pwSurface showcase

BoulderSean · Post by **BoulderSean** » Mon May 29, 2006 12:43 am

[note from the admin: this post has been moved to this section to allow nudity without any restriction.]

so with the latest update i have been able to play some more. most my render times now seem to be much faster.
attached i'll show the same scenes with different values.
the first set are pwSurface renders. i used the supple skin setting for the base and modified it until i got something i like a bit better. i'll show draft/normal/production settings and then some AO renders in normal/production. following that will be USMP renders. then after that, for fun, changing the skin blue with pwSurface renders.

sorry for nudity if not allowed. playing with skin tones felt it was important. also, using irina from renderosity, and i really don't have much that fits her.

BoulderSean · Post by **BoulderSean** » Mon May 29, 2006 12:46 am

BoulderSean · Post by **BoulderSean** » Mon May 29, 2006 12:47 am

BLUE!

Bea · Post by **Bea** » Mon May 29, 2006 2:40 am

I actually prefer the USMP ones

BoulderSean · Post by **BoulderSean** » Mon May 29, 2006 6:35 am

Thanks for the input, Bea. If your reason is anything like my wife's, it's because the pwSurface is "too shiny".

FWIW, I was purposefully shooting for something less shiny than the standard supple skin, but not too flat. In the vein of Boris Vallejo art.

With that said, out of curiosity, which of the following pictures do you like best? These should be not quite as glossy.

Or, if "too shiny" was not the same reason, why did you like the USMP better than the pwSurface renders?

Post by **Lakys** » Mon May 29, 2006 7:59 am

Really nice renders with pwSurface. Personally I prefer them compared to USMP result, which are grey/fade on this model and case.

One important thing to understand, if you use USMP High or Mid, you need to put the same level of ambient in the surrounding environment.

Concerning pwSurface, it would benefit of some less deep AO, AO is killing your render.

Modifying a little USMP settings, you can get it as shiny and coloured as pwSurface. This version of USMP was intended to be really neutral (not adding much color or removing).

Bea · Post by **Bea** » Mon May 29, 2006 10:01 am

I don't know of too shiny is quite right. The skins just looked wrong - a little bit too plasticky. Lakys is right on his there is a touch of grey but they just look more real to me
Your next posts I can't really tell but I think the last one. Again they look excellent don't get me wrong but still have that not skin look about them. Maybe its a female thing

weimart · Post by **weimart** » Mon May 29, 2006 10:47 am

Bea wrote:I don't know of too shiny is quite right. The skins just looked wrong - a little bit too plasticky. Lakys is right on his there is a touch of grey but they just look more real to me
Your next posts I can't really tell but I think the last one. Again they look excellent don't get me wrong but still have that not skin look about them. Maybe its a female thing

I second that opinion.
Just out of curiosity, BoulderSean, are you using a bump map in your pw renders? I'm asking because I noticed that the supple skin shader may look very "plasticky" whithout.

BoulderSean · Post by **BoulderSean** » Tue May 30, 2006 6:52 am

Lakys, sorry, didn't mean to cause a thread split. Also, yes, I agree, the 3 images that use AO are shot due to the speckle. That is what I was trying to show with the various settings on the first round. The diffs between draft/normal/production and AO.

Bea, no biggy, to some degree I have to fight my screen. I work a lot from a laptop and the LCD screen looks way different than my CRT. On the laptop, the first round of images looks about right to me. On the CRT, they look plastic. The 2nd round looks better. Also, while I like the Irina body morphs and it's skin mat, I don't really like the stock head morphs it comes with. I attempted to reset them and morph the head some on my own. Ultimately, I don't like them either, the face ended up having too many flat planes.

Ultimately all I am trying to do, is zero in on some settings that look good using pwSurface. I don't find any of the presets to be very pleasing. Supple Skin was much better that the previous stuff, but still... not too great, IMO.

Weimart, man, I think we are just go to have to agree that we are looking for separate things from pwSurface. Of course I used a bump, but my perspective is way different than either of your head renders. Zoomed out like I am, you ain't gonna see a lot of bump unless I make it severe like the anvil she is sitting on. Your second head is so far from what I am trying to accomplish. To me, that light looks dead, the head looks dead, the skin tone is flat, and the eyes are just bizarre. I'll attach a couple pics to show how a head at one size with bump can lose it at a smaller size. Yes the bump is exagerated. Also the tone is closer to what my eye personally likes. Still working on it. I just believe people have a bit of "shine" to them.

Bea · Post by **Bea** » Tue May 30, 2006 7:10 am

Now that last post I like

I don't use PW just Lakys presets and this is the way I like the face to look

This one I am pleased with

Post by **Lakys** » Tue May 30, 2006 7:34 am

BoulderSean wrote:Lakys, sorry, didn't mean to cause a thread split.

There is absolutly no harm. Forum rules are not yet perfectly set up and clear. However, you work looks more like a WIP as well, so having a specific case could help even more.

Bea, I do really love this render, a subtle colour indeed. And it would be even greater the day you may be able to use AO/IBL with it.

weimart · Post by **weimart** » Tue May 30, 2006 7:41 am

BoulderSean wrote:Weimart, man, I think we are just go to have to agree that we are looking for separate things from pwSurface. Of course I used a bump, but my perspective is way different than either of your head renders. Zoomed out like I am, you ain't gonna see a lot of bump unless I make it severe like the anvil she is sitting on. Your second head is so far from what I am trying to accomplish. To me, that light looks dead, the head looks dead, the skin tone is flat, and the eyes are just bizarre. I'll attach a couple pics to show how a head at one size with bump can lose it at a smaller size. Yes the bump is exagerated. Also the tone is closer to what my eye personally likes. Still working on it. I just believe people have a bit of "shine" to them.

I totally agree : we are not exactly looking for the same thing on that matter.
I think you got me wrong, my point was I felt, like Bea, that your first PW renders were looking kind of plasticky, and I was wondering if this was not due to a lack of bump which brings the pw renders to look really shiny. It was just a thought I had, and I illustrated this with close ups because I had those images hanging in my renders folders and I thought it would show the difference. The second image is one of various test renders I made to see how the settings I have behave with different lights, and I agree it is not really good.

Bea · Post by **Bea** » Tue May 30, 2006 10:49 am

Lakys wrote:Bea, I do really love this render, a subtle colour indeed. And it would be even greater the day you may be able to use AO/IBL with it.

Lakys thank you - you have made my day

BoulderSean · Post by **BoulderSean** » Tue May 30, 2006 3:14 pm

Bea, that is really nice. That Sordora? I have a hell of a time getting skin to look good with Sordora using PW. Learning though. Seeing that SSS color makes a huge diff.

EDIT:
Lakys, yes definately a WIP. Ultimately, I was hoping to find a group of settings for pwSurface similar to USMP. I am thinking it may not be possible. As mentioned above SSS changes things drastically. What works on one texture can be radically different on another. The preset SSS in Supple Skin works great on Irina, however, for Livia and RealWoman, they end up looking sunburned. That last head shot I posted is Livia morph with RW texture and I had to tweak SSS quite a bit to offset the effect.

Bea · Post by **Bea** » Tue May 30, 2006 10:26 pm

Thank you - the texture I used was Dazyl