Iray Shaders - is n-g-s-anagenessis-2-revolution God of All?
I am looking at several products that are finally on sale, and realise that I am not sure whether 1. they do what I think they do and, ultimatly, which one - or ones - i need to accomplish my goal. I'd really appriciate the insights!
Goal: An Easy way to make not-originally-iray stuff render more photorealistically. Specifically, since joining less than a month ago, I find myself playing mostly with pre-iray products: M6, V6, Daz 2 horse, Daz 2 Cats, Daz 3 dragons, clothing built for genesis and gen 2. The following products, all finally on sale today, seem to all claim "Click me, and I will make your stuff look good in iray. No experience required". the only difference is that the first product seems to work for "everything" while the next three are specific "skin", "dragon" and "horse".
Below are the products I'm looking at, along with MY understanding of what these products do. Can you tell me if my understanding is correct what product or products you think would accomplish my goal?
1) https://www.daz3d.com/n-g-s-anagenessis-2-revolution - This looks like a magic perfect for everything solution. Appears to be a "catch all" that does a descent job on everything from skin to fabric to animals on any genesis figure. So it looks to me like the perfect easy and most universal solution. Too good to be true?
2) https://www.daz3d.com/ig-iray-essentials-dragon-3 - I think this makes my dragons look good with one click but works only on dragons. I'm unclear as to whether this is the same as NGS but only for dragons.
3) https://www.daz3d.com/ig-iray-essentials-victoria-6-michael-6 - I think this makes V6 and M6 look good with one click but works only those figures and is thus not very helpful since I use Stephanie 6 a lot.
4) https://www.daz3d.com/iray-smart-converter-and-advanced-skin-managers-for-genesis-2 - I think this makes all Gen 2 humans look good, but is more complex to use. Not sure how it overlaps with NGS
Comments
I haven't played with Anagenessis 2 that much. It doesn't appear to be a one click solution. You would still have to play with some settings. However, it does give very good results for almost any type of surface it converts to Iray. Hopefully, someone how has played with it more can give you more specifics.
The two IG Essentials products are new Iray materials for those specific products. I like them as they are really excellent materials.
Yes, the smart converter has a learning curve but can give really good results once you figure out how to use it. It does have good directions explaining each step though so it isn't that bad of a learning curve.
Anagenesis: https://www.daz3d.com/forums/discussion/110976/n-g-s-anagenessis-ii-revolution-commercial#latest
It's worth a read, or at least a skim-through.
Anagenesis works fine on some characters, and makes other look... not so good. Like all other converters, it's a gamble, i.e. since it uses a completely different approach on reassembling the maps - it discards most of them and only uses the diffuse map.
IG Iray Essentials, I don't own.
Smart Converter, my go-to conversion tool. It plugs the maps into the right slots, and adjusts some basic values (like the eyes)
EDIT: The best way is to learn how the different sliders of the surface work... there's always the Iray Ueber Base shader that you can apply, and from there work your way through the desired result. :-)
Bee - thank you. I tried to read through the forum - i had actually started reading it even before posting, but most of it is going over my head. So I'm still confused as to whether the products I'm looking at are redundant of complementary...
<<Smart Converter, my go-to conversion tool. It plugs the maps into the right slots, and adjusts some basic values (like the eyes)>> I LOVE to know people's go-to tools. Does this really ONLY work on Gen 2 skin?
Knit - <The two IG Essentials products are new Iray materials for those specific products. I like them as they are really excellent materials.> Ah! ok, I think I understand: The Smart Conveter takes any Gen 2 existing skin and does stuff with it. Wheras as the IG Essentials are just materian - new skins - for specific products, right?
Oh, and here is another one: https://www.daz3d.com/human-essentials-for-iray .... is that like a "light" version of the smart converter?
Yes to both of those. I use #1 and #4 the most. Of the two, I use anagennesis more, simply because it works great on non people skin like dragons etc. I don't usually have to fiddle with it much to get what I want and it makes a huge difference on most of the pre iray skins.
The second one does a wonderful job on Gen2 skins, but it is only for Gen2 skins. It is a good tool to start learning about this kind of stuff too, if you apply a setting then go have a look at what it changed in the surfaces tab, you can get a good feel for how to tweak skins as well.
IceDragon, thank you! super helpful. Anagennesis is my catch all begginer solution, and then when I'm ready to really work through the skin shades, then i can try the smart converter. But the most $ smart to START with, would be anagennesis for its ease of use and versatility.
For the smart converter, you'd need the G3 version for G3 skins, and this bundle for Genesis and M/V4 skins: https://www.daz3d.com/iray-converter-for-genesis-and-generation-4-bundle
https://www.daz3d.com/iray-smart-converter-and-advanced-skin-managers-for-genesis-3
The G3 and G2 version also allows you to change skin colours and add sweatiness, amongst other things, so as far as versatility is concerned, you can make good use of it on people.
EDIT: Here's a comparision render of three different 2Gf characters with 3Delight skin, between 3DL, Iray, and conversions with Iray Manager and Anagenesis.
3Delight (one AOA distant light, AOA ambient light)
Iray Out Of Box Render, using HDR light only; same light will be used in all Iray renders).
Notice the eyes of the elf character keep their glow.
Iray Manager conversion, using setting 1. Note that the converter has two conversions; one for light and one for dark skin, which I used accordingly.
Note on the elf eyes: they changed to grey; I re-added the colour settings from the original to the base colour, translucency and emission colour.
Setting 3 of the Iray Manager conversion. Elf-Eyes see above.
Anagenesis. It has two different convertor start icons for light and dark skin. The Elf-eyes went grey like with the Iray Manager, but adding the colours into the slots didn't restore the original, as Anagenesis works differently. So they are still somewhat greyish.
Bee- I am speechless and greatful for your taking the time to do all these renders! I looked through them several times and really appriciate the explanations about the eyes., I see the Anagenisis is leans toward the darker side. Seeing the side by side renders really helps. Smart Converter setting 3 looks like the best for human skin but loses out on being limitted to Gen 2 humans and not THAT much better than Anagenisis, which was still really good and cross applicable to animals. And... so that's another $25 I'm about to spend :)
You'll probably have to desaturate most of the 3Delight diffuse maps for use with anagenesis, if you don't want "too rich" colours. I've had pretty good results with doing that for my own shader settings that I use based on the Iray Manager conversion.
What I do when the eyes go foggy or lose the color is just go back once the conversion is done and re apply the eye materials. Generally, that puts the eyes back to the normal color.
I have and am very happy with this product too. The one drawback (and by no means a deal breaker for me) is that on the occasional nude render, Anagenessis doesn't work on the Anatomical Elements. I did see a plug in or add on to achieve this but as of yet, I've been unble to make it work. So that drops my estimation of this product from 100% to 99.999%
You could just copy the shader settings from the hip, for example, and then manually plug in the gen map into the proper slots, replacing the hip material.
By default, Anagenessis 2 has darkened every skin I've tried it on, but there's an easy remedy: set Translucency Weight to 0 in the Surfaces tab, then play with it and various other sliders to suit. After my initial disappointment (I'm working on a story with a pale-skinned Nordic type character), I ended up being glad I snagged it on sale.
I returned Anagenesis because the promises made in the promos didn't live up to the results with the one click solution. Characters for me were often red after applying the product (with ONE CLICK, as advertised) and I had to tweak and tweak. And it's not just me. Read the forum thread and you'll see repeated "getting red" results.
On the flip side, I support and promote @3DVigitimes and the Iray Smart Converter and Advanced Skin Shaders and all of that vendor's products. They are CONSISTENT. There are presets for the adjustments, and the promo promises deliver. And it's easy to customize by going into the Surfaces tab if you want to tweak, BUT YOU DON'T HAVE TO. With Anagenesis, using the "one click" promise, many were ruddy or a metallic sheen looking skin that HAD to be tweaked. A few were okay, some were fair/ good. Quite a few contributors on my Art Studio thread (showcasing products) had the same results- a mixed bag with some good, some definitely not.
If you want consistency, look at that product I linked and you mentioned, and others in 3DVigitimes store and I think you'll be very happy. It's a stand alone product, EASY TO USE, and I wouldn't personally combine it with the Anagenesis. You'll love the results you get without it!