How do you get gems like diamonds etc to look shiney and well, like they are supposed to inside of Poser?

I have raytracing turned to 4 and when it renders it renders horridly. Dull, no shine and looks nothing like a diamond is supposed to look like.

A lot of the look of faceted diamonds depends on tons of refraction going on, the general effect is referred to as "caustics", and as far as I know (not very far)  that isn't very easy at all to simulate in Poser.  A beautiful caustics tutorial:

http://www.lemiere.com/tutorials/tutorials_caustics.htm

Goodness!  I feel like I was just in an episode of Star Trek with all that talk about photons,  LOL  There were words in there that I have to look up, hehe

Is that tutorial for Poser or for some other program?

I think my bride's tiara will be made of pearls!  It seems easier :)

Well that's what I'm getting at, I don't think it can be done very well in Poser (or at all).  What other tools do you have?  Vue can do it, Max can do it, Maya can do it...

Caustics are those patterns that light makes as it bunches up from reflections and refractions. The most typical example is when you use a magnifying glass in sunlight to focus the light in a small hot area. Or the curved sliver of light you see reflected from things like metal rings. Light patterns seen at the bottom of a pool of water is another example.

To get them in 3D, you need a renderer that simulates those rays in the form of light photons. Poser (AFAIK) doesn't as yet have this feature so you cant really get the look of diamonds exactly. Most you can do is get a render with nice refractions and reflections and then paint the caustics in photoshop.

If it's not for a closeup, you could put photos of diamant as a texture map on your diamant object. It would do the trick :)

Attached Link: http://www.3dlapidary.com/HTML/Collections.htm

I want to get Vue but have been waiting for a sale, hehe  I have Bryce from when it was free or cheap at Daz last year, but I think it's only a bare basic without the bells and whistles version.  I have never installed it because my other computer wouldn't run it. I haven't gotten around to installing it on my new one because I was wanting to get the more current full version.

Seems like it's post work for me, at least for now.

Thanks :)

Acadia--

This might help, in particular message 35

www.runtimedna.com/mod/forum/messages.php

Carrara5 also does caustics, and quite well, had some success with gems in it, and  i prefer it over vue. With the ability to program my own plugins, the software (should) never truely be obsolete for many years, until someone makes a toy that I can't program myself :)

About 2 years ago i worked with poser6 for quite awhile trying to make 3d gem materials tha look realistic. I found that poser6 can fake some effects from caustics, but not fully, and the color of the gem (ruby, emerald, etc) effected the results a bit, diamonds since clear, i couldn't for the life of me make one to my satisfaction. 

Ruby filters red light, emerald filters green (using most known colors, but for those who don't know, there are tons more colors, seen blue diamond in titanic? hehe rare but exists =P) but diamond, the most common clear one, filters no light, and each wavelength (color of light) going into it, goes in a slightly different direction, just like a prism.Shine a light through a prism, and you get a rainbow on the wall :) Effect of this is giving diamonds a "living fire" inside, if cut right. 

Closest i came to diamonds was to render 1 map of my scene with the usual raytracing needed (ignoring diamond quality), then set all lights to have only their red light, area render with raytrace to MAX, just the diamond area, cut and paste to a paint program, do again for green light, but slightly different refraction on the gem material, and a 3rd with blue light and different refraction. Put the 3 color cuts together should look normal, paste it in the first rendered picture that's you're scene. Tada! Without caustics though, it isn't perfect, you won't get reflected light effects you see from a spoon on a table, but its a little step forward.

Now a Ruby isn't always a perfect red, emeralds not always a perfect green, so the above method can help with that as well, just remember the light values you had set :)

What is really important is the total internal reflection (TIR) effect. This is when light that is inside the diamond (which has a very high index of refraction) cannot pass through a facet when hitting it below a certain angle. As a result, instead of leaving the stone, it reflects back into it and usually comes out the front, or at least it does when the gem is cut at the right angles.

If you follow the link that kalon gave you to my thread on the fresnel effect, you'll get close with just using the reflect refract tricks I show there. Those are the kinds of shaders I have on these gems in this render. But the TIR needs some help as Poser won't do it. What I did here was after importing these gems from the lapidary site (listed above) I set up two material zones. The top zone is using my colored glass shader. The bottom zone (for the facets that face downward) is just 100% reflection. If you look at the back of these gems, they look like perfect mirrors which is not accurate. But if you're rendering the front of them, then what you see inside the gem is total reflection of the scene visible through the top of the gem.

Diamonds also show "fire", which is caused by the prism like splitting of light into a rainbow. You can get some of that effect as I did here by setting up a Color Ramp node with some pastel green and red in it and drive that with an Edge_Blend node. I'm showing that in the screen cap above. Thus you see some purple and green in the diamond reflections.

Because 90% of the object is basically reflections, you must set up things in the scene to reflect. Here I'm using a blue sky dome surrounding the entire setup. That's why some of the facets, especially the top of the ruby, look blue. You're seeing the direct reflection of the blue sky.

Forgot to say change my glass shader a teeny bit - use an index of refraction of 2.4 instead of 1.4.

Quote - Diamonds also show "fire", which is caused by the prism like splitting of light into a rainbow. You can get some of that effect as I did here by setting up a Color Ramp node with some pastel green and red in it and drive that with an Edge_Blend node. I'm showing that in the screen cap above. Thus you see some purple and green in the diamond reflections.

Hmm interesting idea, could take a quicker render from that than my way since less raytracing and 1 render instead of 3. But I wonder the difference in end result between the 2, as my way is more of what accually happens, vs a way of "faking it with a painting" so to speak.

yeah, just to agree with the others - caustics are light beams focused by a curved surface, and they're easy in carrara et al. a diamond is polished using diamond grit on a flat wheel, which takes advantage of the diamond's relative hardness in a few planes, and relative softness in all the others. hence a curved, polished diamond is difficult to achieve, and if one is offered, it may be a fake.

I'm trying this again.   If this works,  I want to save the material settings so I don't have to keep redoing it if I want to use the tiara again.

What's the difference between the "single material" and "material collection"?  I'm assuming I pick the single material, but  under what circumstances would I want to pick the "material collection"?

Quote - Forgot to say change my glass shader a teeny bit - use an index of refraction of 2.4 instead of 1.4.

In the screenshot you provided, there is no "refraction" at all, just reflection which is set at 1.0.  Is that what I am changing or do I need to connect yet another node somewhere?

This is a free tiara from RDNA by Maveris according to the readme.  But I no longer see it on their site for download.

Anyway, here are screenshots of what I'm getting, which is nothing like a diamond....though at least it doesn't look like dull flat stuff this time, LOL

Here is the finished render.  I rendered it up close so it's esier to see.

Acadia,

Is there anything in the image for the diamonds to reflect?

As for Material vs Material collection - If you were going to save this set up for this jewelry, both metal bits and diamonds you'd save as a material collection. It would probably not work in another piece of jewelry unless the material names were the same. Collections are good for character texture set ups.

Acadia, You would select material collection if the object you're applying the textures to have multiple material zone. Example would be if you take a cube and give each side a different material zone. In the material room you would apply a texture to each side and then to save the final result you would use the the material collection and then check the boxes for each zone.

Quote - Acadia,

Is there anything in the image for the diamonds to reflect?

As for Material vs Material collection - If you were going to save this set up for this jewelry, both metal bits and diamonds you'd save as a material collection. It would probably not work in another piece of jewelry unless the material names were the same. Collections are good for character texture set ups.

It's an image of a bride wearing a tiara. Nothing else in the scene, just her.

I think for things like water, or diamonds you'll need a skydome for the object to reflect.

Quote - I think for things like water, or diamonds you'll need a skydome for the object to reflect.

Sky domes are way over my head, plus I don't want the figure on a background.  I just want to render the bride and save her as a .png with a transparent alpha channel so she can be transposed on any background.

I guess I'll look around for something else to put on her head, or try and come up with something in post work.

Attached Link: http://www.3dlapidary.com/HTML/Renders2.htm#STEP3

Hi Acadia,

Reflections and Refractions can be done in Poser, just like Bryce and Vue.  The catch is fedding reflective/refractive materials, with varied reflected/refracted light.  Bryce and Vue have built in Sky Domes,  so you're getting hits from every wich direction, by default.  Poser's outer space is null and void.  Without anything else in a Poser scene all you get is a reflect/refract of the actual light points(Bright white,) or the reflection/refraction of empty space(Dark points.)

Ajax has recently offered a great free Sky Dome for Poser.  At that thread you can see what kind of refections, and quality of background I've gotten with it.  It's only drawback is that, by default the Water plane renders as slow as molasses.  I; revamped the Sky Material Zone Texture, applied a Mirror material to the ground, and made each other Material Zone Transparent, for that image, and the background rendered very quickly.   Anyone interested in my Sky Dome Material file may e-mail me.

I think once you've added this sky dome to your scene you discover a whole new world within Poser; Reflections(mirror), and Refractions(Water, gems) become totally doable(just make sure youve keep Raytracing on(The manual recommends larger than 3!)

And I definately reccomend bagginsbill's material files!

P.S. - If you search for my name, in the Poser forum, and for either "Reflection" or "Sky Domes," you'll see some other threads I may have explained myself different with, but they mostly all boil down to Ajax's latest freebie!

Angel~

Quote -
And I definately reccomend bagginsbill's material files!

If you are talking about the Matmatic stuff, I don't understand that. It's not like it comes all together in one package for installation.  When I was following the thread there was stuff being posted all over the place and I didn't know how to save it or where to save it or anything so I just gave up on it.

If it came in one neatly zipped package that would be different, but I was completely lost and when I posted asking for help, no one replied.

So far as skydomes go, I tried the one from RDNA before and used Dr. Geeps tutorial on skydomes. When I say they are over my head, I truly mean that. I just don't understand how to use them.

Acadia, whoa. I was out of town and couldn't jump back in to reply.

The last bit you said about Matmatic is confusing to me, since Matmatic is HOSTED ON YOUR SITE remember? It's just one zip file. All those other posts you may be referring to are not part of matmatic. They are examples of things I come up with over time and are not part of Matmatic at all.

Anyway back to the diamond. I guess I wasn't clear in my first post. As a result, you made a mishmasm of the chromatic reflection material posted above, and the simple fresnel material in my article. What I was trying to say was this:

1. Go to the fresnel thread and try either the simple glass shader (fresnel node and nothing else) or try my 5-node version, with and Index of Refraction of 2.4. Either would work, but my version can be used for ruby and other colored gems, whereas the simple fresnel won't look real.

2. If you're not happy enough with the shine, it is because of lack of total internal reflection. This is less important in ruby and other dark gems, but very very important in diamond and lightly colored gems. To get that look, modify the gem so it has a new material zone on the bottom facets. On those facets, attach either a) a perfect mirror shader (just a reflect node), or b) my chromatic mirror which I showed above.

Again, 90% of the diamond's appearance is actually reflections of the scene behind and above the camera.

You do not have to use a sky dome if you want a transparent background - I just suggest a dome because it is the easiest thing in the world to set up, as you can see it from every direction. I use a sky dome so often I made it part of my default Poser scene. File-New = skydome and ground. 

Anyway, you don't want one, fine. But you have to have some strongly contrasting stuff to reflect in your gem. Try placing giant white squares or balls all around the gem scene, just outside the view of the camera, but in view of the gem. If the gem is facing the camera, you can probably just put a couple big one-sided squares behind the camera. But make sure they are WHITE, meaning even if the light doesn't hit them right, they must GLOW!

Don't get frustrated! 

I don't have my Poser gem stuff here at home - when I get to work on Monday I'll post complete materials so you don't have to guess what I mean or try to copy mat room screen shots.

Forgot to say - do not use Fresnel with reflection. Fresnel is both reflection and refraction built into one node with a specific implicit rule that we can't change.

You can use it alone for realistic clear things, but not with the reflect or refract nodes because then you're fighting the fresnel node and doubling up, and not for colored things because the fresnel node doesn't do reflection color correctly,

Attached Link: Maxwell Render

Quote -

The last bit you said about Matmatic is confusing to me, since Matmatic is HOSTED ON YOUR SITE remember? It's just one zip file. All those other posts you may be referring to are not part of matmatic. They are examples of things I come up with over time and are not part of Matmatic at all.

Really? I didn't know that. Yes! That was the part that was confusing me! I thought it was all a-la-carte so to speak.

Is there a better tutorial about how to use skydomes somewhere?  I tried Dr. Geeps but I don't understand it. There is just too much going on in the image and I find it overwhelming.

Well, I installed Matmatic and now I'm even more confused.

I created my very own thread at RDNA in the Node Cult Forum because I don't understand matmatic at all.

Acadia

Is it the numbers on the RDNA Skydome that are confusing?

Let me jump in here and tell you what I'm doing, and if I'm using it incorrectly, someone else will come along and correct me and we'll both learn something. :))

If you've downloaded Skydome3 from RDNA, unzip with use folder names activated.
The domes will appear in a folder within your Figures library, while the sample sky mats will unload in your Pose library.

Load the figure dome from the Figure Library. I believe you're using Poser 6 so the numbers don't really matter. The numbers are there because the skydome was created to be usable in Poser 4 which didn't have a materials room (at least not as we know it now) and couldn't tile textures. I generally use Dome 09 Tile. If the sky looks too stretched I adjust the scale in the Material Room by dropping down both the U_scale and V_scale in equal increments for example changing both to .5.

BTW if you're collecting the other textures that RDNA has available for the Skydome, be sure to get the Skydome 3 textures, they're tileable. The original Skydome could not tile it's own textures.

Essentially it just sits there, you don't really have to do any more to it. And while it may look like it's in the way, there's quite a bit of space before it. Should you run out of space and have things poking through the dome, just scale it larger. This may mean you need to readjust your U and V scale again.

I suppose if it really bothers you, you could make it invisible until your second to last render. Just check for poke through, and check your reflections before the final render.

I hope this helps, but I didn't know which part was confusing you...

Edit to add: I know this won't help you with your diamond project since you don't want any background at all. It's just for future reference ;-)

Quote - The only render engine I know of that can accurately render diamonds (including light dispersion) is Maxwell Render by Next Limit Technologies. Worth taking a look in their gallery,

accually many render engines can do gems, i mainly use carrara5, and does it quite well. the tools in most of the 3d apps contain the tools to do most everything, it's just a matter of simplicity. Poser i am sure would be capable of doing caustics if someone was bored enough to sit in mat room for 3 months and figure out the 1000+ nodes in the right order :) carrara5 however has that built in already, but does not take into account the "prism" effect when determining colors. it does however have the tools needed to program a plugin to do it, and much more simply. so the question is not of capability, but rather simplicity and value of doing it.

I have the free dome from RDNA, not sure if that is #3 or not.  I will try what you suggest though.

I think I also understand matmatic now. I thought it was something like Wardrobe Wizard and actually did something when you clicked the button. I didn't realize that it was a behind the scenes type thing and that whatever it did it generated into files I had to access in the material room library.  slaps self  hehe

Attached Link: Indigo Renderer

The free Indigo renderer would get close too.

Acadia - The RDNA Sky Dome did'nt work for me either.  And, from what I remember, Dr. Geeps tutorial is as much geered toward making a sky dome as anything else..  WIth Ajax's freebie all you need to do is load the Sky Dome Figure.  The ground plane is automatically positioned properly, and the dome huge!  Just e-mail for my material file, and apply that Collection, before you try to render the water plane...

And OK Matamtic is a little difficult, at first, but it just takes asking the kind Mr. Bagginsbill for his help.  When I did he was more than willing to explain how to use it, personally.  The beauty of Matmatic is that it is a language for creating Material files, more so than just the material files.

bagginsbill - Hello, I hav'nt forgotten my promise to write you a beginners tutorial!  Its been a couple months, but lets see if I can rememebr off the top of my head.

1.) DL MatmaticBeta1

2. ) Create two Materials Library folders named; MMdownloads(For Freebies), and MMWIP(For personally written scripts)

1. )  Open the Matmatic userconfig.txt and add:

"scan :Runtime:libraries:materials:MMDownloads*"

and 

"scan :Runtime:libraries:materials:MMWIP*"

3.)  Search RDNA and Renderosity for "Matmatic" threads, and the subsequent scripts:

Matmatic Announcement and discussion: http://www.runtimedna.com/mod/forum/messages.php?ShowMessage=228105

Matmatic Download: http://loftydesigns.net/Beta/Beta/MatmaticBeta1.zip

Parmatic: http://www.runtimedna.com/mod/forum/messages.php?ShowMessage=226110 

Parmatic SR3 Issues: http://www.runtimedna.com/mod/forum/messages.php?ShowMessage=234750

Threads where I've used these for special effects:

Deep Ocean Water: http://www.runtimedna.com/mod/forum/messages.php?ShowMessage=226110

Incidence SSS on Jessi: http://www.runtimedna.com/mod/forum/messages.php?ShowMessage=229578 (although I think I did that one wrong)

Algroithmic Eye Makeup: http://www.runtimedna.com/mod/forum/messages.php?ShowMessage=229726

Reptile Scales: http://www.runtimedna.com/mod/forum/messages.php?ShowMessage=228528

Goldfish Scales: http://www.runtimedna.com/mod/forum/messages.php?ShowMessage=233907

Procedural Bruises: http://www.renderosity.com/mod/forumpro/showthread.php?message_id=2760455

Furry Jessi: http://www.renderosity.com/mod/forumpro/showthread.php?message_id=2760455

 Polka Dots: http://www.renderosity.com/mod/forumpro/showthread.php?message_id=2774035

Monster skins: http://www.renderosity.com/mod/forumpro/showthread.php?message_id=2773712

Plaid: http://www.runtimedna.com/mod/forum/messages.php?ShowMessage=244503

Bricks: http://www.runtimedna.com/mod/forum/messages.php?ShowMessage=240354

Stars and nebulae: http://www.runtimedna.com/mod/forum/messages.php?ShowMessage=240500

Mixing nodes tutorial: http://www.runtimedna.com/mod/forum/messages.php?ShowMessage=237743

4.) Upon finding an interesting script, add a similarly named directory, within the MMDownloads folder.

5.)  Save that script, into it's folder, with the extension .mm1.txt at the end of the script file.

6.) Run compile.py, and all of the folders that had Matamtic scrips in them will now also have Matmatic Materials!

7.)  Examine the material file, and copy the script into the MMWIP fodler.  Make some changes to the script, and run the compile.py again, for more/new material files!

It just took Renderosity 12 hours to tell me there have been additions to this thread since my last ebot.

I just spent all that time explaining how to use matmatic, and now, after I have, I see Acadia already knows?

Quote - It just took Renderosity 12 hours to tell me there have been additions to this thread since my last ebot.

I just spent all that time explaining how to use matmatic, and now, after I have, I see Acadia already knows?

Thanks :)  Your time wasn't a complete waste. I didn't know about many of the links you posted, so I will go and have a look at them and save any scripts that are there.  Thank you :)

I managed to find the Tiara at RDNA in the free stuff.  It's called  13Days Past - Ballerina Tieras

If anyone wants to give this a try, the item is found in the free stuff. Search for "Tiera"

Quote - I believe that caustics aren't the main issue - a flat facet will not form them - caustics are created when a curved surface focuses otherwise parallel beams of light onto  a point.

The individual shape of facets don't matter. The overall shape of the surface does. So even if each facet is flat, if they join together to form a curve (like they do in most gems) then you get caustics. The most noticeable effect in gems is the 'inner glow' they show. And this is also why most simple renders it looks like its some sort of plastic, not a gem.

eg in this (real) ruby:

http://texasvc.weblogswork.com/wp-content/images/ruby.jpg

Notice how the gem actually seems to be emitting light, and not just reflecting it. Compare this to the render you posted and tell me if it is even close ?

A coincidence you refer to a ruby image - I done this rough and ready one last night while I was trying out the Gem model just to see how it performed. Needs a better lighting set up and some more render time to get it to photo quality though :-). It uses correct Index Of Refraction data to give a good result - by data I mean the usual IOR value for the gem, plus light dispersion etc.

Quote - Acadia - The RDNA Sky Dome did'nt work for me either.  And, from what I remember, Dr. Geeps tutorial is as much geered toward making a sky dome as anything else..  WIth Ajax's freebie all you need to do is load the Sky Dome Figure.  The ground plane is automatically positioned properly, and the dome huge!  Just e-mail for my material file, and apply that Collection, before you try to render the water plane...

Where do I find Ajax's freebie? I looked in free stuff and I don't see a dome listed in his free stuff.

In another thread, I read that Ajax's free dome is included in the free Dystopia package(s) at DAZ.

Hi folks.

Perhaps we're not agreeing because implicitly we're using different definitions for the words we're throwing around?

In Becco_UK's beautiful ruby a couple posts above, I agree that there is something red shining in the shadow, and that Poser doesn't model that. I disagree that the term for that is a "caustic".  I can only go by the dictionary on these issues. The American Heritage Dictionary gives me this for "caustic":

• The enveloping surface formed by light rays reflecting or refracting from a curved surface, especially one with spherical aberration.
• Since the definition of caustic encompasses both reflecting and refracting light, the key is the word "curved". I totally agree that there are reflections in a gem seen through the gem's surface and also that those reflections can hit the table beneath it and light up the table. I disagree that those are called "caustics" - they are called reflections and refractions.

The notion of a caustic in optics is related to the other meanings of caustic, having to do with burning or stinging. For example, when you use a magnifying lens to focus the sun's rays into such a small area that you can cause paper to burn, that particular hot refraction is a caustic.

Quote - In another thread, I read that Ajax's free dome is included in the free Dystopia package(s) at DAZ.

Thanks :)  It was there.

bagginsbill: I tend to agree with your description - in my simple ruby image you see reflected light from the faces on mainly the left side of the image (the sun shines from that side!) and within the shadow the focused refracted light is visible (but needed longer render time to achieve more definition). The key part of the ruby material is the Index Of Refraction data file that controls all elements of the material. I have a simple diamond rendering at the moment with surface and refracted abberation (rainbow) effects visible. Post it later.

Regarding Poser and diamonds I feel the best results will come from dedicated reflection/ environment maps. I've been messing about all afternoon and I have doubts that Poser can achieve a good degree of realism without much time being used. Always fun to have a go with Poser now and again though!

Acadia - What would you like for a background to the Tiera(Post example?)

If you ave a direct link to the Tiera please post it.  RDNA and Renderosity have the same ownrs(No Badwidth Theft)

Ajax has more than one Dystopia Freebie(I think.)  So there is no confusion, the one I used is here:

http://www.daz3d.com/i.x/shop/itemdetails/-/?item=4706&spmeta=rl

I tried to uload a .RAR of my .MC6, for the Sky Dome, but a i did'nt work, would a .zip have?  Either way I would'n try the sky dome without it, or it'll take you at least 20 minutes to render, becasue of the water plane's Dissplacment(or bump?)
Becco_UK - Trust me, Poser needs a Sky Dome(Or another encompassing object), in order to get good Reflection and Refraction.  And no they do not require increase render time all that much:

Here is a render using a SKy Dome that Bushi gave me.  The background needed to be composited, but the only material aplied here is bagginsbill's mirror(Demo Set)

Thee pics are imported from other threads.  Please do'nt mind the pink squigly, it refers to a form of sphereical mapping preparation I'm trying to lern how to do.

Anywho, this is another render with bagginsbills mirror material, this time using Ajax's Sky Dome, and the actuall rendered background.

These are mirror materials, and not glass materials, but actally they both look very similar(with as many smooth surfaces.

Again , the render times of these scenes were not much diferent than the same scene with textures, in fact maybe a little quicker.

I only know of Maxwell Render that can create this effect accurately.