How To Achieve Genesis 9 Skin on Genesis 8 or 8.1 Figure

Modelcraft

How To Achieve Genesis 9 Skin on Genesis 8 or 8.1 Figure

Hello,

What I learned, from my short span with Genesis 9 Characters, is their skin details are amazing. Which I feel, is not available in Genesis 8 Characters. I tried some tests and I felt the difference is huge. What I know is that Genesis 9 Uses PBR Textures.

Is there any way we can achieve this on Genesis 8 character? Is it possible to use Genesis 9 skin texture on Genesis 8 or 8.1? 

I tried this product Genesis 9 UVs for Genesis 8 and 8.1 Female

But I didn't succeed properly. Especially with eyes and eyelashes. 

I know this seems to be a stupid question, but are there some models that have PBR Textures as good as Genesis 9? Please share some information and process.

Richard Haseltine

All Iray materials will generally be PBR - Genesis 9 and 8.1 usually use the Daz PBR Skin shader, a shader intended specifically for skin. Genesis 8.1 does not have the 8K detail maps, instead using more generic detail maps which tile across the surface.

Modelcraft

Richard Haseltine said:

All Iray materials will generally be PBR - Genesis 9 and 8.1 usually use the Daz PBR Skin shader, a shader intended specifically for skin. Genesis 8.1 does not have the 8K detail maps, instead using more generic detail maps which tile across the surface.

So If I understand correctly, Genesis 8.1 characters, don't have PBR by Default? Is there any way we can achieve this on Genesis 8 character?  

Gordig

Eparagraphics said:

Richard Haseltine said:

All Iray materials will generally be PBR - Genesis 9 and 8.1 usually use the Daz PBR Skin shader, a shader intended specifically for skin. Genesis 8.1 does not have the 8K detail maps, instead using more generic detail maps which tile across the surface.

So If I understand correctly, Genesis 8.1 characters, don't have PBR by Default? Is there any way we can achieve this on Genesis 8 character?  

Core figures (Michael and Victoria 8.1, etc.) have PBRSkin materials, PA characters may or may not have them.

Richard Haseltine

But Iray Uber is a PBR shader, just not a specialised skin shader.

Gordig

Richard Haseltine said:

But Iray Uber is a PBR shader, just not a specialised skin shader.

You should have a chat with whoever is in charge of naming things at Daz, because "PBRSkin" and "dForce hair" were both mistakes.

outrider42

Pretty much all Iray shaders are PBR by design.

Many Genesis 9 characters use a 8k normal map that come from the starter essentials. This texture is a big part of the look these characters have. If you can convert this to Genesis 8/8.1 then you can create similar skins. There may be some textures in the 8/8.1 line that produce similar results. There is nothing stopping anyone from producing such a texture. But it takes more than that, it takes coming up with a material setup that works. One thing you can try is just mimic the material settings of whatever you favorite 9 character is on a G8 that has some similar looking textures, then tweaking them the settings hone it in.

I have converted the 8k normal maps I speak of to G8. I sometimes also use the G9 eye textures on G8. That can be done since the 8.1 eye UV is similar. So the eyes are pretty straight forward. Here I just made a test setup. I took Victoria 8, with no HD morphs, and replaced her skin base color with Zelara 8. I used a totally different light skinned character's skin textures for the translucency maps. I blended some of Zelara's face texture in this other texture. I took some specularity maps from a bluejaunte character in the dual lobe specularity settings. I used no bump map in this one, but one could. I used the 8k normal detail maps I converted. I used the 8.1 tear prop and 8.1 eyelash prop. But the model is Genesis 8. I did that...simply because I could. For me, it is easier than trying to convert everything I have to a different Genesis. Rather, I can use the few things from newer Genesis that I care for. This is also using the regular old Iray Uber, NOT the PBR Skin shader. You can use either one. I chose not to here as demonstration. PBR Skin can be useful if you wish to use both a regular normal map like perhaps the ones Zelara has, along with the detail 8k normal maps for the skin micro details. But you cannot use the exact same settings with PBR Skin, they are different. Actually, what drives me nuts about most PBR Skin setups is that the edges of skin look way darker than they should. It is very unnatural. 

This pic is not perfect, and it was a rush job to serve as proof of concept. I converted these things some time ago, and use them in other character models. But here, I just through them onto Victoria.

Under the right lighting, I think they can look better than most of the G9 models we've seen so far. However this lighting was a quick preset.

If you cannot convert the G9 normals, you can try using one of the later bluejaunte G8 character textures as substitutes. The specularity maps on these are produced in 8k quality, and do a good job of creating the skin micro detail. With the right setup you might not even need the 8k normal maps to accomplish it.

No one single setup will work for all characters. You'll have to play around with it. But you can get close.

alex86fire

outrider42 said:

Pretty much all Iray shaders are PBR by design.

Many Genesis 9 characters use a 8k normal map that come from the starter essentials. This texture is a big part of the look these characters have. If you can convert this to Genesis 8/8.1 then you can create similar skins. There may be some textures in the 8/8.1 line that produce similar results. There is nothing stopping anyone from producing such a texture. But it takes more than that, it takes coming up with a material setup that works. One thing you can try is just mimic the material settings of whatever you favorite 9 character is on a G8 that has some similar looking textures, then tweaking them the settings hone it in.

I have converted the 8k normal maps I speak of to G8. I sometimes also use the G9 eye textures on G8. That can be done since the 8.1 eye UV is similar. So the eyes are pretty straight forward. Here I just made a test setup. I took Victoria 8, with no HD morphs, and replaced her skin base color with Zelara 8. I used a totally different light skinned character's skin textures for the translucency maps. I blended some of Zelara's face texture in this other texture. I took some specularity maps from a bluejaunte character in the dual lobe specularity settings. I used no bump map in this one, but one could. I used the 8k normal detail maps I converted. I used the 8.1 tear prop and 8.1 eyelash prop. But the model is Genesis 8. I did that...simply because I could. For me, it is easier than trying to convert everything I have to a different Genesis. Rather, I can use the few things from newer Genesis that I care for. This is also using the regular old Iray Uber, NOT the PBR Skin shader. You can use either one. I chose not to here as demonstration. PBR Skin can be useful if you wish to use both a regular normal map like perhaps the ones Zelara has, along with the detail 8k normal maps for the skin micro details. But you cannot use the exact same settings with PBR Skin, they are different. Actually, what drives me nuts about most PBR Skin setups is that the edges of skin look way darker than they should. It is very unnatural. 

This pic is not perfect, and it was a rush job to serve as proof of concept. I converted these things some time ago, and use them in other character models. But here, I just through them onto Victoria.

Under the right lighting, I think they can look better than most of the G9 models we've seen so far. However this lighting was a quick preset.

If you cannot convert the G9 normals, you can try using one of the later bluejaunte G8 character textures as substitutes. The specularity maps on these are produced in 8k quality, and do a good job of creating the skin micro detail. With the right setup you might not even need the 8k normal maps to accomplish it.

No one single setup will work for all characters. You'll have to play around with it. But you can get close.

 

Interesting process. Could you please post a render with the the default normal maps from Zelara or something (4k, or whatever they are) so we can see what is the improvement the 8k version brings.

outrider42

Comparing Zelara's normals to the 8k normal details is not really apples to apples. The normal maps for Zelara (and most all characters) serve a purpose for creating the illusion of extra geometry, and they tend to use it for "larger" features, if that makes any sense. Essentially, the normal maps for Zelara replace the HD morph. If you render her with her HD morph, she will come out pretty similar to what she looks like with her normal maps applied. Take notice that most Daz core G8 characters do NOT load any normal map when you load the HD character preset. So normal maps tend be a replacement for HD morphs in this way. No this may not apply to non core characters, as PAs are free to do it any way they wish. This is just the way Daz cores handle it.

Rather, the 8k normal maps I am talking about provide the micro skin detail, a much finer detail than what Zelara's is intended for They can be used across multiple characters because in a way they are kind of universal. Though of course it would be great if they made unique detail normals for different characters. You could use both of these maps at the same time, if you use PBR Skin. PBR Skin has some extra slots for 'detail' maps. So you can have Zelara's regular normal maps plus these 8k detail maps at the same time.

Now to be clear, all normal maps are meant to be a replacement for pure geometry. That is their purpose, normal maps exist because using pure geometry for realism means a lot of geometry, and that is computationally heavy on resources. Until we have hardware and software that can handle billions of polygons without grinding to a halt, we will still need normal maps.

Why these maps work is not just because they are 8k, but because they are high quality PNGs. Just take a look for yourself. You have these maps for G9 in your starter essentials, and almost any G9 core and many 3rd party characters use them. Open the maps in a pic viewer and take a look at how detailed they are, with no compression artifacts.

That detail is key. The closet anybody came on G8 is bluejaunte, but they made their 8k detail maps for specularity. Either process can work, and you can find many threads praising bluejaunte characters for their realism. Those 8k spec maps played a big role in why they look so good. On the flip side, I came to realise their normal maps were too highly compressed. In a closeup render I was perplexed by some odd looking jagged edge like artifacts on a character in large renders. The cause turned out to be the compression in the normal map, if you see compression in the normal, that can end up in your render. In lower resolution renders these artifacts are not visible. Anyway, the micro details cause the light to bounce around the skin. With a good material setup the small cracks of skin absorb light in a way that makes it look soft. This technique also does a good job of reflecting light in a way that people tend to like. The skin is not universally shiny, rather the parts that are in direct light shine more, while parts of skin out of the light look correct, and soft. But the SSS has to work with it, too. It needs enough translucency for the skin to absorb the light just right. You don't need anything exotic here, at least I don't think so. You don't need any wild colors in the SSS channels. You can even use textures in the SSS channels if you wish.

A cheap and dirty way to make characters look good is to simply apply a material preset from a bluejaunte character to your character, and work off that. Then replace the base color and translucency maps with your prefered character. You can also replace the normal maps (particularly for the reason I mention above). You can use whatever normal maps you like, using the ones the character came with would probably be fine, but you don't have to. Or, you can even skip the normal maps, that would work for a youthful character. This might look great immediately. If not, you can tweak the trans values and sss settings slightly until you get there.

Don't be afraid to experiment. Sometimes the best results (at least for me) come from using 2 seemingly different skins with each other. I think I used bluejaunte Misumi base colors as the trans maps for the first pic with Zelara. Again, I altered them to have more Zelara features, like the moles on her face.

This is the same Victoria with Zelara's material preset applied. This includes Zel's normal maps. She doesn't look bad, but she could look better.

I also made another version of her tweaked differently. This time I removed the bluejaunte spec maps, but kept the 8k normal details. In the dual lobe settings, I used another converted G9 texture. This time it is the "R" texture, I assume the Reflection/Roughness texture as that is where it is used. But I kept the Zelara base color along with the Misumi trans maps. But that's it, 4 textures per surface, nothing more. No bump maps or multiple spec maps. Just a color, trans, spec and normal. It is a pretty simplistic setup. In this pic, all the skin micro detail you see is coming from the 8k normal map. The detail under her eyes, the pores on her cheeks, those are all from this normal map. Some pores are baked into her base texture, but if you zoom in, you can see how they pop more here than the default skin. On the default skin they look flat. Here they look more 3 dimensional. Then look at her arm. On the default you see some really bumpy skin. This comes from the bump map, and they are not as clean and crisp as the 8k normals in the other pics. Even here the 8k can be limiting if you zoom in enough. There just aren't enough pixels in this area. Still, the result is improved IMO. Also, this last pic is using PBR Skin, but it doesn't have to. This last pic isn't meant to be better or worse than the first pic I posted in the thread, just a different take.

alex86fire

outrider42 said:

Comparing Zelara's normals to the 8k normal details is not really apples to apples. The normal maps for Zelara (and most all characters) serve a purpose for creating the illusion of extra geometry, and they tend to use it for "larger" features, if that makes any sense. Essentially, the normal maps for Zelara replace the HD morph. If you render her with her HD morph, she will come out pretty similar to what she looks like with her normal maps applied. Take notice that most Daz core G8 characters do NOT load any normal map when you load the HD character preset. So normal maps tend be a replacement for HD morphs in this way. No this may not apply to non core characters, as PAs are free to do it any way they wish. This is just the way Daz cores handle it.

Rather, the 8k normal maps I am talking about provide the micro skin detail, a much finer detail than what Zelara's is intended for They can be used across multiple characters because in a way they are kind of universal. Though of course it would be great if they made unique detail normals for different characters. You could use both of these maps at the same time, if you use PBR Skin. PBR Skin has some extra slots for 'detail' maps. So you can have Zelara's regular normal maps plus these 8k detail maps at the same time.

Now to be clear, all normal maps are meant to be a replacement for pure geometry. That is their purpose, normal maps exist because using pure geometry for realism means a lot of geometry, and that is computationally heavy on resources. Until we have hardware and software that can handle billions of polygons without grinding to a halt, we will still need normal maps.

Why these maps work is not just because they are 8k, but because they are high quality PNGs. Just take a look for yourself. You have these maps for G9 in your starter essentials, and almost any G9 core and many 3rd party characters use them. Open the maps in a pic viewer and take a look at how detailed they are, with no compression artifacts.

That detail is key. The closet anybody came on G8 is bluejaunte, but they made their 8k detail maps for specularity. Either process can work, and you can find many threads praising bluejaunte characters for their realism. Those 8k spec maps played a big role in why they look so good. On the flip side, I came to realise their normal maps were too highly compressed. In a closeup render I was perplexed by some odd looking jagged edge like artifacts on a character in large renders. The cause turned out to be the compression in the normal map, if you see compression in the normal, that can end up in your render. In lower resolution renders these artifacts are not visible. Anyway, the micro details cause the light to bounce around the skin. With a good material setup the small cracks of skin absorb light in a way that makes it look soft. This technique also does a good job of reflecting light in a way that people tend to like. The skin is not universally shiny, rather the parts that are in direct light shine more, while parts of skin out of the light look correct, and soft. But the SSS has to work with it, too. It needs enough translucency for the skin to absorb the light just right. You don't need anything exotic here, at least I don't think so. You don't need any wild colors in the SSS channels. You can even use textures in the SSS channels if you wish.

A cheap and dirty way to make characters look good is to simply apply a material preset from a bluejaunte character to your character, and work off that. Then replace the base color and translucency maps with your prefered character. You can also replace the normal maps (particularly for the reason I mention above). You can use whatever normal maps you like, using the ones the character came with would probably be fine, but you don't have to. Or, you can even skip the normal maps, that would work for a youthful character. This might look great immediately. If not, you can tweak the trans values and sss settings slightly until you get there.

Don't be afraid to experiment. Sometimes the best results (at least for me) come from using 2 seemingly different skins with each other. I think I used bluejaunte Misumi base colors as the trans maps for the first pic with Zelara. Again, I altered them to have more Zelara features, like the moles on her face.

This is the same Victoria with Zelara's material preset applied. This includes Zel's normal maps. She doesn't look bad, but she could look better.

 

I also made another version of her tweaked differently. This time I removed the bluejaunte spec maps, but kept the 8k normal details. In the dual lobe settings, I used another converted G9 texture. This time it is the "R" texture, I assume the Reflection/Roughness texture as that is where it is used. But I kept the Zelara base color along with the Misumi trans maps. But that's it, 4 textures per surface, nothing more. No bump maps or multiple spec maps. Just a color, trans, spec and normal. It is a pretty simplistic setup. In this pic, all the skin micro detail you see is coming from the 8k normal map. The detail under her eyes, the pores on her cheeks, those are all from this normal map. Some pores are baked into her base texture, but if you zoom in, you can see how they pop more here than the default skin. On the default skin they look flat. Here they look more 3 dimensional. Then look at her arm. On the default you see some really bumpy skin. This comes from the bump map, and they are not as clean and crisp as the 8k normals in the other pics. Even here the 8k can be limiting if you zoom in enough. There just aren't enough pixels in this area. Still, the result is improved IMO. Also, this last pic is using PBR Skin, but it doesn't have to. This last pic isn't meant to be better or worse than the first pic I posted in the thread, just a different take.

 

Thank you for the detailed explanation. 

I knew bump maps added "fake geometry". I remember bow that I knew about normal maps as well at some point, since they are details about how light would be reflected from different angles but I guess I kind of took it for granted and didn't think about it in detail anymore.

I makes sense that not just the resolution but the quality of the texture map itself is the reason for the added realism.

 

I am trying to convert an older G3 model to G8.1 or G9. (G9 I've had trouble with the textures fitting because of the UV mapping)

I think using better and more up to date normal maps will increase the quality of this conversion considerably.

Any idea how I could increase the quality for the diffuse/base color texture as well?

alienarea

You could try this https://www.daz3d.com/1-click-pbrskin to convert your G8 skins, results depend on quality of the original skin.

One of the most versatile pbr skins for G8 and G8.1 is this https://www.daz3d.com/ginny-hd-for-genesis-8-and-81-female currently on discount.

I didn't have trouble with genesis 9 uv's to G8. This Angela 9 Space Infantry skin on Genesis 8 https://www.deviantart.com/alien-area/art/Space-Girl-1003193177

outrider42

Honestly there is no good way to increase the quality if it isn't there from the start. You can try various AI tools to upscale or fine tune textures, but you will probably have trouble around the UV borders, and AI tends to "make stuff up" that makes no sense. Plus AI isn't really designed for that. (You'd need an AI specifically made for upscaling textures, you can't just use Topaz, and it has to be made for human textures.) The thing is, it is really hard to get back quality in textures if they lack them from the beginning. It is why I have always argued for products to use the best textures they can. Even if somebody's hardware cannot handle them, it is very simple to compress or reduce the quality of any given texture. We even have a product to automate that. But getting quality out of a poorly compressed texture is not easy, and even impossible. 

But the good news, at least for skin, is that most of this applies to the normal maps. If you find a great normal map, it can kind of obscure a base color that isn't quite as good. I actually have textures I converted from past Genesis models, like 2, which are not as crisp as some newer ones. Yet they still look great when used with these normal maps. 

But sometimes you do still need to clean them. I use GIMP a lot, and use the heal tool to blend areas with bad compression and save as a higher quality JPG or PNG. JPG is actually OK here, it just needs to be high quality. The normal maps are PNG, though, because I couldn't get them to look as good in JPG. So micro detail textures probably should be PNG, while others can still be JPG. You can also blend in parts from other textures using the healing tool.

You can find a lot of characters that use noise maps as their bump. This can work ok when not close up. But as the camera zooms in, and/or the render resolution increases, the noise map is, well, just a noise map, and you can start to see that manifest in the render. I have used 8k noise maps as bump maps in the past. At 8k it reduced the noise to smaller pixels which are less visible. But still, this isn't going to reproduce the lattice surface of human skin at close range. So to make up for that you would need better base colors that have some of that detail baked in.