i'm not understanding why texture filtering on the DAZ figures is an issue these days?

and the eye fixes?

i'm seeing seams on V4 skins.  The DAZ support said to turn off texture filtering.

Texture filtering combines adjacent pixels to reduce the effective resolution. It is beyond the scope of your question as to why you want to do this, but there are some legit reasons.

Anyway, some texture authors do not understand this effect or are unaware of it. This includes Daz. As a consequence of their ignorance, they do not draw "outside the lines". In other words, if they fill the color map right up to but not past the seams, then the data on the other side of the seam is not consistent with the skin color. Usually it's white.

Texture filtering then combines adjacent pixels (white) with the skin pixels, resulting in a visible lighter colored line at the seams.

A texture that properly anticipates this effect includes a little bit of skin past the seam, so that texture filtering can do its job, which it has to do in 2D, not 3D.

 Texture Filtering blurs out detailed textures.  in my opinion, Many a render goes bad when some textures look blurry like my eyes are going bad.  Turning OFF Texture FIltering is almost always better to my eye than leaving it on, because it looks sharper which also looks better.  On some lo-res textures it actually looks beter, but on most, IMO, it looks pretty bad.

There is a python script available to turn it off here.  Just search the freebies for 'Turnfilteringoff' or a variant of that.

Joe, try turning your shading rate down in render options and on each figure. trust me.. you don't need to turn off texture filtering to get a sharp texture at all. the shading rate is set to high as default.

 I know about the shading. I'm talking about the textures looking blurry becasue of texture filtering.

so am I.
the filtering and the shader rate work together. if you leave the filtering as it is and lower the shader rate, the textures sharpen. try it.

That's odd ... I have P7 and PoserPro and always have texture filtering turned on but I've never got this white lines that some are getting. Could it maybe be low render settings causing this issue?

I always set the shading rate to 0.2 and if you need really sharp images when rendering with the Firefly try setting the post filter size to sync instead to box. Makes a huge difference.

just a point of info :> DAZ3D the company does NOT actually author any textures or content products, so they HAVE NOT got texture filtering wrong. the same people who make textures for Poser make them for use in DazStudio as well, the only difference is in the shader set-up. the textures ( .jpeg, .png etc) are identical.
so please don't blame a particular marketplace for the perceived shortcomings of content author/producers.
quite often the same content is sold at  various market places, and it is rather unfair to point the finger at only one.

Quote - just a point of info :> DAZ3D the company does NOT actually author any textures or content products, so they HAVE NOT got texture filtering wrong. the same people who make textures for Poser make them for use in DazStudio as well, the only difference is in the shader set-up. the textures ( .jpeg, .png etc) are identical.
so please don't blame a particular marketplace for the perceived shortcomings of content author/producers.
quite often the same content is sold at  various market places, and it is rather unfair to point the finger at only one.

erm except it was DAZ SUPPORT that told her to turn it off not the content maker. it's in the first post.

the point is that the texture filtering tool does what it says, the problem lies in the textures that  the texture makers have made, not the program or DAZ3D, the company.
so don't have a dig at the company.
as a company their quality control on products submitted to the store is far higher than most of the other Poser content marketplaces.

how about you stop stirring things up? your the one thats actually turning this into a fight.

I'm enjoying the DAZ content, don't mean to knock it. 
I've gone a bit overbudget :wub: with the Platinum Club stuff.

But, I wish the product detail pages could give a mention about the texture filter thing without me having to wait 2 days for a support answer.

example (doesn't mention anything about seams in Poser):
 http://www.daz3d.com/i/3d-models/-/v4-elite-texture?item=7378&_m=d

Atleast, now I can recognize what the problem is.

You can see the seam on their heads in this buggy render. 
And you can see the difference in Michael's hair,
texture filtering on his face 'off',
texture filtering on his neck 'on'.

They've split the material groups between neck(up the back of his head) and face,
so there isn't a complete 'head' material.

Best Regards,

Quote - That's odd ... I have P7 and PoserPro and always have texture filtering turned on but I've never got this white lines that some are getting. Could it maybe be low render settings causing this issue?

I always set the shading rate to 0.2 and if you need really sharp images when rendering with the Firefly try setting the post filter size to sync instead to box. Makes a huge difference.

I have my shader set to 1.05 and sync.

I'm finding that if I set the Filter rate higher (it says to raise rate for anti-aliasing)
I end up with a scattering of pixels not rendering, leaving holes in the render.

Have you noticed this too?

just putting things straight. the problem described is with the textures,  not the program or the company that produces it.

i do not defend the company if something is their fault, but i do not like people blaming the program or the company for something that is not there fault . stating that the problem is caused by the program or company without any base in facts is just wrong. especially when the OP said the problem was with the textures.

joelglaine mentioned that he has problems with texture filtering, and he uses Poser.

so how can anyone say the problem is just with DAZ3D or DazStudio?

as i stated before, DAZ3D do not make textures!

just noticed that the OP is using an Elite texture, these are not set up for Poser. the textures were designed to work with omnifreakers HSS for the best results. of course, HSS does not work in Poser.

3anson, what you're saying is simply not consistent with what DAZ 3D says. You just said Elite is not set up for Poser. DAZ disagrees with you. Let me show you what I mean.

From a DAZ 3D press release, July 17,2008

Quote -
Leveraging unprecedented technology to deliver unparalleled results, DAZ 3D today unveiled its Elite™ series of add-on morphs and textures for the fourth generation Millennium Figure, Victoria.

Notice it does not say "DAZ 3d today unveiled yannek's Elite series ...".

Clearly, yannek made the textures, but DAZ 3D has never positioned the Elite series as a brokered product. It has always been announced and promoted as the company's own product. Yes an actual human, not DAZ 3D the company, made the thing. That doesn't change the authorship, intellectual propery rights, and responsibility. Otherwise, you could say that Poser 8 is my product or PhilC's product or Stefan Werner's product, not Smith Micro's product, simply on the basis that each of us wrote parts of it.

If you still don't think it is correct to credit DAZ 3D for the problem, instead of yannek, consider what DAZ 3D says about the Elite Series:

Quote -
A Proprietary lighting system is used for creating even, flat light designed to work perfectly in all conditions when applied to the 3D model.

Proprietary to whom, yannek or DAZ 3D? You know it's not yannek.

And this:

Quote - Some of the best texture artists in the community have worked with us on this project. DAZ 3D has instituted a stringent QA process that is much more demanding than any existing quality control process ...

The phrasing clearly indicates, to me at least, that the whole project, the processes used, the tools used, and all the deliverables were conceived, specified, contracted, controlled, and managed by DAZ 3D.

Yannek did not institute the QA process, DAZ 3D did. And it's clearly not more demanding than the QA at RuntimeDNA. Why do I say that? Because  I have never seen anybody ever say that a RuntimeDNA brokered V4 texture, such as any product from RebelMommy, shows any texture seam problems. There is no evidence that DAZ 3D product management was aware that you need to "paint outside the lines" on a texture to avoid seams when using typical (not extreme) render settings and texture filtering. In Poser, texture filtering is an important optimization. It produces better results for a distant figure (a non-closeup) with less computations and memory use.

Yet, DAZ 3D says this on the Elite series web page:

Quote - The Elite series of products are optimized for use within Carrara, DAZ Studio, and Poser.
...
Most importantly, everything necessary to accomplish this is assembled into an easy-to-use package so that the end user can enjoy superb renders right out of the box.

That's simply not true, unless you are willing to quibble about what "optimized" means versus what they meant by it. IMO, to optimize a texture means to make it work reasonably well (no seams) when using non-heroic render settings, and when using texture optimization features of an application like MIP-mapping (texture filtering).

I have seen forum posts by various people saying that decreasing min shading rate helps, but even with very small shading rates, they still see the seams if texture filtering is on. Turning off texture filtering leads to longer render times and more memory use. Long render times and more memory use, when it is possible to do something to avoid that, is exactly NOT optimal.

The funniest part of all this is it isn't just Poser. There are forum posts where people say it happens in DAZ Studio, too.

Believable3D said this Sep 2, 2008 2:38 am

Quote -
I've been getting seams with Elite in certain poses. (Unfortunately, with Amy, which is about my fave texture.) And that's in Daz Studio, as I don't have Poser yet (Poser Pro is on the way). :( 

And she's ... believable.

as you so clearly say, BB, a person with the handle 'yannek' created the textures, under commision , i would presume. so, the problem with the texture is because the creator did not take the texture a few pixels outside the uv map. i have no argument with that.
if there is a problem with a texture and names are mentioned, the creator 's name or none should be stated. not having a dig at a company for the sake of it.

i am sure if these seam problems had shown up in testing, they would have been sorted before release.
as a company, they are a marketplace, they buy some products, commission some, and they sell products on a commission basis. they do not create content.

erm they create plenty of content. Victoria, Micheal etc....

sorry I'm outta here. this person 3anson has no interest in facts at all and wants to just have an arguement.

I've got better things todo with my time.

Quote - I have my shader set to 1.05 and sync.

I'm finding that if I set the Filter rate higher (it says to raise rate for anti-aliasing)
I end up with a scattering of pixels not rendering, leaving holes in the render.

Have you noticed this too?

 You mean the Post filter size? I've never changed the Post filter size but left it at the default setting 1, only changed from box to sync. The Min Shading rate is set to 0.2 and the Pixel Sample at 12.   But I'm going to test these next time I'm doing a render. Will see if I get the same results as you've mentioned.

thanks. 

I've changed every setting one by one and I'm pretty sure
the culprit is the Post Filter size.

One setting is for the Geometry anti-aliasing.

Texture anti-aliasing.

my memory is failing me.

I don't dare put Poser on my dayjob PC. 
I do have a little Acer Netbook, what would Poser look like on an 8" screen.
It has 1gb of ram and 160 hard drive.  should be enough computing power.

Quote - I have seen forum posts by various people saying that decreasing min shading rate helps, but even with very small shading rates, they still see the seams if texture filtering is on. Turning off texture filtering leads to longer render times and more memory use. Long render times and more memory use, when it is possible to do something to avoid that, is exactly NOT optimal.

Longer render times, yes, memory usage - no. FireFly since P7 is using a texture cache that keeps the amount of memory used for textures constant, regardless of the number of textures, their size or the filtering used (similar systems are being used by PRMan or 3Delight too).

Quote - The funniest part of all this is it isn't just Poser. There are forum posts where people say it happens in DAZ Studio, too.

Last time I used DS, it used 3Delight with texture filtering on at all times without the option to turn it off. You might be able to turn it off with some RSL hacking, but I didn't investigate that.

Wouldn't it be smarter of texture filtering to instead wrap around to the next part of the mesh for the pixels instead of going into the "white" area?

Quote - Wouldn't it be smarter of texture filtering to instead wrap around to the next part of the mesh for the pixels instead of going into the "white" area?

Such a feature would be useful. But it would no longer be called texture filtering, since the algorithm would be very different, and it would no longer be fast.

Texture filtering is a 2D operation, having nothing to do with geometry and UV map. There's no part of the image itself that is recognizable as a UV edge, where the other side wraps around. It's all just one big image.

 I never noticed any real time difference between filtering or non-filtering.  I've been told filter takes longer, and filter takes shorter time.  I'm far more concerned about how the final image looks, and if a texture is blurred, it's blurred. Period.  If texture goes to the edge of the UV and texture blurring causes it to mess up, it's got to go.  I have NEVER seen any usefulness to it.

Poser 6 worked fine without it.  That is the one thing in Poser 7 I WISH I could turn off globally.

The big thing is render settings beyond the filtering. When you render with bad settings the lines show.

There's also the inbetween setting.  The dropdown list has a 'fast' option.

In my opinion, prop hair renders better with texture filtering on.

Quote - There's also the inbetween setting.  The dropdown list has a 'fast' option.

In my opinion, prop hair renders better with texture filtering on.

that is the only thing that I've found texture filtering good for...things with Trans Maps applied, like hair.

--Rebekah--

 Texture filtering is good for HAIR?  Hmmmmm, I'll have to try that out.

Something needs to be done for any texture (whether image based or procedural) that has contrasty regular patterns, particularly fine parallel lines, like hair or a cloth weave, such as plaid fabrics. It does not happen when vieweing these things up close, such that the smallest features are larger than a pixel. It happens when viewed farther away, and some features line up with individual pixels to varying degrees, or when you get sometimes 1 per pixel, sometimes 2 per pixel, as they get smaller. This is a problem of under-sampling, below the Nyquist frequency, and occurs in all kinds of digital technology. In all cases, it creates artifacts - aliasing - the appearance or sound of things that are not there.

There are two choices for Poser users - super sampling or texture filtering.

Super sampling means to sample and evaluate the texture at many points for each pixel. To do this you decrease your min shading rate and increase your pixel samples in render settings. This will do the job, but it will cost you a lot. In certain scenarios, you will have to do more than 4X. You will have to do 9X to 16X. That means a min shading rate of .0625.

When the root cause of a moire pattern is a texture image itself, and not a procedural or geometrical detail, texture filtering is much more efficient. First it is only done for problem areas, not the whole image. That's a big time saving right there. Second, it is done in 2D so you don't have to fully evaluate the 3D shader.

Textures with no detail involving semi-regularly spaced repeating patterns do not exhibit moire. However, if we under-sample them we are distorting the details.

The thing is that most "natural" textures have details which are essentially random. Things like moles and freckles, the tiny wrinkles in skin - these are details that look just as good, whether under-sampling has distorted them or not. Do you notice when a little nick is taken out of a freckle? No you don't. But you do notice that the freckles as a whole seem less sharp.

IMO, the reason it seems less sharp is not a flaw in texture filtering, per se, as a technique, but in Poser's implementation of it. I feel that it is too aggressive at times, being tied to the min shading rate. If it had a separate control of its own for detail level, then I'd leave it on all the time.

As it is, I only use it for things like hair and cloth.