V6 "Red Face" Effect
RCDeschene
Posts: 2,800
What is the deal with the V6 Belle skin and the red glow that always seems to be seen at the face in render? I don't like the way it looks and I would like to know which map or dial is the one creating it.
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I am tired but there is something you can do to fix it, in the surfaces for teeth, gums, mouth and tongue there should be something called "Group ID" near the subsurface stuff, change that to a different number than the one that it is currently. That should fix it. I have done it a couple of times and it seemed to help.
Yes, the 'lightbulb head' effect.
You can fix it by using the normal non sss maps, or tweaking the lights to minimize this look.
I don't always like the sss shading effects, although I know they are popular.
Greetings,
This always happens for me using Interjection, also. I think I found that lowering something...ambient maybe...reduced/removed the effect. I've taken to avoiding SSS unless I am pretty confident of the result I'm looking for.
I see it all the time on deviantArt renders, and when 15-20 people are saying, 'Gorgeous image!' I feel like I'd be a shit for pointing it out. :-/
-- Morgan
Use raytraced lighting to avoid this problem or keep all lights forward facing. This issue is caused by light passing through the body, and this happens any time you use lights without shadows. Lights which don't cast shadows in Daz Studio will pass through any and all solid objects as if they weren't there. Good for filler light, but bad for subsurface scatter effects.
Well, that's odd, because I've never had this effect before with any texture skin or lighting formula before V6.
Well, that's odd, because I've never had this effect before with any texture skin or lighting formula before V6.
The translucence effects are quite pronounced in the AoA Subsurface shaders, which Victoria 6 uses by default. The same effect is also visible using UberSurface as well as pwSurface, a problem I fell foul of in several of my renders. You can check my DA for examples. Look for Finding Fairies and Lady of the Forest to see but two examples using UberSurface2.
It will depend heavily on the amount of subsurface scatter and the backscatter boost, if any.
You could apply the V6 Belle Mouth NO SSS mat and see if that helps.
Subsurface Scattering is a raytraced based effect and only properly works with raytraced shadows in all rendering programs as far as I know, it relies on shadow information that requires raytracing to determine how far a light is able to scatter through a surface.
The quick thing to know is that Puntomaus is right that the Belle Mouth NO SSS preset will reduce the red face. But here's a hopefully useful illustration of various options to see something more about what's going on.
V6 Belle loads with AoA SSS active, and very "realistic" settings. AoA subsurface can work with both Raytraced Shadows and Deep Shadows (raytraced works better), but it needs some shadows, or it's going to give you the glow face. Shadows need to be active for every light-emitting light that hits the figure.
The lighting setup I'm using here is very much like the one described in the DAZ promo light tutorial DAZ_jared put here - two distant lights, two spec lights, and UE2 with an HDR map. The only thing I change with the lights from render to render is the shadow settings, and the only thing I change with the surfaces are the SSS settings and the Diffuse setting.
Far left is default V6 Belle with raytraced shadows on the lights. Then, moving left to right, Deep shadows with same surface settings, then No shadows with the same surface settings, where we see the red face effect, then with SSS toggled off for all skin (Note: also lips must be turned off on their own, the helpful "skin" surface group does not include the lips, since they often have different spec settings, etc.). She looks like a zombie here because the the SSS is realistically replacing a portion of what is usually handled by diffuse. Diffuse in Belle is set by default to 50%. So in the next image, also with shadows still off, I've restored Diffuse to 100%, so she behaves now like a typical skin surface with no SSS. The last image uses the "Belle Mouth NO SSS" preset that Puntomaus mentioned, which compensates to reduce glow effect when you are rendering using lights without shadows. I don't think this is really a proper way to go, but in a pinch that will get rid of it.
I love the results achievable with AoA SSS, and I've been adding it to all my figures now, though it does take time. Anyway hope it helps.
Make sure the inner mouth and eyeballs have a different group number than the skin in the SSS section.
Just thought to mention that localization of the effect is likely why people notice the issue more with certain characters. Interjection maps out SSS strength using the original SSS effects to add contrast between thin/thick areas of skin to accurately map density, while AoA's SSS shader works in a way that better pulls this information from mesh thickness. With the face being a feature rich area of the body having lots of different contrasts the "redness" appears there more so than other areas on characters using these things. If you've used SSS based characters in the past without noticing lack of raytraced shadows being an issue it's because the "redness" is much more even throughout the entire mesh, and the lack of localization makes it harder to see the difference.
Well, that's odd, because I've never had this effect before with any texture skin or lighting formula before V6.It's not the Figure it is the texture, it LOADS with SSS set. All the advice given above about lighting is correct and should fix the issue. I believe the Grouping is preset to work properly as I've never changed it on any of my SSS default textures.
This isn't always the best way to do it in my opinion, it will keep things like eyes from interacting with the skin surface which they do in real life. When you think about an eye that's partially closed there are areas behind the eyelid that should interact with the scattering in the eyelid. Closing your eyes and looking at a light source you'll see light coming through your eyelids and scattering into your eye, on separate group IDs there would be no interaction.
The Inner Mouth material maps the inner wall of the cheeks, so it's one half of the thickness used in that area (you need two sides with opposite normals to great geometry with thickness and the inside here is using separate mapping than the outside). Without both the inside and outside surfaces of the cheeks on the same ID they won't properly calculate geometric thickness, it would act as two separate meshes both scattering to the other side of the face without opposite normals for the light rays to exit.
I've got a render here that I posted in the SSS thread a while back and every surface uses the same Group ID, the contrast between different scattering materials is only done with other SSS settings.
It's interesting, Belle's group IDs are setup fairly well by default, I think: eyes and teeth are different, though tongue, inner mouth and gums are the same group as the rest of the body. As long as you are using lights with shadows, it's fine and makes sense. Although I'm intrigued by what you're saying, DimensionTheory, about the eyes interacting through the lids, that makes sense to me too. And that's a lovely render, BTW.
What the "Belle Mouth NO SSS does", I now see, is change the gums, inner mouth, teeth, and tongue from using the AoA to using ubersurface. So I sort of think the fact that that reduces the red face may be an accidental consequence - it excludes them from the SSS calculations because they're just a different shader now, much like Hellboy's recommending changing group ID would have separated them from the body's calculations. In my mind it makes no sense to use SSS without shadows, so I think the preset is more about just not using SSS on the mouth/teeth than about the reducing the glow effect. I see it as, you reduce the glow effect by either using SSS with proper shadows, or else you turn off SSS.
I wasn't talking about the figure itself, I was referring to V6's default skin texture, Belle.
I wasn't talking about the figure itself, I was referring to V6's default skin texture, Belle.And I was saying that all my PA made skin textures that come with SSS on at load render fine if I use lighting set to the Raytraced Shadows. Not all skin textures have SSS at load time, Belle does.
Well, I tried what Storypilot's explained and I think I finally got what I wanted. The image below is V6 with a very simple setup of a UE2 Sphere with Intensity and Intensity Scale at 50%, and two Spot Lights: a 75% Key and a 25% Fill. Though, I think its bit of a shame that in order to make it look right without the NO SSS option you HAVE to have raytraced shadows. It's almost as if the skin requires that you don't use anything but a high quality professional lighting setup to render it with...
Hmm, I think it's still glowing quite a bit, but not as much as the original one. :/
I think that's just because of the way I have the spot lights pointed. I have each one pointing down-ward 45 degrees at the base figure. But you can tell that from the evident shadow mustache she has. :lol:
I am afraid SSS needs the GOOD full 3Delight engine that only Raytrace gives to get the effect properly. If you have the Uber Spot lights you could set them to Diffuse only or one Diffuse and One Spec only and get better results.
Actually, no I don't. Where can I find those?