Ok. So I downloaded the shader and have a female model head im messing with. How do I set this up and will it render out? or does it only show up in the veiwport? My intentions are to bake sss into a low poly model can anyone help me out with some tips?
To bake SSS into a lowpoly model I think you'd have to use Mental Ray with max's Render-to-Texture. These shaders are for hardware rendering only, in the viewport.
I see. But can I use the settings he posted earlier and get similar results using the sss skin shader in max? Also How do I even get started with this shader. Is It of the Dx9 material? Then will I get the same texture slots as he's showing?
last time I tried to render to texture with Mental Ray's SSS shader it failed (outputted black). I think it was a factor of how the shader appears differently based on camera angle, and therefore can't be rendered to a surface.
Not to say it can't be done, just that I failed with that particular approach.
If you really wanted to, this is a real hackish way but it might work to some extend.... Render out straight on from front and side, and the planar map from front and side and bake the renders back onto the model and do a little ps work to combine them. You'll get lighting and everything this way tho so im not sure if it would work, but i think doc_rob is right you cant really bake SSS because how it reacts to camera angles... Could be wrong tho
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Ben Cloward has written a good tutorial on getting HLSL shaders like this working in the viewport.
Not to say it can't be done, just that I failed with that particular approach.