How diplomatic :biggrin: Certainly, I agree with that principal.

But I think it is neither a matter of opinion, nor topic for debate, that standing in Brooklyn looking west toward Manhattan, the Verizon building (which says "Verizon" and not "nozireV") is on your right in the North, and the Statue of Liberty is on your left in the South.

You must reverse the image in order to use it as an environment sphere.

Cath hasn't yet concurred, but I'll move on anyway. Since the HDRVFX panorama has the  brightest sky to the left of the sliding board. We all agree (I think) the sliding board is South. Given that turning left from the South we reach East, then the sunny sky must be in the south east.

Now the IBL HDR angular map that comes with Poser 7 is consistent with the panorama. Meaning that the sun is on the left. But if we use it that way, it will be on the wrong side. So flip it. Set the U_Scale to -1 on the IBL. Now since we flipped the panorama and the IBL, they are once again consistent. And since the panorama is oriented correctly everything will look right.

Looking SE toward the sun.

Looking NW with the sun behind us.

Here's a strange thing. Cath was talking about IBL Contrast and we have to guess at what it really does.

The previous render was with IBL Contrast = 1.

I lowered the contrast to .75 and strangely the contrast increased - not at all what is expected.

Setting it to 0 causes a very slow black render.

Check it out - I made the ground plane visible and put Fresnel reflection on it.

Now my props are visible in the lake!!!

Attached Link: SPHERE FOR PANORAMIC HDRI MAPS

DOWNLOAD ABOVE

you welcome!!  renderteam!

and back to the track!!
I did spend some time and created for you the perfect sphere .. download the files, install, you will find the sphere in the primitives under prop section..
in the textures you find very small jpg of the map, also a pz3 scene, you need to resize the ball to 1000 or more and replace the small map with a new HDR or LDR map and done..

you remember my last product it was exactly the way you do that above, real reflections so it is old school for me already, i sold it 2 years ago lol
but now I have better sphere with correct everything, it will cover 360 degrees of the map without any problems.. not matter from inside or outside

ah if you render the new map set the diffuse to black.. forgot to do that..

Add a little Fractal_Sum to the ground Bump channel - you get wind ripples. The lovely HDRI sky really makes this work great.

Very Nice, I see you have good direction too.. this was the south of the side as well lol i made it for the poser6 with sky maps and ground etc... time to rework this and replace the LDR with HDR for better effect..

either the contrast increased when lowering it to 0.75 or the luminosity of the scene became more uniform and higher (meaning the contrast decreased). cath said that P7 ibl contrast was actually intensity or luminosity IIRC.

Quote - Here's a strange thing. Cath was talking about IBL Contrast and we have to guess at what it really does.

The previous render was with IBL Contrast = 1.

I lowered the contrast to .75 and strangely the contrast increased - not at all what is expected.

Setting it to 0 causes a very slow black render.

To this theme, it happen that it turn to black b-c the Light probe hdr was NOT tone mapped before exported to hdr format, mean the contrast was to low and the level of the luminosity was to high, the Luminosity of the tone mapped HDR should be at zero, and the contrast at 1.0
before exporting it to the final hdr format.. the tone mapping is new so I guess all the old hdr maps have not what we need.. if the maps was right, you should get exactly balance of the light and shadows and by setting the intensity lower in poser material room the hdr map will  set the light slowly down, at first the elements and at the end the sky would get dark..
after changing the contrast to zero, there would be not shadows in the scene and one thing what stay over is pure luminosity... I know what i am talking about ... ~~smile~~

Cath - thank you SOOO much for the correctly UV mapped sphere. It works well without having to do those funny U_Scale and V_Scale numbers. A simple U_Scale = -1 and I'm all set to be inside!

I noticed that it came in with a Y Rotation of -2. I assume that was an accident. No matter - it is nothing to set it to 0.

I love the fact that this sphere is oriented so that Y Rotation spins it. The Poser sphere is gimbal locked and very annoying.

Uhoh. Was it intentional that you left off the north and south poles? There are no polygons there. That could be a problem with reflections - the top of the sky is missing.

If there was polygons, you can't do the perfect UV mapping to it b/z this way everything would get to the one point what will be creating bad things.. if you rescale the sphere to a bigger format then you will not notice the lil one point missed at all .. try out
P.S did you noticed how nice and the sphere show the west and east side ? exactly on the right and left.. and the -2 rotation was a mistake

Yes I agree the alignment was absolutely perfect.

I'm not sure I understand why increasing the size of the ball will get rid of the empty spot. The funny thing about an environment sphere is no matter how big you make it, everything you see stays the same size. As you scale the ball larger, it moves farther away, but everything gets bigger in exactly the same proportion.

Here we are at 10000% - see the black hole?

Attached Link: NEW SPHERE FOR HDR DOWNLOAD THE UPDATE

Ok just for you update with no holes this time i fixed it perfect!!!! just download the new zip and update, I LEARNED SOMETHING NEW BTW!!! hahaha

Perfect!!! I knew you could do it.

Yes looks perfect, if only the hdr was tone mapped correct it would looks more wonderful, not a problem for me the data can be edited still but for the other users.. you can plug the hdr map for the sphere also to the diffuse color and control better the intentsity to get the dark places much lighter ...

here was the scene with the real reflection, just a quick one

booksmacked and hoping for 6 more pages

Thanks for the sphere! 

You more that welcome! I think we did a great job today on that!!
bagginsbill seems tired or prepare something new in the kitchen for hit back! lolo

I think this is very exciting :)  I love getting to learn in here!  :)
And, yes, my ADD-addled mind is taking major notes :)

Not tired - just preparing something new. You'll see tomorrow. Have to go home now.

Thanks for the sphere!

Do you ever sleep???

You welcome Jen... made for you too..

and yes I sleep as well... this was a little bit longer discusion as expected but well excited.. still rendering tests..
and nothing to thanks for! all pleasure on my side!
thanks also for your time and can't wait to see what you have prepared for tomorrow.. new stuff always a new inspirations!

I love it when a plan comes together
This is what I was hoping for when starting this discussion. Having great minds come together in their shared love / interest & expose even greater knowledge for all.  I'm not just talking about Cath & BagginsBill, everyone has something to offer & something to learn.

"Everybody can do something"
Gil Scott Heron

speaking of which, time for me to do something more in this thread too :-)

Thank you again Cath for the sphere...make sure you invoice EF to include this in Poser 8 LOL

Quote - I love it when a plan comes together

It's that kind of statement right there that makes me pine for a "devlish" smiley.  Maybe I'll make one and tell the programmers that they have to use it...or "else". 

:lol:

Devilsh???? moi? perish the thought, my intentions are quite angelic...see?

hehehhehe

Ok guys and gals, i downloaded one of the hdri map from the website suggested by one of our member today, plug it into the sphere I made for you, put in some balls and here we go.. nice yes?

but is that good enough ? with the first look on it yes but not exactly, what we missing here in this render are the luminosity coming from the box that should light up the grey sphere and here is nothing we can do about it .. but well this is a pleasant effect as well...

and regarding poser8 they really should do that and create the dom for  hdri maps, it will fix also the problem with rendering the Refraction and all our glasses.. you can well do this using the sphere dom as well so one step to the reality...

Testing out the ball in similar fashion. I have thought aboutthe same thing. I've tried slight reflections in the main tree, or ambient color with other nodes plugged to control, but without success in creating the "bounce" that radient light has with objects. Trying to bring about what other renderers do with radiosity or photon mapping, at least from a "look" even if it is thru Poser "manipulation" ;-)

The infamous Pond HDR...but using Cath's tone mapped version, light is no longer overexposed. I do have questions on focal length & size of the globe as in Bagginsill's renders below. My scaling seems to be off.

Quote - Here's a strange thing. Cath was talking about IBL Contrast and we have to guess at what it really does.

The previous render was with IBL Contrast = 1.

I lowered the contrast to .75 and strangely the contrast increased - not at all what is expected.

Setting it to 0 causes a very slow black render.

I don't have Poser 7, so excuse my ignorance if this isn't the case, but this looks to me like intensity color clamping.  HDR images, of course, have high contrast changes from pixel to pixel. One pixel may have an intensity value of 10, for instance, and the pixel right beside it may have a value of 10,000.  This kind of shift in dynamic range can be hard to control, so most apps that make use of HDRI offer some kind of clamping options.  Perhaps Contrast is the equivalent function in Poser?  Higher values mean more intensity clamping (of contrasting colors), while lower values mean less.  That would produce results similar to what you are seeing there.   Of course, this would also mean that a value of 0.0 could only be useful when secondary rays from true GI are employed.

If Cath tone-mapped her HDR images in some other application, then she wouldn't need this feature per-se, because her maps would already be clamped, and using any value other than 0.0 on her maps might give undesireable results.

Again, I'm just making a guess here based on some highend features I've worked with in other apps, so this may be TOTALLy incorrect for Poser, and I apologize if it leads to a dead end, or if it's already been explored before, and ruled out.  I didn't read this whole thread.

Quote - and regarding poser8 they really should do that and create the dom for  hdri maps, it will fix also the problem with rendering the Refraction and all our glasses.. you can well do this using the sphere dom as well so one step to the reality...

 

You are so right on there, Cath. Poser 7 should have added this - it is not hard to code, but users have to do a lot of work themselves. Other apps, such as Modo, make it trivial. Attach your panorama to the "Environment". Flip a switch that enables the environment as a light source. Done.

Then of course there is the Enable GI button :)

No it is not the case, it works really perfect, b/c the old hdr was created not from many exposes, I use Artizen that have special feature with **HDR tone mapping** for hdr images to correct everything . The HDR images from poser was above the 0.0 value that why the sky looking so unatural blue and the other areas create to much shadows.. making the correction I got back to 0.0 . Poser have the **Intensity** : Luminosity  and the **Contrast** : Midtones   only .. here is what I can correct with if is wrong or looks unatural..to bring back to right value. Many pple import the images for the hdr as 2.2 display curve , digtal cameras use 1.0 ... on other aplication as max you can set the display curve to 1.0 but not in poser that why the render looks to dark and over exposed with light too...

Alex tested the new light probe and the models surface was not more over exposed with the light.. it set everything to the balance for more natural look..

above shots from Artizen HDR edition ,,, dont do that with photoshop or any other editor b/c you will lose the data

Here example what will happen to the light probe while changing the Intensity of the light in Poser using correct tone mapped hdr light probe..to use with Poser

here some test renders with all the same material setting but different light probes.. see where the light come out more natural.. The poser material don't have any settings for the display curve of the gamma, all hdr light probes have the gamma 2,2, but rendered all textures in poser have the gamma display curve 1,0 if you want tp use the gamma curve 2,2 you need to use all your textures also in the same gamma curve what would be a huge thing to do.. so now or we change the light probe to work in poser, or we going to change the models surfaces to work it right... i think setting hdr light probe on a display cirve 1,0 would fix everything and pple don't have to mess with all the poser surfaces and textures for now, until we get the modern new monitors with that allow us to display the rendered images using hdr textures etc.. Other better rendering software have the option to change the display curve while rendering to 1,0 but still not poser... we have to change the rules a little bit other we will be not happy with the final rendering effect.. so if you export your light probes from your hdr editors change the curve back to 1,0 what allow you to render all your textures in right light... or use the 2,2 hdr and change and convert all your textures to 2,0 and after you render you [dark] looking image, export to photoshop and set it to 1,0 so you and others can see anything... choice is at you

Now you see what looks more natural, all surfaces are the same beside the light probes.. the orginal rendered with the poser7 light probe and the on the right side with new tone mapped light probe.. spheres rendered with one light using hdr light probe and ao..

Thanks Cath... This shows the difference very well. I have a couple examples with the old & the new Pond probe & was going to post them this evening,  but Instead I will do a little tone mapping & set up examples with a few other HDRI that are floating out there.  Want to show the difference & the range of change before & after  with human figures, using custom shaders set to add realism, like my custom work or RSS & BagginsBill's Unbelievably Complicated Figure Shader (AMUCFS)

oops! I missed the message in which cath posted a link to the corrected (tone-mapped) HDRI. can somebody tell me where it is? sorry about that!

Alex..When you export light probe to use with poser at the export time use the display curve gamma 1,0
not the 2,2.., in case you use all textures and backgrund in gamma 2,2 then it is fine...
correct the light probes and trust your eyes, set the collors to most natural as possible, use the pre set Photoreceptor to correct the light probe in Artizen..if you use it... if HDR SHop then set the exposure down until the natural blue sky show up in balance with the rest..  and I can't wait for the result to see.. if you do right your surfaces will show right.. I don't know if the shader nodes you use will work with the HDR light I don't have it so I can't tell.. so try to put some regular object with white diffuse color so I can see what is going on lol... 

I updated the file so you can still download from the old link also both are updated
the link is on PAGE 6

o.k., thanks, cath. then the tone-mapped image is called "dom-ldri-test-map.jpg"?

No I did not included any hdr maps with that b/c this is not allowed for share the contest from poser... you should do it by yourself ...sorry
I will upload some free maps as well soon ..
rescale the ball in the scene from 6000 % to 20.000 %  apply the hdr maps from the HDR textures from Poser7 content there are the light probes and the sphere maps in a hdr format..
add the light probe fromr the poser7 and render .. so much to do, however you will get over exposed effect on your models, b/c of the lil bad light probe..
but I know you have some more light probes from other artist so plug something new in..
The sphere i created yesterday is for the panoramic standart HDR maps that you can find on the net buy or donwload for free .. search google only

MEC4D said:

Quote - Alex.... I don't know if the shader nodes you use will work with the HDR light I don't have it so I can't tell.. so try to put some regular object with white diffuse color so I can see what is going on lol... 

I will include white spheres & objects for reference , but the skin shaders do look quite good under HDRI, the first 2 tests I posted & my portrait examples were all shaded as such (the Real Skin Shader, with a few tweaks in this case)

I think it's looking quite fine hehe. Now with right (tone mapped) HDRI probes & bkg... :thumbupboth:

Will try to put a few things up tonight.

Ready to go skinny dipping hehe.

I tone mapped both the lightprobe & the latitude map for the pond HDR, & here are the results.

I added 1 infinate light for sun, shadow, & specular. The "MECdome" is scaled to 20,000% & the figure about 3000% to get the right scale & perspective.  I added a cloth plane as a shadow catcher under him & the balls.

One Tip: Turn off cast shadows on the environment sphere, that way your shadow catcher won't cast a shadow & still work (I had a hard time with this, then a couple min later...Duh figured it out

With the HDRI tone mapped correctly, I can set contrast to zero & get just diffused light, but on this I turned the contrast up quite a bit (around 6.0) to give more shading & depth with just the HDRI IBL, & then the shadow/sun light enhances everything.

More to come soon (after work that is ).

Attached Link: V4 takes the plunge, 1024x768

Click for full view of the render at 1/2 size...

Click on attached link for full 1024x768

I am just plunging (pun intended) into this subject, and have not read the thread yet, but I will. 

I made this render last night with Carrara 6 Pro. No supplemental lights, high render settings, used the "Pond" non-AO file that came with Poser 7, have not looked for the "tone corrected" one yet. Also, I just did about 10 lo-res tests and then one final, plus I am brand new to Carrarra, so don't consider this a highly tweaked offering. 

The backdrop is from the .hdr file only. Render time for 1024x768 = 1 hour, 2 minutes.

::::: Opera ::::

i will add that it is going to be great in Carrara to get verisimilitude with V4 and settings and HDRI with such little fuss, perhaps no additional lights to set, and the .hdr itself rendering on the inside of a "dome" backdrop which exists in the app by default. [I will need to figure out how to make shadows and/or reflections on the ground plane in C6, obviously.]

I echo others who say this should get implemented in Poser8/Pro.

::::: Opera ::::

bookmarked

Alex, your final test looking good as well!! I luv the light and colors there, you got it! welcome in da club! however the balls have not textures and are exposed.. never use any white color on the surface.. change the diffuse color to 127 127 127 and plug in a Math node : simple color and there change the color you want to use on the object...

The IBL contrast affect the Ambient Occlusion in the scene too , for the perfect tone mapped Light probe the contrast at 1,0 is correct... more shadows? put the value UP, minder shadows ( AO) put the value DOWN .. simple is beautiful...

@ Operaguy, you should make test with poser, so we stay on the subject... :))
i don't know carrara settings so i dont know if this is fine.. the tricks here are only for use with Poser 7.. other softwares have different settings..

Hey Catharina, not sure if I ever told you this, but your work is absolutely top notch!  :)  I have your older hdri maps and love them, especially the hdri-in room warm jpg since most of my work is indoors.  Do you plan on doing some new ones?

I am now using Carrara 6pro, and despite the bugs, handles AO and shadowing extremely well.  Your maps work great, but the experimentation is never ending when one is trying to learn how to simulate human skin, bumps/displacement, SSS, lighting, and shadows!

Again, you are my absolute mentor, love your work.

Philip

Hello Philip, thank you very much, I am working as well on new stuff.. coming soon..
making many tests before I can put something on the market, the new maps would be in hdr version so much more better as the one for poser6 with ibl ldr..  the in room was my favorite too :)

Human skin is to complex, i made yesterday tests with a head maps, every maps separate for all effects.. it is huge.. but working perfect.. only face have so much different areas of sss, bump maps etc.. to get it right you need a right maps, only shader nodes will never do that it is imposible

Thank you again!!
Cath

Excellent news Cath, I can't wait to see what you come up with for the Skin.  The problem for me is trying to figure out how to do this stuff in Carrara, but its all good!

Thanks,
Philip