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Thanks for the info, I think I have a handle on it for the most part. A flat plane with the emissive shader on it set to the right settings seems to work pretty much like a soft box, and instead of using a reflector I just use another emissive plane set to a much lower setting. Here's one I rendered like that last night.
I was going for Rembrandt lighting but stopped short because I liked what was going on with the shadows this way. The back jaw was looking too dark though so I popped in another, smaller and lower powered emissive plane and got that light along the back and left jaw.
Post worked version:
Here's the 1st real life portrait I did using true Rembrandt lighting on my oldest daughter, who is 18 now. :)
Rembrandt lighting creates a triangle on the shadow side cheek, it's created using one light and a reflector.
I'm pretty happy just with the effects I'm getting using the flat plane and emissive shader, so far I have been able to reproduce most studio light set ups that I want. I think more might be overkill for me, but I had looked at a few of those sets before I learned about emissive lighting. Glad I held off.
Thanks for the information, that's what I thought, buy a product, product, product. lol I'm going to check out that other thread and see if I can save myself from so many product purchases. :)
Reflectors will work *IF* you go to the Render settings, Optimization tab, and turn the Caustic Sampler on.
But I think it's easier to just set the plane to emissive. You get more control that way, and they're easier to aim.
That said, if any of your renders are going to depend on reflected light, you probably want to set Caustics to on.
Here's an example of a cube on a mirrored floor, an emissive plane on the side, and a spotlight aimed just at the bottom of the cube.
Caustics Off (Default) (2:32 render time)
Caustics On (2:52 render time)
With caustics on, you get the light bouncing off the floor onto the cube and nice reflected shadow on the wall
But note, it's stll not perfect. The mirrorred reflection of the cube doesn't show the additional reflected light.
That's good to know Jack, thanks. Super helpful when your doing a scene with reflective surfaces because they should bounce light back. In real life anything white bounces light, anything black absorbs light. Photographers paint the walls in their natural light rooms white so that the light is reflected around the room, it's also why a lot of natural light photographers wear white shirts, and why white is an option for your reflector surface. I used to do a "summer fairy" set every year and had a big 4'x4' fiberglass mirror on the floor to be the "water" that I would later fill with the flood filter in photoshop. New photographers would always ask me why I had a mirror there if I was just going to cover the surface with fake water anyway. Because water is highly reflective, if there was not light on my subjects face coming from where the water was it would never look real. The same thing is true in 3D - if you have a water, or any other reflective surface in your scene then light needs to be reflecting off it.
Also just because I'm curious, what about color cast of reflective surfaces? For example if your photographing someone in the summer and using the tress as your shade you'll get an awful green cast to your person if you don't white balance. If i use a colored paper backdrop in the studio whatever color paper I am using will reflect that color onto my subject. As a photographer it's annoying, as a 3D artist I think there are some circumstances where something like that could really add some realism.
The color cast (or indirect lighting) will occur just fine without the caustics filter.
Caustics are the light rays reflected or refracted by a curved object or the projection of those rays on another surface. Think of them as the patches of brighter light that show up when you shine a light through a magnifying glass or water glass.
Got it, thanks for the explanation!
1st study with the Daz horse, I made my own normal map because it doesn't come with a bmp map, I think I need to work on my horse skills a little more.
Awesome! Picked up the DAZ Horse 2 Pro Bundle a long time ago, but sadly have not done anything with it yet. Your horse looks great - especially the lighting with just enough detail coming through in the dramatic shadows.
- Greg
I think the horse looks great. Given its age I'd say you did a really good job with it
Thanks Greg, I'm probably still getting the hivewire horse but at $12 for the pro bundle the equipment was worth it, and trying to get this one to look ar good as I can is a fun challenge until I recover enough from these sales to afford to buy it.
It does ok, better then I thought it would. I was disappointed that there were not any bmp maps, but it did force mo to learn how to make normal maps on my own. So I learned something new,. :)
Love the horse. I saw it in the gallery and left a comment and like. I haven't managed to get the horse to render so well. I might have to break him out. I haven't tried in awhile. You did good!
Do you have LAMH? Might be a good (better?) way to fill the bump gap. Hmmm . . . I wonder if there is already a preset - short hair should be relatively easy.
- Greg
Thanks, I didn't like the way it rendered until after I added the normal map, it was too smooth.
I do, but I haven't tried doing my own hair yet. not sure how it would do with short smooth hair like a horse, although I think it would be cool to make a winter coat for the horse. Also I think I saw presets for the main and tail but not the body...
I'm working on learning to make characters, I want to just do some fun "everyday" types and give them away as freebies, but..... I REALLY don't want to do eyes. Anyone know of some merchant eye resources that allow for freebie use. I don't mind changing the color but the initial getting everything lined up and looking right and painted, I just don't want to do it. lol
Anyway this is Miguel, the professional collage student, video game addict and lover of "baked" goods. You know the guy. He rents the worst house on the block wih a bunch of his buddies, never mows the yard, and listens to the music a little to loud.
Just have the face done, I need to change some render settings on the rest of my skin but this was a test render to see how the face was looking.
Another one of my own models I'm working on. Any good tutorials on makeup texturing out there?
I've been playing with make up and texturing in photoshop. I take the skin uv map into photo shop, copy it and save it with a different name so I don't lose my original, then just start layering. I just bought a merchant resource I want to play with as well as disect so I can get a better idea of how things work. But I'm pretty sure for make up its just a mater of lots of layers and playing with it til it looks good. Also some other make up scripts out there that lets you put together your own make up as well but not sure if its for personal use only or not. Let me see if I can track down some links for you.
Instant Make up for V5
Instant Make Up for G3F
Build a Babe Fantasy Skin Merchant Resource This is the one with photo shop layers.
I don't want to post my stuff on your thread but I have a render in my thread where I did the face paint. but here is a link to it . Next time I give it a go I will soften it and do more layers and fade the edges a bit.
Thanks for the links. My problem isn't doing the makeup so much, it's just finding the edges. I tried to do eyeliner and it was to far away from the eye.... It looked great on the texture map, but not on the model.
Love your facepaint piece! You did a great job with it
A mixed media piece a did a few days ago. One of my challanges in PS is "lighting things up" or creating more dynamic lighting.
And a sci fi one I played with today.
Awesome! More dragons, please . . .
- Greg
Thanks, I'm a huge fan of the dragons. :D
Here's one of my favorite mixed media dragon pieces I have done.
Gorgeous! And thank you for your kind words! I think with the make up its a matter of figuring out exactly how the uv map fits the face and eyes. I would imagine a lot of trial and error although a really good person to ask in Darwin's Mishaps as he does a lot of make up for his characters and is generally very good about sharing his knowledge.
Very cool how you've got his tail wrapped around the cliff like that - excellent job! Thanks for scratchin my dragon itch . . . again!
- Greg
Thanks for the tip. I got the eyeliner on yesterday, after several hours of back and forth between photoshop and daz. ;)
Your welcome, thanks for stopping by.
Went to bed last night with a half cooked render, woke up today with a rebooted computer
I think it's time to go ebay shopping and upgrade the graphics card. I only have a gtx 750, need to pull out my motherboard manual and see if I can pop a 2nd gpu in