Rendering Issues

uriahpatrick

Upon rendering any character, using any hair, the "Basic OpenGL" makes the hair become see-through.  How can I fix this issue so the hair remains visible when it's done being rendered? 

Also, how can you turn off the shadows when rendering in "NVIDIA Iray"?

Thank you to anyone who can help!

TheKD

Not sure about the openGL one, but you really can't turn shadows off, as it's a physically based rendering system. All light makes shadows.

SixDs

I assume that you know that the Basic OpenGL render option essentially gives the same results that you would get using a screen capture of your viewport - WYSIWYG: what you see is what you get. If the hair is visible in the viewport, but not in your Basic OpenGL render, I cannot think of any good reason why that should be. Sorry. What happens if you actually do a screen capture of the viewport? Is the hair still transparent? If so, I would suspect that there is something amiss with the graphics card or driver, but I can only guess.

"how can you turn off the shadows when rendering in "NVIDIA Iray"

As TheKD says, the Iray render engine is specifically designed to emulate the way light behaves in the real world. Asking how to make it turn off shadows is almost like asking how you can turn off shadows in the real world. The 3Delight render engine is much more flexible in this regard and you can manipulate shadows in a variety of ways regardless of the actual light being used. When using Iray, the best you can do is to use an omnidirectional or ambient light source to recreate the type of light one would have in the real world on a cloudy day, when shadows are very soft and barely detectable.

Edit: Okay, after giving it some thought, something occurred to me that might explain the "invisible hair" behaviour you are seeing in your Basic OpenGL renders. With the hair selected, go into the Parameters tab and look under the Display settings. Is "Visible in Render" set to "On" or "Off"? If set to "Off", that would explain why you can see the hair in the viewport, but not in the render. Set visibiliity to "On".

uriahpatrick

Hello, you two.  Thank you, both, for leaving me your comments.  I’d like to return the favor and share with you both my opinions on the matter of NVIDIA Iray and how I just found out that it's very possible to turn off that shadow (as for the semi see-through hair, that's still somewhat a mystery to me).

But first, since I’ve omitted this previously, it’s best that you know that I’ve been rendering in PNG format; and thus, screen capturing would just defeat the purpose of wanting to hide that background (aka that default grid layout).  As for the shadows, well, they’re a bit of a nuisance seeing as my image(s) are in PNG format.  Whereas, those shadows just stick out like a sore thumb as an aftereffect.

Yet, never fear.  I have found the solution to that stubborn shadow.  Simply follow the path I’ve listed below, or the picture I've attached, and you’ll find exactly where you can manipulate the shadow’s intensity.

“Render Settings” (Pane) / “Editor” (Tab) / “NVIDIA Iray” (Engine) / “Environment” / “Ground Shadow Intensity” …and there you’ll find it!  Simply decrease its intensity and the shadow will ultimately appear nonexistent. 

Now, on to figuring out that hair dilemma…?  I’ll return once I’ve figured out that problem, too.  Whereas, yes, to answer SixDs' question.  The hair's display settings does show that the "Visible in Render" option is set to "On".  Perhaps it is a graphics card issue?  Yet the issue is only with the hair, and nothing else...hmm. 

Anywho, thanks for all your pointers! 

 

Bytheway, I should add that the hair is only transparent when used with Basic OpenGL, whereas it does show up with NIVIDIA Iray...