note, I do hope the op that started this excellent thread, Wancow, if feeling much better soon.

Have you heard from him since summer?

Chohole · December 2014

Mustakettu85 said:
zarcondeegrissom said:

And as a side note, I do hope the op that started this excellent thread, Wancow, if feeling much better soon.

Have you heard from him since summer?

http://www.daz3d.com/forums/discussion/49698/

wowie · December 2014

Mustakettu85 said:

That's some neat ginger, and the lighting is great as well =) I don't recognise the hair model, though.
What problems did you come across with anisotropic highlights? Or is this not UberSurface but shader mixer?

Pyrit Hair by SWAM, the newer Genesis 2 Female version. Right now there's an annoying bug with it - by default it loads parented to the had so it causes problems once you changed the head size. Easily fixable by unparenting it. Already filed a bug report about that.

On some model hair strands, the highlights doesn't look quite right even with very high glossiness (I'm also using quite a lot of fresnel with it).

Mustakettu85 · December 2014

chohole said:

http://www.daz3d.com/forums/discussion/49698/

Thank you very much Chohole!

Pyrit Hair by SWAM, the newer Genesis 2 Female version. Right now there's an annoying bug with it - by default it loads parented to the had so it causes problems once you changed the head size. Easily fixable by unparenting it. Already filed a bug report about that.

On some model hair strands, the highlights doesn't look quite right even with very high glossiness (I'm also using quite a lot of fresnel with it).

I see now, thanks. Fresnel on hair sometimes works awesome, but sometimes it can indeed make things look strange. Must be something about the model geometry.

wowie · December 2014

Some additional reading material.
http://www.cg.tuwien.ac.at/research/publications/2007/weidlich_2007_almfs/weidlich_2007_almfs-paper.pdf

Any idea how we can model or hack interreflection between layers?

Also:
http://www.photometricviewer.com/

A freeware IES light viewer. Any takers on converting various IES profile into light presets?

Mustakettu85 · December 2014

wowie said:
Some additional reading material.
http://www.cg.tuwien.ac.at/research/publications/2007/weidlich_2007_almfs/weidlich_2007_almfs-paper.pdf
Any idea how we can model or hack interreflection between layers?

Probably in RSL only. The standalone 3Delight, if you choose to install the Maya-specific files as well, gives you the source for 3DelightMaterial that features coating with meaningful light absorption (the code itself isn't that complex there), and also cites the following paper:
http://publik.tuwien.ac.at/files/PubDat_182027.pdf

And since you mention IES, Paolo Berto Durante had an interesting thing to say about how useful they actually are:
http://www.3delight.com/en/modules/PunBB/viewtopic.php?id=70

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