Wanted: SSS Skin Tutorial

[Hirazi Blue]

I am looking for a good thorough explanation of how to set up a SSS Skin shader in MR.
Using the default values just looks horrible, but I have no idea how to tweak all the parameters
to get to a more or less convincing result...

[Rork]

What about the MR docs that come with SI?
I can recall a pretty extensive explanation on the skin shader and the textures that will go along with it.
There was also a PDF about skin shading, not sure if that was in the docs as well.

Sorry to be vague, I don't have SI running atm.

rob

[anhungxadieu]

well, i see fxphd have one call "Production Rendering Techniques with Mental Ray"
this course instructor very well explain sss skin in mr, unfortunately he use 3dsmax, but i think it should be the same in xsi
https://www.fxphd.com/fxphd/courseDetai ... Course=202

[Rork]

Yes, "Zap" knows his stuff about MR

Unfortunately you must have a paid account to access those tutorials.

Good find though, completely forgot about that one ;-)

rob

[rray]

What about the MR docs that come with SI?
I can recall a pretty extensive explanation on the skin shader and the textures that will go along with it.
There was also a PDF about skin shading, not sure if that was in the docs as well.

Sorry to be vague, I don't have SI running atm.

rob

It is, that one, 12 years old but still pretty much current considering MR's dev progress
file:///C:/Program Files/Autodesk/Softimage 2015 R2-SP2/Doc/mental_ray/tutorials/fast_sss_tutorial.pdf

-rr

[wesserbro]

I had several attempts of creating skin with mental ray fastSSS, pretty much got decent results, but each time it was like a first time, so thats not really a straight-forward process by any stretch. From what i can recall now you should use 2.2 gamma and play with layer compositing options. Seems i even ended up compositing sss layers in post, so get ready to not get good results out of the mr box )

And one more note: skin shading is much more complex than any tutorial existing by now shows you.

[Hirazi Blue]

Thank you, guys!

And one more note: skin shading is much more complex than any tutorial existing by now shows you.

I feared as much...

[sirdavid32]

Ignite a light, place the camera against the light (like recieving a flare) and place the mesh in front of it.
Use fast SSS shader. You need to write a lightmap (in case you don´t have one, you still use mental ray but tweaked
versions of SSS / search-download from web) and then SWITCH ON "shadows" on light (any kind of light).

Subsurface parameter is "specular". Play with base and measure in mm ; how light will produce shadows inside of the mesh (with the sss shader).
This way you´ll apreciate the effect.

DT (digital tutors) have a 2007 xsi training series about this.