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Ahh!
I should have waited, sorry.
And, I should have looked a little closer at all the options, like presets and additional maps.
So, these are filters that these FF experts have made, and put up for the community to freely use. (understanding that they deserve credit and a shout out, etc) Which brings up the next topic, and I am sure you won't be surprised. Making our own filters so we can put them up for others to use. I think I can figure out that part on my own.
So much progress!!
DG, you rock!
Thanks a ton!
I had a quick question. Not sure if it has a quick answer. What is the best resolution for your texture images to be saved at? I've seen a wide range, especially where it comes to textures that will be tiled, but I can't figure out if there is a good resolution for specific types of props or if it is mostly just what the texturer decides to use. Are there any hard and fast rules as to what size and resolution a texture image should be?
No worries my friend. I don't know about experts, LOL. There definately are some contributors with a ton of knowledge, but the bulk of the filter library is made up off submissions from the community and general dabblers. You might even notice some PAs have contributed various things. A shout out if you used a filter is appreciated, but according to the submission agreement, no credit is required. The end user is free to do whatever with the end results of any filters in the filter library. Some people do not submit every filter they make, but keep them for their own use.
2000x2000 or 2048x2048 is a good compromise between file size and getting enough detail for most things. Skin textures have been 4096x4096 lately to allow even higher detail. I don't compress my jpegs at all, which has led to rather large sets. Keep in mind that larger textures take up more RAM when rendering, and longer download times. So no hard and fast rules. Use the smallest size and resolution to maintain the amount of detail you need for your item.
Thanks, DG!
Awww.
Everyone is most welcome.
I'm happy to help.
Kevin, sorry for the diversion and I'll get back to your hair either later tonight or tomorrow morning. We have covered the basics. All that is left is what to do with brushes that make hair.
2048 and 4096 are slightly more 'efficient' than 2000 or 4000 pixels, at least in 3Delight when tdlmake runs on them. There are also a couple of other reasons to keep them 'power of 2' sizes, but it's not really all that important. And for Iray it isn't quite the same reasons, but it still is better.
Now, for 'detail' there are a few ways of doing it...image maps, normal/bump/displacement or modeled (or a combination of any/all of them). Geometry, up to a certain point is 'cheaper' than image maps (that's the point where the memory for the geometry equals/exceeds what's used for the image maps...which is somewhere around 3 or 4 levels of subdivision on a moderate base resolution mesh). Iray requires some fairly high levels of subdivision for using displacement (3Delight uses a different type of subdivision and is practically 'cost free' in that regard, so displacement is 'cheaper' in 3DL), but bump and normal maps are fine.
Thanks for pitching in with the techie answer MJC. You explained that much better than I could have.
FYI...
It's true that you can download textures for Filter Forge. But you can also buy the whole set. Everything that was available when each version of Filter Forge came out. If you buy the entire library, then you probably also want to buy the Librain. I bought just the texture set originally and then I loaded all the textures. Filter Forge would error out when I tried to open it. I had to add the textures in smaller groups. Tech support said "Do you reely need to load ALL those textures. There are probably many of them that you will never use. Which is true. But if you have the Librain, you can browse all the textures and then select the ones you want to use and transfer them into Filter Forge.
Hey look! I'm official now. https://www.filterforge.com/filters/13854.html
I've seen that filter librian and filter forge disk, and it could be very useful, especially if one does not have internet acces in places they may want to use their filters. That has happened to me on occasion.
I bought the disc a couple of years ago and it comes in very useful if you need to reinstall your programs for some reason.
I made a filter a while back too and got accepted.
Has anyone mentioned that Pixar released one of their texture libraries for free?
https://community.renderman.pixar.com/article/114/library-pixar-one-twenty-eight.html
They say:
***********************************
Created in 1993 this texture library includes 128 repeating textures, now available for free.
Pixar One Twenty Eight includes:
At the time the idea of "repeating textures" was so innovative that new techniques were invented to create these images. In fact Pixar took out several patents for the technology, developed by David DiFrancesco, which you can read more about here Method for Borderless Mapping of Texture Images.
Updated for 2015
The texture library has been upgraded and now includes bump and normal maps. While created in 1993, this library still has many potential uses. Enjoy.
******************************
I haven't downloaded or tried them yet, but they certainly look interesting!
Free is good!
Edit to add: I DLed them: all the files are in .tif format, nicely arranged in folders
As you can see, I found some bricks...
Congrats on the filter acceptance! It looks good. I'll have to add it to my library. I'm still working on trying to create my own filters, but I keep getting distracted by too many projects.
You and me both....
And yes congrats on the acceptance!
Yes, congrats, Destiny!
I'm on my way to buy your new product.
Finally got around to trying the Fantasy Mask and Collar.
But I had to put the white on black texture in both the diffuse and the cut out channels. If I tried any other combination, the wrong parts got left behind. (I also had black on white textures too.) So maybe I misread or misunderstood something?
I suppose the medal looks that way is because it is reflecting something?
Hi Destiny, just curious if you will still be going forward with this thread on the texturing people ?
Just a quick note to say that even this thread has gone dormant since June of last year, I discovered it only recently, and all the great information is *hugely* appreciated! Maybe we can get the ball rolling again.
~ Russ
Would love that as I am ready to devote some time to learning to texture templates etc. I'm especially interested in the MFD and the POTS dress and being able to do the cut outs.
Hi guys. Yeah I went MIA. I'm still here and so insanely busy it isn't even funny.
I think I covered everything I wanted to in these 12 pages, except for how to make character skins. I'm hedging on showing character skins because the information won't really apply unless you have 3DCoat, or similar projection painting software, and I'm not sure if I can do it properly without using a video format. I don't think it can be adequately shown by screen shots in forum posts.
Hello Russ, nice to meet you, and thanks for the kind words.
Hi Sonja! I hope to be able to get back to this, possibly this summer, if I ever get caught up.
*Waves to all*
No rush! I had planned on working on this on my own anyway so anything I learn on the way I will be happy to share here. It will probably be in fits and starts but I want to run through this thread again and do the exercises and then branch out so to speak. Will post again when I have something to share.
@DestinysGarden No worries. These pages were a great stepping stone and I learned so much! I've been able to take everything I learned from you and expand on it so the lessons were very much appreciated. :)
Hi Sonja (and all):
By MFD, I think you mean Morphing Fantasy Dress for Genesis 3 Female(s), yes? I have that, maybe we can explore texturing that together.
What is the POTS dress?
At the risk of displaying how little I know about this whole process, I will explain my approach to retexturing a garment, from the very beginning, in little baby steps that even I can understand (I think!).
The first step is to download the templates for the garment. I have found that garments purchased from other vendors often include the templates with the initial download of the product. But DAZ doesn't seem to do that, so you need to log in to your DAZ account and go to your Product Library page, where you can access the list of all your purchased products. Search for the specific product you want, and if a template is available, you will see a button at the bottom of the page to download it. Here it is for the Morphing Fantasy Dress for Genesis 3 Female(s):
This post way back a while ago list the steps to generate your own template for anything that doesn't have one. I've noticed Daz Originals usually do have templates, and PAs (myself included) include them maybe half of the time.
https://www.daz3d.com/forums/discussion/comment/1066821/#Comment_1066821
It really is super easy and you shouldn't let the fact that no template is provided stop you from re-texturing something that you really want to work on.
I totally agree with Destiny, of course. She is the expert! I have only done one exercise where I tried to make my own template, but it was a super simple item.
So once you have the template, either downloaded or making your own, you want to get organized. Unzip the template folder if it is zipped. I find most of the template folders from DAZ unzip to a folder simply called Template. I like to rename it to match the name of the zip file. I also tuck the zip file into the renamed folder, for backup. Then put the folder where you can find it easily. I have a folder just for templates, so I move it there.
Inside the folder you should find the actual template file. it may be buried inside a nested folder. In the case of the MFD, there is a folder called MFD and the Morphing Fantasy Dress.jpg file (the actual template) is inside that. Open the template file with your 2D graphics program of choice (Photoshop, the GIMP, etc.). Here is the MFD template in Photoshop:
I take a few moments at this point to analyze the template, to make sure I know which piece is what, and the orientation of each piece, because that will determine how you lay your fabric or material on top of the template. In this case it is a very simple template with just the two sleeves of the dress, the front, and the back. It doesn't even matter which sleeve is right or left, since we will almost certainly be texturing them the same. Also, in this case the designer has lined all the pieces up nicely vertical, which is not always the case! So if we have a simple fabric pattern we want to apply to the whole dress, we could do so by simply adding a layer over the template and copying in our fabric. But if that's all we wanted to do, we wouldn't need the template... ;-)
To see how the unaltered MFD looks in DAZ Studio, I loaded the dress onto V7, without applying any texture. Here is a screen shot, in Iray Preview mode (the colored lines are related to the lights in the scene, please ignore them):
Next, for the sake of self-education, I have applied the Black Widow Sexy material file to the MFD. Here is the screenshot:
Carry on Russ. I think you've got this. You don't need me. Heh.
I look forward to seeing your results.
Oh, and I *think* POTS is Pharaohs of the Sun. https://www.daz3d.com/pharaohs-of-the-sun-for-genesis-female
To understand how it was possible to create the effect shown in the Black Widow Sexy illustration above, we need to understand the Material Zones defined as part of the MFD. If we go to the Surfaces pane in DAZ Studio and select the MFD, we see these Material Zones defined: