May I please borrow your expertise?

I've been trying in vain to get the same shiny renders in DAZ that I've gotten in Poser.

Because of limited time and knowhow, I'm hoping someone would kindly help me out so I can complete the DAZ-version of the ThingaMaJigMachine (a fun toy that makes random props).

The speed of the render is a very important factor, because the basic purpose of the ThingaMaJigMachine (apart from making props) is to stimulate creativity, and we all know how those loooong renders tend to vaporize our enthusiasm, don't we? My pathetic experiments with lighting and refraction and reflection took way too long and looked rather terrible    when compared to results from the Poser-version.

Here is a test scene for you to play around with (311kb zip). It includes a ThingaMaJig which was rendered from the Poser-version so you can see the type of effect that I'm after.

I would really appreciate your help in overcoming this hurdle - the person who sends me the shiniest speediest DAZ shader script will receive a full version of the ThingaMaJigMachine, as well as acknowledgement with a link to your website in the final distribution. More info and contact details in the attached zip.

Thanks
`_~
Trienie

Attached Link: Super Shine Shaders for DAZ Studio

Thanks very much for your quick reply!
They look gorgeous, I'm going to try them out right now.
`_~
Trienie

Thanks for that..I'm particularly impressed by the topcoat shader.

Ditto. On round surfaces it looks absolutely stunning.

Unfortunately my ThingaMaJig looks washed-out and my textures fade away. Probably because it's a flat surface, and lights and camera are "out of the box" - I hope to keep it this way because I want to introduce my ArtStarters series to a group of raw newbies next.

I ran into the same problem when I made "Hearts for Dark Backgrounds" and found a solution, but for the life of me I can't remember how I did it. How embarrassing!

I decided to start from scratch, made a "stupid mistake" and got the desired result!

Originally I applied displacement on the texture and it looked dull and flat. When accidentally applying displacement to the shape instead, I had the effect I wanted.

Hope this helps someone sometime...
`_~
T

the shaders I mean, I was trying to put them on a sphere primitive.

I then tried loading up the thingamajig file, hoping that this may solve my problem with the sphere - and I get this error message:

So what does this mean by "correctly" what is "correctly" in this context?

You need to put them in the shaders folder.

Having said that you only really need the topcoat shader as you can choose a colour or texture for your primitive/figure through the surfaces tabs(under diffuse/colour) and then apply the top coat again making sure you have highlighted the figure/primitive in the panel above the shaders tabs as well as in the scene tab.

The topcoat is fantastic on floors in DS.Gives a floor that ballroom shine.