Michaelab opened this issue on Apr 20, 2013 · 20 posts
Michaelab posted Sat, 20 April 2013 at 8:42 PM
Just downloaded and not sure how to best use it.
Thanks
hborre posted Sat, 20 April 2013 at 9:46 PM
There is a users guide within the zip file to get you started.
Morkonan posted Sun, 21 April 2013 at 3:27 AM
I wish there was a better tutorial on it, as well. Some of the settings are not described at all. I would put that up to the tutorial being created for an earlier version, but I don't know for sure.
basicwiz posted Sun, 21 April 2013 at 6:17 AM
I wrote the manual, so perhaps I can help.
What settings are you asking about?
Morkonan posted Sun, 21 April 2013 at 3:57 PM
Quote - I wrote the manual, so perhaps I can help.
What settings are you asking about?
Off the top of my head, the dropdown box with "Chicken", "Potato?" Something to do with the SSS settings. There's no description for any of those entries and it'd be nice to not have to render them all in order to see what each one does. (Not exactly "intuitive" descriptive words, on the face of things. But, once I knew what they were, I'd probably see the need for the choice.)
Snarlygribbly posted Sun, 21 April 2013 at 5:19 PM
Quote - Off the top of my head, the dropdown box with "Chicken", "Potato?" Something to do with the SSS settings. There's no description for any of those entries and it'd be nice to not have to render them all in order to see what each one does. (Not exactly "intuitive" descriptive words, on the face of things. But, once I knew what they were, I'd probably see the need for the choice.)
They are their own descriptions.
The 'chicken' setting creates a subsurface scattering effect similar to that seen in the skin of chickens.
The 'potato' setting creates a subsurface scattering effect similar to that seen in potatoes.
And so on.
They are the names of the settings taken directly from Poser's Scatter node options, so to use any other names would have only led to confusion.
So if you're rendering milk, use the milk setting. If you're rendering skin, use the skin setting. And so on.
Free stuff @ https://poser.cobrablade.net/
mikegg posted Sun, 21 April 2013 at 8:24 PM
I don't understand. I changed the material option in ezskin and looked at the both scatter nodes and the check box "use_material _color" is not checked. So what ever change you make to the option in ezskin changes the material, but if the box is not checked it doesn't matter, the material color is not used.
Where is the option in ezskin to put a check in that box?
Mike
basicwiz posted Sun, 21 April 2013 at 8:46 PM
Since the boss is here, I defer to his expertise...
Snarlygribbly posted Mon, 22 April 2013 at 2:55 AM
The Material drop down box affects the way the light scatters (i.e. it affects the maths) but not the colour. Changing these options will make a difference regardless of whether or not the Use_Material_Color box is ticked.
Each of these presets also has a colour associated with it. In Poser you can choose to use that colour or not. EZSkin always uses the texture map colour rather than the preset colour so it never ticks that box. The presets still affect the maths though, giving rise to subtly different SSS effects.
If there is a demand to be able to use the presets colours, I could add a check box to do so in EZSkin. Let me know?
Free stuff @ https://poser.cobrablade.net/
Michaelab posted Mon, 22 April 2013 at 9:32 AM
What is the difference between what Oxygen (http://www.runtimedna.com/OXYGEN-For-Poser-and-DS.html) does for skin verses what EZSkin does?
basicwiz posted Mon, 22 April 2013 at 9:34 AM
Oxygen is a set of custom textures and bump maps that sits on top of EZSkin.
Michaelab posted Mon, 22 April 2013 at 9:50 AM
It would seem to me, the unenlightened, that if Oxygen sits on top of EZSkin it would cover the effects of EZSkin. No?
basicwiz posted Mon, 22 April 2013 at 10:08 AM
I don't own Oxygen, but from the write up it looks like you need EZSkin installed for it to work. Why not contact the Oxygen vendor for clarification?
mikegg posted Mon, 22 April 2013 at 10:33 AM
Ok Snarly thanks for the clarification. I didn't know it affected the maths. I tried different settings and didn't notice any difference, so the effect must be subtle...I'll look closer next time. :)
Would I like a way to use the colors as a material color? Might be a fun thing to experiment with as a way to change a characters complexion. It does have a noticeable effect when you change those settings with "use material color" enabled. If they're feeling sick you could even use the apple option and get a green tint
Mike
hborre posted Mon, 22 April 2013 at 10:45 AM
Actually, the manual does cover that topic, somewhat, by example.
Snarlygribbly posted Mon, 22 April 2013 at 10:49 AM
Quote - I don't own Oxygen, but from the write up it looks like you need EZSkin installed for it to work. Why not contact the Oxygen vendor for clarification?
You don't need EZSkin to use the Oxygen product.
EZSkin was, however, used to help develop the Oxygen shaders.
Like all shaders produced via EZSkin, they can be used by anybody for any purposes, commercial or otherwise. It's also worth noting that this is largely due to the generosity of Bagginsbill :-)
Free stuff @ https://poser.cobrablade.net/
mikegg posted Mon, 22 April 2013 at 12:52 PM
Not that it matters, but I really don't see it in the manual. However there sure are a lot of options to experiment with.
Michael
Michaelab posted Mon, 22 April 2013 at 1:00 PM
Could you explain to me in a nutshell, what EZSkin does for rendering of skin that Oxygen does not and vice-versa? They both are dealing with skin, aren't they?
Snarlygribbly posted Mon, 22 April 2013 at 1:55 PM
Quote - Could you explain to me in a nutshell, what EZSkin does for rendering of skin that Oxygen does not and vice-versa? They both are dealing with skin, aren't they?
Er, nothing, except that EZSkin can be used with any texture set, not just the Oxygen ones. Oxygen uses its own very high quality texture/bump/specular maps, EZSkin uses whatever is currently being used by the figure. Apart from that they do very similar things.
Free stuff @ https://poser.cobrablade.net/
Morkonan posted Mon, 22 April 2013 at 10:34 PM
Quote - ...They are their own descriptions. The 'chicken' setting creates a subsurface scattering effect similar ...And so on.
Thanks for the reply. After I made my post, I ended up hunting around Poser's mat room and found the nodes in question. But, I guess I'll have to start rendering to see all the effects. (SSS takes so very long... I use a famous fake SSS script for my preview renders, then switch to EZSkin if I'm doing HQ stuff. Still trying to get the hang of it, due to not being able to render those as quickly as I march through all the options.)
Thanks for the wonderful script - You've made it possible for people to easily use a very expensive bit of software, at no cost to them. That's worthy of better thanks than just this free reply. :D Thanks for keeping your script updated, as well!