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I changed the thread name again.
No one asked me - Diomede posts screenshots on whatever
Great work on the hair and a nice explanation too!
ditto that
+1
Looks absolutely fantastic, diomede!!!
Appreciate the comments. Thanks.
This is a great thread! lurking but appreciating it all!
tnx,
--ms
This was most helpful!
Thank you, MindSong and Ice Dragon Art. I hope there is enough in the early parts of the thread that someone can at least get started.
Hi diomede!
Looks like Northern Renaissance Art Meets Halloween! Awesome image and post work!
I'm no expert either...sigh, I wish someone would publish a software agnostic 1001+ tips and tricks for multipass rendering, so many neat uses for passes seem like the best kept secrets. I'm sure you saw this thread, where JoeMamma2000 basically wrote a manual explaining all of the passes and their uses for Carrara:
http://www.daz3d.com/forums/discussion/54406/compositing-and-post-work-what-is-it-and-why-should-i-care/p1
Anyway, I'm chiming in to say there seems to be something wrong with your Depth Pass, one of my all time favorites.
It should be a nice grey scale image of objects where those closest to the camera are darker, and those farther away are lighter. Not sure what is happening in your scene to cause such a "crushed" image of black and white.
I whipped up a quick example using a Carrara Terrain rendered with an Alpha Channel, A Depth Pass, and a simple example of creating instant fake Atmospheric Perspective!
First image - Beauty Pass of an almost drag and drop terrain - I made it 1 km x 1 km.
Second image: Depth Pass spit out by Carrara.
I then brought both into After Effects (and I know you can do something similar in Photoshop, I just don't know how, lol) and used the Depth Matte to DRIVE a Levels Adjustment where I set the overall RGB to be lighter, more blue and less red. Where the Depth Pass was darker, less effect leaked through, and where it was lighter, more effect was applied. I then dropped in a gradient behind the terrain and voila, the last image. (I edited this post - it was a solid color before, but I couldn't let it stand, despite my compulsive laziness...) You can use that for...all kinds of things, fake Depth of Field, invert the matte and pump up your foreground...ummm well anyway just an observation that your Depth Pass looked like it was clipped...but could be used as a Matte in and of itself...hey, how did you do that????
Also, you can apply adjustments to the Depth Pass itself to create more dramatic changes.
Lastly, if the Depth Pass from Carrara is giving you grief, you can cook your own! The old Distance Fog trick (last image). Turn off all your lights, including any Ambient Light, then under Atmosphere choose Distant Fog and set it to pure white. Set your start radius to zero, and your extent radius to the edge of your scene (may require you to calculate where that is). Then render - it will render fast and may be a little more subtle than Carrara's default Depth Pass.
Have fun - your images are awesome!!
P.S. - I think I posted this link previously in the JoeMamma2000 thread, but here it is again...forget software titles and just look at the chart and further explanations contained therein:
http://www.g-3d.com/Newer_AAC_3d_multi.html
...maybe outdated, but I think it stimulates thoughts for potential mattes, etc...
Cheers!
Thank you, DesertDude. Great information. The terrain example is very illuminating (get it?).
I will have to go back and check out what happened to the multipasses for the Witch's Brood image.
If all your objects are relatively close to the camera (as may be the case for the Witch's Brood image) then Infinity is set to white and everything else will be black (or probably just very close to it, you've probably got some very dark greys in there). DesertDude's fog trick would be helpful in this case.
Thanks, Phil. That is probably it. For those following along, the object index pass still separates the image elements for the Witch's Brood image. We are just talking about the depth pass.
Finished the first part up to the multi pass render. Seriously, most helpful, I now have a fairly good idea where the basics are at and how to move about at least for setting up a scene. Will make learning and navigating the rest a bit easier, so thank you!
I'm glad it helped get you started. Definitely ask if you have questions. Lots of helpful people.
I'm still trying to figure out how to optimize and save a global skin shader? If someone could point me in the right direction I would appreciate it. I understand it has something to do with the multi colored ball at the top left. And dragging something to it so that it will cover the whole figure? but there are so many options for each skin I have no idea what I am supposed to do with what.
Hi, I go through an example starting here.
http://www.daz3d.com/forums/discussion/comment/1701046/#Comment_1701046
The shader tree is made up of several channels. Some are relativey straightforward, such as the color (diffuse) channel and the bump channel. Alpha can make things visible or invisible. The highlight channel controls whether and how light shows on the surface of the object. Shininess is how a highlight light is spread across the surface. Bump mimics roughness but without distorting the mesh.
1) If you buy a skin shader designed for Carrara by Ringomonfort, then literally all you have to do is:
- open your browser tray (bottom handle) and click the content tab instead of the sequencer tab.
- go to the shader tab
- find the subfolder that has the particular skin shader preset (sometimes in a folder starting with the initials DP, sometimes under Ringomonfort)
- highlight the "actor" level of you model and find the globe thing you mentioned
- click and drag the preset from the browser tray to the globe
Carrara will then automatcally adjust all of the shader domains for how Ringo set them up.
2) If you buy a character set for Studio and you want to convert to Carrara, there are several steps you have to take. You will have to go to the link at the top of this post, but here is a summary.
- for whatever reason, the Studio duf file will load the color map (diffuse texture) in Carrara but not the maps for the bump/normal channel or the highlight channel. You have to identify where the vendor stored those maps. You can then click the apropriate channel in the shader tree (highlight or bump) and navigate to the maps to load them.
- There are some skin settings that seem pretty standard but don't get set by the duf file as a default (again, don't know why) when converting from Studo to Carrara. For example, the shininess channel is generally empty but should be positive but low for most skin shaders. You can enter these for one shading domain and copy them to many other shading domains. These include shininess, reflection, refraction, and subsurface scattering.
- Often you can enter these once and copy a shading domain to another shading domain. For example, the forearm and the thighs use the same maps (limbs). Enter one and copy it to the other.
- There are couple of shading domains that need special treatment. These include the eye lashes, eye reflection, and cornea. You will have to address these individually.
- Once you get the shading domains the way you want, click and drag the multicolored ball from the property tray (upper right) to your shader browser (bottom handle).
- In the future, load your character and then click and drag your saved preset from your browser to the multicolored ball.
If the link at the top isn't what you are looking for, let me know.
Multi-pass also works for animations. We can use them as animated selections and other reasons in VFX techniques. Pretty sweet stuff.
Thanks! Another issue. Working my way through the balcony scene. Trying to unwrap the UV. However, I do not have an unfold option where you have an unfold option. its missing completely. Sooo I can't unfold anything and am stuck....
Hmmm, I'm not sure. I have Carrara 8.5 Pro. I'm not too sure what the difference is between Pro and regular. Maybe the unfold function is one of the differences. I do see that you have the "operations" tab. Your mesh looks like a cylinder. Can you try selecting your mesh, go to the operations tab, and try the custom preset for cylinder (and you will choose an axis)? Not ideal, but that should a least give you an initial uvmap and keep you moving until we can figure out why you don't have the unfold tab appearing.
You've got a bunch of buttons missing from the toolbar too. You running Standard by any chance instead of Pro?
Well...It just crashed. So I have to start over. No big deal, I am going to start over and make the post first and then I will try the cylinder setting.
I thought it was pro. Let me go look My brain is starting to fry just a tiny bit right now.
Edit - nope its pro not the regular. Let me double check and make sure everything installed the way it should.
Oh no. Bummer.
Well, the other choices just give me garbage so thats not going to work. I wonder if I need to uninstall and re install. And should I do it via DIM or manually? Clearly something is missing and it is the pro version.
I don't remember where it is, Help menu maybe? But there's a way to resubmit your serial code, I believe.
Go to your Daz3d account and make sure that you find the SN for the Pro version and enter that into Carrara. I think that non-Pro also would not be running at 64 bit... again, I could be wrong. It looks like you're not running Pro to me though.
Just check your Insert menu. Do you have an Ocean you can insert into a scene?
If you're not running pro, and own pro, there has to be something simple to fix it. I'm pretty sure that the re-entering of the SN will do it ;)
Uninstalling and re installing did not help. Wonder if I need to put in a bug report? Also the regular 8 comes bundled with 8.5 as well as something called Carrara Render Node? I'm super confused now.
Okay here is something even more strange. I have it installed on my laptop as well. The one installed on my laptop has all of the tabs. Ugh. Let me go uninstall everything again and then re install it all again and see if it helps. Maybe three times the charm....
Render Node doesn't get installed on the main computer running Carrara. It's a version of Carrara which may be installed onto other computers in a network to run a render farm.
Look in your Daz account for your serial code. Is it possible that you have both standard and Pro serail numbers in there? I just checked mine and I only have codes for Pro.
I'd definitely file a support ticket, but then I'd keep trying stuff too. Who knows, maybe it's a mistake on their end - giving you a Standard code instead? I'm sure thay can get you a new code, though. They'll certainly help.
Regular 8 comes with 8.5 because 8.5 was an upgrade to 8. Though it is its own, full installer, Carrara 8 in the Product Library is what gives you the full Carrara native content installation instead of just the 8.5 Genesis additions.
So for the full Carrara browser catalog and wizards, we need to install the Carrara 8 Native Content
Then Carrara 8.5 Native Content gives us the new inclusions for Genesis - a much smaller package than the Carrara 8 one.