Yes its me again, the newbie with another question lol.  Ok so in the VSS, when i sync it for some reason it takes away a few things on my figure. One is the makeup and nail paint. And the other big one is, i made fishnets on the limbs texture, for some reason it takes it away when i sync, and no fishnets anymore . Help grandmaster of poser, i need your help =)

These elements of your figure, were they done with multiple images blended together using nodes? Is the makeup actually drawn on the figure's color map? Is the nail color from using a color parameter in the nodes, or part of the texture?

the makeup and nails were just a click from my poses library, they were part of a figure texture.  The fishnets i did in photoshop over the V4 texture as a new layer, then flattend the image. If this info helps out at all

I understand you used a mat-pose to click these on. The question is how was the makeup accomplished. If there is more than one color map involved, then we go one way. If there was just one color map involved, we go another way. Either way I'll ask more questions.

If the color of the fingernails is not in the color map image, then it was in a node - part of the material definition that goes beyond the texture set. That means we need to use a fingernail polish material, not the default skin material applied to the nail zone.

If you flattened the fishnet into a single image, then it should work.

Can you show me a render without VSS and with VSS? Can you show me the shader before VSS? I have no idea what you're seeing.

Sometimes people say something is "gone" when it is still there, but just weaker.

Sure ill see if i can get them posted for you bill, thanks so so much.

IM at a friends house messin around with his poser stuff so give me a bit to try and get these posted =)

I've had this as well most noticeably with the lips and finger and toenails.
All I have been doing though after I run the sync script is then re applying the nail texture
and the lip texture and then make some node changes manually based partially on what I have read
from bagginsbill's postings and tutorial stuff. It's no where near as good as what he does, but then I am still learning my way through the vss marvel.

Sounds like you want to be using a different material for the lips and nails.

VSS is about copying a set of shaders onto multiple materials zones on your target figure. You do not have to use my shaders - you can put any shaders you want in the Template material zones.

The trick here is that VSS, by default, is applying the Template Skin shader to skin, lip, nails - everything except eye and inner mouth parts. This means that the material applied to the lip, nails, and other skin areas is identical. They will only differ in which texture maps are used.

If you want fingernails that are using a different shader, then you have to change things in the VSS control prop.

You want to create a new material in the VSS control prop for the nails. Then you want to put a nice glossy nail shader in there. One you might want to try is from my free Orb shader set. You'd also want to change the "Shader Rules" in the control prop so it knows you do not want to copy Template Skin to the fingernails. So you'd create a new material zone, like Template Nails. You'd add a Shader Rule node to Copy Template Nails. And you'd wire up the Rule fingernail or whatever to connect it to Copy Template Nails.

I think this was discussed in the VSS Guide, and/or in the gigantic VSS discussion thread. I'm too tired to look. (Been working too much lately).

Or you could just re-apply some other mat-pose to restore the fingernails as incantrix does.

As for the lips, some people actually use different node settings for the lip material zone. But I really discourage that. It works ok for a figure that is really far away, but up close you see a hard edge that is very unrealistic. For this reason, I wish nobody had ever included a separate material zone for the lips. It's much better to have a face texture with the lip color you want blended properly where it joins the skin around the edge of the lips. Or, a more advanced technique, is to have the same shader for lips and face, but the shader includes a mask (like a transmap) that causes a different color and shininess to be used on the lip area.

This is one of the things I've been meaning to get around to for a couple years now - to make a set of lipstick effect masks to be used with VSS. Then you could just dial in what color lips you want, and how shiny, and VSS would take care of it. Same with eyeshadow, eyeliner, and similar stuff. But I'm just too busy with work and haven't done it.

Robynsveil has been working on these things.

Hey BB, i can faintly see the fishnets once i sync the vss and render. Pics comming now

You can see that the fishnets are just barly still there

also when i go back to see the texture map on V4 skinleg, ts not my fishnet texture map but the one that was there before

All sorts of effects are possible with multi-layered shaders controlled by mask images. Lipstick, lip liner, eye shadow, tan lines, stockings, french manicure - tons of stuff is possible.

I demonstrated many of these in this thread:

http://www.renderosity.com/mod/forumpro/showthread.php?thread_id=2772463&page=1

Have a look on page 3 to see lots of lip treatments, all using the same default texture set.

I never got that product off the ground because I had to solve the problem of making these shaders work with any texture set. That led to the creation of VSS.  Since then I pretty much just stopped working on it.

I'm tired. yawn I should go to bed even though it's only 8:35 pm.

Quote - also when i go back to see the texture map on V4 skinleg, ts not my fishnet texture map but the one that was there before

Huh?!? Then how is it drawing the fishnet (faintly)?

i have no clue =(

Is there a bump map involved with the fishnet? Did you connect the color map to the bump channel in the shader before running VSS?

That is the kind of stuff that really throws VSS off - using the color map for things you shouldn't be using it for.

Before you run VSS, are there two Image_Maps in the shader? I need to see what VSS is seeing before you run Synchronize.

ill try and find where your talking about.  Hey any clue how to take a screen capture on a MAC?

where do i look for them, in template skin in the vss materials?

Nope - I don't know how to screen cap on a MAC.

Quote - where do i look for them, in template skin in the vss materials?

I'm talking about the figure, the shader on the figure, before VSS modifies it. Not the VSS materials, the figure's materials as they were before you synchronized.

VSS analyzes your existing materials and tries to make a vss version of it.

is this what you wantd to see? or go into advance ?

I pretty much always use different materials for the lips and nails.
generally when I get the skin I want I tend to look for lips and nails that i think work with it.

I did read in the vss discussion thread about changing rules and that which I presume can make the script bypass or ignore those areas. But have not even started looking at the rules side of it as yet.
Still catching up on that discussion thread though as it is huge and with so much information.
If you get around to doing the lipstick and other shaders I think it would be fantastic.
And honestly I dont know how you find the time you at present just to keep up with all the forums that you do.  Let alone keep improving things.

@meltz: Screen capture on a Mac...

Hit Cmd-Shift-4, then use the cross-hairs to define your capture area. It saves by default to your desktop, I think... at least mine does. It saves as a png and usually quite a big filesize, so before posting I always open it up in Preview and Save as a jpg at 50 to 80% quality, depending on how much detail I need to show.

Btw, I received your VSS script files. I'll take a look at them when I get home from work this evening.

Quote - here is the advanced

I need to know what images are in those color image maps. We're trying to figure out what VSS sees for your images before it calculates the modified shader.

There are multiple image maps in there, and you said you replaced one with your fishnet color map. Then when you applied VSS, it used the original color map. Also, after it supposedly removed your fishnet color map, it still faintly drew the fishnet, leading me to wonder what is in the bump map.

So since they're all closed, I can't tell a thing, other than there are multiple maps involved.

Once I understand what the initial state is, then I'll ask more questions.

Ugh. Now I can't see the connections.

In the future, open images so I see the image, and open other nodes so I see the parameter values and connections. I don't need to see the preview images of math and other types of nodes. They don't show anything even if I did want them. I just wanted to see the images you had loaded and where they went.

OK so I see that you have two different color maps in there. VSS has to choose one since the shader is not set up for two color maps at the same time.

Since you have both the old and new in there, it may be that after applying my VSS Template Skin, it used old color map.

Go into the materials before VSS runs, and fix the issue with two color maps being there. Either collapse that to one color map, or make sure both Color_Texture and Color_Texture_4 refer to the same image. Then Synchronize and see what you get.

BB it worked =) thanks so so much. I'll get this learning curve eventually. All i did was match up the maps in there and it worked.

One more question, to change the skin tone of a texture, do i just go to the VSS Template Skin an then change it in PMC: Color Tint? tring to get a native american looking skin from the whit skin i have loaded in. 

Quote - BB it worked =) thanks so so much. I'll get this learning curve eventually. All i did was match up the maps in there and it worked.

One more question, to change the skin tone of a texture, do i just go to the VSS Template Skin an then change it in PMC: Color Tint? tring to get a native american looking skin from the whit skin i have loaded in. 

Yep. "Tinting" is not one of those well known CG concepts. I made it up as a verbal shorthand.

There are an infinite number of ways to take an image with certain colors in it, and change it using color math to a different but related set of colors. Listing all of these, and why you use one versus the either, would require an entire book, one I just happen to be writing.

But I'll give you the short and sweet version.

Basic grade-school arithmetic gives us add, subtract, multiply, and divide. (+, -, *, /) Higher level math gives us polynomials, exponentiation (powers and roots), logarithms, trigonometric functions, etc. All of these can be used to manipulate colors, and they can be assembled in combinations - yielding infinite possibilities. I use all of these in my shaders and for the most part you don't need to know why.

Tinting, as I define it, is very simple. You take a variable color pattern, like a pattern that captures skin/lip/mole layout, or a wood grain, and you multiply it with a constant color. In the VSS shader, the PMC:Tint color is multiplied with your color map.

If you'll recall, multiplication has a couple interesting special cases. Multiply x with 1 (x * 1) and the result is just x - no change, regardless of what x is. The other special case is multiply x with 0 (x * 0) and the result is always 0, regardless of what x is.

In color multiplication, each of the Red, Green, and Blue values from the two colors are independently multiplied to produce the new values for Red, Green, and Blue. So for color multiplication, the color WHITE (RGB 255, 255, 255) is the equivalent of the numerical value 1. And the color BLACK (RGB 0, 0, 0) is the equivalent of the numerical value of 0.

So... Tinting with WHITE produces no change in the colors. X * WHITE = X
Tinting with BLACK produces BLACK no matter what. X * BLACK = BLACK.

This is why the default value of PMC:Tint is WHITE. This is the value to use that does nothing - it does not Tint the colors even though Tinting is always turned on.

Everything in between BLACK and WHITE produces something more interesting.

Going back to basic arithmetic, let's think about x * t, where t is the tint value. When t is 1, we've established that the result is unchanged, x * 1 = x. But what if t is just slightly less than 1? For example, if x = .535 and t = .99, then the result is .52965. This is very close to the original value .535 because t is very close to 1. If t is .8, then x * t is .428 which is a bigger difference, but still not a very big difference.

Now the same holds for colors. Colors which are close to white will produce relatively small but noticeable changes to the color from your color map. These colors are commonly known as "pastel" colors.

In every case, tinting with a pastel color will slightly darken the color and depending on the basic hue of the tint, will cause a color cast in the original colors that is similar to the hue of the tint color. The stronger the saturation is in the tint color, the more the color map will be forced to take on that hue. The darker the luminance of the tint color, the more the color map will be darkened.

In certain cases, tinting can actually de-saturate the colors of your color map. For example, most skin color maps have a strong red component, medium green, and weak blue. If you tint with a tint color that is weak red, medium green, and strong blue, you can actually make these become more balanced, resulting in something that is closer to a shader of gray. We use this trick a lot in VSS, because many color maps have too much red in them, something called burned-in subsurface scattering. The VSS skin shader wants to add red from subsurface scattering in various places, depending on which way the light is falling. But if you start with a very red color map, the effect is that the figure looks sun-burned. So we often use a cyan colored tint to basically remove some of that burned-in redness, and let the rest of the shader decide where to add it back.

The other use for tinting is to create ethnic variations, which is what you're trying to do. For the most part, if you're starting with a pale caucasian color map, then you can make it darker simply by using a tint color that is a shade of gray, such as RGB 200, 200, 200. The darker the tint, the darker will be the result. If you want it more red, then use a little extra red in the tint, like RGB 230, 200, 200. If you want it a little more yellow, then use a little extra red and a lot of extra green, like RGB 200, 230, 180.

Experiment with various tints and you can achieve a lot of interesting variations in skin tone.

Sometimes, you end up with the hue and saturation you want, but the overall luminance becomes darker than you like. In such cases, you can try increasing PM:Boost value, which is pretty much a final amplifier of the brightness of the skin. The other thing you can do is insert a Math:Add node and connect it to the PMC:Tint color. Increase the value above 1, and you brighten the color without changing the hue or saturation.

Here's a workflow tip. When you manipulate the PMC:Tint value in the VSS Control Prop for Template Skin, you can see the changes in the preview image on the Poser Surface, but they are shown against a plain white color. After synchronizing and rendering, you may find that the color you ended up with was unexpected and not what you were trying to get. This happens to me all the time. So here's how I handle it.

Synchronize. Now, switch your material room from VSS, and instead display one of the skin zones on your figure, for example the torso. This will show the preview of the shader with the actual color map you've got loaded on the Poser Surface.

Make adjustments to the PMC:Tint value right there on the figure's torso material. With each change, you'll be able to see a reasonable approximation of how that looks in the Poser Surface preview. You may make several adjustments until you think it's about where you want it. Then write down the color you entered here in the torso. Switch back to the VSS Control Prop Template Skin, and enter the same color there. Then Synchronize, to copy this setting to all the skin zones.

I find this to be a big time saver versus repeatedly adjusting, synchronizing, and test rendering.

Quote - OK so here I go with another question. The problem i ran into is that i darkend his texture in the VSS Template Skin/PMC: Color Tint. Now the skin is the shade i wanted but the problem is that the red pants on the texture is painted right on the texture itself. Is there a way i can brighten the pants part of the texture  but still keep his skin shade?

Red pants? Those are pants, not his legs? You have a figure that has both skin and cloth in the same material zone?

This is a bad thing, from a realism standpoint. Even if "pants" are the same exact color as your skin, this is a different material (real world material in this sense) and the shader for cloth is wildly different that the shader for skin, regardless of what color we're talking about. You should fix this figure so that you have a different material zone for any built-in clothing. You do not want to be using my skin shader on a pair of pants or tights or anything similar.

ok ill try and see whati can do. I think i just might go buy the M4 bodysuit from daz and put that on him for his tights.

M4?

But M4 has separate material zones for the hip and legs. Why don't you just change the Shader Rules to not copy the skin template onto the legs? You want a different shader there - use a different shader.

Once you do, you'll want to learn to create new material zones and new rules to use them.

Click on Designer to get the VSS designer menu of buttons.

Go into the VSS Control Prop.

Click on Add Material Zone. From the dialog pulldown, choose * Other - type it in*. Then type in Template Cloth and hit OK. Now you have a new template on your control prop.

Go into the "Shader Rules" material on the Control Prop. Click "Add a Rule Node". Select * other - type it in *, then type in *skinhip and hit OK. A new rule node will appear near the top. Drag it to an open area.

Do the same to create a rule for *skinleg and *skinfoot.

There is already a rule for toenail. Move that with the other new ones and open it.

Click on "Add a Copy Node" and choose Template Cloth. Drag that over to your other nodes.

This instructs VSS to use the Template Cloth shader for hip, leg, foot, and toenails.

Load a suitable shader for cloth into Template Cloth, Synchronize, and render.

You now have an easy way to manage those four material zones from one place, and all your skin zones from another place.

After making this modified control prop, save it back to your props library as a new prop. I'd call it VSS_M4_Tights.