V4 Skin Shaders for Carrara
Garstor
Posts: 1,411
There are plenty of skin shaders/textures to choose from. I'm curious about the Carrara community at large -- what are your favourites? Is there one particular choice that you use most often? Why?
(Yes, I hope that this post will drive some near-future purchases on my part)
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Not to prevent you from parting with money, but have you looked at the Hi res. Carrara shaders for V4/M4 that came with Carrara's native content?
Aside from those, I tend to buy the skin shaders that come with Carrara optimized versions.
The one exception I made was for a product called Orca Maid which is really a character, but comes with wet maps that you can use in the highlight channel to give a wet skin look. You'll have to build the Carrara shader yourself because there is no Carrara pre-set for that one.
http://www.daz3d.com/shop/catalogsearch/result/?q=orcamaid&x=0&y=0
I have the hi-res shaders installed and the follow Carrara optimized:
M4 Elite: "Rob Carrara"
Michael 4: "Jeremy Elite" (this install seems screwed up)
V4 Elite: "Lana Carrara" and "Marie Carrara"
I was hoping to expand on Carrara optimized shaders based on user's suggestions.
I really like the Elite series of skin shaders.
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I use this to enhance them...
http://www.daz3d.com/shop/gkd-skin-ultimate
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I'm really surprised there weren't many more Elite shaders made. It would have been nice to have some shaders with tattoos.
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That product looks interesting -- and thanks to the "This product requires" list, I have links to several new V4 Elite skins. Now to find some more M4 Elite stuff and whip out the credit card...
Call it an end-of-year gift for DAZ. :) Thanks guys!
I have the hi-res shaders installed and the follow Carrara optimized:
M4 Elite: "Rob Carrara"
Michael 4: "Jeremy Elite" (this install seems screwed up)
V4 Elite: "Lana Carrara" and "Marie Carrara"
I was hoping to expand on Carrara optimized shaders based on user's suggestions.
Wasn't sure if you knew about the included shaders, so I figured I'd mention them. Any look you're going for? Different races, or tats as tsarist mentioned?
It's pretty easy to alter the shaders in Carrara. The V4s in the image below use the hi-res shaders to which I've added the wet maps I mentioned in my previous post. The Asian V4 (V4 with A4 morphs) uses an included hi-res shader in the color channel with a multiplier and color to give the skin a darker color. The wet bathing suits use sphere primitives and a surface replicator to get the beaded water look.
Phoenix1966 has some great sets to chose from for males. Just FYI.
You truly are a gifted individual, EP!!!
As always, Love your work!
Those look very nice. Thanks for posting the link. Which ones do you have and are there any caveats, such as having to use displacement maps?
I concur wholeheartedly!
Thanks for the M4 link too. I am basically looking for appearance variation so that I am not always rendering the same figures. One day I'll have the textures & the skill to go full-on arrogant and create a doppleganger of myself. :)
I don't have any of them... but I want pretty much the whole collection.
I've experimented with using displacement maps in the bump channel, multiplied with the actual bump map. Nothing fancy, just a simple multiply... worked great for those 'veins in the muscles' type of displacement. Doing such, I would have to increase the bump value in the top level in order to get really displaced results.
But C8 (or is it just 8.5b?) has the whole displacement channel working very well - but it takes more render time than the multiplied bump method.
You could further my method by actually setting up further sliders to set values between the bump map and displacement map if you wanted to.
Displacement takes longer to render because it actually effects the mesh, that's why it takes longer to calculate. The bump channel is just a trick of the light. No actual geometry is involved. I believe you can bake the displacement to the mesh if you export the model, but I could be wrong on that.
Right...
But since this whole process is truly one big trick, none of my viewers will know whether I used this method or that. I'll take speed if all else is similar enough! ;)
I agree. I rarely use displacement.
The thing about some of the more aged textures is that the bump channel is limited as to what it can do. To get the deep wrinkles, you need the displacement. 3dage had bought some aged M4/V4 textures that weren't supposed to work in Carrara and got them to work by adjusting the intensity of the displacement maps.
Nifty...I haven't tried doing much with displacement maps yet...just one more thing in a very long list of stuff to learn.
Nifty...I haven't tried doing much with displacement maps yet...just one more thing in a very long list of stuff to learn.
If you do have issues with the displacements in Carrara, as I mentioned above, Andy worked out how to get some great effects with it when the textures he bought weren't supported. Good luck!
Reby Sky is shipping with Carrara shaders.
Others have said they are the best, have not had the time to try them:
http://www.daz3d.com/shop/v4-elite-reby-sky
I actually had to Bing for who this person was...well, those texture sure do look damn fine. I guess I can buy one more item today (I passed one of the tests toward SQL Server 2012 certification...so this is me rewarding myself!)
BTW, what the heck is this: http://www.daz3d.com/shop/reby-sky-magnet-fit
Carraractors: Delphina hasn't been mentioned yet? Probably because all Carrara owners must assume that everyone buys this when they purchase Carrara? Hmnpf!
Anyways, Here's a link to this Carrara Genius' Daz Store:
Dimension Theory
Nifty...I haven't tried doing much with displacement maps yet...just one more thing in a very long list of stuff to learn.
Congrats Garstor! Nobody deserves a good "Spoiling" better than you, my friend!
Nonetheless, think of displacement maps the same as you would a height map for a Carrara terrain and you feel the whole picture in your gut much faster than any explanation. White = High, Black = Low. But then there's all those nifty parameters to fun with... ahhhh!
One can never have enough realistic people maps in one's collection!
Wow... what a fun thread. I fine myself digging through all of my Runtime/Textures folders! lol
Okay...I must put my foot down and not buy anything else today. Delphinia is favourited... :) Let's see what is left in the bank next week after the mortgage (and fiscal cliff! :long: ).
Well, the reason it stumped me that Dimension Theory's offering was missing from the thread is because of his very awesome approach. He gives four quality variants to choose from. From Basic (Reflection and SSS = None) to Superb, which uses reflection and sss. But then he includes some incredible video tutorials - which will certainly help an Carrara artist to play confidently in other areas of their existing favorite shaders - plus a really cool tidbit about his "Camera Control rig" which is simple, but Way Cool!!!
Please know that the product requires that you first purchase RM Delphinia V4, which for some crazy reason doesn't appear in Rebelmommy's Daz store, so follow the link provided. Gonna have to fix that!
I know it's a lot to dish out for a character, getting both products. But the set is excellent and is a great learning tool to boot. Not to mention the fact that it supports an incredible Carrara Published Artist, who is very generous with friendly advise. Just check his YouTube channel!