Hi folks,

I'm interested in selling some of my work as canvas prints, but I've been quite disheartened by the fact that, to put it bluntly, my work just doesn't look good enough!

I've seen many renders out there which look stunningly realistic, but I've been unable to produce such effects unless I create pieces which feature dramatic lighting, or edit them heavily in Photoshop to create artistic effects. I'd love to be able to create renders of my characters which make them virtually indistinguishable from photographs.

I've played around with PP11 and EZSkin 3, as shown in Annie's render here, but she still looks like a 3D character!

Would someone kindly take me by the hand and walk me through creating a photorealistic render of one of my characters, please?

Here is the test render with Annie from PP11:

Here is an example of one of my renders with Annie which could have been a photograph to begin with, but it's hard to tell, due to the heavy postwork:

Hologlitch

And here is an example of one of my renders with Annie which features dramatic lighting and atmospheric effects. This is pretty much the most photorealistic render I've ever been able to create with only minor postwork on colours and levels:

Soulrays 003

I'm happy with the final two going to print, but I'd really love to produce renders which are evenly lit, full colour and photorealistic.

Thanks,

Glen.

Forgot the nudity tag. Many apologies! :(

Just putting it out there that dramatic lighting and after render image enhancement is normal and not something to be viewed negatively. That said, my best advice is to look at actual photographs, pick one, and attempt to recreate it - lighting, set, clothing, the works. In doing so, it may become apparent to you where you're going wrong. One of the things I can tell you right now, without knowing your workflow is that if it looks good without textures, it will look even better with them. So setup your scenes without the textures visible. If you can do that and make a compelling image, you're well on your way.

This video may help you with the lighting aspect. It's for modo but lighting rules work regardless of application.

I had written out a detailed post with lots of explanation etc, but I then clicked the link you posted and, for some really stupid reason, it loaded it up in the same tab and wiped my post, when every other site I use opens links like that in new tabs.

Short version: Thank you very much. I'll have a go at 'clay rendering' and I'll watch the video. Thanks! mumbles to self I'm fine, really, not even mad! :D ¬_¬

Have you read through this thread?

http://forum.runtimedna.com/showthread.php?102517-Skin-shader-from-Blender-thread-WIP/page4#post934359

Hi, yes, I put some of those suggestions to use in Annie's test render above. I'm trying Reality again though, so we'll see where that goes. :)

My own opinion is that the two most important aspects of realism in figure renders are lighting and posing. If either isn't right, the render will not seem realistic. Even with perfect lighting and shaders, if the pose is wrong, it will look like a photo of very realistic... mannequin.

Details are extremely important, as we humans notice even the tiniest details when assessing other humans. For example, in your first render, the position of the right hand, while possible, would be very, very uncomfortable to maintain for even a moment. Try it yourself. The hand moves pretty easily from side to side away from the thumb. But if you try to move your hand from side to side towards the thumb, its movement is much more limited. If you twist your forearm as well, as the model does in the pic, it becomes quite uncomfortable.

When I cover a breast with my right hand, I naturally bend my hand away from my wrist, without even thinking. So, while technically the pose you showed is _possible _, it's very unlikely because someone covering her breast will simply choose to bend in a much more comfortable way.

We will notice such things in a render, perhaps unconsciously, and as a result, it won't look quite right to us.

The solution is to use actual photographic references and to pay extremely close attention to the smallest details.

Notice the angle of the hand covering the breast in each photo:

Fortunately, as you can see, you can find photo references for poses pretty easily. I just googled: female covering breast with hand to get these images.

I think the best posing method is to use a canned pose that someone else created to get started, and then use photo references to fix their mistakes. (Even the best vendors will make errors in posing from time to time.)

I tried to update by adding nudity tag to post, but... alas.... it doesn't seem to be working.

Edit: In any case, Teyon's advice is spot on! Use photo references. And the experience of trying to recreate a photo exactly will teach you more than any kind of tutorial.

Black n White photos sure but colored ,Even in high end app's I don't think they reach 100% realism. might hit 80% with a lot of post. it's lights,render settings,poses n all that for sure + maps are very important n where I think they fall short are the shaders.

it's a lost cause for me to try realism so I try for cool ;)

Glen ,I defiantly give your renders a cool :)

Thanks folks. Hmmm, I guess I missed the part with the hand, thanks! After working with other characters and noticing more realism from them, I think I'm having an issue with Annie's materials being quite low resolution. That's a serious bummer because, to fix this, I'll need to create new maps while keeping her looking like Annie. Hmmm.

moriador posted at 11:52AM Fri, 01 April 2016 - #4263600

My own opinion is that the two most important aspects of realism in figure renders are lighting and posing. If either isn't right, the render will not seem realistic. Even with perfect lighting and shaders, if the pose is wrong, it will look like a photo of very realistic... mannequin.

Details are extremely important, as we humans notice even the tiniest details when assessing other humans. For example, in your first render, the position of the right hand, while possible, would be very, very uncomfortable to maintain for even a moment. Try it yourself. The hand moves pretty easily from side to side away from the thumb. But if you try to move your hand from side to side towards the thumb, its movement is much more limited. If you twist your forearm as well, as the model does in the pic, it becomes quite uncomfortable.

When I cover a breast with my right hand, I naturally bend my hand away from my wrist, without even thinking. So, while technically the pose you showed is _possible _, it's very unlikely because someone covering her breast will simply choose to bend in a much more comfortable way.

We will notice such things in a render, perhaps unconsciously, and as a result, it won't look quite right to us.

The solution is to use actual photographic references and to pay extremely close attention to the smallest details.

Notice the angle of the hand covering the breast in each photo:

Fortunately, as you can see, you can find photo references for poses pretty easily. I just googled: female covering breast with hand to get these images.

I think the best posing method is to use a canned pose that someone else created to get started, and then use photo references to fix their mistakes. (Even the best vendors will make errors in posing from time to time.)

Your right, when I saw the first render it looked uncomfortable to me even though I did not have an idea as to why. The references you use immediately seemed more relaxed although again, without your explanation, I doubt I could have explained why.

I think that definitely is one area I could improve on with some renders, however, if we were to crop the image to Annie's face, it would still clearly be a 3D render. I don't know why, but it just looks 3D.

Another example of a render which I hoped would appear more realistic than it does is the one below.

Boho in the Meadow

The image lacks detailed texture, too much skin specular highlighting for an ordinary scene, darker shadows in background does not match figure shadows, AO missing from accessories and clothing, eye pupils too large, mouth appears to be glowing, DoF looks awkward. I can keep on going but I think you get idea of way it fails as realistic.

I'm not sure how I can change the shadows, as it was all rendered in one take and I would have hoped that Poser would at least be able to keep shadows consistent.

With regards to AO, I read somewhere that this was old technology and not needed in high quality PP2014 renders, so I haven't bothered with it at all. To be frank, I'm not even sure what it does. Maybe that's a big thing I'm failing on.

What about depth of field looks awkward, is it too much?

As far as specularity goes, I used the EZSkin plugin with out of the box settings. What should I change there? Same with her mouth, it's all EZSkin shaders and I don't know what to change. The lips are the same as the face.

Thanks for your feedback.

Poser - Lighting 201: Ambient Occlusion

Ambient Occlusion is a map in substance n a lot of app's .

different app's can work different ways or have a different definition for some thing.

different app's use different maps. I can make some not herd a lot about maps in substances , think there for certain game engines ,that you've not herd a lot about.

you can goolge

ambient occlusion ,specular ,normal ,bump ,diffuse ,displacement ,vector .etc etc

bump .newer tech displacement .newer tech vector. normal gamers use a lot.

The Secrets of Realistic Texturing in Blender

Roxie has specular ,bump ,diffuse ,I think. I don't have V4 loaded but V6 has specular ,bump ,diffuse ,normal. I think

maps make or break a mesh. if your character or close etc etc don't have the maps needed maybe you could use CrazyBump to make the maps.

Ok, thanks.

Thinking about it, maybe I can get some good results from only using IDL? I remember seeing some pieces somewhere which only used IDL and they were pretty fantastic looking. I have Sasha posing against a wall in a white room which I've built out of primitive squares. With her, I have set up three softboxes at various locations and angles to give a reasonably even illumination of her body. I've cranked the pixel samples and IDL quality up to the top and am doing a quarter-sized render at the moment. The test renders in the preview window didn't look too bad, though they were very grainy. If it looks any good, I'll post it here, otherwise, I'll fiddle 'til I get it right or find that it won't work for me.

Hi Glen, I'm thinking that some contrast could give more realism in the render. All what the guys said here is true - people are looking for details. Give the brain of the observer something to do. And the difference between the model and the dead props increases the realisfic feeling.

Henning

Thank you very much.

Here are few of my older renders in Poser Pro 2014,they're still doesn't look photo-realistic

All has been rendered with IDL and Gamma Correction and in Poser Pro 2014

Hope this helps

Thanks,Jura

The pose is much better!

IDL along with gamma correction will almost certainly enhance the lighting. I always uncheck the "light emitter" checkbox on anything with a transparency (hair and plants, usually), though, because otherwise the render will take too long for my impatient soul.

Checking the "crisp" texture option for the skin in EZSkin may also enhance the render of the skin. Sometimes it doesn't work very well. Sometimes it's fantastic. It's a toss-up, but if you haven't tried it, it's worth a go.

I've noticed -- at least in my case -- that most firefly renders come out of Poser with less contrast than they appear to have when you view the render within Poser. Dunno why. Taking the image into an editor for post processing, however, can do wonders for that.

Now, as for photorealism, you can have ideal, you can have real, and you can have realistically ideal. Ideal never really looks right to me. For example, when people (even children), squint with their lower eyelids, there are going to be folds under there. And no one over the age of about 10 has such perfectly smooth lower lids (except maybe the seriously photoshopped 50 year old Hugh Laurie in a L'Oreal ad). She's an adult. Don't be afraid to give her face just a hint of character.

Anyway, you put up a reasonably high res image, so I took it into photoshop and gave enhancing it a shot. When I increased the detail level, it was apparent that there are lots of details in the texture. They just aren't showing up in the render. But you can't enhance them too much in post, or the skin starts to look really dirty. As I said earlier, using the crisp setting on the skin textures might really make a difference. I did add some light effects to give the image a bit more depth. Don't know if the final result is better, though. However, if you decide to give post processing a try, consider rendering with HDR optimization checked and then export as an .HDR image. You get a lot more data to play with and can do quite a bit more. Also, just in case you don't have them, Google is giving away the Nik Software suite of photoshop filters for free. They really are quite amazing, and a lot of fun to play with. And if you don't have photoshop, I believe it's possible to get them to work in Gimp (though it would take some fiddling).

You can see that with the details enhanced that her left forearm needs a few gentle swipes with the morph brush.

Finally, I love the skirt!!. But that shirt desperately needs a better texture. I bet even a tiling texture would work very well.

I did these ones about 3.5 years ago. IDL plus gamma correction and SSS are really pretty keen. The skin textures do make a difference on close-up, especially when you boost them in post.

I posted these on DeviantArt, and someone commented on the last one that I should give the model his compliments. I didn't think she looked real enough to talk to. LOL. Thanks Vicki Four, The Girl Next Door!

Just to be clear, I could list dozens and dozens of obvious and blatant flaws with the images I posted above, from posing problems to details in the mesh to shaders to post processing. (Example, top pic: She's wearing an earring, but there's no actual hole in her ear! The skin on the earlobe should be pushed in slightly where the metal goes through. It may seem like a tiny thing, but even subconsciously we notice stuff like that. And let's not talk about the hair.) Actual photorealism -- I've certainly got a long way to go still. :) These days I spend more time trying to make my images look like illustrations. :D

hornet3d posted at 7:19PM Sun, 03 April 2016 - #4263628

Your right, when I saw the first render it looked uncomfortable to me even though I did not have an idea as to why. The references you use immediately seemed more relaxed although again, without your explanation, I doubt I could have explained why.

I figured it out simply by quickly trying the pose myself. That made it self-evident very quickly. Then, just to be sure it wasn't just that my own wrist is peculiarly stiff, I checked online for references. I have a rule: If something looks wrong, it is wrong. Even when it isn't... many actual photos have bizarre problems -- but you don't get a pass as a photographer just because "it's a photo," right? :D

Thank you very much, moriador! I do have the Nik Collection, yes, I've used it quite a lot, but I don't really know what I'm doing with anything, so I just move things about until it looks nice. Do you remember what settings you used? I'm thinking that the colours are a bit bright, but it's not bad overall. Yes, her top is a bit lifeless. I'd really love to get her a tank or strappy with a really lovely looking crocheted cardigan to put over the top. I've been looking for a crocheted cardigan for years, not managed to find one. I've found a couple of flat ones with transparencies, but they don't cut it, it has to look like big lumps of yarn.

Maps make a huge difference, I know. I did a cheeky render with Annie quite some time ago wearing a tulip hat. The hat looks awesome.

I'll try what you've suggested, thank you very much!

Hah. Love the expression! And, the hat is awesome! Up close, the skin textures look good. Mouth and tongue are great. It's just the shaders that are off in this one. Fix that and give the contrast in the overall image a boost, and I think it'd be quite lovely.

For a crocheted cardigan, most of that would be in the tex maps, you're right. The pale green shirt in the other render would make a fine cardigan, I'd think, with the right tex maps. I wonder if I can come up with something in Filter Forge. If I get something workable, I'll post it here. I know I can do knits and wool that look pretty decent.

When it comes to Nik Software, I've found that the only thing that works to figure it out is to experiment like mad. And if you get a result you like -- save the recipe. One of my favorites filters at the moment is in Color EF -- Sunlight. And I use Pro Contrast as the last filter in a recipe just about every time.

Oh, and as for what I did with your picture... I made tried a bunch of different things in combination and saved about 30 odd different layers, which I think played with, changing the blending modes and opacity to see what would happen, until I got something that looked kinda like what I wanted.

I do remember using Sunlight and Detail Extractor (very gently). Plus Pro Contrast to finish. But the entire process was insanely complicated because I enjoy playing around with it too much.

Hah, thank you! Hmm, you can make knitwear maps? Do you think you'd be able to make something like this please, with a transparency map for the small holes in the knit? I'd love to put Annie in a bikini like this, or even a leotard! That would be so awesome! :)