Up realism on old hair

alex_bb8aa5da

I have elven hair for genesis, which i LOVE LOVE LOVE. But it renders kind of cartoony.  I am likewise drooling over Cuffed Tail 2, but that one is even older and I'm afraid will render even less photoreal.  Is there anything you recommend to improve the hair?  I found this product: UHT Hair Shaders for Iray, but it is not on sale and I'm unsure how well it works.  Thoughts?

Illidanstorm

I had Uhr shader for a while but gave it back because I found the oot hair shader far better. It's on sale right now on renderosity. It works on all hairs and gives them a great look.

glaseye

Just a quick test with OOT IrayPair Hair Shader for the 2 hairs mentioned; left with the 'base' OOT shader applied, right with a OOT colour preset (different ones on each hair)

Also converted both hair to use SudD - High resolution SubD level set at 1

alex_bb8aa5da

Thank you! It makes me nervious to buy in denderosity, but I guess its a known site?  And plays nicely with daz?

glaseye

Renderosity is a well known site that's been around longer then I'm using DS or Poser (and that's 10+ years now ). Not sure what you mean with plays nicely with DAZ (DAZ or DAZ3D is the company, DS - DAZ|Studio is the application ), but OOT Hairpair is made for use with DS and Iray...... In all my 10 years I did not buy as much there as I did here, but did not encounter major problems ( maybe 2 or 3 glitches with a sale, but all were sorted within hours.....)

alex_bb8aa5da

glaseye!!!! YOU ARE AMAZING - i just saw you posted the hairs I was looking at with renders.  THANK YOU.  I think that settles the question for me!!!!!  With just one.. err... more question...

<<Also converted both hair to use SudD - High resolution SubD level set at 1>>

What does that mean and do I need to buy anything more to do what that says? :)

ETA: Here is what i found online about this. I'm not sure what it means, but it seems straight forward enough... Is this right?  the post was from a few years agoL

Go to the Scene tab. 

Click on the little button at the top right of that tab (or left, if you have it docked on the right of your screen). 

Choose Edit--Geometry--Convert To SubD.

(by play nicely I meant whether I would have any problems installing something Renderosity purchased into Daz studio application since it is coming from a different company (rederosity) and not Daz.   I take from your comment that it's not a problem.)

 

glaseye

Converting to SubD is a function included in DS; see image, select the hair in the scene file and perform the function. It changes the hair from base resolution to high resolution and sets it at level 1.  ( you found it alredy)

As for the 'playing nice' well, you need to know how to manual install the files into DS. It is not difficult, so feel free to ask if needed, although I do have the feeling that the way I install things will be completely different from the way things will have to be installed on your side (got my own preference on how things should be installed and organized, so I do not use anything like the install manager or connect.....)

AndyS

Some time ago I used the Ultimate Hair Shader of Slosh as a start to improve some older hair products.
But I had to rework the delivered textures (increased the density / details by a factor of 2 and 4). And some hair requires structures in diffrent directions, what I created too.

So here as an example my iRay adaption for KoZ Messy Hair.

glaseye

Ah yes, Kozaburo's hair, ancient by now, but still oh so usefull and usable.

Here the OOT version  (and in case you're wondering, no I've got no connection whatsoever with OOT; I just happen to have choosen their product for iray hair conversion. And as I am experimenting with my older content now, these renders are just a little extra testing this way..... )

alex_bb8aa5da

Thank you guys sooooo much.  The OOT seems to be really the path of least resistence!  Another to-buy item.  <gulp>  seriously, thank you so much for posting the example shots

 

BeeMKay

For shader conversion, OOT is great, but UHT also does a good Job. I'd also recommend the Lustre Shader sold at the DAZ store (don't have the URL at the moment).

Thing is, do you want to keep the original map of the hair, or replace it with the ones that come with OOT or UHT?

Because that is what those sets are doing, replacing the original hair maps. And depending on how the hair was made, you sometimes dont want that, because the result looks awful. 

What I do is, I also use the OOT shader, because the colour settings are great, but when I apply it, I keep the ctrl key pressed. A little box pops up, and in the second option, I use it to Ignore the maps. That means that all the colour settings are used, but not the maps. 

Though, I have to say, the longer I keep fiddling with the settings and learn how to perfect the results to my need, the less I would really need the OOT shader in the first place, because I know the settings by heart. But it is a huge time server for initial renders and setting up a character.

one note of caution, though, when using older hairs. They were designed with 3Delight in mind. But Iray, especially when you use shaders like OOT or UHT, you will find that there are not enough layers of mesh, and because of that, there is see-through to the head (looks like a halo of sorts then or is even invisible) from some angles, or when using certain lights. 

I'm currently in London on vacation, but will be back by the weekend. If you are interested, I can show you a few examples when I'm back.

Inkubo

Those are some beautiful hair results. Thank you guys for posting them. It never occurred to me to mess with SubD, but I need to try that tonight--I bet it works wonders on Wyatt hair.

AndyS

BeeMKay said:

For shader conversion, OOT is great, but UHT also does a good Job. I'd also recommend the Lustre Shader sold at the DAZ store (don't have the URL at the moment).

( ... )
What I do is, I also use the OOT shader, because the colour settings are great, but when I apply it, I keep the ctrl key pressed. A little box pops up, and in the second option, I use it to Ignore the maps. That means that all the colour settings are used, but not the maps.

I don't use the Ctrl Key.
I want to replace the old textures, because the authors (and still some today) already included specular effects. But in your individual scenes these effects don't fit to the current lighting setup. On the first look you won't notice. But sometimes you want it correctly.

That's the reason I use the personally modified UHT textures and part of the shader setting (plus some own modifications due to iray). Only the transmaps persist. But those were already respected by the UHT shaders themselves.

glaseye

oot's hair pair does have a 'base' preset that uses the hair original diffuse maps. I don't have any of the other products, so I can't compare, but as mentioned, tweaking the settings after the initial conversion can improve results... (did not do that in the samples, but usually do that as well)

AndyS

glaseye said:

oot's hair pair does have a 'base' preset that uses the hair original diffuse maps.

So as I described: OOT inherits the wrong specular includes (in the diffuse maps) of the original authors of the older products.
So thank you - For me this is a non-buy.

glaseye

Nope, the base preset uses the diffuse map, the colour presets uses OOT's diffuse, specular and other maps. The base presets is for use with, for example, hairs that have both horizontal and vertical strands in the texture maps and don't take the "all strands in one direction maps" very well...

I guess 'base' is the wrong word used by me.....

alex_bb8aa5da

... And this discussion has now gone way over my head :)  I'm still on glaseye and pretty pictures (and I want to know where glaseye got that dog on the avitar). But i'm getting that both these products are good for a newbie who wants to use older hair without it looking fake.  With the preference going to OOT.  And keeping in mind that advanced users might do more advanced tweaking and may not need these products at all.
  One day that will be me. not today. or tomorrow ;)  You guys are awesome

glaseye

that avatar is about 10 years old by now; it's the old millenium dog from here....in it's basic setting......

A liitle more 'dog' over here

https://www.daz3d.com/forums/discussion/100546/bring-out-the-dogs

 

alex_bb8aa5da

Ok, smart people (and cute avitar dogs) what about Universal Hair Shader for Iray that's on sale now?  Is it all the same thing as the OOT, just a different flavor and it's whatever you like better type things, you is there an actual difference in how it fundamentally does stuff?

glaseye

Can't really help you there, as I don't have that product. Looking at the description I guess it functions similar to OOT's hairpair. UHS mentions a "Fiber Mesh Eye Brows Prep Preset" which OOT's doesn't have, so that would be an extra.....but as said, I'm not able to compare......

Richard Haseltine

alex_bb8aa5da said:

Ok, smart people (and cute avitar dogs) what about Universal Hair Shader for Iray that's on sale now?  Is it all the same thing as the OOT, just a different flavor and it's whatever you like better type things, you is there an actual difference in how it fundamentally does stuff?

Yse, it is a replacement shader which can either use the existing maps or replace them (for hair that is helpfully set up, as most is) with its own maps. It has various configuration options, and settings to do things like add more gloss (some people complained it looks dry - I'm not sure that's absolutely true, but some hair in DS is set to be very glossy so it may seem it by comparison - so that can be used to compensate).

alex_bb8aa5da

Thank you!! Got the universal shader because it was on sale and i am not sure how renderocity handles refunds. It is doing ... something :)  I just don't know what as i keep clicking things and the preview render is nothing like the actual render but it's a work in progress made soooooooo much easier by you guys.  HUGE THANK YOU.