Call this my return to the hash fold (I stormed out in a huff during the v.9 debacle but no one really noticed) 
Anyway, started playing with the osx beta of 10.5 and have knocked this much out while reaquainting myself with the tools.
Warning: nudity, cover yer eyes if they are delicate.
I like the improvements they have made to porcelain :).
-Matt
Yep, porcelain is AMās saving grace in my eyes - I just wish it was part of the surface attributes instead of a separate material.
Welcome back - and keep postingā¦
JoeW
Yeah, thats one thing I liked about v.9, for at least a little while they made porcelain part of the surface props. I was looking for it when I came back then saw it had moved back to being a material.
Itās nice to see the transparency rendering errors I was encountering during v.8-9 are gone too.
BTW Joeā¦ I think it was one of yer Hunter jiggle animations that pushed me over the edge and pulled me back inā¦ itās all your fault! ;).
-Matt
Hey! Hey! Itās NOT my fault! LOL! Donāt go blaminā it on me! Just know that weāre still working with Beta stuff, and to not expect everything to be perfect nowā¦ although the renderer has improved a great dealā¦
JoeW
Oh i never expect hash to be perfect, beta or otherwise ;). Been using it long enough to know betterā¦ waitā¦ that sounds wrongā¦ been using hash too long 
But it gives me hope and Iāve been lurking and seeing improvements from afar so thought Iād dip my largish toe back in the A:M waters.
But yer still an inspiration Joeā¦ so itās partially yer fault :bowdown:
-Matt
Well, having upgraded to version 11 I am playing with all the new features and what could be better (or faster) than dropping image map hair for Hashās new Hair system and already Iām impressed!
Looks like I will need to try Porcelain in this model also.
I too have been upgrading my model Briar Roseās hair with the new v11 hair.
I want it to render fast so Iāve made it as simple as possible, i.e no transparency and low density. I think I can get away with it as I want the hair to look stylised, in keeping with the rest of the model. These settings work quite well for animation too, Iāve found it best to avoid long thin hair as this jitters around when rendered.
Anyway, still more tweaking to do, but hereās a pic of the hairstyle so far.
Hey Steve, WOW! She is really coming on.
She is getting on for Shrek quality now. No wonder you have been quiet of late.
Do I see a secondary emitter there putting out some thinner hairs near the front, or are they all thin and merging into clumps somehow?
Also, are you using kinkyness or have you managed to get roughness looking good (faster render times with roughness I guess)
The eyes really have it! It is a nice detail to have the hair reflecting in them. Also, the skin is really looking good. Are you using some kind of skin shader or a lighting rig?
One thing that I am thinking though - and you are probably going to hate me for bringing this up - the fact that she has no nostrils stands out a bit now that she is looking so realistic.
Anyway, really nice work and one of the best examples of AM hair that I have seen.
Originally posted by pequod
I too have been upgrading my model Briar Roseās hair with the new v11 hair.
Sweeet!:applause:
Stephen,
Nice hair on a nice model! Are you rendering with Z-buffered shadows only? Is that a speed issue or is it so the hair looks best or both?
Thanks for showing an update,
Jim
Hi Stephen, very nice work!
I am interested in seeing how the hair works out in animation!
Please post as you get some samples!
I too think the quality has a movie type look to it.
Very nice
Mike Fitz
www.3dartz.com
Thanks Guys, now for the details.
John, Yes there is a second emitter for the thin hairs underneath the main thick hairs. Itās purpose is mostly to fill in the gaps between the forehead and locks of hair, and also when the hair moves in animation. I try to keep it as thick as possible in order to avoid the shimmeringā¦could be caused by Z-buffered lights, not sure.
I do have some slight kinkiness on the hair to lessen that mechanical straightness you can get otherwise, but Iāll give roughness a try since youāve mention itā¦thanks.
Iād like to soften the reflections in her eyes a bit but not lose the small specular highlights, do you have any tips on using soft reflections?
No skin shader, infact Iām slowly replacing my materials with maps.
The lighting is just a simple 3 light setup. The main shadow light is to her right casting a Z-buff shadow, about 100% intensity. The second warm filler light is face on to her, no shadows. It helps produce those warm turning edges between light and dark shade on her face. The final light is a strong (200% intensity) blue light position to the left of her, slightly from behind. Shadows turned on for this one so the dark areas between her and her cap are not illuminated. If she had nostrils, they would be glowing as well if I didnāt make sure the light shining from behind her had shadow casting on.
Of course this isnāt the reason I never modelled her nose with nostrils, but I do question sometimes whether I should have left them out. Anyhow, itās unlikely Iāll have the time to light Briar this well for all her animation scenes, so sheāll have to continue to breathe just through her mouth for the time being 
Jim, Iām using Z-buffered lights exclusively for shadows because of the time saving. I do also prefer the slightly unreal image quality they produce and shadow casting hair certainly looks better with them IMHO.
Iāll post a clip of the hair moving once v11.c comes out, Iām expecting a bug fix.:rolleyes:
Originally posted by pequod
Iāll post a clip of the hair moving once v11.c comes out, Iām expecting a bug fix.:rolleyes:
Is this the one you were expecting?
>>Fixed problems when relations controled pose sliders in converting v9.03 and later models that were converted from v8.5
before v9.03 that have 1D relationship drivers to channels Jane.mdl from cd {Stephen Millingen}<<
I have no idea what that meant, but it seems Jane gets around. Yes, 11.0c is out now for the PC.
Jim
Terrific, Stephen! The hair looks so cool!
I vote for keeping her nose as is. She looks cute with a little button nose. If she really needs her nostrils ā in a scene where she sniffs something (the stench of Almerez?) ā itād be easy enough to paint a couple of dots in the appropriate places, on the targas.
The color saturation on the glove might come down a bit, maybe?
Wonderful work! Letās see more! :applause:
Sincerely,
Carl Raillard
Quote - S Millingen.
ādo you have any tips on using soft reflections?ā
You should be carfull asking me things like that, I will only go and make a load of stuff up
I know what you mean about the spec size thing. Render speed is not an issue if you are using multipass as the extra sampling is done in the passes but I have found spec size to be a problem. This is an example of physical accuracy and artistic desire being at odds.
The softness of reflection would usually come from the depth of field of the lens which would cause the reflected objects to be out of focus. I guess you could try to achieve this with dof rather than soft reflections but it could be a nightmare to set up. You would have to set the spec light close to the eye to keep it in focus.
You could allways do the reflection map thing - after all, Pixar have made a lot of that technique even mapping animations made by cameras recording the surroundings.
Again, this could be a difficult thing to set up but if you are only doing long shots then you are surely best of with a simple reflection map as you would get a lot of artistic control.
You could even paint the specular shape so you could have a window shape or whatever (I am assuming this would work allthough I have never tried).
Hmmā¦ I think I have run out of ideas now. Hope it helped more than it bored.
Originally posted by pequod
I do have some slight kinkiness on the hair to lessen that mechanical straightness you can get otherwise, but Iāll give roughness a try since youāve mention itā¦thanks.
Iād like to soften the reflections in her eyes a bit but not lose the small specular highlights, do you have any tips on using soft reflections?
Hey Stephen,
Sheās looking really goodā¦ GREAT really. I think your switch to maps is going to help overall ā¦ of course, then youāre straying into that area where youāve gone so realistic that it turns up the pressure
I might suggest you try using an environment map on her eyes. I donāt know what kind of a hit you take for the raytraced eyes, but Iāve found that 99% of the people looking at her would never notice that the reflections werenāt raytraced. You could just blur the environment map to get blurry reflections, and youād get to keep your crisp specularā¦ I made a few panoramic maps in Bryce a couple of years ago, and I find that they work really well. If you wanted to do a scene specific map, you could render a camera rotation in your scene and stitch the results together and distort them in Photoshopā¦
Keep posting updates - like I said, I think sheās looking great!
JoeW
Jim,
I guess Jane is an old 8.5 model and therefore afflicted by the same pose problem as Briar. My little girl has grown up through every version since 8.5. 9.5 were the difficult teenage years, struggling mainly with the change from 1 dimensional poses and smartskin to the new multi D relationships.
Carl,
The gloves are textured with materials because I was too lazy to map them. Theyāll have to be my next decal job. Although the great thing about relationships, is I could quickly create a pose to lower the intensity of colour on that glove materialā¦hmmm.
Not seen much of Gaty recently!
John,
Thanks for the info both public and private. I shall give environment maps a try, I just donāt like having to use different maps for every new scenery. Lazy bones strikes again.
Joe,
Yes, she is veering towards that dreaded realism pit, someway to go yet before she reaches Huntersā high standard. It all started when I began lighting my scenes naturalistically. Briarās bright flat colours started to look incongruous. Then I couldnāt resist giving her the new v11 hair, which in turn made her solid eyelashes and eyebrows look silly in comparison. Oh well, I donāt think Iāll ever finish this project, Iāve become a tweak junkie. It doesnāt help that Hash keep delivering new improved features. Iām like one of those guys who are constantly tinkering at the weekends with their classic cars, but never seem to drive them anywhere.
Incidentally, version 11.c has fixed one problem, but now her hairstyle has flipped out. Something to do with āis rodā and the stiffness settings I think.:shrug:
Yay Stephen,
Sheās got so much character! She looks beautiful, now stop playing around with making her look good and animate her! >:)
Seriously, you and Jim and some of the others make these great models, and then you just keep making 'em greater and greater, and I keep waiting on the edge of my seat to see them dance around.
Admit it, you guys are just trying to force me to learn patience. Meanies 
Iād offer to animate them for you, just so they could live and breathe, but youāre better animators than me (ā¦so far, Iāll catch up, just you wait)
Keep up the great work. Iāll just sit here, waiting PATIENTLY for all your short films to come out.
-Alonso
(As a side note, I kind of liked her more when she was more cartoony. Donāt get me wrong, she looks great now, and I love her freckles, but I liked her when her eyes where a little rounder, her mouth was a little wider, and her hair was a burnt sienna solid shape)
Originally posted by pequod
Incidentally, version 11.c has fixed one problem, but now her hairstyle has flipped out. Something to do with āis rodā and the stiffness settings I think.:shrug:
Hi Pequod! Great model.! Been too busy to see the W.I.P. thread being updated so missed your models release. She looks lovely, less mischievous now but I like her!
p.s. what does āis rodā mean? I keep wondering but Iām not on the Hash forum to ask.
Originally posted by hoochoochoochoo
[B]Hi Pequod! Great model.! Been too busy to see the W.I.P. thread being updated so missed your models release. She looks lovely, less mischievous now but I like her!p.s. what does āis rodā mean? I keep wondering but Iām not on the Hash forum to ask. [/B]
āIs Rodā is a cool, yet misleading setting. What it does is make the end bone try to stay parallel to itās original orientation - so you get more of a āslidingā motion as opposed to a āpivotingā or rotating motion. It still pivots to an extent, but itās not nearly as much as a āregularā dynamic bone.
This setting is very important for my āboobsā setup - it makes the softbodies look like they are sliding vertically, as opposed to pivoting and looking very unnatural.
BTW - you have to use it on a multi-bone chainā¦ and the weird thing is that you shut it OFF to make the changeā¦ weird to me, but very usefulā¦
JoeW
