This Daz3D Portrait Tutorial explains everything in Daz Studio how to create a beautiful portrait render. We will also touch depth of field and other tips. A portrait is usually a photograph or painting that represents a person, in which the face is the main part of the picture. Daz Studio is famous for its beautiful characters, so it is no wonder that people may want to make a portrait of such a character. In this article we are going to see how to do that exactly.
Daz3D Making a Portrait Render
Of course, first of all you need to prepare a character. Add it, select a pose and a wardrobe, maybe change some materials. Pose should be fitting for a portrait.
Next important thing to prepare – is a scene, especially a background. You can add an environment if that is what you want to do. I will simply use an HDRI and make the dome visible. You can check our Daz3D How to Make the Dome Visible Tutorial if you want to repeat this.
Daz3d Portrait Camera Setup
After that is the most important part of creating a portrait – a camera setup. To create a portrait camera setups is really important. Basically a camera and its settings is what creates a proper portrait.
Create a camera and put it on the same level as the character’s head – pointing on it. As was said from the beginning – head and namely face is the main part of a portrait. Use Thirds Guide to help yourself with the task.
Before everything else – time to change aspect ratio. You can use any aspect ratio that you would like, no restrictions here. Good variants for the portrait are 16×9, 9×16 and 4×3. I would use the latter to fit more space above head.
Camera Settings
There are a lot of settings available for Cameras in Daz Studio. They all can be found in the “Cameras” tab while you have a camera selected.
Starting with the “Focal Length” setting from the “Camera” section.
The default settings is 65. Focal Length may sound similar to zoom, because it makes things look either closer or further away depending on its value. In reality it is different from zoom and depends on a type of lens you are using in real-life photography.
Depending on Focal Length objects and characters also look different. Here is an example of default Focal Length of 65:
65 Focal Length
Usually photographers prefer to place a camera further and increase a focal length. This can look better while shooting a person. Compare how my character looks on the low focal length above and on the higher with further away camera here:
500 Focal Length
You can notice a difference in a character, how she looks, especially the part that is further from the camera, such as the shoulder. Though I will still use a lower value of Focal Length in final render because I don’t like how background changes. In my case I think that a better background is more important than the Focal Length look.
Now to the Depth of Field. It is also a really important part of the Portrait render too. It should have even a smallest amount of Depth of Field. I will not explain how to use it here, because you can read about that in our tutorial Daz3d Depth of Field: How to Use it.
For the portrait render we need all the focus to be the characters face, as was said a couple of times already. So in the case of DoF the face should literally be the focus of the camera. Change the Focal Distance setting, so focus will be as close to the eyes as it can.
The result looks like this:
It is the default “F/Stop” setting result. You may want to experiment with it a bit. Maybe make it lower, to increase the overall blurriness even more:
Daz3D Portrait Settings
We are finished with Camera and its settings. What about other settings though?
Lighting. I am using an HDRI and it lights my scene really well. If I want – I can just leave it as it is. But it probably is a good idea to add some spotlights that could add more to the scene and emphasize the character.
It is easy to notice that this image is a lot brighter, the shadows on a character look better and more alive, as is the whole character. There are more prominent details and especially hair looks shiny and noticeable.
All that is thanks to the fact that I have used a three point lighting technique. You can learn about these techniques and how to create a proper lighting yourself in the Daz3d Iray Lighting Tutorial.
Another important thing that we have not yet mentioned is the “Render Settings”. Mainly because there is not a lot to mention here. There are no special render settings for the portrait render that I know of.
That is why you simply should use whatever settings you like most. Read our article on the matter: Daz3d Render Settings: Basics & Tips. It will help you to understand which settings would fit your scene.
For example you can enable “Spectral Rendering” for better colors on the final render or try using Tone Mapping for post-production purposes.
Daz3D Portrait Products
To improve on your Portrait render even further, you can try to use additional products.
For example a IDG Portrait Studio 2 Bundle by DestinysGarden & InaneGlory & IDG Designs. It is a big pack that includes everything: lights, scenery, props, poses and shaders. It is a set of a photographic studio that suits for making portraits perfectly.
Source IDG Portrait Studio 2 Bundle by DestinysGarden & InaneGlory & IDG Designs
Another similar product is the Orestes Glamour Portrait Bundle by Orestes Graphics. This bundle contains a set of props and HDRIs to help you create amazing portraits and other kinds of renders.
Source Orestes Glamour Portrait Bundle by Orestes Graphics
Also you can use Studio Light PRO HDRI Iray Wow Lights by Dreamlight. It is different from the last two, because it is not aimed to give you a full set to work with, but instead gives you tools. That is- lighting tools simulating Studio Lights that would suit Portrait renders made in the Studio-like scenes.
Source Studio Light PRO HDRI Iray Wow Lights by Dreamlight
Conclusion
Creating a portrait is not that difficult, especially if you know what you are doing. And a good portrait can really emphasize the look of your character, all its details and even make them look better than they may really be. Especially with the power of virtual cameras and lighting – creating beautiful portraits has never been easier.
Final portrait render