Hi List, so I was very eager to investigate this new porcelin feature thinking that this was something new new new.
Now, let me just say that I’m not reporting anything that I believe to be fact, I would like someone to chime in and give me the info… but this is what I’m seeing…
1.Porcelin is just a material that averages the splines normals.
2.Porcelin is a material that has been around since at least 1999 and works in v8.5.
3.Porcelin will in fact smooth out the model’s mesh, but you will loose large amounts of spline detail.
4.With number 3 being said, you can really only use this material on clothing or other items that don’t require detail. Example… I loose the bone structure on WidowMaker’s cheecks and I loose the stomach muscle detail that is built into the mesh.
Anyone?
Mike Fitz
Porcelin Observations
Ok, part of this is true. Yes, porcelain has been around for a while (I think it was in 8.0 too). But there are some major improvements in 10.5.
Firstly, it uses more polys to averega the normals…so it will be more exact. If I understand it correctly, it used to be 4x4 polys, and is now 16x16 (anyone who can clarify this).
Secondly, there is a new attribute called Normal Weight…which lets you set how much smoothing you want. Though note that 0% is not the same as no porcelain. See this page I threw up for how the different settings work http://www.ragtag.net/xternal/porcelain/index.html
The best way to see the difference is to view them by stepping through them in an image viewer (ifran view or acdc or something). I didn’t match the camera in AM10…but the difference is obvious (the ear is a good place to look).
Yes you loose detail, but not as much as you used to. So, so far, I’m kind of happy with it.
Of course, you could always try my three pass approach I had planned for 8.5. Create a black and white mask texture which defines where you want the porcelain material and where you want the normal one. Render out the character with the mask texture applied and constant shading. Then render out the image twice, with and without porcelain. Combine the two renderes using the mask into one image, effectivly giving you painted control over the porcelain material (and taking about 2.5 times as long to render).
Ragnar
p.s. There is a rendering artifact when porcelain was applied 100% around the eye. 
Don’t know what this is. All renderings where done using the old anti-alias method…no multi-pass.
Ragtag - Okay, good visual examples of what porcelain can help us achieve. But doesn’t seem to be a realistic option for certain types of characters.
What are the results that others are achieving? I think that I would only use this on clothing or other non essential detailed mesh.
Mike Fitz
Well I find it great to use. It realy liberates me. I am throwing 3-pointers and 5-pointers in here and there and not having to worry about creasing so much. I am using magnitude to define creases and it comes out fine. Loss of detail is not a problem. I don’t bother with the normal weight thing. If I want creases then I put them there myself.
Excuse my ignorance but I’ve been avoiding 10.5x updates because of porcelain problems. I recently had to finish a project in 10x, and some features we’re really buggy. 10.5x seems to be better but because of issues with porcelain…
I get this with all render settings… in 10.5a.
Being supremely uninformed, is there something you have to do to enable correct rendering of 5 point patches using porcelain in 10.5a? I apologize if this question has been answered before.
Thanks in advance!
It looks like the normals of your 5-point patch are pointing the wrong way. All you need to do is select all the points around the 5 point patch and hit F (or right click on the selection and choose Flip Normals).
5-point patches have a tendency to have their normals pointing the wrong way when you create them.
Ragnar
You probably just need to refind normals and then make sure your normals are pointing in the right direction. 5 pointers seem to always point the wrong way.
3DArtZ : Good gracious, you’ve either been in a cave or too busy working on more cool WidowMaker stuff. The new porcelain is much improved over it’s previous incarnation. Being able to control it’s effect through normal weights let’s you more easily use 5 pointers, 3 pointers and hooks with reckless abandon. I’m with John, it’s liberating 
Thanks My Fault and Ragtag, I used ctrl + 1 to turn on normals and found that more than one patch was having the normals pointed in the wrong way. :eek:
Consistently all my five point patches in my other models have theirs pointed the wrong way as well. Again many thanks from a now enlightened user
Primus, try taking off the porcelain material. Then do “refind normals” and then go through and make sure your normals are pointing in the right direction. Flip any that aren’t. Re-apply the porcelain material. I found that I had to take the material off, then do the fix and then re-apply for it to work. Many times in Hash, things don’t update as they should and you have to do things that force it to… I think this is one of those things 
My Fault, I’ve worked extensively in Lightwave and Maya and things pretty much work as they should.
A:M is a such a quirky little critter. Wonderful, wonderful character animation tools, many ideas from A:M’s workflow I’ve adapted and scripted using the other packages.
I must say if not for the forum, and with the frenetic pace of updates and lack of solid documentation, I would have long ago given up on it. Thanks!
Heres how I deal with the porcillain issue (a method given by one of the Anzovins)…
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Finish your model with as little creasing as possible but with no porcillain
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Use refind normals from the context menu.
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Select show normals (shift+1)
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Flip any patches that are facing the wrong way (make all normals face out). There is a patch select button on the right. Press f to flip normals of selected patch.
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Some of the patches will look odd, don’t worry
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Save the model
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Re-open it
It should look fine now.
Primus, AM is very quirky, but what they get right they get soooo right. Hopefully they take some time to really document what AM can do. I know Steve had put up some cool tutorial movies from his classes. More of those would be appreciated by AM users, especially those new to the program.
The more I dig around the more I realize AM can do a lot of things I didn’t know it could. Unfortunately a lot of things are buried under 50 triangle property clicks. I still think the person who came up with the new interface should be shot or failing that, slightly maimed 
I’ve been using Maya 5 a bit lately and while I am amazed by it’s power and falling head over heels in love with MEL, they make a lot of things overly complicated and makes me appreciate AM’s workflow.
Now if there were a simple way to get AM models and animations out of AM and in to Maya I would be sooooo much happier.
I usually work with Show Back Facing Polys set to OFF. This means that I can instantly see any patches that are facing the wrong way. No need fix stuff later when I can do it as I build the model.
Yep, Maya is powerfull and convulted. The one thing I HATE about it…is that it’s impossible to move CVs (in logical screen space) after you’ve skinned and posed a model. What are you supposed to do if you have a simple cartoony character with lots of stretching, squeeshing and bending…add a new deformer every 20 frames of animation or so. Shudder!
I work in Maya for a living and use AM for fun!
Ragnar
100% agree the below points. I really hate that…that’s why I like use A:M. A:M really fast if u dont meet those lagre bugs.
>after you’ve skinned and posed a model. What are you >supposed to do if you have a simple cartoony character with >lots of stretching, squeeshing and bending…add a new >deformer every 20 frames of animation or so. Shudder!
3DArtZ : Good gracious, you’ve either been in a cave or too busy working on more cool WidowMaker stuff. [/B][/QUOTE]
It’s true, I have not been investigating the 10.5 betas as much as I should have been. But I have been using compositing techniquest to really eliminate all of the creasing issues that may pop up from now to now with my models. Not trying to say that I never have creasing in my models, but I really don’t have that problem too much. And the compositing in post tech. that I use eliminates that problem all together. So, I really wasn’t in dire need for porcelian.
But I am really impressed with the insight everyone has offered about the subject so far.
Thanks
Mike Fitz
I’m also curious about the advantages and disadvantages of porcelain when modelling. I will firstly thank AM for listening to users and improving how it works - and feedback seems really good.
Mike, maybe as another POV, you could spend a fair bit of time tweaking your model, pulling bias handles and tweaking cp placement and then finding that every time you re-pose your model you have to go through the whole process again - I remember a post about jedi-like low-splinage in a different way here… My way of looking at porcelain would be from an animators perspective.
Namely, a great parent model should also be a great animating model - having to re-tweak your model for every frame of animation is truly counterproductive and so porcelain in it’s new guise should be considered. As a final proviso to my ramblings I haven’t up-graded yet but keep finding those problems I’ve raised above.
If I may be so bold - follow Jim Talbots Mighty-Mouse posting in the WIP section. Beautiful model but even he had to re-tweak his original cp’c/mesh when he started posing.
Naturally, it does cover up some of the odd-looking spots in posing, but it in no way evades outright creases when the joint is moved too far…
Porcelain at higher settings also seems very useful for a variety of non-photorealistic applications–like toon/anime renders, which are practically the only kind I ever attempt…
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