How do I make my renders look more realistic in Daz? Example image included.

[Deleted member 2807072]

Hi, I've never posted here before so apologies if I get the etiquette wrong.

I started using Daz yesterday and came up with the attached image today. It looks really blurry and I want to make it as clear and realistic as possible.

What do I need to do, and what do you need to know in order to help me?

Thanks in advance.

PS. I'm talking just about the image quality rather than posing or the artistic content itself.

 

[Rich]

Welcome aboard!

To start off with, if you only started using Daz Studio yesterday, this is a very good first result. As with any other tool, there's a lot to learn, and "practice makes perfect," so don't be discouraged.

You weren't specific as to which areas of the picture you're unhappy with, so I'll just spout some random advice.

Daz Studio has a number of settings related to rendering quality. Basically, if iRay had it's way, it'd keep fiddling with pixels until the cows come home. So, you'll want to find the Rendering tab (Windows > Panes > Render Settings) and look at the Progressive Render selection.

Assuming you have "Rendering Quality Enable" set to "On", the render will stop when any of the following conditions occur:

1. The maximum number of iterations (samples) have been run. This defaults to 5000.
2. The maximum rendering time has elapsed. This is in seconds, and defaults to 2 hours (7200)
3. A certain percentage of pixels are "converged" from iRay's point of view. (Rendering Converted Ratio - defaults to 95%). Basically, "converged" means that, after a bunch of iterations, iRay seems to think that it's found the final value of the pixel.

So, the first thing you may want to consider is fiddling with these numbers to allow the render to go longer. Of course, that increases rendering time.



The second thing that some people fiddle with (I don't, but...) is the Filtering tab.


You can decrease the setting on the Pixel Filter Radius to 1.1 or 1.2, or try the Mitchell Filter - some people think that it gives them sharper images.

But, probably the most important thing is to pay attention to lighting. iRay struggles on areas that aren't well-lit. So, "shadowy areas" are going to tend to have "fireflies" - random dots that aren't the same color as the adjacent pixels, and are going to be slow to converge, which can make them look out of focus.

Based on the foreground brightness, it looks to me like you have the camera headlamp on (which is the default if you don't have any spotlights in the scene) and then you have some emissive surfaces in the upper right (the lamps). That isn't a lot of lighting for a scene. You're probably going to get some better results if you put a few spotlights in (search the web for "Three-Point Lighting") and turn off the headlamp. Among other things, the headlamp is almost certainly what's bleaching out the white stockings. Maybe two lights slightly above and on either side of the camera pointing at your figure (set them to "rectangle," not to "point" or you'll get weird shadows) and then another wide-angle spotlight above everything to provide overall illumination to the room. Be aware that the default luminance for Daz spotlights is ridiculously low - 1500 is basically a dim candle. So, you're going to have to crank up that value a lot, or the spotlights won't seem to be doing anything. (I frequently have spotlights in the 20,000 - 100,000 range, depending on what they're illuminating.)

Given all that, if you could point out the areas of the render that concern you, it'd be easier to give more specific advice.

 

[Deleted member 2807072]

Really great help, thank you! Only yesterday I found a video about spotlights but I wasn't that bothered about trying them until I read your message.
The other things that I want to achieve are having such detail I can see the pores or skin details, so it seems like I'm there with her. Some games have such detailed models.
I have put two examples below where I just can't seem to make them realistic. And these are after around 40 mins of rendering. Although the older women picture is quality I may just accept now as it isn't bad....

PS. Just realised I now have three spotlights but not sure how to turn off the headlamp? I'm using the Perspective view for rendering, if that helps.

 

[anne O'nymous]

It's just test files so it matter less, but be also careful about the details.

In your first try, the right hand is floating in the air, while looking like it take support on something, and there's the parts of the shoes are going under the socks. Plus the socks really have a texture problem, clearly shown by the use of the camera front light ; they are way too white, almost reflective, what feel totally unnatural.
And there's also a sizing problem in your last try, perhaps amplified by the camera angle. The girl is way too tall (over 2m50), while the viewer is too low for someone standing on his feet, and too high for someone in another position.

This said, I agree with Rich for a first try it's impressive.

 

[mickydoo]

Lighting lighting lighting

Daz models need light directly on them to show their full potential BUT, don't put it directly in front of them. I have read that in real photography, female models have never got light in their face, it's off to side, I have no ide if that is true. What I do know but, putting the light source to side in DAZ works fantastic, as puts shadows around eyes and noses etc which ads to realism and is great to tweak in Photoshop. In both those pics the is no real shadow detail on the character.

 

[Deleted member 2807072]

It's just test files so it matter less, but be also careful about the details.

In your first try, the right hand is floating in the air, while looking like it take support on something, and there's the parts of the shoes are going under the socks. Plus the socks really have a texture problem, clearly shown by the use of the camera front light ; they are way too white, almost reflective, what feel totally unnatural.
And there's also a sizing problem in your last try, perhaps amplified by the camera angle. The girl is way too tall (over 2m50), while the viewer is too low for someone standing on his feet, and too high for someone in another position.

This said, I agree with Rich for a first try it's impressive.

Thanks, yes I have started to work on the Y axis to stop them all floating as well!

The last picture does have the MC on his knees so I'm not too worried about that. I made a 9 image Renpy game for myself to try out. Still not happy with the skin quality though.

 

[Deleted member 2807072]

Lighting lighting lighting

Daz models need light directly on them to show their full potential BUT, don't put it directly in front of them. I have read that in real photography, female models have never got light in their face, it's off to side, I have no ide if that is true. What I do know but, putting the light source to side in DAZ works fantastic, as puts shadows around eyes and noses etc which ads to realism and is great to tweak in Photoshop. In both those pics the is no real shadow detail on the character.

Ah, see I've been shining the spotlight straight at them since I started even having one yesterday. I'll give that a try, thanks.

 

[anne O'nymous]

The last picture does have the MC on his knees so I'm not too worried about that.

You should, what matter isn't the realism behind the scene, but the feeling carried but the result.

Behind the scene, you surely put the camera at a place that is more or less where the eyes would have been. But the result is weirdly uncanny, letting the player with the feeling that he is facing a giant girl.

All photographers cheats when they take a picture, and most of the time they do it just to re-establish the truth.
A camera focal distorts the perspective, and here you're doing a low diving shot, what always lead to this, hmm, "giantistic" result. But in real life, it's not what you'll got if you were on your knew looking at the girl. The upper part of her body would look slightly bigger, but just slightly, not significantly like it's the case here. This while the rest of the scene wouldn't look so reduced.
Unless it's precisely what you're searching, for art purpose or some dramatic/comical effect, when you're building your scene, you have to compensate the induced distortion, in order for the result to looks like seen from human eyes.

 

[Deleted member 2807072]

You should, what matter isn't the realism behind the scene, but the feeling carried but the result.

Behind the scene, you surely put the camera at a place that is more or less where the eyes would have been. But the result is weirdly uncanny, letting the player with the feeling that he is facing a giant girl.

All photographers cheats when they take a picture, and most of the time they do it just to re-establish the truth.
A camera focal distorts the perspective, and here you're doing a low diving shot, what always lead to this, hmm, "giantistic" result. But in real life, it's not what you'll got if you were on your knew looking at the girl. The upper part of her body would look slightly bigger, but just slightly, not significantly like it's the case here. This while the rest of the scene wouldn't look so reduced.
Unless it's precisely what you're searching, for art purpose or some dramatic/comical effect, when you're building your scene, you have to compensate the induced distortion, in order for the result to looks like seen from human eyes.

"PS. I'm talking just about the image quality rather than posing or the artistic content itself." As per my original post, thanks for your help but I'm really just asking for help about the image quality. I shouldn't worry if only I am going to look at the images

 

[Deleted member 1121028]

You can decrease the setting on the Pixel Filter Radius to 1.1 or 1.2, or try the Mitchell Filter - some people think that it gives them sharper images.

Mitchell shoul bring a tad bit of sharp. Gaussian curve is softer, Mitchell more agressive, and Lanczos a bit of both world (Triangle is linear, Box is equal weight). Most common problem, imo, with lowering filter radius too much is creating/worsen staircase effect. Set to 1.1, filter only applies to the pixel and 1/10 of the adjacent ones.

A quick render to show what I mean:

 

[Deleted member 2807072]

Mitchell shoul bring a tad bit of sharp. Gaussian curve is softer, Mitchell more agressive, and Lanczos a bit of both world (Triangle is linear, Box is equal weight). Most common problem, imo, with lowering filter radius too much is creating/worsen staircase effect. Set to 1.1, filter only applies to the pixel and 1/10 of the adjacent ones.

A quick render to show what I mean:

View attachment 957685

Thanks, so which filter do you think is worth setting as 1.5?

 

[Deleted member 1121028]

Thanks, so which filter do you think is worth setting as 1.5?

The 3 are good (Gaussian/Mitchell/Lanczos). I have preference for Mitchell, but whatever you choose it's the same principle : don't go too low (sharp but bring aliasing) or too high (no aliasing but bring blurr).

But if the goal is really to sharpen details, IMO, the best way is to do it on texture level or post render via PS and the like (who got generally better tools for this) rather than pushing too hard Iray pixel filter.

 

[Deleted member 2807072]

The 3 are good (Gaussian/Mitchell/Lanczos). I have preference for Mitchell, but whatever you choose it's the same principle : don't go too low (sharp but bring aliasing) or too high (no aliasing but bring blurr).

But if the goal is really to sharpen details, IMO, the best way is to do it on texture level or post render via PS and the like (who got generally better tools for this) rather than pushing too hard Iray pixel filter.

Thanks, I'll try the Mitchell one first. I'm on week one of Daz so am not bothered about trying PS yet.

 

[Deleted member 1121028]

am not bothered about trying PS yet.

You will soon ^^
Prepare yourself for GIMP, PS or whatever lol