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ManFromAbora β Fall of Man
Published: 2015-06-28 11:14:07 +0000 UTC; Views: 2710; Favourites: 27; Downloads: 92
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What legacy did man leave behind for those who followed after? Would they remember us, would we be seen as gods or monsters of old?After a long hiatus, I'm getting back into my dryad character, working on textures. A lot harder than it first appeared. In this case, it came out a bit overly saturated I think. The problem area is that there is no relief to the leaves that make up her body, even though it was strongly worked to show to some shadowing between the different layers of leaves. I'm beginning to think that there won't be a simple 'one texture suits all lighting conditions' solution.
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I like to see people push the software with creativity.
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Glad to see you haven't given up on this - by far the best idea for a tree spirit that I've seen.Β 'Illegitimi non carborundum'...Β
Maybe you could create a separate AO map for the leaves (instead of trying to incorporate the shadowing effect from the different layers of leaves into the texture image itself)? Not quite sure how you'd then combine that AO map into the shader. Also maybe add some (more?) surface texture to the leaves (using bump/normal I guess)? I've just started playing with bagginsbill's leaf shader (you posted to that thread back in March 2014 - www.renderosity.com/mod/forump⦠) and I'm getting results that I think look quite good.
P.S. Is this a DAZ Studio or Poser render?
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Wow! You sir, have an incredible memory. I had completely forgotten about that forum. I had to go back to re-read it again. I've tweaked the materials again this morning to something akin to what Baggins Bill posted, and got a really incredible render, but then changed the lights and it become a bland mess with no definition.
This is a Poser render. Funny story really, if I knew how to use Daz,Β I have no doubt the Dryad would already be for sale on their site. Long story that you can read in my journal entry.
Thanks for the feedback! Much appreciated.
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Not memory, just chance. 
About half-way down page 1 of that thread bagginsbill notes "...The leaves are one-sided ... Since they have no thickness, scatter doesn't really do its job, which is a big part of the realism of a leaf shader...".Β
I guess that your dryad's skin has no thickness? So this observation would apply (same with the leaves in my picture)
He also mentions in a totally different thread ( www.renderosity.com/mod/forump⦠) that scatter is the 3D version of translucence.
Hmmm... I feel an urge to reopen that old leaf shader thread... 
I do remember parts of your 'long story' - I first saw your dryad when you posted the 'Songbird' image. I later read (both here, and on other forums) about some of the problems you were having, hence my 'Illegitimi non carborundum' comment above.
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Wow. You came up with a different solution than I did with your leaf. I'm going to try your technique to see how it fares under this lighting scheme. As for translucency, there is another thread at Rendo when Baggins Bill was trying to help me with that very thing. (I was attempting to create translucency maps so light from behind the figure would give more realistic shading on the leaf material. Never really solved it, and it added hours to the render time.) I'll have to go back and see if I can find the thread.
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I'm still just trying to understand, and it may take a while before I get something that does what I want. But bagginsbill has nipped in on that leaf thread (as I was hoping
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Finally found it. Try this thread to see if it helps: www.renderosity.com/mod/forumpβ¦
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Thanks. It does.
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Just sent you a note - I've tried what you're trying and got some strange results...
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I'm following that thread with much interest. Trying some of the set ups you have to see how they work. Currently I'm playing with the method you used to create variation across leaves. Man does it add to render time! I was hoping to go one further with translucency and create translucency maps. One of the concerns I have for this V4 material is that it is single sided, and if translucency worked like it should, then anytime she is lit from behind, you would have a single translucent leaf, rather than the illusion of overlapping leaves as in the diffuse channels. so I created translucency maps to capture the lights more realistically, almost like shadow maps. Never could get it to work right. I can make it work in Vue without too much trouble as it has a setting for infinitely thin materials, but in Poser its been a tough go.
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The stuff I'm doing is for a leaf shader to use all the one-sided transmapped leaves in my library plants (mainly from XFrog and DAZ), where every single leaf uses exactly the same texture image. That's why I'm trying to get colour variation via the shader. Render time doesn't bother me too much.
But for your dryad the colour variation across the leaves would probably be best done in the texture map itself?
I'm fairly sure that you should be able to get translucence working as you want. But the main limitation seems to be that you must have a directional light (i.e. not IBL/IDL) shining onto the back face of the leaves ('back' being the side that's away from the camera).
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Got a bit off track on that, sorry, I was referring to the background ivy. They are exactly as you described, one sided. They are all identical leaves (well, two, a younger and older leaf texture) and I was trying your technique on them. As for V4, translucency does work, but it turns V4 into one giant leaf with a solid backlit color. As the V4 main texture has overlapping leaves, I was attempting to create a translucency map to have variation in lighting depth and shadow just as in real life when overlapping leaves are backlit. I never could get it to work. In the image above, she is backlit, but at an extreme angle. Were I to move the camera sllghtly more to the left, her back lit leaves turn yellow(ish), just as you would expect in real leaves, but are a solid yellow with no variation to indicate the leaves are overlapping.
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D'Oh! Of course, the background ivy! I was too focused on your dryad
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Haven't really gone anywhere, just put Dryad on hold to get my thoughts on what I wanted to do with her sorted out.
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Be or not to be? Be! Definitely!Β But to be a dryad or a man?
Great "Hamlet" picture! I like this idea.Β Β
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Thanks. But each leaf texture has to be tweaked for each lighting scheme. Trying to find a decent set up that will do good across many lights, like a lot of skin textures already do.
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It will take some time, to get that texture just the way you want it, but the result will be awesome
You are very welcome
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