Texture material problem with Genesis and Carrara

jrm21

Am attempting to use some genesis characters with Carrara (8.5 - latest beta, MacOS). Most things work fine. I had to adjust some reflection settings on one female texture to avoid the shiny/plastic skin effect, but that wasn't a big deal.

Moving on to M5, I have hit a problem I cannot figure out. M5 comes with the "Phillip" textures, which I cannot get to work properly with Carrara.

Attempting to use the Phillip "eyes" results in a black orb.
Phillip face without any facial hair work. Those with facial hair yield solid black face.

How can these textures be used in carrara?

Three images:
1. Render with "regular" eye texture applied.
2. Render with Phillip eyes (black hole)
3. Render with M5PhillipFace05 applied

evilproducer

So what does the shader tree look like? Are the UVs different for the different textures?

jrm21

evilproducer said:

So what does the shader tree look like? Are the UVs different for the different textures?

When it comes to anything "UV" I have no idea what is what. I looked at the shader tree, but it to complex for me to understand. It looks like it is supposed to be a face texture with two different facial hair items overlayed. The first layer - face texture - is the regular face map,but it also adds a "color" which is black.

For now, I opened the various texture maps and bump maps in PS. I combined the various elements to create the desired face amp with facial hair and then brought that back into a simple face texture in Carrara.

It works, but I would still like to figure out how to get the actual "phillip" texture applied in Carrara.

Dartanbeck

FYI:
Genesis has the capability of using different UV Mapping - which is the magic behind getting such a variance in shapes and sizes, while still looking great.

I've heard that DS can switch the Genesis UV's on the fly - which I don't believe Carrara can yet do.
Therefore, you must load the correct Genesis figure according to it's UV mapping:
(It looks like you're using the correct M% mapping, though)

Examples that I know of:
Basic Female = V4 mapping
V5 Character Presets = V5 Mapping
Basic Male = M4 Mapping (I think)
Etc.,

So it works best to actually load the Gorilla character if a Gorilla is what you want to end up making - so you get the appropriate UV mapping set up.

Also,
Genesis, at least in Carrara, is a little different to get used to.
Be patient (certainly more patient than me :( )
You'll soon find the many, Many, MANY advantages that such an ingenious design can offer.

Good luck in all of your endeavors

RoguePilot

Hi,

I just did a test and inspected the Texture folder.

The shader you are using is based on the Studio MLIE function and will not work in Carrara. (If you refer to shaders as textures it can cause some confusion)

The effect can be replicated using the Layers List but it would be tough to get it lined up properly. It can be done if set up on a flat plane first and then transferred to M5. In this case the best option is to build the new texture in photoshop as you have done, it's a 2 minute job and you end up with a perfectly usable texture. The beards can even be used on other skins with only a little extra work.

If the beard textures were at the appropriate size and aspect ratio it would be simplicity itself to overlay them using the Carrara shader functions. The Layers list is normally very usable with textures made for the MLIE, such as the wounds pack or tattoos. The only difference here is the critical need for perfect alignment which would take time to get absolutely right.

The eyes are again due to using a Studio shader in Carrara, you will get used to having to adjust things like that. I urge you to delve into the shader room, it can be one of the most satisfying things about Carrara.

jrm21

RoguePilot said:

Hi,
The shader you are using is based on the Studio MLIE function and will not work in Carrara. (If you refer to shaders as textures it can cause some confusion)

The effect can be replicated using the Layers List but it would be tough to get it lined up properly. It can be done if set up on a flat plane first and then transferred to M5. In this case the best option is to build the new texture in photoshop as you have done, it's a 2 minute job and you end up with a perfectly usable texture. The beards can even be used on other skins with only a little extra work.

It makes sense. Glad to know I figured out the best way to handle this.

Aside from loading in shaders like this and seeing the problem - is there any way to know in advance what items will work in Carrara and which are better off left to Studio? I never see anything in the product descriptions. Of course, it you select "Carrara" compatible items, almost nothing shows us in the store.

The eyes are again due to using a Studio shader in Carrara, you will get used to having to adjust things like that. I urge you to delve into the shader room, it can be one of the most satisfying things about Carrara.

I can do a few things in the shader room. The multi-level stuff is just a bit too much for me. I played around with this one for a while and wasn't able to get anything reasonable going. I see what you mean about lining thing up and could almost see what was supposed to be happening in the shader tree. But darned if I had any idea how to get there. In the end, PS was a no-brainer.

Thanks all for the help. I am coming back into this after a several month absence. Between trying to remember all the little details, and wrapping my head around Genesis and the latest C8.5 beta, my head is spinning.

3DAGE

Try saving as a DUF (Material preset) from Daz Studio.
you can import that DUF onto your M5 figure in Carrara 8.5 beta.

Also,..
The Carrara 8.5 beta has a NEW shader type,... Multilayer , and Multilayer elements.

It's a bit like the "Layers list" shader, but has the advantage of "Blending modes" and an opacity slider, between the layers.

Hope it helps :)

jrm21

3DAGE said:

Try saving as a DUF (Material preset) from Daz Studio.
you can import that DUF onto your M5 figure in Carrara 8.5 beta.

Just tried and it didn't work. Looks fine in DS, but the same "black face" problem in Carrara. When loading the original items (character, material) in Carrara, the status bar indicates they are .duf files, so I don't suppose that's the problem. I think RouguePilot is correct in that this material uses a feature unsupported in Carrara. Interestingly, this did allow the "eyes" material/shader to work.

Thanks for the idea.

Of course the downside of trying this method is that it showed me how quickly things load into DS. I was used to getting something to eat while a character or prop loaded into a scene and thought that was "the way it was." These same items load into DS almost instantaneously. Of course, DS crashed on me twice in the five minutes it took to test this, while Carrara only crashed 6 times in about three hours of use yesterday - so Carrara "wins" on the "fewer crashes/hour" metric. :)

Also,..
The Carrara 8.5 beta has a NEW shader type,... Multilayer , and Multilayer elements.

It's a bit like the "Layers list" shader, but has the advantage of "Blending modes" and an opacity slider, between the layers.

Hope it helps :)

Yes, the problem shader is a multilayer shader/multilayer element shader. See attached screenshot showing the shader tree and resulting blackface.

The problem is easily rectified by taking the three elements and creating a single texture map in Photoshop. I imagine a "properly" set up complex texture would offer some kind of benefit, but for my use the texture map method provides everything I need.

3DAGE

A couple of questions ...

When you load M5 from the smart content,. It should have the Philip textures applied by default,..
Is this what happens on your system.

When you edit any of the shaders,. you should see the setup is already (Multilayer,. and Multilayer elements.)

You can add more multilayer elements. if you want, and you can adjust the (imported) settings which have been translated from DUF to Carrara's shaders,.. there's always some errors in the translation, but bear in mind that it's a Beta,... and that you can manually adjust the shader to work better in carrara,. and than Save that "Global shader" to your "my Shaders" section of the browser

Pic 1,. what I get when I load M5 .
Pic 2, after some adjustment of the imported settings.

jrm21

3DAGE said:

A couple of questions ...

When you load M5 from the smart content,. It should have the Philip textures applied by default,..
Is this what happens on your system.

When you edit any of the shaders,. you should see the setup is already (Multilayer,. and Multilayer elements.)

You can add more multilayer elements. if you want, and you can adjust the (imported) settings which have been translated from DUF to Carrara's shaders,.. there's always some errors in the translation, but bear in mind that it's a Beta,... and that you can manually adjust the shader to work better in carrara,. and than Save that "Global shader" to your "my Shaders" section of the browser

Pic 1,. what I get when I load M5 .
Pic 2, after some adjustment of the imported settings.

I can load M5 in Carrara and it works as you describe. I can also apply two of the Phillip face shaders - 01 and 02 (unshaven and stubble).

The problem only surfaces when I apply a shader with facial hair. I believe there are six of them, 03-08. The screenshot in my last email is the result of applying (I believe) #5.

When I load M5, I get exactly what you show in your first screenshot. The only difference is that my render preview shows blackened eyes. I usually apply a different (non-phillip) eye shader and the character has eyes again.

I kind of see what you did with the eyes based on the before and after. I tried the same - dragged the "Source 1" up one level to the "Shader" thereby eliminating the "multiply" and black "source 2" sections. I did this for the three affected eye parts and ended up with a light color eye.

However, trying this on face shader "Phillip 05" doesn't work. It will result in a face with the base Phillip shader applied, but seems to ignore the two other layer which contain the facial hair. Thus, and "edited" 05 shader leaves you with the same thing as the "01" version.

Have you tried one of the Phillip w/facial hair shaders and been able to adjust that so it works?

3DAGE

You're right jrm21 . and I get the same results as you do with the hairy face shaders,.

I think the issue is obviously the way that the DS / Duf shaders are being translated into Carrara,. and I'm not sure it's something which the end user can "Fix" right now,.

There appear to be two issues,.

The "Multiply" with Black,. which produces the black overlay, and can be adjusted by moving the texture maps up a level.

The "UV Transform", which should be scaling the beard maps to the correct position (but apparently isn't) and it also has the Multiply with black... just to confuse the issue further.

If you adjust the maps for the beard to get rid of the black multiply, then you can see that the Beard maps are in the wrong place and scale.
and I think that's an issue which the Developers need to look at.

Either way, there's some issues that need to be looked at here, to improve the functionality and translation of shaders originally designed for DS / Genesis.

Have you posted a bug report about this yet ? ..

jrm21

3DAGE said:

Have you posted a bug report about this yet ? ..

I have bug reports filed in October 2011 which haven't been acknowledged yet. In the past, it has been longer than that before I have had reports acknowledged. Makes it feel like a waste of time. Despite my lack of success with the bugtracker, I just submitted a report on this and another item.