SereneNight’s Sci-Fi Fun Thread 3

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  • Serene NightSerene Night Posts: 17,648
    edited March 2022

    Noor travels by Moonspring which is a sort of pool you bathe in and end up in another location when the moon is full. I thought this was a cool idea. I may try another piece with him floating in there since dark scenes aren't my strong point. Especially when the character has white hair and black skin.  I recolored the pool with rock and moss shaders since the existing textures didn't survive close inspection. I also recolored the water. The pool itself is https://www.daz3d.com/oculus-cistern which was recently on sale. I did remove the roof. It has some barely visible water droplets which I quite like and which fall from the sky.

    No, it is not an illusion. Noor's eyes keep changing colors. I can't decide what color they should be. Red is sort of standard, and purple which is my usual looks best, but is rather cliche, so I am trying Green now. I don't like to be predictable. 

     

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  • Serene NightSerene Night Posts: 17,648
    edited March 2022

    Here is Jn Jun Jie, which is a new release. He is a realistic Asian figure, with some nice even brows which is one of the reasons I picked him up. He includes HD. No gens as far as I can tell, although he is not a Juvenile since the description describes him as a man not a teen or a boy.

    I particularly like his face. His body is fairly nondescript. he is for Genesis 8.1

     

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  • Serene NightSerene Night Posts: 17,648
    edited March 2022

    Aerys  is a cute male Satyr/Faun kind of Fey character for Genesis 8.1 He includes rams horns, with multiple color options, a very nice skin, and face paint and makeup options. He includes gens.

    This is a stylized adult toon figure. His body is slightly broader than would be typical for usually slender-type fey, but you can easily use morphs to change his shape if you desire. I like the horns, and the skin quite a lot. I mention the broadness because I find broad-waisted characters sometimes bend slightly strangely in the studio.

    There is a bug with the fingernails which I don't fully understand but will submit a ticket for. 

     

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  • Serene NightSerene Night Posts: 17,648

    So, Turbo Loader, is very cool, but also somewhat disturbing to see just how much junk is loaded with every character. I loaded it, decided to take a stab at disabling half of what was in the data folder. I ended up disabling something the character needed, so I am going to have to be more careful of the morphs I disable.

    So far, I do like it though. Very interesting tool. Wish I'd had it, before I deleted most of my morphs in my data folder. But, they can always be loaded again from dim!

  • barbultbarbult Posts: 24,245

    Serene Night said:

    There is a bug with the fingernails which I don't fully understand but will submit a ticket for. 

    If your Render Settings Instancing Optimization is set to Auto, try changing t to Speed or Memory and see if that fixes the fingernails. That change often fixes black marks in foreheads and eyes. Maybe this fingernail problem is similar.

  • Serene NightSerene Night Posts: 17,648
    edited March 2022

    The Twins Havensong. They are half-drow half high elf. They both take after different parents but are essentially the same model with slight alterations.

    In this case, Dembran Havensong, is the oldest, and Evandras Havenstong is the younger twin. As Evandras would say "My brother is the handsome twin." They habitually do that when asked which twin is which, explaining that the other twin is the one who clearly has some great quality or other.

    They work together as a team and are rarely apart, and if there is one Havensong twin around, the other is around somewhere. 

    Their story is getting revised because I wanted to change some things around.

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  • Serene NightSerene Night Posts: 17,648
    edited March 2022

    My advice before messing around with Turbo Loader is to backup your data\DAZ 3D\Genesis 8\Male\Morphs

    This way if you mess up, you can remove turboloader, and the disabled files, and just put your original ones back.

    I was kind of enthusiastic about using this product and now can't find re-enable some things because I don't really know what I'm doing.

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  • Serene NightSerene Night Posts: 17,648
    edited March 2022

    Broderick is an FWART creation. I really liked his look in the store I bought him, and he has a really cool geoshell beard. He comes with the usual sort of options, eye colors and tats, and a quite nice geoshell beard.

     

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  • vwranglervwrangler Posts: 4,889

    I've been going back and forth on Broderick -- both because, seriously, I've got so many G8/.1 guys that my system takes ages to load -- and that's not even counting the guys I threw off the island! I also wonder if he uses FWSA Skinvent for his textures.

  • Serene NightSerene Night Posts: 17,648
    edited March 2022

    I think he's sexy but his skin was waxy. I like his beard. I found all kinds of jcms firing with turbo loader which was odd. 
     

    I bet you would do a lot with him. I predict a purchase.

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  • nemesis10nemesis10 Posts: 3,421

    Try adjusting down the Duel Lobe Reflectivity to reduce the waxiness

  • Serene NightSerene Night Posts: 17,648
    edited April 2022

    On the subject of men's releases, I kind of liked this one, its JRH dForce Marcel Home set for Genesis 8 Male. It includes shorts and a kind of nice vest. 

    I thought it might look nice recolored with some fantasy sheer shaders, but this is how it loads by default. It includes a discard and fold-over chair morph and crumpled on the floor morphs.

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  • Serene NightSerene Night Posts: 17,648
    edited April 2022

    The boys enjoy some time at the beach.

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  • Serene NightSerene Night Posts: 17,648
    edited April 2022

    This is a Camera Raw filter that does everything Black and Red. I tested it out on an earlier Boyd picture. It looks good, but only with certain images. Dark backgrounds seem to be key. It makes everything look sortof cyberpunk.

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  • Noah LGPNoah LGP Posts: 2,589

    Can you update your signature please ?

    Now your gallery link is https://www.daz3d.com/gallery/user/6584759480221696

  • Serene NightSerene Night Posts: 17,648

    Okay, I updated the sig file.

  • Serene NightSerene Night Posts: 17,648
    edited April 2022

    So, picked up the new Martin Hair for Genesis 8 Male, when it went down in price on the second day of the sale. I like the fit of the front and the nice detail of the hair on the top which has sort of a nice cut with the hairs tapering to a point, rather than just flat wires. This is more detailed than the usual hair sold in the store. 

     Unfortunately, it does have a slight female/unisex  hairline problem, which is disappointing. You can see it at the top near the temple area. 

    At any rate, I kind of like it, I may try and see if I can surface select some of the hairs to make the hairline recede slightly near the part on the sides. 

    Understanding the difference between hairlines is important. Women tend to have the smoother round hairlines. Men, tend to have hairline that resembles the top of a heart. 

     

     

     

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  • nonesuch00nonesuch00 Posts: 18,131

    Serene Night said:

    So, picked up the new Martin Hair for Genesis 8 Male, when it went down in price on the second day of the sale. I like the fit of the front and the nice detail of the hair on the top which has sort of a nice cut with the hairs tapering to a point, rather than just flat wires. This is more detailed than the usual hair sold in the store. 

     Unfortunately, it does have a slight female/unisex  hairline problem, which is disappointing. You can see it at the top near the temple area. 

    At any rate, I kind of like it, I may try and see if I can surface select some of the hairs to make the hairline recede slightly near the part on the sides. 

    Understanding the difference between hairlines is important. Women tend to have the smoother round hairlines. Men, tend to have hairline that resembles the top of a heart. 

     

     

    I've known a few guys with hairlines like that & they all seemed to be from the Balkans and had very thick hair.

  • DarwinsMishapDarwinsMishap Posts: 4,087

    I thought about that hair; Haven't decided if I'm going to pick it up, but seeing it here I might. 

    Nice renders, as well. :D

  • Serene NightSerene Night Posts: 17,648

    @DarwinsMishapThanks! I appreciate the feedback

    @Nonesuch: yeah, dunno about that, maybe they combed it down over their hairline in the front. 

  • Serene NightSerene Night Posts: 17,648
    edited April 2022

    So I picked up the dForce Fantasy Rogue Outfit for Genesis 8 Male and the textures.  There are some nice kitbashable pieces included to make your Middle Eastern fantasy character.

     I wish there was more detail in the bracelets, and the shoulder armor (the neckpiece), is removable if you don't like it. The shoes which I did not show, will make nice bedroom slippers. 

    I particularly like it, when the texture is actual texture, such as the vest/shirt, that has a floral pattern. I found some of the tiled textures to be a bit 60's or busy for my particular tastes. 

    I bought this to make some Elvish Skimpwear. Eilistraeens are not known for wearing a lot of clothing, and yet each Elf is expected to be able to sing, dance, and play a musical instrument. 

    I searched my runtime for a musical instrument and found this fantasy lute. It is not iray textured, so I used some wood textures to spruce it up. The tuning pegs, and the knobs, are unrealistically sized for this instrument, and would likely be unusable. They were a bit of a distraction, and I tried hiding them, but it looks worse to have nothing to tune with. 

    I know I have another lute in my runtime somewhere.

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  • nonesuch00nonesuch00 Posts: 18,131

    Serene Night said:

    @DarwinsMishapThanks! I appreciate the feedback

    @Nonesuch: yeah, dunno about that, maybe they combed it down over their hairline in the front. 

    No, the usual hair style was flattop or combed back. I did notice it because it was so unsual.

  • GordigGordig Posts: 10,060

    Serene Night said:

    I searched my runtime for a musical instrument and found this fantasy lute. It is not iray textured, so I used some wood textures to spruce it up. The tuning pegs, and the knobs, are unrealistically sized for this instrument, and would likely be unusable. They were a bit of a distraction, and I tried hiding them, but it looks worse to have nothing to tune with. 

    Honestly, the size of the tuning pegs is the least of their problems.

  • Serene NightSerene Night Posts: 17,648
    edited April 2022

    Yeah, I really thought I had a lute or other medieval instrument in my runtime, and I'm loathe to buy another but I may have to. 

    EDIT: Hmm. I see Sea Shanty Props has a Gittern-type instrument. This looks a bit better. Just don't look too closely at the strings and where they go.

     

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  • vwranglervwrangler Posts: 4,889

    Serene Night said:

    I think he's sexy but his skin was waxy. I like his beard. I found all kinds of jcms firing with turbo loader which was odd. 
     

    I bet you would do a lot with him. I predict a purchase.

    Alas, you were correct and there was a purchase. I don't know why. It's not like I needed him.

    That said, I do like him -- although that shader got a bit of editing, because he was way too translucent for my tastes.

  • Serene NightSerene Night Posts: 17,648

    His shape is good, and I do like his beard. His skin is a bit odd, and frankly a bit of a departure from FW's regular style. But I would say he was definitely purchase-worthy. With tweaks of course.

  • GordigGordig Posts: 10,060

    Serene Night said:

    Yeah, I really thought I had a lute or other medieval instrument in my runtime, and I'm loathe to buy another but I may have to. 

    EDIT: Hmm. I see Sea Shanty Props has a Gittern-type instrument. This looks a bit better. Just don't look too closely at the strings and where they go.

    That definitely does look better, although it could use a few winds around the tuning pegs. Gotta save polys when you can, I suppose.

  • Serene NightSerene Night Posts: 17,648
    edited April 2022

    So, a while back I bought the male cheerleading squad outfits. I didn't do anything with them at the time, so loaded them up to take a look now. 

    The outfits require dForce, and quite honestly, to me, it didn't help the fit. The clothing should work for action poses, but Owen's top exploded immediately.  The shoes seem odd to me, and there is a lot of added bulk. I do like the textures, except the fabric looks more like shiny plastic and there is no real grain to it, so that's all there is.  On Boyd's shirt, the fit of it looks like it's embedded in his chest and slipping off.

    I confess to some disappointment. I think this set would be far better just plain conforming. Using dForce as a substitution for fitting clothing just doesn't always work. 

    That said, I do like the bright colors of the textures. I just wish they looked better, and fit better. 

     

     

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  • Serene NightSerene Night Posts: 17,648
    edited April 2022

    So, had the time to mess with the Alascansus hair, for Noor the drow elf.

    It really had to be dForced from the memorized pose, which took a fair amount of time. Even dForcing, I found the bangs conformed to the face in a strange way. I ended up just resetting the bangs to default.

    I'm still not hugely happy about the lack of good dark skin. While Torment's skin works pretty well, it has extreme eye bags/wrinkles under the eye. I may have to pull those maps up in photoshop and do some judicious editing.

    White hair is a bit of a challenge as well. It tends to make characters look older, and the hair itself is more wig-like than other colors. 

     

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  • Serene NightSerene Night Posts: 17,648
    edited April 2022

    The Future City Park HDRI by Dimension Theory is really rather nice. I like the ground for once. The depth of field works pretty nicely for closeups too.

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