Forgive me if this has been asked before but I'm trying something out in using Normal Maps in Poser. Since I'm having a heck of a time doing bump maps. Has anyone made an attempt at it and where to place it in the materials?

Just thought I ask.

Thanks.

There are several programs which can create normal maps from diffuse texture, some freeware and others not. GIMP has a plugin which is easy to use, I believe Blender might be capable of doing it also, although there is a steep learning curve. Materialize is another free software which can create several different type maps including normal maps. ShaderMap is another program which can also create multiple maps although it is not free but modestly priced. I believe they might be offering a free version. And there is an online site which can convert your maps and allow you to save the results to your hard drive, also free (https://cpetry.github.io/NormalMap-Online/). Those that I mentioned are programs that come to mind, however, there are much more available if you conduct a search.
In the Material Room, if you use the PoserSurface panel, you connect your normal map to the Gradient_Mode Node and use the Tangent Space Normal Map setting. One the PhysicalSurface panel, you use the connecting node name NormalMap.

Thanks hborre, for that info. I have GIMP which I have been following a tut on how to do Bump, Spec and others to the letter. I have tried Materialize and generated a normal map... so I'm familiar with those mentioned. The thing is, I just did a texture map from scratch and wanted to try other things besides going for the bump and specular map.

You are the most helpful.

JB

Try this at github normal map generator free and easy. Link should be allowed. It isn't to a competing store.

I would advise you to take a look at XNormal.

This program calculates a normal map from two 3d models. You take one model, put it into Blender (for example), make it high-poly and sculpt the hell out of it. You load both the original and the sculptes model into XNormal (AFAIK they don't need to have the same geometry) and you will get the differences as a normal map.

If you apply this normal map to your (original) model, it will look very much like the sculpted one.

.... from a slow learner ... Can someone give a simple explanation of what a normal map does, as opposed to specular, trans, bump and displacement. Thank you

operaguy posted at 2:10PM Mon, 11 March 2019 - #4347877

.... from a slow learner ... Can someone give a simple explanation of what a normal map does, as opposed to specular, trans, bump and displacement. Thank you

Seconded!

K

Have a look at the Polycount wiki http://wiki.polycount.com/wiki/Normal_map (old but still good info).

So my understanding is that a normal map stores direction information for each pixel whereas a bump map stores height information for each pixel (height maps can be used for either bump or displacement depending on how they are connected in the material).

In practice then they add relief detail without changing the geometry. Bump maps are far easier to create and manipulate however as normal maps are essentially code - if you're not sure how they work, best to stick with bump.

How bright a surface appears in a render is determined by its angle to the light. A surface pointing directly at a light will receive more light energy than a surface turned away. The angle of a surface is stored as the normal vector, each face of a mesh has a normal and without any mapping the render engine will use this to calculate the output pixel intensity.

Bump and normal maps both generate detail by modifying the base normal of a surface using a uv mapped bitmap that overlays the base mesh. This allows the render engine to calculate a unique normal for each pixel of the bitmap giving the impression of higher res detail. The difference between the two is a bump map contains a height value that the render engine uses to modify the base normal where as the normal map contains a vector (XYZ = RGB) baked in when the map was generated.
Normal maps require software to generate, as already mentioned they are useful for transferring detail from a high res model to a lower res model. They are also specific to the mesh they were generated on, applying a NM from one figure to another can produce strange results.

For Firefly the level of detail may be dependent on the shading rate as textures are averaged across a micro-polygon. Try reducing the shade rate if the bump/NM looks lower res than expected.

Bump and Normal maps work on both diffuse and specular components of light unlike specular maps.

Displacement maps work by modifying the base mesh. Firefly breaks up the base mesh into micro-polygons before applying the displacement map so produce much finer details than Superfly.

Applying Normal maps there are at least two different formats, OpenGL and DirectX, they differ in the Z direction, if you find the relief is inverted it could be the wrong format. I use OpenGL which appears to work ok. Remember to set GC = 1 when applying the texture map.

Thank you Ironsoul, that was clear and incisive. And thanks for the link caisson, I will pursue it.

I think I did something while trying to make a bump map (heightmap - which is an Achilles' Heel with me), and applied it with a Normal map through Materialize, and I believe I'm coming up with something. Liking the results so far. Thanks, guys for all your help.

jartz that looks excellent. I hope you'll post more of your process.

Here's where I'm at with bump maps and SSS. Skin maps "Lana" elite from DAZ

Thanks operaguy. I'd love to share with what knowledge I have, I'm still in learning stage. It's making skin bump maps that always throw me off a bit. As I stated on my last post, I tried to create a face texture (e.g.) and converted into a desaturated black and white map, which comes out so light. So I had to go to Brightness and Contrast in Corel PhotoPaint or Gimp, then duplicate to create the white areas (which is tricky, for me) and use Difference to the layer. There I have my map. Then next, I go to Materialize and use the Diffuse first, then the Height Map (of what I created), then create my Normal Map. I think I did alright. If only there was a tutorial on how to do a good bump map for textures through PS, Gimp etc, but haven't found any. So, this is a learning process...

Here are the things I did so far.

I was told to take the skin map, desaturate it, then invert it. I have done that in the past with success for bump and displacement, but not lately because I'm using the bump map that came with the DAZ "Lana" package.

I'm going to render again, with eyebrows.

:: og ::

One note ...

On the normal map, it appears as though it is inverted such that the areas that should be raised are lowered. Take a look at the nostril, for example. It is raised instead of lowered. Same with the indentations on the lips, and the eyebrows.

I am not familiar with GIMP, but what you would do in Photoshop is open up the normal map in Photoshop, and then go into the "Channels" palette. Then you invert ONLY the GREEN channel, which will "flip" the directions of what is up and what is down. (As Caisson mentioned, there are two formats that differ in what is raised and what is lowered ... Poser prefers Open GL, and many normal map utilities seem to default to DirectX which is probably preferred by game engines)

Otherwise, check whatever utility you used to create your normal map, and check to see if there is an INVERT NORMAL MAP feature there.

Correction .. it was Ironsoul that mentioned that DirectX and OpenGL handle the height direction differently. Didn't edit fast enough LOL

Thanks Deecey, I'll check it out and see what I can come up with.

Operaguy, yeah. I was thinking of the same thing. I was still looking at the dark being low and light being high. Granted when I was doing terrain, it was mostly an inverted greyscale, when I think about it... not to get off topic, so there it is. I'll try that as well.

I am still searching for a more "luscious" complexion as per that first jartz render, but this render is to show the effect of high bump on eyebrows.

Firefly render with high settings and GI active, with a dome and an area light, one small spotlight.

:: og ::

Really nice render, operaguy.

I've been trying out the bump map part as we mentioned: Should I invert the greyscale or should I just desaturate it, go to Materialize, use Diffuse, the Heightmap, and the Normal and call it a day? I did a bit of trial and error and went to said program (Materialize) again, and I darken the skin texture in Diffuse, went to PhotoPaint and desaturate the dark diffuse map, went back to Materialize, add the Height Map I created, then create the Normal Map, and save it. As Deecey stated, when I open the Normal map to my Paint program some of the side go upward. So I went to Green channel, Inverted it and all goes down. I did a texture render of LaFemme, and I think it's going okay.

I love how you did the Eyebrows. Was that under a bump map or Normal. With my Normal, my brows are downward...

I am working only with bump maps, and procedural bump. I can't answer your question, I don't have the knowledge and experience with those other programs, and exactly zero with normal maps!

This info from ironsoul is encouraging me to stay on my path with Firefly and bump/displacement:

"For Firefly the level of detail may be dependent on the shading rate as textures are averaged across a micro-polygon. Try reducing the shade rate if the bump/NM looks lower res than expected. Bump and Normal maps work on both diffuse and specular components of light unlike specular maps. Displacement maps work by modifying the base mesh. Firefly breaks up the base mesh into micro-polygons before applying the displacement map so produce much finer details than Superfly."

Frankly, there's too much trial and error with procedural. I spent enough time attempting to tweak the settings to know it is the road to frustration for me. So I'm sticking with Firefly renders with GI and tweaking the settings for SSS, Specular, and the bump maps that came with the set.

More importantly, the map-set I'm working with is spectacular. Whatever genius created it for DAZ, I wish I could find more like it. The camera used must have been powerful. What's odd is that the only one of the four "V4 Elite Maps" that are this fine is the "Lana." The others all have issues.

::::: Opera :::::

OpenEXR file of a render. Post-process to desaturate, unsharp mask, and tone mapping, for effect.

::::: Opera :::::

Once more, with feeling...

You absolutely_ cannot _make a valid bump map from a desaturated diffuse map. So it follows that if you then make a normal map from that, it will be wrong.

Don't simply take my word for it; you can either see for yourself that the raised and indented areas correspond to colour, which is nothing to do with the underlying texture. Any areas that look correct are more down to happy coincidence than anything else.

If that ain't good enough for you, search out older threads on the subject, particularly BagginsBill's comments about it.

So there.

I long ago gave up using the diffuse for bump, and am only tweaking the bump map that came with the "Lana" package. I'll check BB's comments, hopefully they teach a way to make a bump map!

I guess I'm sorry I mentioned that old idea.

:: og ::

operaguy posted at 9:40PM Thu, 14 March 2019 - #4348072

I long ago gave up using the diffuse for bump, and am only tweaking the bump map that came with the "Lana" package. I'll check BB's comments, hopefully they teach a way to make a bump map!

I guess I'm sorry I mentioned that old idea.

:: og ::

Hey, you're an OK fella. I just didn't want you wasting your time.

Thanks, Sam. Can you or anyone help with the settings of a bump map? a) is there a video tutorial on it somewhere, or a PDF tutorial? b) is it explained in the Poser user manual. I mean an actual "this is what will change" level?

I would love to know what each of these actually do:

Checing the manual, I'm finding "some" information about those nodes....

Sam Therapy, I'm not saying you are wrong, and I'm not saying that BB does not know the deep truth, but just for the record, the Poser manual suggests the desaturated/inverted diffuse map for a bump!

::::: Opera :::::

With the digital emily project they used the specular reflection map to build the normal map. I'm assuming this avoids the problem of skin pigment variations and SSS impacting the detail. They probably also used a model that wasn't wearing makeup and had washed her face to make the distribution of sebum more even.

Makeup/washed clean ...

Ironsoul, that is one of my issues with the "V4 Elite Skin maps" from DAZ ... while the Lana set her face is totally devoid of makeup and definitely deep cleaned, with the others, Amy and Marie, the photoed skin is not "honest." How someone could think that the basis for a skin map should have makeup and/or plucked eyebrows is beyond comprehension.

How do you obtain a "specular reflection map?" Can you precipitate that out from a photograph? I wonder if "Materialize" can do that? I'm going to check tomorrow.

The article behind the link explains it better but they used polarised lenses (Polariztion of specular light). I haven't used Materialize but it most likely would generate any spec map from the same info as the height/Normal map so not sure the benefit. From a learning point of view it might easier to start with something mundane like generating a height map for a brickwall or wooden planks.

They used two photos per camera and changed the polarization between both Images. On one Image, the light from the lamps was polarized differently than the filters on the camera. This way no direct reflection is recorded. Then, they shot a "normal" Image. The difference between the two is the speculation, which they used for the normal map, probably after compensating for Fresnel based reflections.

The results of using Polarisation filters when photographing Skin are pretty drastic. I assume that Levius' latest photosets are made in a similar way, since they don't seem to contain much specularity. Sadly, there does not seem to be a "specular" Version as well, so creating spec maps isn't possible that way.

Hi bantha, thanks for the link to Levius, and I see no evidence of any maps, just photos. The sets look fantastic.

But you say "Sadly, there does not seem to be a "specular" Version as well, so creating spec maps isn't possible that way." So... are you saying you can't pull a spec map out of a photo, and optionally turn it into a normal or bump map?

wait, i read you post more carefully... I think you are saying that with Levius, there is only one file per shot, not a "regular" and a "polarized." So you can't use the two to take the difference and make a spec map, like they did for Emily. Right?

operaguy posted at 9:30PM Fri, 15 March 2019 - #4348087

Checing the manual, I'm finding "some" information about those nodes....

Sam Therapy, I'm not saying you are wrong, and I'm not saying that BB does not know the deep truth, but just for the record, the Poser manual suggests the desaturated/inverted diffuse map for a bump!

::::: Opera :::::

There's a long standing tradition of stuff being odd, badly worded or just plain wrong in the Poser manual, even in many of the supplied materials and their suggested uses. This is just one example.

The thing is, you can make a bump map from a desaturated image map but it won't be correct. It's how many vendors here and at DAZ have done it over the years. Doesn't mean it's the right way to do it, though. Still, if you're happy with indented navels, nipples, freckles and every other bit of skin that's darker than the surrounding area, or raised parts where the skin is lighter, then go for it.

The key thing to remember is, the underlying bumps, lumps and erm, texture of a skin bears absolutely no relation to the colour values represented in a diffuse map. Taking that into account, how the heck can you ever expect a bump map derived from such a source to be valid? Sure, you'll get bumps, which to some people, is all that matters but if you want to get as close to realism as possible, you'll avoid this method entirely.

SamTherapy, what is the correct way to make bump maps?

Crikey, that is one hell of a question. Short answer is, to get a good, realistic bump map is a colossal pain in the hind end and every bit as time consuming as creating a diffuse texture from scratch. But more so. Effectively you'd have to draw every wrinkle, crease, pore and whatnot, since there's no efficient way of extracting them wholesale from a diffuse map. That said, you may be able to get away with using premade photos of pores, wrinkles and creases, desaturated, then placed into appropriate areas on a blank map. Way, way back, Anton suggested using a desaturated scan of orange peel for pores. Never tried that one myself but it sounds like it could work. You could hand paint creases, blurring brush edges and blending, and maybe using a fine grain "granite" overlay in places. Any or all of these methods, plus many more I don't know about. Just bear in mind that your overall map shouldn't shade or lighten overall. It will definitely look very different from any of the bump maps you're used to seeing but since it's only interested in generating bumps, not shade, it should work properly.

I may be wrong here but ISTR BB used to create them through his old shader tricks, but I don't think the whole shader works properly with current versions of Poser. Repeat, I could be wrong.

All that said, SnarlyGribbly's EZSkin can generate procedural bump maps for you, and that's the method I use nowadays, on the rare occasion I render humans.

SamTherapy posted at 7:07PM Fri, 15 March 2019 - #4348142

All that said, SnarlyGribbly's EZSkin can generate procedural bump maps for you, and that's the method I use nowadays, on the rare occasion I render humans.

This there. You're right, Sam.

I've been content in working with just the EZSkin's texture and procedural bump and specular map method. It does help a ton, I also managed to raise the lips bump shader just a tad and get to see the creases. Only thing I want to know, will it let me do mask for make-up or would the Layer option be the way to go?

Other than that, I'm good!

That, unfortunately, is something I don't know. Maybe ask Snarly.

Thanks again, all.

No doubt you've had enough of the notifications by now but hope the following helps with your last question.

Problem with adding a mask direct to Ezskin mat is the complexity of the node set-up so layer is probably a good place to start however it has its own problems. Thought I'd do a quick example of layers with Firefly but didn't seem to work so this is for Superfly.
Create Mask

Apply Ezskin to figure

Add new Layer to skin mat, add new material and apply mask

Render...

This will create a lne where the mat ends with other textures which I think is due to the SSS. Solution appears to be to add the layer to these adjacent textures.

Render again

The layer just replaces the mats below so if you require effects like bump to propagate through its a bit of a problem. I use a much simplier texture set than Ezskin so just copy the bump onto the new layer but for Ezskin that is more complex.

Hope that helps with the ideas

I got it now. Thanks.

JB

ironsoul posted at 7:38PM Sat, 16 March 2019 - #4348162

No doubt you've had enough of the notifications by now but hope the following helps with your last question.

Problem with adding a mask direct to Ezskin mat is the complexity of the node set-up so layer is probably a good place to start however it has its own problems. Thought I'd do a quick example of layers with Firefly but didn't seem to work so this is for Superfly.
Create Mask

Apply Ezskin to figure

Add new Layer to skin mat, add new material and apply mask

Render...

This will create a lne where the mat ends with other textures which I think is due to the SSS. Solution appears to be to add the layer to these adjacent textures.

Render again

The layer just replaces the mats below so if you require effects like bump to propagate through its a bit of a problem. I use a much simplier texture set than Ezskin so just copy the bump onto the new layer but for Ezskin that is more complex.

Hope that helps with the ideas

I was wondering if adding the mask layers prior to using EZSkin would work. Set up a regular texture, get the masks in place, then run EZSkin. Haven't tried it so I don't know if it would be a valid workaround.

Ezskin blats much of the existing shader node set-up, even Snarly's coding skills can't cope will every variation of the the material room's node set-up.

Oh well, that's knackered that idea, then. :(

About the process for Emily ...

What if you had a great regular photo and also a polarized one? For Poser, would that be worth pursuing?

I emailed levius and adam responded and is curious. (not a flat "no.")

If he supplied both, what would the next step be, and is it even worth it?

::::: Opera :::::

Then next step would be to create the difference between both of them. You would get a specular map, also you would probably see the pores, since they reflect differently. It's explained in the "digital Emmely" link earlier in this thread. It is crucial that the model does not move between the shots and both shots use the same angle.

When creating the specular map, you would need to take care only to use the center part of the specular map. Due to the Fresnel effect, the skin becomes very reflective if the angle is to steep.

bantha, that was my specific thought: the model CAN NOT MOVE. I wonder if the pros on Emily had a camera that could shoot both at the same time.

I'm going to go back and read the Emily information, but in general:

1. what does one need to get a polarized file? A special lens or a special filter or a special setting on the camera?

2. is "taking the difference" a simple thing a person could do in photoshop, and then export spec, normal and bump maps?

{I know many are pursuing procedural bump and spec, but I am still interested in actual maps, for the moment}

:: og ::

Regarding 1. This might help YT link

More specific details here. I also found a video on Youtube that went onto the optical details in more depth but as it was focused on the medical application and contain subjects people might find distressing did not post a link - search for "Katharine Hanlon Cross-polarized and parallel-polarized light" if you're interested - also contained an interesting slide on the impact of colour with skin depth which is OT here but curious how it would work with fresnel when creating SSS.

ironsoul, I watched the video you linked, and will drill down on the other links you just provided. I sent Adam (levius) another email with more information, and links.

I guess I am obsessed now. I am dreaming of EmilyPoser.

::::: Opera :::::

Adam at 3d.sk responded to my email and says he will discuss with his photography staff.