So, I decided to buy Poser 12 (right now I'm not sure why). This is a Poser 11 vs Poser 12 Superfly render test. The files are exactly the same and as far as I can see the render settings too, however, P12 renders are, well... Bad. They look plain, texture-less, the lighting has no details and everything look cartoonish. Am I doing something wrong here?

Poser 11 (left), Poser 12 (right).

Previous Superfly shaders no longer work correctly. This has been point out several times in the comments. The shaders will need to be updated.

Yes, but this is a great side by side comparison. Thank you for posting it. Hoping for some sort of solution.

one thing to be aware of, and I think this is a bug: Post render denoise is ON by default even though the box is not checked. You have to toggle the box on then back off again to turn it off. As of this moment I have not found the denoiser to be useful at all due to the way it destroys detail in the skin and makes the render look cartoonish or look like it's a Photoshop painting. Maybe they'll have controls for it soon so we can adjust how strong it works.

You're welcome. Yup, I hope a solution soon, honestly I thought "Early Access" was going to be more like, "testing new features" and not "it won't render correctly".

Rhia474 posted at 12:03PM Wed, 04 November 2020 - #4403201

Yes, but this is a great side by side comparison. Thank you for posting it. Hoping for some sort of solution.

Hi, tried that, but didn't work anyway, sadly.

ghostship2 posted at 12:29PM Wed, 04 November 2020 - #4403205

one thing to be aware of, and I think this is a bug: Post render denoise is ON by default even though the box is not checked. You have to toggle the box on then back off again to turn it off. As of this moment I have not found the denoiser to be useful at all due to the way it destroys detail in the skin and makes the render look cartoonish or look like it's a Photoshop painting. Maybe they'll have controls for it soon so we can adjust how strong it works.

Question: So is it the Denoise that makes the skin all glowing and the eyes 'light up'? I too just rendered a scene with a few La Femme (default P11 out of the box texture) and a V4. All the La Femme's textures and eyes lit up yet V4 (with SSS texture I think) kind of appears okay. Also; WOW, the entire scene is Full of Noise (I was about to turn Denoise on until I read this post)

no that's SSS shaders not working correctly. I've never liked using SSS in the eyes because this would happen in previous versions of Poser. SSS is just not necessary in the eyes.

Update: I'm working this with the Poser Support team, they say they didn't expect this drastic difference. I'll keep you guys updated :)

ghostship2 posted at 4:51PM Thu, 05 November 2020 - #4403205

one thing to be aware of, and I think this is a bug: Post render denoise is ON by default even though the box is not checked. You have to toggle the box on then back off again to turn it off. As of this moment I have not found the denoiser to be useful at all due to the way it destroys detail in the skin and makes the render look cartoonish or look like it's a Photoshop painting. Maybe they'll have controls for it soon so we can adjust how strong it works.

Just a note of agreement here. The denoise works really well, I think actually too well. It makes the render look perfect and clean, but you don't always want that. If there is a lot of noise in the render, it even erases actual features, e.g. I had it completely erase a lightswitch on the wall in a dark (very noisy) scene. This needs an adjustment dial. In practice, I might save an image both ways and then combine them in postwork.

A tip: the postfx is already a sep layer in the EXR. Pull into photoshop and slap a mask on it with the original render under it and use a mask to custom apply those fx only where you want them.

Update: For those having these issues like me, support told me they found the bugs and will fix them, also:

There's presently a work around but it's awkward. If you greatly increase the "scale" values on all the scatter nodes that will help the glowing eyes look.
The second part is the Blinn node is totally broken. (also a high priority bug) for the moment you could use a specular node in it's place but it would look different.

Thanks for sharing that. I would rather hear that it's a bug they intend to fix than a deprecated feature we will have to work around, or a deliberate change. That makes me more optimistic.

You're welcome. They tested a scene I sent them with my model (above) and with it they found 2 bugs, they said those are now high priority for the next patch. So hopefully it will be fixed soon.

ChromeStar posted at 4:37PM Sat, 07 November 2020 - #4403690

Thanks for sharing that. I would rather hear that it's a bug they intend to fix than a deprecated feature we will have to work around, or a deliberate change. That makes me more optimistic.

UPDATE: I download Poser 12.0.288, as you can see guys, it's still awful.

@gabrilxdesign The default La Femme shaders work just fine. Why not just use those?

ghostship2 posted at 3:43PM Fri, 13 November 2020 - #4404476

@gabrilxdesign The default La Femme shaders work just fine. Why not just use those?

Because I have dozens of models with dozens of variations, and none use default stuff. I would have to copy and update hundreds of files just to make them work "fine" in Poser 12 since not even default La Femme convince me right now. Sounds like a lot of work I didn't think I should do. Default can be fixed with more lighting though.

As it is now with the new cycles implemented we will have to redo the shaders weather we like it or not. I know it's a PITA for sure but in my view i thnk it's worth it in the end.

what sss skin shader are you using?

I'm liking the P12 rendering, mostly. Don't care for the dark lines that seem to follow the texture edges, but I'm sure it'll get fixed.

The money I plunked down for the NVIDIA RTX 2060 card has been well worth it. Insanely fast rendering now. :-)

This is V4 set up in P11 with EZSkin3 script applied there, and then saved and opened in P12.

And, yes, I know the top is goobered at her shoulder. This isn't for anything other than to post here, so I let it go.

@sliderule others have said that the odd lines in the SSS skin can be removed by subdividing the mesh. Is your V4 subdivided at least once in your image?

ghostship2 posted at 7:57PM Fri, 13 November 2020 - #4404506

@sliderule others have said that the odd lines in the SSS skin can be removed by subdividing the mesh. Is your V4 subdivided at least once in your image?

Sweet! No it wasn't. That fixed it right up! Thanks!

Actually, you don't need to subdivide the model to get rid of those zone lines, just switch to Poser unimesh.

hborre posted at 11:17PM Fri, 13 November 2020 - #4404520

Actually, you don't need to subdivide the model to get rid of those zone lines, just switch to Poser unimesh.

figure looks better subdivided. Also I've noticed that cycles shaders will have a strange, dark edge to them if not subdivided.

Well, I changed my main model to Base La Femme Simple PBR in Poser 12 and it looks better, I like how the face is rendering, but not the neck and body. I'm missing that nice highlight in the neck/collarbone, looks more realistic in my Poser 11 render. I guess it's nothing I can't change in Lightroom (post). At this point I don't know if I should wait for new patches or get into the idea of modifying my models and variations to a "P12 version".

set clamping to 0 and see if the highlights become brighter.

@gabrielxdesign see my thread about the glossy node.

ghostship2 posted at 2:19PM Sat, 14 November 2020 - #4404536

set clamping to 0 and see if the highlights become brighter.

I'll try, thanks!

Also:

Update: Got this from Support There's a known issue with the Blinn and Phong speculalarity nodes in SuperFly. This is the cause of the flat looking skin and will be addressed in the next release.