Looking good!! 

The fun moment: 
- an old Aiko3 character: Brielle (2005!)
- Afrodite Ohki's Matuk Hair for "La Femme"
- a Genesis8 dynamic TankTop

Using an adapted version of Ghostship2's Eyes material settings with Sasha-19's irises

Love the renders so far! Keep them coming folks I wanna see more. :)

Lotharen posted at 8:38 AM Sat, 30 October 2021 - #4429596

Love the renders so far! Keep them coming folks I wanna see more. :)

Lotharen posted at 8:38 AM Sat, 30 October 2021 - #4429596

Love the renders so far! Keep them coming folks I wanna see more. :)

I happily oblige! Here's my latest :)

Wooow ❤❤❤

Thank you :3

A slightly different way of working for me, this is using Superfly in poser 12 but, as per a recent Rendo tutorial,  I have lit the scene using a .exr image connected to the background rather than a dome.  There are no lights at all in this render.

A slightly different way of working for me, this is using Superfly in poser 12 but, as per a recent Rendo tutorial,  I have lit the scene using a .exr image connected to the background rather than a dome.  There are no lights at all in this render.

It looks great! 😊

hornet3d posted at 3:52 PM Tue, 2 November 2021 - #4429792

A slightly different way of working for me, this is using Superfly in poser 12 but, as per a recent Rendo tutorial,  I have lit the scene using a .exr image connected to the background rather than a dome.  There are no lights at all in this render.

It looks great! 😊

Can you take a screen grab of your environment map set up from the Material Room Hornet?  Looks nice and crisp.  Not sure how many HDRI files I have that actually have an exr file included.  Wish there was a way to generate them from the main HDR files so we could bypass all that rigamarole setting up the Dome.  Such a PITA in Poser!  

RAMWolff posted at 8:55 PM Tue, 2 November 2021 - #4429822

Can you take a screen grab of your environment map set up from the Material Room Hornet?  Looks nice and crisp.  Not sure how many HDRI files I have that actually have an exr file included.  Wish there was a way to generate them from the main HDR files so we could bypass all that rigamarole setting up the Dome.  Such a PITA in Poser!  

https://www.posersoftware.com/article/536/poser-basics-how-to-use-hdr-lighting

I found it easy to follow and shows how background is set up and why.  The only difficulty I found is that the display of the background is restricted in preview so that it does not fill the preview screen but renders full size.  I used a low sample count to set mine up but you could also use the raytrace preview.

The background works with both .hdr files and .exr the only reason I used the .exr is because I had some nice samples to work with.  I am not sure if I am allowed to link but if you do a search for 'hdrmaps' you should see a site at the top of the listing where they have a number .exr files free to download.

Can you take a screen grab of your environment map set up from the Material Room Hornet?  Looks nice and crisp.  Not sure how many HDRI files I have that actually have an exr file included.  Wish there was a way to generate them from the main HDR files so we could bypass all that rigamarole setting up the Dome.  Such a PITA in Poser!  

Y-Phil posted at 2:32 AM Wed, 3 November 2021 - #4429828

RAMWolff posted at 8:55 PM Tue, 2 November 2021 - #4429822

Can you take a screen grab of your environment map set up from the Material Room Hornet?  Looks nice and crisp.  Not sure how many HDRI files I have that actually have an exr file included.  Wish there was a way to generate them from the main HDR files so we could bypass all that rigamarole setting up the Dome.  Such a PITA in Poser!  

Just in case: you also have https://polyhaven.com/

Thank you for the link, there is a good selection there and some very different from what I have seen elsewhere such as the one inside the car or SUV.

Picturenaut 3.2 can resave HDR to EXR.  The software is free and can be useful for manipulating HDRs.  The best software is HDRShop but is no longer available, it was also a freebee.

Can you take a screen grab of your environment map set up from the Material Room Hornet?  Looks nice and crisp.  Not sure how many HDRI files I have that actually have an exr file included.  Wish there was a way to generate them from the main HDR files so we could bypass all that rigamarole setting up the Dome.  Such a PITA in Poser!  

Picturenaut 3.2 can resave HDR to EXR.  The software is free and can be useful for manipulating HDRs.

Picturenaut 3.2 can resave HDR to EXR.  The software is free and can be useful for manipulating HDRs.  The best software is HDRShop but is no longer available, it was also a freebee.

I seem to have lost posting so I hope this is not duplicated, apologies if it is.  This has become a real Work In Progress for me as I am now starting to play with the focal length and positioning of the camera and balancing that with the rotation and scaling of the background image.  Rotating the image not only changes the background view but also the lighting of the scene or figure.  In this case the rotation made very little difference as there were no real high spots in the background image.   here I have added a single light, just as I would with a dome, to brighten the figure's face and also add highlights in the eyes.

If I am doing anything wrong here (or missing something) please let me know, I am on a voyage of discovery here and I would not like to mislead anyone.

I didn't use any lights in this render but there are bright areas in the background so I found positioning difficult.

What type of materials are you using on the skin?  It looks off for some reason, perhaps SSS is lacking?   Watch your bump settings, there are wrinkles showing up in unusual places.  Nice work, BTW.

This is a Superfly render with all the texturing converted to Cycles and PrincipledBsdf.  Background HDRI, 3k, no additional lighting other than the ambient settings from the HDRI.  Fresnel was added to all the material zones.  The model is V3.  This is WIP and testing to find the right balance of the environment and textures.  

The background is soft because it is only 3K, higher resolution will give you a sharper image.  Also, I read that true HDRIs are already in a linear workflow so introducing them to Poser will require setting them to a Gamma correction of 1, not 2.2 like other image formats.

Have also worked a little HDR images. I think the renders are really good with it. But sometimes the renders are extremely overexposed. I got the problem under control with the Cycles Gamma node. The first image was rendered without the node and without a rotation, the second with rotation, the third image I then corrected with the gamma node. I used the HDR image. Without applied rotation it was not bad but too dark for my purposes. After the rotations it was extremely overexposed. The differences between the images become quite clear.

The Material room:

Image 01 without rotation:

Image 02 with rotation:

Image 03 with rotation and gamma node:

hborre posted at 10:56 AM Wed, 3 November 2021 - #4429860

What type of materials are you using on the skin?  It looks off for some reason, perhaps SSS is lacking?   Watch your bump settings, there are wrinkles showing up in unusual places.  Nice work, BTW.

Anyway I have had another try with hopefully a better skin and a better use of the background lighting.

hborre posted at 10:56 AM Wed, 3 November 2021 - #4429860

What type of materials are you using on the skin?  It looks off for some reason, perhaps SSS is lacking?   Watch your bump settings, there are wrinkles showing up in unusual places.  Nice work, BTW.

Thanks for pointing that out, a major drop off on my part and I didn't even notice.  Somehow I have been using an old version of my character that i have not used for almost two years and, as you say the is not right.  I now need to find out how it happened as I thought I had retired that version.  

Anyway I have had another try with hopefully a better skin and a better use of the background lighting.

It's a really cool outfit

Outdoor shots with HDR light are simply fun. Render only lit with background.
Greetings

hornet3d posted at 4:10 PM Wed, 3 November 2021 - #4429871

hborre posted at 10:56 AM Wed, 3 November 2021 - #4429860

What type of materials are you using on the skin?  It looks off for some reason, perhaps SSS is lacking?   Watch your bump settings, there are wrinkles showing up in unusual places.  Nice work, BTW.

Thanks for pointing that out, a major drop off on my part and I didn't even notice.  Somehow I have been using an old version of my character that i have not used for almost two years and, as you say the is not right.  I now need to find out how it happened as I thought I had retired that version.  

Anyway I have had another try with hopefully a better skin and a better use of the background lighting.

It's a really cool outfit

Stopped playing with background lighting and spent the day re-organising my processes after hborre picked up on the fact I was using an old version of my character, (thank you hborre).  I am not sure exactly what went wrong but I think it was the result of me testing my backup procedures in case I had a system failure.  Hopefully it is all sorted but a lot of work so I treated myself to Heloisa Hair by Afrodite-ohki, here is my first test render.

A comfortable version of the background shader. When playing around with the shader, you should use a small HDR image. 2k or so. Large images always cause a delay that gets on your nerves in the long run.

Regards

I usually use a sphere for visualization while I'm setting up the scene and then I switch to the background node one of the last things before I render due to the lagging they can cause. My geriatric computer has that problem even with medium-sized backgrounds. 

https://www.renderosity.com/forums/threads/2961030/rotation-when-using-an-hdr-bitmap-on-the-background-node there's a script here to help set up a background. I've only used a it couple of times so I can't say how good it is.

Using low-resolution HDRIs will soften the final image in the background; if you want a sharper, crisper image, 3K - 4K is preferable.  A 5K image will definitely slowdown your system.

RedPhantom posted at 7:04 AM Fri, 5 November 2021 - #4429941

I usually use a sphere for visualization while I'm setting up the scene and then I switch to the background node one of the last things before I render due to the lagging they can cause. My geriatric computer has that problem even with medium-sized backgrounds. 

https://www.renderosity.com/forums/threads/2961030/rotation-when-using-an-hdr-bitmap-on-the-background-node there's a script here to help set up a background. I've only used a it couple of times so I can't say how good it is.

I'm using my script each time. And now I think that Snarly's EZCatcher can be adjusted:

* by setting the same environment map
* and by using the same rotation/location values as the ones used for the background node

Only the scale must remain -1, -1, 1

The last thing I have to found: evaluate the HSV node's Value to adjust the intensity of the shadow catcher

A comfortable version of the background shader. When playing around with the shader, you should use a small HDR image. 2k or so. Large images always cause a delay that gets on your nerves in the long run.

Regards

Thank you for this! 😊

HDRi on the background node, Snarly's EZCatcher aligned with the same rotation and location, and...
150 tries to adjust color and the brightness (the 1st try done with EZDome, of course) 😁

No other light.

Snarly did have a Zoom tutorial not too long ago on how to use the ShadowCatcher feature in EZDome.

hborre posted at 4:57 PM Fri, 5 November 2021 - #4429965

Snarly did have a Zoom tutorial not too long ago on how to use the ShadowCatcher feature in EZDome.

If that interests someone, you can have it here.

Oh and as I'm absolutely not fluent in spoken English, I've probably skipped some important informations.. 😁

This is a quick render of a prop model created by Shredder for DAZStudio and posted at ShareCG.  I imported it into P11 with D3D's DSONLoader, saved it back into the Library, and opened it in P12.  I took the liberty of changing the original textures for procedural shaders created by Ghostman, threw Andrea behind the driver's seat, and rendered it an HDRI background rotated with the setup above.  Environmental lighting only.

If you're using the background node, you can use the ground plane with a shadow catcher. It works well that way. If you're using a sphere, anything under the sphere won't render.

This is the background node and a light because the hdri wasn't producing shadows and the ground plane with the shadow catcher option checked.

RedPhantom posted at 9:41 PM Fri, 5 November 2021 - #4429980

If you're using the background node, you can use the ground plane with a shadow catcher. It works well that way. If you're using a sphere, anything under the sphere won't render.

This is the background node and a light because the hdri wasn't producing shadows and the ground plane with the shadow catcher option checked.

Oh wow... I haven't seen that coming. I mean:

Good catch! Thank you 😁

Still having fun with Snarly's EZCatcher 😊

Woah! thanks for sharing all those amazing images. Now if I could just get motivated enough to make something myself. I don't even have any 3D rendering programs installed atm. 

Y-Phil posted at 5:05 PM Fri, 5 November 2021 - #4429966

hborre posted at 4:57 PM Fri, 5 November 2021 - #4429965

Snarly did have a Zoom tutorial not too long ago on how to use the ShadowCatcher feature in EZDome.

indeed, and as some FB contacts were aware but couldn't follow, I've recorded it. That's how I've learned how to use the "Picker" tab.

If that interests someone, you can have it here.

Oh and as I'm absolutely not fluent in spoken English, I've probably skipped some important informations.. 😁

Y-Phil posted at 5:05 PM Fri, 5 November 2021 - #4429966

hborre posted at 4:57 PM Fri, 5 November 2021 - #4429965

Snarly did have a Zoom tutorial not too long ago on how to use the ShadowCatcher feature in EZDome.

indeed, and as some FB contacts were aware but couldn't follow, I've recorded it. That's how I've learned how to use the "Picker" tab.

If that interests someone, you can have it here.

Oh and as I'm absolutely not fluent in spoken English, I've probably skipped some important informations.. 😁

Thank you for the link, here is my first attempt at using the EZdome in the manner suggested.

It looks great! 

Y-Phil posted at 4:47 AM Sun, 7 November 2021 - #4430031

hornet3d posted at 12:10 AM Sun, 7 November 2021 - #4430026

Y-Phil posted at 5:05 PM Fri, 5 November 2021 - #4429966

hborre posted at 4:57 PM Fri, 5 November 2021 - #4429965

Snarly did have a Zoom tutorial not too long ago on how to use the ShadowCatcher feature in EZDome.

indeed, and as some FB contacts were aware but couldn't follow, I've recorded it. That's how I've learned how t

o use the "Picker" tab.

If that interests someone, you can have it here.

Oh and as I'm absolutely not fluent in spoken English, I've probably skipped some important informations.. 😁

Thank you for the link, here is my first attempt at using the EZdome in the manner suggested.

It looks great! 

Y-Phil posted at 4:47 AM Sun, 7 November 2021 - #4430031

hornet3d posted at 12:10 AM Sun, 7 November 2021 - #4430026

Y-Phil posted at 5:05 PM Fri, 5 November 2021 - #4429966

hborre posted at 4:57 PM Fri, 5 November 2021 - #4429965

Snarly did have a Zoom tutorial not too long ago on how to use the ShadowCatcher feature in EZDome.

indeed, and as some FB contacts were aware but couldn't follow, I've recorded it. That's how I've learned how t

o use the "Picker" tab.

If that interests someone, you can have it here.

Oh and as I'm absolutely not fluent in spoken English, I've probably skipped some important informations.. 😁

Thank you for the link, here is my first attempt at using the EZdome in the manner suggested.

It looks great! 

Thank you, I have only ever used the EZDome with a Sibl but the video you linked to showed how to set the dome up using a HDR for the outer dome and a .jpg for the inner dome.  It also showed how to link the sun, which is what I have done here.

Very nice ❤

If you are going to include a light or light mesh with a background image or EZDome to provide additional fill-in illumination, you should closely match the light color, intensity, and light direction for a blending effect.  Otherwise, the scene will just not look right.  For the longest time, I have been working on a scene, reconstructing shader nodes for Superfly, and recasting props throughout the scene.  Initially, I started with an EZDome but switched to an 8K HDRI that was rescaled to 4K.  I followed the background shader setup posted above, rotated the image to my satisfaction, and rendered the first image with ambient lighting.  

The second image that follows contains 1 infinity light, set to a 25% intensity, shadow intensity to 85%, Shadow Radius Blur to 4, and the light color to match the background.  The direction of the infinite light matches the direction from the background ambient lighting.

The inclusion of the infinity light brings out the specularity in the scene, a situation that you don't see with the ambient lighting from the dome or background.

Looks good. I like very much!
Have a nice day.
Stephan

several ways to light a scene with a dome or the background. 1st: if I use a dome I just use the simple Envirosphere single dome prop. It's easy to use and I can make changes quickly. 2nd, if you want more light in your scene using a dome there are a number of ways to do it without having to load up a Poser light and ruin the mood or thrash about trying  to match the ambient lights. 3rd: you absolutely DO get specularity using background lighting.

from my upcoming material set for P12 :background lighting and speculars.

from my upcoming material set for P12 :background lighting and speculars.

several ways to light a scene with a dome or the background. 1st: if I use a dome I just use the simple Envirosphere single dome prop. It's easy to use and I can make changes quickly. 2nd, if you want more light in your scene using a dome there are a number of ways to do it without having to load up a Poser light and ruin the mood or thrash about trying  to match the ambient lights. 3rd: you absolutely DO get specularity using background lighting.