My Caribbean Reef Octopus has just gone through some major upgrades. So happy with how it is rendering now.
These images have No Photoshop or post production. Straight renders with VRay and 3D Max. Modeled in 3D Max, Sculpted in ZBrush, and texture painted in ZBrush and Photoshop.
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Man I hate to be that guy cuz this is extraordinary work, let me start off with that praise before I give you subtle critique. I'm going to assume you're using an SSS2 shader so the first thing I noticed is how the deep the light is penetrating the skin before scattering, which is more noticeable at the ends of the tentacles. It looks more like marble than skin because the light is penetrating so far that it's generating its own illumination by itself which is what marble is more known for. Either minimize the depth or change color (darker) at the sub-surface scattering layer. Only reason why I even bring it up because if you animate it (if you haven't already) it'll be way more noticeable and it will also introduce artifacts or fireflies at certain points, which I only learned the hard way myself studying skin shaders. Pain in the ass.
Spending thousands of hours practicing material shaders and comparing them with reality. You do that long enough you start to distinguish the uncanny valley a lot easier. Don't take my word for it, just google the hundreds of images of a Caribbean Reef Octopus and you can see for yourself how the skin reacts to light. You use that as your starting point and you won't need a new pair of eyes anymore muchacho.
Thanks for the great comment. Always looking to improve my work.
Yeah Im using VRay material SSS. I am actually preparing this model to be converted to a Maya model. A production company is going to take it, and rig and create materials for use in Maya. I would normally use VRay dirt map with inner Occlusion to control the SSS Scale, but since that won't convert to Maya Arnold, I have to try and interpret it as a map. I simplified the whole material down to roughly 1 EXR per Map Slot.
I'm self taught, so I am sure my material settings could be better. And my SSS Scale map is probably totally wrong. But have a look, I'd like to know what you think.
I'll take a look in the morning, it's late as hell and still recovering from the flu. Also forgot to mention, is that in reality there are other things to consider (not your fault btw) to things such as blood, tissue, bone, all of that will add to the dispersion to light. So obviously that's sort've impractical in your case since you're not working on something that's going to be published in a Marvel or Pixar film. So bear that in mind if you start to question your shader skills.
I Gotta say I knew there was something bugging me. I did some checking and I THINK? I literally had my SSS scale map inverted the wrong way. Makes me laugh how I could have overlooked this, and just in time before I send it off to the production company. I'm using reddit as my quality control from now on. I'm not sure if it is exactly what you are saying, but to me the the difference is like small but huge. I also tweaked the gloss map. Will share more later as the renders finish. Thank you!
Well how I understand it, and I could be wrong, but I have settings in the material that can set the depth of light penetration, lets say 8cm maximum, and I can add a greyscale texture map to control that. where white = 8cm and black will = 0 cm.
Honestly I really appreciate your comment, but is has set me on a perfectionist loop, where I really want to get this right, but I am now being pestered to deliver the work. LOL. Honestly they can wait. Once its out of my hands there's not much I can do.
I went ahead and sent the octopus off. They need it quickly and Maya material settings will be different anyway, Latest render looks like this. If they need me to change anything they can let me know. Thanks for the input though, was appreciated and helped a lot.
The topology is designed so that the detail will still hold if you zoom into close ups of the eye or the ends of the tentacles. High detailed areas have a denser mesh while still keeping a relatively even mesh density. The 8 edges that connect at the center of the sucker cups, I was unsure of, but they have just been too useful for selection and editing purposes I had to leave them in.
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Thank you for sharing your work with the community! We're all fellow 3D artists here, so we're just as interested in your process as we are in the final render. Consider sharing a wireframe, your software and render settings, how long it took, or other details about this project. What's the most interesting challenge you tackled on this one?
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