eye reflection for animated scenes?
dale_5e04542c64
Posts: 49
I'm an using Advanced Ambient Light with V4.
I purchased "Bright Eyes" which gives a nice refection to eyes for a realistic effect. Seems like having a reflection is a huge improvement:
"Bright Eyes" is great with a still scene, but with an animation, if the eye moves, the "Bright Eyes" surface moves with the eye. Of course, this is not realistic.
Any suggestions on creating a realistic eye reflection which works well even in an animation?
I've been searching and seen bits and pieces but no solid method. Is it a matter of adjusting the surface reflection in certain parts of the eye? Do I need to use a spot light instead of just an Advanced Ambient Light.
Thanks for any suggestions.
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Don't use bright eyes. Use Corneal Bulge 100% and that will help exaggerate the natural reflections from the cornea somewhat but it won't be exxagerated like bright eyes is.
Thanks for the help. In the following test, I set the eye on the right to 100% for Corneal Bulge and kept the left eye at 25%. I see a little bit of difference between the eyes, but not much. Is there maybe another method to get a more defined eye reflection which will work with animations (and not just still scenes)?
Note: This is a empty scene except for V4 and one Advanced Ambient Light. Is there something else I need to have in scene to get a better reflection in the eyes?
There are two other morphs but I think they are part of the Zev0 Aging Morphs bundles or maybe the Growing Up Morphs bundle and they are listed one right after the other in the Shaping Pane and are grey background title header (as opposed to blue, pink, green and other colors of other install products).
The first one is called 'Iris Realism' and the second one I forget the exact name but it has the would iris in it too, maybe iris bulge or something like that.
Whoops, V4, I am working in Genesis 3. I think Zev0 only started at Genesis generation with those products.
Well I'm going to keep searching but if anyone has any suggestions, please let me know.
I'm sure there has to be some workable method of accomplishing this.
If you are doing iRay turn up the reflectivity of the corneas up if available. I'm guessing reflectivity should already be quite high.
My current computer can't handle IRAY animations, so I'm only rendering in 3Delight.
Since I have an empty scene (except for v4) I'm wondering if it would help to have something for the eyes to reflect?
For example, I've seen somewhere where a plane can be set up with a spot light pointed at it. Then, this plane is reflected in the eyes. Doe anyone have any experience/suggestions for this type of thing?
I've never used 3DL but I have a 5 year old laptop with only Intel HD Graphics 3000 with 16GB RAM and it handles iRay fine, although very slowly. It worked also when it had only 8 GB RAM but with smaller scenes.
For 3DL though I think you need to use something called SSS or AOA but am not sure. I hope someone that know will come back and say for you for sure.
Contrary to what most people think 3DL is not faster than iRay, it's just that they are making unrealistic renders with less light calculations and so it is faster for them but as soon as they try to start making it more realistic 3DL becomes much more difficult to set up correctly than iRay is and when it finally is set up correctly, about as long to render a frame as iRay.
nonesuch00 - Yes, I am using AOA lights. I'm able to get more realistic renders than with standard DS lights.
No matter how I have set it up, I can't seem to get an equivalent renders in IRAY without a huge difference in render times. I will explore this more after what you are saying.
Still looking for a way to get basic eye glare/reflection that works with animations. Any suggestions greatly appreciated.
I think I made some progress. I put a small primitive plane in front of V4 and pointed an AOA Advanced Spotlight at the plane (rather than at V4). On V4 character, I turned the reflection on "Eye Surface" up to 70%. You can see in the following two test renders that the eye glare shows in same position even when eyes are looking in different direction. This is really what I have been trying to accomplish:
The issue now is that with "Eye Surface" refection turned up so high, the rest of eye is distorted. The eye surface becomes discolored and the "Eye Surface" becomes way too pronounced. You can see the differences in the following two test renders. The one with the eye glare has reflection set to 70% and the one without the eye glare has reflection set to 0%:
Any suggestions for maybe getting "Eye Surface" to reflect the primitive plane so an eye glare is visible, but without the "Eye Surface" being so distorted and discolored? I can't remember where, but I saw someone suggested somehow creating a transparent sphere around eyeball with reflection turned up high. Or maybe there is a much easier way of accomplishing this that I'm clueless about?
Thanks in advance for any suggestions.
After some serious searching, I found a great tutorial by @SpyroRue:
http://www.daz3d.com/forums/discussion/6376/cat-like-eyeshine-in-daz-3d-tutorial-page-6/p3
I applied his tutorial settings to the eye surface for my Victoria 4 elite character. These is a noticeable improvement as you can see in the image below. The eye reflection is "real" in the sense that it doesn't change when the eye is moved to the left or right:
The only issue seems to be with the eye surface. The eye surface doesn't cover the whole eye so it's resulting in a "contact lense" effect, which I don't think looks good.
As an alternative, I did get lucky and stumble across this product:
http://www.daz3d.com/eye-maps-generation-4
It includes "spherical reflection maps" which supposedly "stay oriented when the eyes move." This looks promising for what I am attempting to achieve. Has anyone had experience with this product or have any other better suggestions (for creating a eye glare that doesn't move when eye moves)?
Thank you for any advice.
I also found this product, which seems to be a promising option for achieving realistic eye reflections which work with animations: http://www.daz3d.com/project-eyeris/
I'm now trying to clarify if it will work with my Amy Elite, V4 character.
AoA has a tutorial for surfaces using the AoA Subsurface Shader Base, which is included with Daz Studio Pro. There are settings for realistic eye reflections using this shader. It's currently on sale as part of the build your own Flash Sale going on right now.
http://www.daz3d.com/tutorial-introduction-to-character-surface-settings
@dracorn - thanks for the heads up. Seems like a great tutorial.
Unfortunately, I think I already went down that road. The Subsurface Shader is powerful, but the V4 character I have does have some issues with this approach. The eye surface does not cover the whole eye. So when I applied the Subsurface shader to the eye surface, it didn't look good. Too many issues with the eye surface being different from the rest of the eye. I've seen other people mention this issue elsewhere. You can see pictures of this issue in previous posts within this topic.
Maybe I'm missing something and there is different way of accomplishing good eye reflections using this shader. If so, please let me know. I'd be happy to pick up the tutorial if it will work.
Thanks for any clarification.
@dracorn - I got the tutorial. I learned a lot but I did end up going with http://www.daz3d.com/project-eyeris/
I'm very happy with results.
I have Project Eyeris too. Excellent product.