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This is an interesting post and some of it is over my head, but it contains a lot of the same questions I sometimes have. However, how can you tell if a texture is set to use a shader or not? How can I tell if the Age of Armour SSS is being used or not?
Thanks for the great tips Jaderail, and the great question Zarcon.
To see which shader is in use open the Surfaces Tab and select any Skin zone and the shader will list at top.
Click image for full size.
Every surface has some sort of shader. That is information the program uses to know how to render the surfaces. To find out which one go to the surface tab and click editor. Then look at the top next to the word "Shader:" . That will tell you which one is used.If it is the Age of Armour then it will say AoA_Subsurface.
O.k. forgot to look there.
Is there a way to change the 'Daz default' shader to AoA, without ditching the Wachiwi skin color/freckles/etc (for example), and/or without invoking the SSS "Lizard Skin" effect?
I think it was SSS code that had a glitch with rendering odd patterns on people.
Applying the SSS shader shouldn't remove maps, if the initial shader is one of the standards. The main problem to check is that, if there are no displacement maps, the minimum and maximum values are 0. I have a script for this: http://www.daz3d.com/forums/discussion/25642/
Thanks, that's super helpful!
That is due to the settings used in the AoA SSS. In most cases it goes away with a larger render. If that does not work you can lower the shading rate on the surfaces. It may take a bit of time and reading to get use to working with the AoA shader but it will give you much better skin tones in renders and it is worth it to read the pdf that Age of Armour did for it.
Thanks Richard Haseltine for that script, place that with the 'Point eyes at fix' script. Is that the cause of that lizard skin effect?
Jaderail, that workflow is difficult to think of an improvement on. Even if you plan to have the camera move around the scene, as only stuff in view matters to the camera. If only other projects waited till everything was set before starting on the one thing that the layout/design of depends on everything else on around it. (Faster, Better, Cheaper. Pick two, lol)
I need to get some more coffee, and figure out where them shader controls are.
Also I noticed some 'V4 Elite' textures around, is that just a texture (jpg/png/bmp) set, or dose it use AoA/SSS/Whatever add on shader-thing?
That is due to the settings used in the AoA SSS. In most cases it goes away with a larger render. If that does not work you can lower the shading rate on the surfaces. It may take a bit of time and reading to get use to working with the AoA shader but it will give you much better skin tones in renders and it is worth it to read the pdf that Age of Armour did for it.
Is that how they got results like this?
No, the Elite skins use Elite Human Surface Shader.
O.K.
So AoA, and Elite, are shaders, and SSS is something else?
(edit)
good beginner stuff at first glance. AoA pdf
http://docs.daz3d.com/lib/exe/fetch.php/public/read_me/index/16324/16324_subsurface-shader-base.pdf
SSS stands for Sub Surface Scattering, which is the way light interacts with the interior of a translucent object like skin. Remember that 3D models don't have any interior substance, only surfaces So shaders need to try to mimic that effect. Age of Armour's Sub Surface Shader is one way of doing so. AoA's SSS, UberSurface, and EHSS are all shaders that try to do so (among other effects) -- AoA's SSS is rather recent, and wasn't around back when the Elite textures were made.
Looks like a lot of shader model/code options. This is what I'm looking at right now. I know not all figures came with an FanGizmo shader option, unlike the Watchiwi skin I'm using for 'G2F7W'.
I was avoiding anything SSS, because of the Lizard effect. If that is indeed simple to fix And Not just call it 'Broken', then I need to revisit all the other figures in my Daz Install.
Natasha Elite would be another Epic option, if she worked with Genisses (1) and Genisses 2.
the shading issue almost never happens with the HSS or Ubershader. I don't often have to make adjustments for renders fairly large or the characters face is close up and the render isn't really small. Characters that use some sort of SSS tend to have more realistic skin tones so I think it is important for characters. One thing to be aware of is that you need to be sure every light in the scene uses shadows or you get odd glow sometimes.
I use all of them at different times. But again this comes from learning each one and I've been at this DS thing many years now.
Apply just the SSS Base mat, and, Shader: Hmmmm, O.K. [shrugging shoulders]
I did two 'control' renders for a baseline before fussing around. The closeup face is almost perfect, except the ears are not quite real looking. The full body render, well only the arms and cloths looked real. I'm almost curious what the "AltShader" is. Two more renders first to see if this 'Sith' looking thing in my View-field, is indeed human or not, lol.
O.K. the darker look isn't that bad, it's just startling when it first changes from default to SSS.
Multiple means there are different shaders on different surfaces. Alt is, I am guessing, the alternate shader set up the content creator used. It isn't a studio shader as far as I know.
You can only get the Default Shader used with a Single surface selected, Many areas selected will always list Multi even if the same shader is used on all of the Material Zones. It simply means you have more than ONE item selected and it can not display a list in a single text field.
Yea, they probably don't need AoA subsurface for the shafts of each eye lash as opaque as some individual hair Strands can be. Something that usually has no translucence until it is exposed to light levels on the intensity of, say, the KT impact flash, lol.
That SSS mat is nice for figures that include them. However, what if they don't. That shader model that came with Studio states "Preset Not Included" or was that just for the octopus preview thing?
http://www.daz3d.com/subsurface-shader-base
Example, Fw Yasmin, only has a base mat for the daz studio default shader.
(reading that PDF again, pg 4?)
Umm AoA SSS Shader can be added to any texture even those that use other SSS type shaders. Just select all the Skin surfaces on the loaded texture. Go to the AoA SSS Shader and hold CTRL as you double click to apply it (the figure needs selected in the Scene Tab as well) and at the pop up do Surfaces> Selected and Images>Ignore just as explained before.
Here is a V4 Elite at load with one Shader and now with AOA SSS applied...
What about mouth stuff, or eyes stuff. should I leave them alone if there fine as is?
should that be applied to each surface individually, or highlight it all (as shown in attached pic)?
You can Apply to All at once even the mouth bits if you like, that works. But you can only see the name with a single surface selected or it will say Multi again.
If you see nothing that needs changed on the eyes or other place just do not change them.
I was just concerned that it may be some kind of fill thing that needs a container or something completely enveloping it, or it would get confused with different texture-map segments.
I had some difficulty finding the 'balls' in the smart tab (There all Dz no AoA ones.)
However there is a 'Base Shader' under products in the smart tab, and that appears to be all there is in the Content Library as well.
In the PDF, there is two separate skin subsurface presets. I must presume there is a 'Pro' version that is not available for Studio, or I'm looking in the wrong place.
"O" supposedly it try's to match existing textures, I guess that happened, as Yasmin did not noticeably change in the view-field, or the shader is not doing anything.
You must configure the AoA SSS Shader yourself, suggested settings are in the PDF file. That or use Copy paste from a Skin already set up. it was built for you to create the look you want not as default shader. If you want blue skin with a green SSS you can do it on the Base AoA SSS Shader but you must set it up.
so I'm wasting my time waiting for this thing to render that hair... "O" wait, there's an eye brow. lol.
I must read that again then, I only noticed setting descriptions in my first pass. I figured I could just select "Skin A" or "Skin B" and just go with it for now.
I hope this is not like that Roman floor, where I had to set each individual pixel by hand (I copy-n-pasted allot).
(Edit)
that thing on the inside of your eyelid, on her it is showing now almost like she is squinting with a second set of eye lids. There is a simple fix for that, isn't there?
Ahh you got it now it seems... you got all the info I do. I still just use the skins I prefer and edit lights mostly. Never been one for that perfect look myself. I'm more a comic type artist most of the time. So default skins work in my stuff.
I inadvertently set the skin texture to the water in the eye, didn't I?
I intended to go threw this hair-ripping-out routine once, then save the figure hair, and cloths, as a "Scene Subset" so I don't have to mess with it again, aside from just tweaking a slider here or there.
The Cornea, Tear and Eye Surface(for those figures that have it) don't really gain anything from an SSS shader, the DAZ Default shader is all they need. Since these surface are almost always 100% translucent most of the available light would pass through instead of being scattered.
Rip my hair out time then. I sequentially flipped the Opacity of each part individually to see where it is, from "Cornea" down to the "Tear" and nothing there seams to be where the extra skin-tone has appeared on the eye.
It's almost like the AoA shader went beyond the edge on the "Face" or the "Head" when it was applied. Time for another pot of coffee, and to go over the documents one more time, unless anyone has any ideas how to fix this eyelid issue.
One screen-cap with the default shader and bump-map cranked up, the other with the AoA applied to skin only.
(edit)
And trying a zeroed T-pose then apply AoA, did not fix that. It was worth a try.
What Skin tone on the Eye? I fail to see what you are talking about. I see you did not edit the displacement as needed in the AoA shader and that is causing the eye to look a bit more closed but the displacement adjustments are mentioned in the PDF I thought. If not they were in the SSS Shader thread in the commons.
EDIT: Which I now realize you may not have known of before I hit post. It is a displacement issue.