Problems with OOT Hair - *Finally, Probably Solved* (12 May 2023)
Blando Calrissian
Posts: 554
There seems to be an issue with OOT's standard hair shaders (the ones that come witht he hairs that you buy) that currently causes them to render as black hair in Iray.
The first group of three photos illustrates the issue. You're probably familiar with this color set. No matter which color is chosen, the hair renders as black.
The second group of three uses Cailin Hair, an older OOT with older hair included shaders. These seem to render just fine.
The final group of three uses Lainey Hair, like the first group, only this time the hair shader is taken from OOT's "IrayPair" set that you can purchase on the Other Site. This set of shaders also seems to work fine.
My drivers are all up-to-date. Running Daz 4.21.0.5. Lighting comes from and HDRI (Brown Photostudio 2, from PolyHaven)
I'm wondering if the recent OOT update from January is causing the problem somehow.
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This is an Iray change in the behaviour of one of the properties (I keep saying top coat, but I think that's wrong) - though DS should be able to work around it in many cases, adn i thought was in 4.21.0.5. The issue with the updates, which were to address a crash issue in Iray, is different though the updates may fail to address it depending on which file is found first (if an older version is found then the updated version will not be used).
It would be a shame to lose to hair-layering utilities that OOT includes in their more modern shades (not to mention the obvious frustration of not being able to use something you paid for). I put in a ticket, so here's hoping Daz will come to the rescue.
I'll also try unisntalling and reinstalling one of the rebellious OOT hairs and see if that works.
Update: the uninstall/reinstall route also failed. Used Download Manager to uninstall and reinstall, and made sure to close and repoen Daz then open a new scene before loading.
Shoot. I wish I knew what the Iray issue is or why it only seems to affect this particular shader set.
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Edit: This was also an issue in 2021 that was discussed here and here. Sadly it seems that neither thread was resolved with a definitive explanation or solution.
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Edit #2: Going off of a comment in one of the 2021 threads, I tried to replicate the reported error in UltraScenery where "having a water feature in scene the rocks as well would render black."
Sure enough...
Update: Tried rolling back to an August 2022 Nvidia Studio Driver (516.94), as a poster in a previous thread suggested that it had fixed the issue for them. Still no dice. Definitely an Iray issue. Not sure why it seems to pop up now and then or what anyone can (will?) do about it.
You need to apply the Base Hair Color 1st as this will setup the correct shader settings (It has a White Icon & says "Apply First")
It doesn't work for me, applying that and then a hair color just gives me black. The preview shows the correct color shade, but trying to render or using iray render just turns the hair black.
Yeah, sadly using the Base Hair Color doesn't fix the problem in this case.
Here are seven copies of Lainey Hair. From left to right:
(1) The base 'white' model (which, by default, uses a basic 3DL shader);
(2) The hair with OOT's "Color 7/3DL" applied;
(3) The hair with OOT's "Hair Base Material/Iray" and "Color 7/Iray" applied;
(4) The hair with just "Color 7/Iray" applied (no hair base);
(5) The hair with OOT's older "IrayPair" Color 11 (Iray) applied;
(6) The hair with OOT's "Hair Base Material/Iray" applied, as well as SloshWerks's "ColorWerks Blonde 5/Iray";
(7) The hair with just Sloshwerk's "ColorWerks Blonde 5/Iray" applied.
For rendering today we're using Dimension Theory's "Platinum Pack Outdoor A" HDRI, Environmental options set to "dome only," Tonemapper options all at default, standard camera with headlamp off:
Although #4 renders with the OOT Iray shader applied, this is because Daz treats this as a 3DL shader (on the Surfaces tab, it reads as "Daz Studio Default (RSL)).
Okay, here's one more for fun and it may have revealed something interesting?
(1) Load the base Lainey Hair;
(2) Add OOT's "Hair Base Material";
(3) Select all parts in the Surfaces tab and apply the basic Daz Iray Uber Base shader;
(4) Go back to OOT and apply "Lainey Hair Color Base 8/Iray" to all of the surfaces;
(5) Success... sort of. At least it renders in a color other than black. The biggest difference is that when you go to the Surfaces tab, the Shader is listed as Iray Uber (MDL) instead of OOT Hairblending Hair (MDL). The latter adds Top Coat options and several Overlays, so those might be where the problem lives (however, playing around with them didn't seem to cause any change in the all-black appearance)
Oh, interesting. I'll try later on doing this on my end to see how it goes. I remember these materials used to work and then suddenly they stopped working. I can't recall when exactly that was, but I'm surprised I haven't seen anyone else discuss this issue before (< which is why I thought it was something on my end).
I use OOT hairs all the time, and don't have any problems with them. I don't have Lainey hair, but do have Super Sleeky - here it is right out of the box:
I'm not denying the problem you're having, but it's something about your set-up and its interaction with OOT hairs, rather than something everyone experiences.
Oh, very much agreed that it is not a widespread affliction. That said, it's popped up enough that it has to be something about this specific shader that is causing Iray to behave this way. Finding out what that thing is would allow Daz and OOT to tweak it in future releases (at least until Iray finds another way to break stuff, of course!). Ideally it might be as simple as turning off or deleting a setting in the Surfaces tab.
If I may ask, what are your specs at the moment? CPU, GPU, and drivers? Version of Daz at the moment?
(and on an unrelated note... Geobra is fantastic, I'm glad that I now have the chance to thank you personally for creating it!)
Here you go:
You're welcome!
Thank you for the stats! Aside from having a 3090 instead of a 3060, your setup seems very much like mine. I just downloaded and installed what I think is the closest Nvidia driver to 31.0.15.2756 (the 8 December 2022 release) so I'm going to give it a whirl. May need to set Windows 10 drivers to match. Stay tuned...
UPDATE: No dice. Still rendering black even with your current drivers installed. Studio version 4.21.0.5 over here, with an AMD Ryzen 5 3600 and an Nvidia GeForce RTX3060.
(stream of cursing) now I'm depressed. What the heck?
Update: Still no success. Sampled a handful of Nvidia drivers (Studio drivers, Game drivers, 2023 drivers, 2022 drivers), but nothing changed. Have not heard back from Daz regarding my support ticket.
As Richard already explained, the new iray in 4.21 changed how some material attributes are rendered, so a number of assets in the shop will not work on 4.21 unless there's an update from the PA. What I find disturbing is that this situation is not handled by DAZ and the customer is left alone searching for help in the forum. For old assets that are not compatible with 4.21 the shop page should state it.
In this case the @outoftouch shop page states "compatible with daz studio 4.21", that's not true. It is compatible with 4.16. I guess you can ask for a refund.
https://www.daz3d.com/lainey-hair-for-genesis-3-female-s-and-genesis-8-female-s
I was thinking of starting a thread in which people could list products that do not work well (or at all) with Daz 4.20/4.21, but I'm afraid that I'll get scolded for doing so.
But it's beyond frustrating as a customer to have absolutely no idea whether the product you're buying is actually going to work, now or in the near future, even though Daz itself is telling you that the product is compatible with the latest Studio version, even if the product uses the most current technology, even if other products of the same type and vintage work just fine.
And then on top of that, there's no way to know whether you should hold on to a broken product in the hope that it will be fixed soon (thank you, KindredArts!), or whether it will be fixed a year from now, or if it will never be fixed and you are better off asking for a refund, in part because both Daz Support and the PAs themselves are sometimes very responsive and sometimes not responsive at all.
So I'm sitting here in limbo with sixteen broken OOT hairs, with an MSRP of probably $300-400, wondering if I need to return them all, wondering if I even could, wondering what I might replace them with. Wondering if I should just get by on 3rd party shaders for now. Wondering if Daz 4.22 or Nvidia is going to break those, too. Wondering how I am going to replace "Wet and Tanned Skins for G8," as that is also broken.
I guess what I would really like is for Daz itself to put a figurative hand on my shoulder and tell me that it is going to be okay, that they are going to set things right. I just don't have any hope for that right now.
I totally agree. DAZ updated iray well aware that it breaks materials, then all the assets in the store were marked as 4.21 compatible even if they weren't. Don't know if the responsibility for this is on DAZ or the PAs though. May be it's the PA that has to update the description as "compatible with 4.16".
In any case yes, for the final user it is a hell, we can only ask for refund if the product doesn't work.
Many Out of Touch hairs have been updated, though instalaltion order or having multiple Runtimes (or Connect installs, depending on order) may lead to the wrong shared file being loaded.
Richard,
Would uninstalling all of OOT's hair products in DIM and then reinstalling them help? Or are there additional, 'common files' in the Runtime folder that would also need to be replaced?
If you ever intentionally or accidently installed any of the OOT hair products from inside Daz Studio (Daz Connect), those MUST be uninstalled from inside Daz Studio, or any changes you make to DIM (uninstall, reinstall) will be completely ignored by Daz Studio. Any Daz Connect installation takes precedence over any manual or DIM or Daz Central installation, regardless of which package is newer or more recently installed.
There seem to be products that have the "bad" common file still, so if those are installed after the good (or if there is an old copy in a different content directory that is checked before the oen with the updated file, or if theya re installed through Connect and the file is read from a product without the update) then the problem will still occur.
I might have found something that works. Still testing.
First off, many thanks to Richard for pointing me in this direction.
Second off, I am trying this in the Daz Beta build, 4.21.1.49, because I have had success with rendering other problematic "Iray turns things black" products here (Wet & Tanned Skins, some of the Ultrascenery products, etc.)
I uninstalled every OOT hair in my library using Install Manager. I then went into my file folders and deleted everything that had anything to do with OOT's Hairblending 2.0 texture. Files, folders... I just kept searching the drive for "hairblending" until there was nothing left.
Then I installed them all back using Install Manager, starting with the newest and working backwards.
So far I have tested Lainey Hair and Vintage Curl Hair. The former loads with a basic 3DL shader and you have to apply the Iray Hairblending Shader to it; the latter loads with the Hairblending shader itself. Both of them seem to render correctly with the Iray shaders applied.
TBH I was surprised to learn that Install Manager doesn't seem to fully uninstall the products, as there were a lot of file folders left over in various data, runtime, and texture locations. I suppose that was why uninstalling and reinstalling didn't work last time.
Anyway the next steps are to test all of the hairs out by themselves, then to load a preexisting figure file and see if the saved hair on it renders correctly.
You sure are determined to use those OOT hair. If it was me I'd ask for refund straight away and use more well designed assets that don't require you to use the beta and fix the DIM by hand.
Also be aware that custom shaders will not export to blender, should you anytime have the need for that.
So you started installing the newest first and then the old ones? Wouldn't the old ones replace the newest dependencies?
I'll admit to not having any clue which method is better, or if it matters. I was thinking of Richard's comment that Daz reads the first file and ignores everything else, so I guessed that having a very recent product installed first might do the trick. For all I know, it doesn't matter, or I did it backwards and (so far) have gotten lucky.
Each instalaltion will replace scommon files placed by the previous isntallation, so if the oldest is unfixed then the problem will be unfixed. What you want, if you are sure that there are no other copies of the file, is to install a fixed version last.
Well, as far as I can tell, all of the hairs work in the 4.21 beta but they still do not work in the 4.21.0.5 regular release, even after uninstalling and reinstalling everything.
I guess we'll see what happens going forward.
Daz never responded to any of my tickets. Been four weeks now, I think. Although from what I've read around here, it could easily be another forty before they get back to me.
(Deleted: very sad post)
Welp, it broke again. Black black black.
And in my sad post I swore I would never do any more investigative work, that I was done experimenting.
So what did I do as soon as I clicked "send"? Did I stop experimenting? Do I go to bed?
No, instead I deleted Nvidia's MDL Material Exchange. That may have worked.
That'll have to do for now, I want to go to bed on a high note.
So after a couple of weeks and with some additional testing... I'm 99% certain that Nvidia's vMaterials shader set is/was the cause of all of my troubles. In both Daz Beta and Daz Current Release, downloading and installing those shaders is what caused everything to go wrong, and deleting all of them is what caused everything to "go right" again.
Deleting all of the vMaterial shaders appears to have fixed both the "OOT Hairs render black" problem and the related "parts of UltraScenery render black" problem. I was working with Nvidia's Version 2.0 and 2.1 shaders at the time. There's a Version 2.2 that has come out recently, but I'm not going to touch that with a 2.2-meter pole!
Many thanks to Richard, FenixPhoenix, and everyone else for their help and support. Let's hope that this is the end of this thread! (well, unless/until Nvidia and/or Daz breaks something else...)