Technically, part of Skin Head, is that correct?

What this is about is my inevitable attempt to actually carry out the experiment and see what would happen if I made a transparency map for the ears, with the slightest hint of non-white. Would it offer any sort of translucency?

Given that all these lights are pretty much behind the head, it look like it sort of works. But perhaps I have just enough angle on them that the effect is not really deriving from that.

Anyway, it's not a workable approach... giving transparency to the ears actually gives V4 a hole in the back of her head. Go figure. And of course, the only light colour that looks reasonable peeping  through is red.

Ah, well, I got some fun rendering out of it... doing a few more, but not particularly as part of the experiment, which obviously doesn't really work. :)

(Click for full size.)

That's an interesting idea though.  Make them semi transparent.  You know I think Bagginsbill was doing something for that with shaders, to make the light to actually relflect back through the skin. I don't understand any of it. I mean I know about light and all that but I don't know anything about making Poser behave like the real world.

Yeah... I actually think the way that right ear glows is kinda cool, although it's not particularly realistic, I don't think.... If there was a material zone dedicated to the ears, I think I could play with those colours. Actually, I think there is a way to do it in the material room, but I'm not experienced enough with that at this point to try to sort that out - especially for a whim like this. :)

I will set up ear materials in my figures.

Some time ago I did come across a post about this same subject.  I believe that originated at RDNA.

You could separate out a zone using the Grouping tool.  It would probably
be sort of imprecise, but you only need the free-standing part of the ear anyway.   

Select the head, use wireframe display, get a good camera angle and lots of light ...

Click on the grouping tool ...

Hit "New Group" and name it Ears ...

Select as much of the ears as you can...

Hit "Assign material" and name it EarMat or something.

Get out of the grouping tool.

Resave the figure, or at least a PZ3, quickly to preserve your work.

Might be interesting to try translucence on the ears instead of transparency.

Thanks, ockham. I was just reading the manual about the grouping tool yesterday. Maybe I'll actually find a use for it....  :biggrin:

This process is easier than it sounds, once you get used to it!

You can use a transparency map to control the level of transparency wanted .

Um... that's what I'm doing....

There is a node that is supposed to light up only when lit from behind and only on thin things like ears - the fastscatter. To make it work you have to use depth-mapped shadows, otherwise it glows all the time.

Failing that there's nothing that's going to work universally. Making a SSS map will help, and you might be able to use the fastscatter with that.

Oh, and a material zone is pointless. You have to make the scatter map anyway, because if the entire ear glows its wrong. Only the thin parts should glow.

Mec4d did this once. She claimed it was automatic, but face_off beat her about and when she finally revealed that she had made an SSS map, well then basically she drew the SSS so what's the point of that.

Thanks, bagginsbill. The only reason I mentioned the material zone is that my transparency map seems to be affecting the back of the head more than it affects the ears - odd, since the only place on the map I've shaded at all is the ears, but... that's the way it is.