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What happened to all the other helpers? I feel kind of alone in this thread right now. I'm not very comfortable as the only person giving advice. LycanthropeX, Frank, chohole, others that were posting, PLEASE give some other views. I miss the company and all the tips I never think of on my own. I'm still learning as I go myself.
Thanks jaderail, will adjust my settings. Yep it's a " false" gel following your advise in earlier threads. Lots of fun, but a bit frustrating as I couldn't get the distance right between the spotlight and the plane, so thanks for the great info.
EDIT: Tip, the higher the resolution of the Fake Gel the larger your Plane needs to be. Or the Smaller, it depends on what you want to do.
I get confused with that one too. I also loved the different effects achieved by lowering the opacity strength. Out of curiosity what size do you make your "gels", I also found that different sizes gave different effects. It sure was fun.
You should get a special prize for the great tips you gave:)
I have got a prize. I got to see all these renders and new friends learn to do things they did not know about before. :coolsmile:
My problem is that I can only give general feedback, no actual help once you start talking of how to do things in DS4, as I don't use it. Plus of course just at the moment things are a bit hectic in other areas.
I agree with Jaderail. The bump looks a little to strong on this. The lighting and framing look good. Are you using the bump and displacement that can with the character or are you adjusting it?
Sorry, I'm trying to finish up a new pack and as Cho said we've been a bit busy with a few other things on the forums.
"You're breaking up with me?" version 3
Made some more changes with lights.
Her left side (viewer's right) : I lowered the intensity of the spotlight so the skin is not over saturated on the neck and shoulder.
Her right side (viewer's left) : I added a low intensity spotlight focused on her shoulder to lighten the shadow on her arm. Also added a spotlight shining on her hair for highlights.
Lastly, lowered the light on her face so her lips aren't so shiny.
I may tweak some more if I see something that's not quite right, or if anyone has any suggestions.
P. S. "Underline" text shows up as italic :P . . . . .bold italic underline
I like this one lot's Denny L. Very good lighting. I see that as finished.
My two cents.
We have some great renders coming along here, don't we.
You and me both. This is just awesome for getting others to learn the most they can and hone there abilities.
Frank, yes I'm using the bump that came with the character, and have now dropped the bump strength to 56%.
I agree with both you and jaderail, I love this contest, I have learnt heaps here, much more than I could have ever achieved on my own. So a big thank you to all our teachers.
Home and Heart, this is much better. To me I still see a little to much bump on just the face. The body looks just right. You can adjust the Bump just one part at a time. You do not have to do the full figure with the same settings. Others may not agree.
Just my two cents. ;-P
Thanks for your comments Jaderail.
Unfortunately I am having my PC upgraded to Windows7 64 bit so I don't think I'll get round to working on this before the end of the month. So much to sort out and get DS4 working and all my contents transferred.
As Jaderail said it still looks heavy on the face and you don't have to do the change over the intire figure. Just select the face/head and adjust the bump there.
I've always used freebie presets and the like for lighting, but after reading through this thread I think I'm going to give it a crack when I get home... my previous experiments haven't gone so well, but I think the advice here might make the difference.
Been there done that. If you follow Adams tut in his sig it goes pretty smooth.
That's the spirit! We want to see what you come up with.
I don’t do many portraits to be honest. I am not going to comment on any image so far due to me coming late to the party. But I will say, man there as some good emotion in some of these images and some great lighting.
Plus the help given makes this the best beginners thread in a long time. Doff’s cap to you all and bows my head in shame. ;)
Here is a quick digest of my thoughts, and what others have said in this thread, on portraits as I see it. :)
I am particularly proud of a portrait I did in Poser a while back which I used advanced skin shaders, displacement, bump and SSS (Subsurface scattering) maps, advanced IDL (Indirect lighting) light rig and emotion and the best textures I could afford or find at the time.
But you don’t need all that to get a good portrait as shown here. I went for the realistic type of image.
I am no expert but for me emotion is one of the key aspects to a good portrait. After all we say a lot with our faces and we can tell a story just by the face alone. Eyes are important to get right too as we all tend to head straight for the eyes, gateway to the soul and all that.
Textures are often neglected; most new comers tend to leave the bump and displacement (if any) map settings at their default. I urge all of you to delve in to the surfaces tab and start messing about. You can inject more life into a portrait with good bump and displacement map settings. This is true for many images to be honest. If something is close up then quality matters. Anything far away I tend to remove bump and displacement maps especially when using DOF as you will never see the detail. So they are just a memory hog if left. Also most teeth come out far too white and glossy, Try making the diffuse colour a slight yellowish colour and dial the diffuse strength back to 90 or 80%. These are all in the surfaces tab.
Composition. . Background should be darker or contrasting but not as bright as the subject IMHO, but they can be brighter if blurred with DOF (Depth of field) this pushes the subject matter further out the image making it stand out at a glance. We automatically go to bright and sharp parts of an image first. I have noticed that a lot of really good portraits have the face framed somehow, hair, clothing or some weird and wonderful head dress and steampunk helmets. LOL Don’t centre your subject in the frame as LX said it looks unnatural. The light also plays a part in setting a mood but so can nicely placed props and backgrounds like what version3 and LX nicely demonstrates and explains here http://www.daz3d.com/forums/discussion/1201/P135/#19039
Then comes light and shade. Again depending on what type of image and mood you are aiming for dictates the lighting. Are you going for a moody dark comic style image with side, back or up lighting to highlight a menacing figure? Or outdoor lighting, overcast with no deep dark shadows, even ambient lighting, a sunny day with strong light bouncing around or dawn/sunset making a silhouette? Look at LX example here http://www.daz3d.com/forums/discussion/1201/P90/#17814 see the contrasts in light and dark. Stunning work.
But yes good lighting can make or break an image but please remember the surfaces interact with the lighting so they might need adjusting too. There is no right and wrong way to light a scene, but there can be good and bad lighting.
I wasn’t going to post it but he is my best, you be the judge. All that matters is that I love the image. :) I based the lighting on a very sunny day with a lot of light bouncing around.
Also note he’s not looking at us, the viewer, makes him thoughtful, hopefully. LOL
I found this unanswered post on page 14 so here is my attempt to help.
Uber Soft Light Bundle: Is this primarily for indoor lighting?
No it can be used as outdoor lighting and I have used it for a snowy misty scene before and works quite well once you learn how to set it up from scratch. Then you will get the best out of it. It also has an Indirect Light function built in.
Studio Light Pro: Any input is appreciated.
From my fading memory I think this is the same as Light Dome Pro below.
Light Dome Pro: Does Uberenvironment do the same thing?
Doesn’t work in DS4 and no updates have been planned, though that info is a two months old. But I haven’t heard anything to the contrary.
Uber Environment 2: Included free - does it compare to other products, or are they apples and oranges?
I use UberEnviroment a lot. Good for overcast days by itself with ambient occlusion, or add a distant for the sun together with Uberenviroment. You can use it with spots and point lights; you can just use it as an ambient light source only. It does Indirect Lighting but that takes time to render and more advanced knowledge and long explanations to explain how render settings and Uber settings work with each other. That will come in time naturally. This is a good place to start learning UberEnviroment http://www.daz3d.com/forums/discussion/306/ Under the section Universal (multi-version or non-specific) tutorials is a link called “Learning UberEnviroment 2”. Note the comments about image at the top of page one of adam’s Tutorials and Freebies index.
Reality 2: Will purchasing this negate the need for any other lighting package?I would say yes as Reality uses the basic Daz Studio lights and converts them into a format where Luxrender can use. Plus Lux makes good use of Mesh based lighting or in Daz Studio Uber Area Lighting built it. Example you can use a plane as a light source. Area Lighting (mesh based lighting) gives better results as all the light rays don’t all travel parallel with each like distant lights do. The light rays are somewhat random which results in light getting further around an object that the other type of lights like spots, points and distant.
Daz Studio uses a surface based biased render engine, 3Delieight. You give the render parameters; it renders with those parameters and stops when complete.
Reality uses an Unbiased render engine, Luxrender which simulates real word light, bouncing light all around the place as it does do. Also you stop a render when you are happy with the results. If not stopped in theory it would render on indefinitely getting crisper until you wouldn’t notice the difference but it would still render on until told otherwise. Good textures play a big part in realism which Reality is good for. But again like all this the learning curve is what you make it. Play, test and generally poke around to see what does what. Watch and read tutorials.
Hope that helps a little.
Before DAZ's new site, I used to look at DAZ's gallery. People would list Photoshop as one of the software used. So I always thought the lighting effects were done as post work Dodge, Burn, or Filters. Now I'm just blown away at how powerful a software Daz Studio really is (and it's free).
Postwork is a good tool, if used right, but good lighting can make or break a render, and there is no real way to substitute postwork for good lighting imho.
Opps... Sorry I forgot this one also. Szark is right info would help.
Studio Light Pro: Any input is appreciated.
From my fading memory I think this is the same as Light Dome Pro below. Szark said.
Nope Studio Light Pro is a set of different lights, they will work in DS4Pro and DS4.5. You get a Super spotlight a Super point light and many more sets. It even includes a nice ambient light set. You need to do some adjusting but the PDF is very helpful.
Light Dome Pro
Is a plugin that only works in DS3 and DS3A at this time. Just as Szark points out. It is one of my goto sets in DS3A.
Those I do have and work with loads. I'm still new to DS4Pro so I can not comment on the other sets at this time.
Agreed.
Hmm . . . something for next month's contest?
Hmm . . . something for next month's contest?
Interesting. I have noted this idea in our contest idea section of the forum for the CVs I can't see why we can't come up with something in the future.
If you want to see some great portraits have a peek at this thread http://www.daz3d.com/forums/discussion/1389/