My Trade Secrets

[P.Alexander]

Thanks alot man ! These are going to be usefull, it's appreciated ! ;)

[DJSmackMackey]

glad you like them. I hope you find them useful.

[Sagii]

Thanks dude! I really appreciate it when people are so kind to help students and others who are trying to learn. I'll check it out :thumbsup:

[DJSmackMackey]

I'm happy to do it. Now I just need to update my work in my portfolio so that it looks like I know what I'm doing. I don't remember the last time I changed it out, but it's been a long while.
Hope those tips help you out.

[mongrove]

geniuis!, thanku

[yenvalmar]

i like these little "tricks" of just using normal features in ways that arent well documented, as opposed to some of the "i know how to program and i spent a long time with mental ray so i'm going to turn everything into a major project" approach of a lot of TDs and shader people.

i cant blame them for it, but often theres several ways to get a result.. when its so simple a lot of this stuff takes longer to write up than to actually make though.. heh.. not as fun as an 49 part tutorial on your zbrush to renderman workflow.

[DJSmackMackey]

Yes, I am definitely not technically minded. I do a lot of trial and error, and I ask other technically minded people how things work to help me understand it all. I'm sure someone can point out even easier/faster ways of doing some of these things too, which would be great. People sometimes tend to make things harder than they need to be, so that's when you just have to take a step back and try and think of other solutions.

[bradw]

Thanks for the tips.
I particularly like the GI and SSS fake soultions ;)

[thematt]

very cool..!! thks a lot for that.

cheers

[yenvalmar]

as seen in your jade dragon image.

[DJSmackMackey]

as seen in your jade dragon image.

sure. what would you like to know?

[Smik]

I really appreciate it when people are so kind to help students and others who are trying to learn.:thumbsup: pricolno!!!

[yenvalmar]

sure. what would you like to know?

or is there any further mapping involved.. i.e. what is the actual shader network, where does the other hack plug into it.

[DJSmackMackey]

or is there any further mapping involved.. i.e. what is the actual shader network, where does the other hack plug into it.

I don't have the scene file with me, but I believe all I did was use the same technique for the SSS fake, and then connected that shader's out color to another shader's incandecense or ambient channel. But it's pretty much done the way I did in the example.
Sorry I can't be more help than that. If I had the scene file I could look at the shader and give you exact specs, but I was working at a studio when I made it.

[yenvalmar]

i keep forgetting you can map the output of an entire shader directly to a slot in another shader. so cool :)

[DJSmackMackey]

i keep forgetting you can map the output of an entire shader directly to a slot in another shader. so cool :)

Yup. I do it a lot. I just did it on a project I'm finishing up now, probably more for a shader than I ever have before, to get a metallic flake car paint look for a coffee cup. I had one shader for the flakes plugged into another shader for the frenel reflections to another shader for the gloss to another shader for the base color. It's such a hack, but I love it.

[Unled]

cool, these are great! Thanks!

[DJSmackMackey]

I'm glad you like them. Hope they help.

[DJSmackMackey]

I just added another one to the list. This new one covers I.D. passes and implementing them in After Effects.

[wormtongue]

u got some really cool and easy to follow tutorials. thanks for sharing. :D

[PhuongDPh]

very interesting tutorials
Thanks !

[Lunatique]

Great stuff--I've added this thread to the sticky thread for tutorials.

[jeffthomann]

You may, (or may not?) want to change your website's format a bit. Looking at it on this )(my wife's) computer in 800x600 pixel resolution makes that logo up top take up a lot of screen real estate.

[DJSmackMackey]

Yeah, I want to redesign the entire site, I just keep putting it off. I just got myself an Xbox360 though, so I don't know if I'll have any free time for a while. :) Dead Rising requires a lot of attention.

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