Is there a way to render shadows in Poser other than black? As far as I remeber, in Vue the shadow color can be choosen freely, but I never found a way to do this in Poser.

You can decrease the shadow opacity, but that's not exactly what you want I think. May be helpful to experiment with though.

A shadow does not have a colour, it is not an object, just an area where the illumination is different. The screenshot shows a ball lit by three lights which are pure green red and blue.

In this one the three lights are closer to each other so the shadows overlap.

This one has a blue IBL light to produce background illumination and a slightly yellowish infinite light. This is similar to what you get from a blue sky and sunshine.

The general solution is just as dadt says. The idea is that the shadow is whatever color there is from ambient lighting when your directional light is *not* shining on it. So set up an image based light with the general color you want for things that are not lit by your directional light.

A specific shadow color on a particular object can be done in the material room for the object that is showing the shadow. I have demonstrated this in the image above.

I use a Blender node to pick two colors for the ground. I drive it with the Diffuse node. The Diffuse node all by itself can detect where shadows fall. By inverting it with the subtract node, I get a high value where there is shadow. I can then adjust the Blending value to decide how much to change the color. Thus, I can choose a color for the shadow.

In this case, I made a pink ball and made the ground shadow pink as well. This is nice as it gives a tone to the ground making it seem like there is some light bouncing off the ball onto the ground, a really cheap form of cheating global illumination. It's not a general solution, but can be used for special effects quite well.

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Here's another useful illusion using the material technique.

You don't have to just use a color for the shadow. You can use patterns, too. Here I used a Fractal_Sum node to create little spots of color in the shadow. It looks like the glittery ball is throwing pink specular reflections onto the ground.

You'll have to click to see the full size view in order to be able to see the effect clearly.

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How about when shadow catcher is being used on ground? I have problems with shadow only being that one color. And I am using 1 IBL. When I use another light to make the shadow color, I get no shadow. I am trying to get my shadow color R:16 G:28 B:54

Great advice you got so far.
One thing one of my art teachers always emphasized is that realistic shadows are never solid black, and also that they always have some blue and opurple in them (when outdoors)
When indoors, they have a bit of dark part of ambient light coloring to them.

Hi, my namez: "NO, Bad Kitteh, NO!" Whaz yurs?
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1.) Before. Setting up scene. 1 IBL Light. Shadow Catcher ground.

2.) After. Shadow grey, and not color I would rather have. Struggled on this. Lighting still needs work, although the shadow color is what bothers me.

Quote - Here's another useful illusion using the material technique.

You don't have to just use a color for the shadow. You can use patterns, too. Here I used a Fractal_Sum node to create little spots of color in the shadow. It looks like the glittery ball is throwing pink specular reflections onto the ground.

You'll have to click to see the full size view in order to be able to see the effect clearly.

That is a nice illusion this one, great idea bagginsbill !!! quick and fast, simple is beautiful!

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"Surrender to what it is - Let go of what was - Have faith in what will be "

@ **Robo2010

**yes that is the problem here the shadows not always fit with the shadow catcher especialy when the orginal ground is reflective in the original photo so photoshop and layers are the last chance....until B.B come with a better idea ;)

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"Surrender to what it is - Let go of what was - Have faith in what will be "

I would go one step farther than BB does and use the ambient to force the shadow color.

Attached Link: My Gallery Image - Spanish Tourist Attraction

> Quote - @ **Robo2010 > > **yes that is the problem here the shadows not always fit with the shadow catcher especialy when the orginal ground is reflective in the original photo so photoshop and layers are the last chance....until B.B come with a better idea ;)

Heheh. I have done this before. Examine my linked image (warning - tasteful nudity).

In the notes there I said this:

*This was suprisingly difficult. Had to make a custom shadow catcher that gave a blue tint to the shadow to match the real shadows. The lighting was pretty easy though. I hacked together an IBL probe myself to get the general lighting and then one infinite light at 120% took care of the rest.

*I'm at home and my Poser file for that is at work. If I recall correctly, I did not use the "shadow catch only" option. Instead, I attached something similar to the above shadow detector (1 - Diffuse) into the Transparency input of the ground. This makes the ground become more opaque where there is shadow, and transparent where there is light. Then I placed a dark blue color in the Ambient and turned Ambient_Value = 1, with zero Diffuse_Value and Specular_Value. By adjusting the amount of transparency and the exact color, I was able to match the shadow exactly.

Basically this is blending a specific color with the background picture where there is shadow and no completely transparent where there is light.

When I get to work tomorrow I'll open that file and post the exact material I used.

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That's cool idea too, thanks for sharing.. now what about the shadow catcher is there anything we can do about ? or is that a closed case

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"Surrender to what it is - Let go of what was - Have faith in what will be "

Quote - I would go one step farther than BB does and use the ambient to force the shadow color.

Yeah almost. You forgot the rest of the floor needs to be transparent for the superimposed image on a background, if you're talking about that scenario.

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cross post!

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Yes I do that too in my renders not using the shadow catcher feature at all , to put a shadow on a light colored ground is fine not big deal look only on my Vacation pic from my gallery , but the most problem is if the ground is to reflective as in the image by Robo2010**
**

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"Surrender to what it is - Let go of what was - Have faith in what will be "

but the most problem is if the ground is to reflective as in the image by Robo2010**

Image (BG), to reflective (lighting and shadow)?

Trying to grasp something here.. **

I mean the ground reflect in the Image BG the light from the sky very intensive , the shadows under the car are much more darker there is not light from the sky not from the sun , the position of your model is in a lucky spot where the part of the shadow excist already but the final render have a double shadows now.. so the parts of the shadows under the model should be darker and the rest need to match the other shadows of the image that have a ::blue tint:: and with shadow catcher feature it is not possible to do that correct.
You should render this out as a layer without the background image, remove the shadows from the places where they are already in the BG image and tint the rest of the shadows to match it and perfect image is finish..

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"Surrender to what it is - Let go of what was - Have faith in what will be "

Attached Link: The other Forum (DAZ) :Smile:

Ah ok, Your right. I made only as an example (Shadow catching) and mostly for another forum. I wasn't really trying to improve image (or my work). The other forum is confused about shadow catcher. I get "Shadow catcher, What is that? What do you mean?...etc..etc" in another 3D forum. So, I had to make examples. Also the shadow color does really bother me, and I would enjoy working on this shadow color when shadow catching in the near future. Can be fun.

This BG photo I took many years ago, months after the situation in Katrina, gas prices started sky rocketting day after. The pumps all over our city (Edmonton, Canada), were lined up of cars, for blocks. I was out taking photos capturing the moments. This was the only image I had on my Hard drive that had reasonable shadows to show, and give examples at the moment.

Ok no problem i fixed it for you hahahah 2 min .. and don't blame the pple that don't know much about the software not even 50% of the words and what that mean..

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"Surrender to what it is - Let go of what was - Have faith in what will be "

Attached Link: Gas Pump Line up.

Kewl...

But, here is the actual photograph if you want to play with it.

And stuff to look at.

http://www3.telus.net/public/tfantini/

Thanks , the image give me some funny idea for later :)

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"Surrender to what it is - Let go of what was - Have faith in what will be "

I opened my previous colored shadow catcher and it was just as I described. However, I've come up with 3 new ways to do it that are incredibly precise. Meaning, you can tell the shadow catcher what color the ground is when lit and not lit, and it does exactly the right thing to adjust the image, rather than simply draw a fixed color in that spot.

Here's a demo render. I'll be posting the math and shader nodes as I have time. Unfortunately, I am currently in a very long meeting and can't post all the details at the moment.

Just as a teaser, the three techniques are:

Given the math behind partial transparency, calculate a negative ambient color that will properly darken the image with respect to R, G, and B. (Demo image here did it that way.)
Use a Refract node with IOR of 1 to "see" what's behind the shadow catcher. Blend that with a color, modulated by the shadow detector.
Use a Refract node with IOR of 1, but muliply that with a color, modulated by the shadow dectector.

I think #1 is fastest (no ray-tracing needed) but I suspect methods #2 or #3 will give more precise results by allowing more manipulation of the underlying image. I will experiment more and let you know.

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Forgot to say, don't criticize the shape or angle of the shadow - you can work that out yourself. I was having trouble matching the degree of blurring with the rest of the scene.

Click to see full size and examine closely the variations in the ball's shadow. It is not a solid color, but rather is showing response to the variations of the real ground image.

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WHOA!..

That is very impressive!

Here is a zoomed in view - notice that the crack in the pavement carries through into the shadow quite well. Click to see full size.

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Well kyraia, how's your brain doing?,... Mine's about to explode. :) This is exactly the type of thread that keeps me coming back to this forum. Thanks, everyone, for all your ideas and inspiration. take care jdc

BB excellent , thanks for sharing and your time... going to test it out with the methods #2 and #3

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"Surrender to what it is - Let go of what was - Have faith in what will be "

Going to wait for a nod setup (although I am using Poser6, hope is the same), so I can see how this is achieved. Also, the sun is out, showing nice shadowing. Going out to take photographs. I am ready for some fun.

Hi folks. Meetings, meetings, meetings. I'm about to go back in, so I didn't have time to develop and test methods #2 and #3. But, I'll present method #1 (using a negative color and transparency) for you. I will not explain the math, unless somebody asks for it. It's not too tricky, just basic algebra. But you don't really need to know it to use it.

I have designed the shader so that we can take all the guess work out of the process. Just follow the steps I outline and you should be all set.

Again, I'm not going to explain here how to generate the shadows in the right perspective. We can talk about that later.

You can use a square or the ground plane for your catcher. I prefer a square as I can move it and scale it more easily. Here we go.

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First thing you must do is measure the general color of the lit ground and the shadows ground.

Load your background image into an image editor. Blur it. This is to remove details and measure the general color shift caused by light and shadow.

Then measure two spots that in real life would have similar colors if lighting was identical. Write these RGB values down. You'll need them later.

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Here is the colored shadow catcher shader. Save it to your materials runtime as ShadowCatcher.mt5. Load it onto your ground plane or square.

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We need to calibrate the shadow detector for your light setup. If you aren't even close to getting your lighting done, do so first.

After calibration, if you change your lights, you may need to calibrate again.

The shader operates in two modes. These are controlled by the Calibrate node. A 1 here enables calibration mode. This is so you can render for shadow detector adjustment.

Do a render.

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First step in calibrating the detector is to adjust Calibrate_BLACK.

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Step 3.

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Step 4.

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Step 5.

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Step 6. Done.

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Note:

I played with more lighting contrast, lowering my IBL and raising my SUN.

As a result, sometimes increasing Calibrate_WHITE will make the BLACK gray again. If that happens, increase Calibrate_BLACK a bit more.

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Geesh....I guess I am out of this one. I do not have "Calibrate" nods. I also see "Shadow color" nods.

Using Poser 6. Do not have P7.

Dude those are math nodes. I used a plugin to rename them so you know what they are.

Just load the shader - all will be fine.

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"I used a plugin to rename them.."

And which ones did you rename, and to what? Losing me here.

and where do we get this plugin to rename them? I could really use that... (or can they be renamed in notepad? runs off to see)

ooh you can use notepad... now to see which node is which..

http://poseworks.com/files/addons/WCRO_RenameNode.zip

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aah thanks BB that'll save time lol

Quote - "I used a plugin to rename them.."

And which ones did you rename, and to what? Losing me here.

I renamed the ones that look like things you've never seen before.

Please don't be confused by the labels. Everybody thinks the label tells you what kind of node it is. It only does that by default, but I can change the label to something more meaningful.

You should not be worried about what the nodes are. Just load the shader, and fill in the values that I have labelled as such.

The shader needs to know the Shadow color - put that in the node called Shadow Color.

You don't need to know that it is actually a Simple_Color node. You need to know what it is for. That is how I've labelled them.

If you were going to try to build this yourself, you would need to know what types of nodes to add, but I really don't think you want to try to build this yourself, or try to change it. I haven't explained any of the math. Every time I try to explain the math, I get responses like "my head just exploded" or "this is too complicated for me to use - I'll pass". This is not complicated at all TO USE.

It is WAY complicated to build, but I've already built it.

Just use it. Follow the instructions step by step. You will end up with perfect shadows.

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Excellent work BB thank you ...and don't wonder for some response, not everyone is deep in this stuff.. but well you made the work here done so I see not really big deal to follow the screen..

Robo2010 my dear don't be lazy .. you can use it good in your next perfect manipulation!!!
I hope you made great shots the other day!

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"Surrender to what it is - Let go of what was - Have faith in what will be "

Ok work done in 4 min!!!!!

I pick up the ground color and the desire shadow color from the image put the value in the Lit Color and Shadow Color set the Calibrate value to Zero and render my color shadow with one simple light.. for the extra blending color tones set the Shadow Blur Radious to 20 in some cases and it work briliant.. THANK YOU BB!!!!!! it can't be more simple... ...and render so much faster as the shadow catcher feature...

i did not used it with a good light so just for simple quick test ...

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"Surrender to what it is - Let go of what was - Have faith in what will be "

For my math nods, this is what I see, and only get.

But I will go and work (take a guess which ones they are). Only way for me to know.

**Robo2010 , you don't have to build it, just put the material BB did into your material folder and add to the ground plane from your material room and change the values to fit your needs .....so simple ...
**
see the post above by BB ::
*Attached File: ShadowCatcher.mt5.txt (13.5 kilobytes)

*Here is the colored shadow catcher shader. Save it to your materials runtime as ShadowCatcher.mt5. Load it onto your ground plane or square.

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"Surrender to what it is - Let go of what was - Have faith in what will be "

*Robo2010 , you don't have to build it, just put the material BB did into your material folder and add to the ground plane from your material room and change the values to fit your needs .....so simple ...

AH!,...how in the world could I have missed that. Geesh (hits forhead).

welcome back on the track! ::

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"Surrender to what it is - Let go of what was - Have faith in what will be "

Cath,

I'm so happy it worked right. You're test image is spectacular. I didn't try any other situations, so it's great to see that it did the right thing.

Robo - Glad you got it sorted out. In case you really have to know, those nodes are just Simple_Color or Math_Functions. But even if you tried to build it - how could you? I didn't show you the rest of the nodes. There are a lot more nodes. In my screenshots I just showed you the ones you have to touch.

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*Robo - Glad you got it sorted out. In case you really have to know, those nodes are just Simple_Color or Math_Functions. But even if you tried to build it - how could you? I didn't show you the rest of the nodes. There are a lot more nodes. In my screenshots I just showed you the ones you have to touch.

*Thats ok for now. I finally got the mt5 file, and all shows in the material room. I am busy at the moment, cooking for wife, family. Also doing windows XP maintenance, all at the same time.

I was so excited yesterday (and even today) for this, and was out ready to take outdoor photographs. Only good shadows was for 10 minutes hour, and was to late finding it raining and cloudy. But, oh man, when that sun comes out at that special time. I am so ready. I will have to hook up my other Hard drive to get that one photograph I really like to try this on. I will also load it up in my download page, so others like yourself and even Mec4D to play with. give an hour or two.

Will be awesome when a family video is used as background.

I made some changes in the Calibrate_BLACK node and set the second value_2 to 1,0000 also, this remove the tint from the background complete and it don't make the background image darker no more.. also the Blending Factor can be set down to minimum and it give nice effect, you can pick the LIT and Shadow colors direct from the Material room and works so fine and more acurate.

Thank you BB again you really spare so much work for me doing it, especialy for animated work this is so excellent .. the rendering speed too
I have to make the HDR + light test to see how it come out but well I hope the AO pick up the nice color as usual.. have to test it while hot on the table! :)

somebody can make dinner for me? I am busy... just kidding..

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"Surrender to what it is - Let go of what was - Have faith in what will be "

P.S forgot to add that by the last settings my shadow value by the sun light was set much more higher.. look here the virtual shadows blends perfect together in 2 min.... one hdr and one sun light... for me works perfect and would be in usage as standart !

Thanks again BB

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"Surrender to what it is - Let go of what was - Have faith in what will be "

*somebody can make dinner for me? I am busy... just kidding..

*

*P.S forgot to add that by the last settings my shadow value by the sun light was set much more higher..
look here the virtual shadows blends perfect together in 2 min.... one hdr and one sun light...
for me works perfect and would be in usage as standart !

*Looking good.

See if you can put one of those spheres in one of those entrances, and one out from it.

I will eventually get to play (looks at watch and life situations).

I am so excited about this thread.

What would you recommend for reflected color from differing objects; where different shadows have different color hues on the same surface?

and

http://images.buycostumes.com/mgen/merchandiser/24750.jpg

-Anton, creator of Apollo Maximus
"Conviction without truth is denial; Denial in the face of truth is concealment."

Over 100,000 Downloads....

For that you can use Gather shader node that will reflect the color of the object , the most simple thing you can do b/c the GI .py script is not that perfect yet to use however i made cool tests with that as well ...

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"Surrender to what it is - Let go of what was - Have faith in what will be "

I've tried the gather node in the past. Problem I kept running into is the item glowing where light levels were low. Perhaps very low ambient values and very high gather values....

Thanks.

-Anton, creator of Apollo Maximus
"Conviction without truth is denial; Denial in the face of truth is concealment."

Over 100,000 Downloads....

P.S here is one simple preview, not really briliant setting but well a quick one that is possible to do.. in real world the colors on the ground reflect from the ball on the floor, in poser the flow reflect the colors of the ball in darker places of the shadow..

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"Surrender to what it is - Let go of what was - Have faith in what will be "

you have to use on light for the shadow and one light with no shadows that will light up the object from the dark side also but not that strong so this way the gather can pick up the light and reflect it where the shadow show up.. i did not used any Ambient it is good for a objects glowing in the dark scenes... however the GI.py script do a nice job for that for very dark scenes

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"Surrender to what it is - Let go of what was - Have faith in what will be "

Great info. Thankie.

-Anton, creator of Apollo Maximus
"Conviction without truth is denial; Denial in the face of truth is concealment."

Over 100,000 Downloads....

You welcome Anton, here one more, the ground have bump noises .. and the shadows are set on lower value.. you see that the left side where is not much light on the ball don't reflect on the flor no more not even the front as only the shadow area, if you use Ambient everything will reflect in the flor or other bojects around that use gather.. you can get it perfect done but for that you need more that 2 min .. ;)

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"Surrender to what it is - Let go of what was - Have faith in what will be "

Aye. because the reflected color is of such a low value in the real world that is can mostly only be visible in lower light levels.

I will definately play around with this more.

I like that it looks like it would be good at faking translucency too.

-Anton, creator of Apollo Maximus
"Conviction without truth is denial; Denial in the face of truth is concealment."

Over 100,000 Downloads....

Yes Anton, see in my gallery Image " WOT " good example for that.. a fake illumination from a object that use also translucence node ... works perfect ? 2 shadows, one green one standart..

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"Surrender to what it is - Let go of what was - Have faith in what will be "

Quote - I made some changes in the Calibrate_BLACK node and set the second value_2 to 1,0000 also, this remove the tint from the background complete and it don't make the background image darker no more.

Cath,

That node is a Math_Functions:Add node. Because you placed a 1 in Value_2, it adds them and produces 2. While you can get away with that on that node, it isn't what I intended for you to do. Just put a 2 in Value_1, or a 2.5, or 3, or 4. The purpose of that node is to detect where there is NOT a shadow, so that the shadow catcher effect is 0 (BLACK). That's why you tune upward until you get black in calibration mode.

The Calibrate_WHITE node is also a Math_Functions:Add node. BUT BE CAREFUL! There is something plugged into Value_1 - I need you to edit Value_1 always, not Value_2. If you edit Calibrate_WHITE Value_2, it will not include the plugged in value and the results will be wrong. The purpose of this node is so you can tune upward to determine where the maximum tinting should occur. I want to see 1 (WHITE) where you want the maximum shadow catcher effect.

These two calibration nodes are very important. Any time you change your lights, do a calibration render again to make sure you're getting black and white. If you don't get black for the un-shadows regions, it accidentally tints the whole picture, just as you discovered.

If Poser had a Simple_Number node (something like the Simple_Color node), then I would have used it, so there would be no confusion or possibility of mistake. But, alas, there is no such node. The closest thing is to use a Math_Functions node and just ignore Value_2 - leave it at 0. It is true that some of my parameter nodes don't care which one you change, but don't rely on that behavior. It is accidental. Always use Value_1 and pretend Value_2 isn't there.

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How cool would it be if Poser let me make new nodes like this :biggrin:

I wish they would hire me. I could do tons of cool stuff for them in just a few weeks. This is what I do in my real job - we build business rules calculations using nodes, only in my system, users can make up new nodes by assembling the existing ones. Then they get to put the parameters they want on the new object, and nobody has to see how the insides work. No coding either.

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Regarding the gather, I find that the effect is usually too strong. If you're plugging it into Alternate_Diffuse, choose a gray instead of white for the value multiplier. This will make the amount of gather much more subtle.

I tried to make an animating GIF of these three renders so you could see the differences more easily. It looked like crap.

Anyway, I wanted to show what a toned down amount of Gather should look like. I have Gather and AO on the ground and the ball, so the ball lights the ground and the ground lights the ball.

I did it in Poser 6 because Poser 7 (the thrid render) doesn't work right. They broke it. Face_off says use material based AO because it works better - well this IS material based AO. It doesn't work better. It sux.

I used 25 samples - that should be high enough to avoid banding and splotches.

Renderosity forum reply notifications are wonky. If I read a follow-up in a thread, but I don't myself reply, then notifications no longer happen AT ALL on that thread. So if I seem to be ignoring a question, that's why. (Updated September 23, 2019)

Attached Link: AOG.html

Oooh - I figured out how to do what I want using flash, and googlepages.

Follow the link

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Quote -

Cath,

That node is a Math_Functions:Add node. Because you placed a 1 in Value_2, it adds them and produces 2. While you can get away with that on that node, it isn't what I intended for you to do. Just put a 2 in Value_1, or a 2.5, or 3, or 4. The purpose of that node is to detect where there is NOT a shadow, so that the shadow catcher effect is 0 (BLACK). That's why you tune upward until you get black in calibration mode.

I know BB thanks I was just quick playing with that but well setting the Calibrate_Black to higher values make it better , I just need some time to work with and find the best way for me to work it out.. so sometimes little experiments are fine, the above setting i did was only for myself to fit what I did not for the general usage ;) .. thank you again for the note about

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"Surrender to what it is - Let go of what was - Have faith in what will be "

Quote - I wish they would hire me.

write to them about, they maybe will do, this is cool and more simple looking for the regular users.. heheheh.. you could make a good job there in this room and move it a little bit forward.. before DAZ kill it with own ideas.. yesterday when I checked the new features in Daz Studio it was funny that they go ahead with the new stuff beside the lighting in Daz studio is still to much game looking for me and not so clear..

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"Surrender to what it is - Let go of what was - Have faith in what will be "

Quote - Regarding the gather, I find that the effect is usually too strong. If you're plugging it into Alternate_Diffuse, choose a gray instead of white for the value multiplier. This will make the amount of gather much more subtle.

I see the gather get a little bit over the edges in P7... can't see anything on this website you posted above it is clean so no flash or anything visible ..
I made a quick test before so not exact.. I never use white surfaces in my final renders and for the best effect I spend 12-16 hours on so not compared to 2 min preview.. but well we have to keep it simple and give the oportunity for the users to play with that.. the self made cookies taste the best right ? ;) I made one pic using only gather nides for the surfaces where was not specular and everything based on reflect and fake GI.. it was looking very natural, rendering time was a killer but well a good quality.. every surface and material need own attention and different settings.. even for GI, we can use one script and light everything the same way.. this will go to nowhere.. skin or wall reflect light different ways that why in some progs everything looks not natural at all , nice for the eyes as illustrations but not photographic effect..

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"Surrender to what it is - Let go of what was - Have faith in what will be "

In you flash code you forgot to change the names and path that why it don't play :::

<em>::::<<span class="start-tag">embed</span><span class="attribute-name"> name</span>=<span class="attribute-value">"Untitled-1" </span><span class="attribute-name">src</span>=<span class="attribute-value"> </span><span class="attribute-name">width</span>=<span class="attribute-value">"358" </span><span class="attribute-name">height</span>=<span class="attribute-value">"322"::::::<br></br><br></br>replace red with : </span></em><span class="attribute-value">"http://poserbagginsbill.googlepages.com/aog.swf"</span>

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"Surrender to what it is - Let go of what was - Have faith in what will be "

Quote - How cool would it be if Poser let me make new nodes like this :biggrin:

I begged for the ability to make custom nodes via a locked macro. Or at least password protected nested nodes. I begged and nagged. No luck.

Quote - I wish they would hire me:

If this ever comes to pass, email me.

I really like the images above. Bounced color is my new favorite thing. But I do most of it in Postwork.

-Anton, creator of Apollo Maximus
"Conviction without truth is denial; Denial in the face of truth is concealment."

Over 100,000 Downloads....

I did another test, nice how the specular reflect on the ground plane..using the gather both for the sphere and the ground, we just have to know exactly what is the level of the reflective surface to set it correct for every object used in the scene..

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"Surrender to what it is - Let go of what was - Have faith in what will be "

bagginsbill i tryed your new shadow catcher. grounbreaking. and even better then the first one.

how do you do this?

You really want the math behind it or just a general explanation?

Renderosity forum reply notifications are wonky. If I read a follow-up in a thread, but I don't myself reply, then notifications no longer happen AT ALL on that thread. So if I seem to be ignoring a question, that's why. (Updated September 23, 2019)

no no no. i dont want explanation.
i just asked how do you come up with this .

did they hire you? for christ sake why dont you work for them? and why dont they do what you asked them?

he he :)

I come up with solutions when someone asks how to do something. I usually don't know how to do it until then.

It's what I do professionally - invent software that most people think cannot be written, or cannot be written quickly.

Renderosity forum reply notifications are wonky. If I read a follow-up in a thread, but I don't myself reply, then notifications no longer happen AT ALL on that thread. So if I seem to be ignoring a question, that's why. (Updated September 23, 2019)

Unfortunately I am not smart enough for the fancy node tricks. :(
My dumb-painter approaches are:

an IBL light set low with a color complementary to the main shadowing light.
a very dark complementary color set on the ambient channel of everything in the scene to fake an ambient IBL... gradients can be used here also.
a separate shadow only render that is composited to a no shadow render and colorized in Photoshop.

Just turned up this image from an old post about using the ambient channel for fake ambient lighting back when I was using Poser Pro Pack.

try gamma shader and you will see how an IBL 20-30% can make your render look good.

can we do a basic shadow catcher without the color options and calibration?

like the poser catcher with gamma correction ? i dont need shadows to have color and calibrating takes some time when i do test renders.

i was trying to change your shader BB but i had no luck.

i substracted the diffuse node and connected it to transparency. didnt look good.

thanks for help.

edit

I can't think of a way to build the shadow catcher using nodes that controls transparency without calibrating. The problem is there is no node that tells you directly how much you are in shadow. All we have is how much light is reflecting, either using a Diffuse node or something similar, such as Clay. I can't even tell how much light is hitting the surface. I can only tell how much is reflecting after hitting, which is based on the normal as well as the light intensity and where the shadow is falling.

So that's why I used the Diffuse node and require that you calibrate, so the shader can know how bright it is when lit and how bright when in shadow.

For example, with an IBL and an infinite, the two values could be .3 and .6, or .1 and .9, or .8 and .9. Which do you look for? Is .5 in shadow? Not in the last one - the last one has .8 in shadow and .9 when lit. So we have to calibrate.

The AO node gives us a direct measurement of occlusion, regardless of how much light is falling. We need a similar node for directional shadows but there is no such thing in Poser.

The information is there, just not accessible or derivable using existing nodes. Only the built-in shadow catcher is able to detect "in shadow %" without regard to light level or angle of incidence.

Also, in P7 it is not possible to build GC into this if we use transparency. We do not have a transparency node either. I wish we did. I would like a Transparency node that gives the color of the object behind the current object, similar to what Refraction does at IOR = 1, but without having to do ray-tracing.

I can build a GC shadow catcher using ray-tracing and refraction instead of transparency. In fact, I already did. But it's slower than the transparency version.

If you really don't care about color or shadow intensity, just use the built-in one. I know it doesn't do GC, but it is good enough for test renders.I'd argue if you're not interested in shadow color, you're not really interested in shadow intensity that much, right? Because pretty much GC would only change the shadow intensity.

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thanks for the explanation.

like you said for test renders i should use the built in shadow catcher.

i am having problems calibrating with the ShadowCatcher-AO.
ShadowCatcher-AO can be used for only AO on the ground right?

with the Calibrate Lit i pic the white part right?
with the Calibrate Shadow i pick the dark part that i get from AO right?

i think i made it to work.
when using material AO its best to have wthite and black because material AO doesnt change with lights. right?

Was dealing with this problem today... the mt5 file provided in this thread is already gone, so i guess I'll just deal with the shadow color in Photoshop, seems the faster way to go :)

Nice necro-post.

The shadow catcher invented in this thread is available from my site and has been for a long time. In fact, it has been improved.

https://sites.google.com/site/bagginsbill/free-stuff/shadow-catcher

Please note it was written before there was a SuperFly and it only works in FireFly.

Renderosity forum reply notifications are wonky. If I read a follow-up in a thread, but I don't myself reply, then notifications no longer happen AT ALL on that thread. So if I seem to be ignoring a question, that's why. (Updated September 23, 2019)

Forum: Poser - OFFICIAL

Subject: Shadow color?