im loving this, feels like im learning, give me all the info you can

Quote - sorry posted during your posts,lol, will read all the links later on have to go out. do you know why the shader was aborted?

Because it didn't render correctly. I don't know why. It was rendering surfaces without any smooth interpolation of normals, so it looked faceted.

Click for full size.

Example - you'd think a little bump would help.

Look at this hair ball. Observe the artifacts near the top.

This is why I avoid really fine bump and use direct manipulation of the color or reflectivity for this kind of thing.

That's not how hair works. That's just how the anisotropic node works. It's wrong. It's one of those "biased" things that people were OK with in 2001.

Here I rotated the hair ball - that highlight has not moved one pixel. It's wrong.

These are things you have to deal with if you're going to try to supply a generic shader.

I do not have solutions. I have tactics I use, but each tactic is specific to:

• the prop I'm using

• what color I want it

* what the lighting is

I can't find a way to generalize the hackery.

to stop the bump issue near the top why not run it through an edge blend value 1 set to white and the bump plugged into value 2 also white and a numerical value of 1. ok this doesnt fix the bump issue but it removes it from the edges where they cause issues

ok that doesnt adress the whole specular issue.i was wondering if there is a way to trick say the blinn node etc to maybe come up with a better shine? just throwing about ideas

My dumb question of the day: can't you either set the reflection not to go over a certain number (ie max it so it doesn't get hot) or maybe use a bias/gain node (can never remember which one does what) to serve as sort of an ad hoc "map" and use that map to subtract out or limit the extra light?

Quote - My dumb question of the day: can't you either set the reflection not to go over a certain number (ie max it so it doesn't get hot) or maybe use a bias/gain node (can never remember which one does what) to serve as sort of an ad hoc "map" and use that map to subtract out or limit the extra light?

I didn't show all the situations. That was one that was easy to see. There are "hotspots" that should not exist that also are not super bright, either.

As soon as you put enough limits to suppress most of the hot spots, you've pretty well lost the realism of the cases where it is supposed to be bright.

Quote - ok that doesnt adress the whole specular issue.i was wondering if there is a way to trick say the blinn node etc to maybe come up with a better shine? just throwing about ideas

In general? No.

As soon as there are two or more light sources, you can't do any sort of tricks because you don't know anything in the nodes about where those are, where the camera is, etc. This is basic shader 101 stuff that has to be built into Poser nodes because Poser doesn't let me write any shader algorithms. It only lets me snap together the ones it offers.

Quote - I didn't show all the situations. That was one that was easy to see. There are "hotspots" that should not exist that also are not super bright, either.

As soon as you put enough limits to suppress most of the hot spots, you've pretty well lost the realism of the cases where it is supposed to be bright.

I see.  So with the anitoscopic node, you are kind of up the creek either way.  It's a shame SM dropped the other model, it was an interesting read and it looked better than the model they compared it too.

i know that when things are not ready for release with poser sometimes they leave it in but hidden away,could this also be the case with the hair shader they apparently tried? could it be somewhere under the poser hood?

and is this reality 3  going to offer more realistic hair in lux?

Oh it's still there. You can easily make one appear using Python  - it is kNodeTypeCodePOLYGONHAIR.

But it isn't even close to useful.

hmmm i see that in somecases somethings are better hidden away,but you can see where they are going.

it looks as if with this current version of poser we will have to do with a looks good(like the current transmap hair) but atleast gives a better reaction to light.

anyways im off out for dinner then the expendables 2.

will try more hair works tomorow, and thanx BB as always an inspiration

if so is there a way to reduce/remove it?

Ohhh lol to those not knowing what they are looking at in the above pic its the horrible blue colour on th back edges of the hair that are the trouble, i thought at first it was one or both of the specular nodes that i have used but its not them.... removed and still getting blue

Try putting each hair material zone in a different scatter group ...

im not sure by what you mean by that snarly?

Use a different scatter group for each material zone ... see pic

ahh i will give that a go thankyou snarly, probably would have found that if i was near my computer,lol

For Poser10-I really hope they fix the Anistropic node!

and have a hair node

As a matter of interest snarly, in the python script is it possible for it to apply the shader to different material zones and change the scatter_group number in each? if not i think i may have to drop scatter.. im hoping this is possible as scatter looks better than without..

Set the scatter node to Marble, as this one is not tinted.

cheers vince, just giving that a go now.

This is version 6, i have done a little hammering of the anisotropic node to make it play ball,namely that super bright tail it has got. im still tinkering with the shader, hopefully someone might like the results sofar.... of and lastly before i forget, someone,i forget who commented on the shader in the freebie section here and said that it looks good as anime hair if you leave the transparency map out, i havent tried this myself yet... i will later

I have got a GC node attached to this and currently have no idea how to make it into an auto GC as BB suggested, maybe oneday,lol

Click to see the detail.

It does look like it is coming along, however closeups are not very forgiving towards strand resolution.  For farther shots, it looks great.

Quote - As a matter of interest snarly, in the python script is it possible for it to apply the shader to different material zones and change the scatter_group number in each?

Yes, that would be straightfoward - I already do that for the hair shader in EZSkin

Quote - And a close up with the light on the side again.

I have got a GC node attached to this and currently have no idea how to make it into an auto GC as BB suggested, maybe oneday,lol

Click to see the detail.

The GC node might not be much use. It is only available in Poser Pro so Poser 9 users won't get the benefit of it, and Poser Pro users will most likely be using render GC so won't want the node there.

ahh i will replace that node with my other working arangement.

i thought the strand resolution looks good,i  assume you clicked on the image? im interested to know how much strand resolution you need?.... oh and some of the edge hairs are a downside to certain modeling techniques, different hairs look better or worse depending on the hair structure or how it was made

For myself the strands look very good and would do well in portrait renders.  Someone else, though, may want finer detail for extreme closeups in full, studio lighting.  Just my 2 cents.