As it currently is, even under a cloudy dim sky SSS objects are blown out with their inner glow. Skylights are not intended to be used as direct sources of light, so they should have a multiplier that reduces their impact on SSS. This would be great as a parameter on the skylight itself.
If you look how its written there, the report has an obvious undertone of “f*ck the users, I think its fine.”
“Lasers and skylights both have photons so hur durr.”
Yeah, sunlight diffused through clouds and a 25 gigawatt laser shine with the same density of photons. #Sarcasm
SSS is not some magical property that only affects direct light. In fact most of what you see of your hand/skin is SSS, direct light is only a small part. If you didn’t see SSS from skylight humans would be way more pale and look more like vampires. You can also see SSS on stuff like leaves in real life too.
In my tests reducing the SSS color to where it looks good in light made it look good in shadows too. The subsurface color generally has a way greater value range than you need for realistic stuff, but because it does you can also get exaggerated/stylistic looks from it. Basically you want the subsurface color to be closer to black than the real color of the object. And in general I don’t understand why SSS having too much effect is an issue since you can reduce the effect by using a darker subsurface color. The sunlight opacity bug is real though.
But if you have other results with SSS in light/shadow you can post those.
The general gist of SSS you described is correct, but game engine SSS only emulates the more obvious effect of “flashlight-through-hand”. *That *is not something you get from skylight.
Direct light intensity –> Is not equal to –> Indirect light intensity || Meaning || More SSS intensity under direct light –> Less SSS intensity under indirect light.
By darkening/reducing SSS value –> SSS is uniformly reduced in both directly lit and indirectly lit conditions || While in fact || As I said in the line above, SSS intensity should not be the same under both direct and indirect conditions.
It’s about brightness/luminance/SSS opacity –> It’s not about SSS color/saturation.
The current issue is –> SSS intensity is the same under both Directional light and Skylight and there’s no option to override how much Skylight influences SSS–> which is the same as saying a firefly emits the same amount of photons as an atomic bomb.
Well, in the current design skylights do affect SSS and I don’t see why they shouldn’t, it looks good. The only thing that doesn’t really affect SSS is ambient cubemaps.
Reducing the SSS color value makes the material darker (closer to a normal material without SSS) so it’s not only saturation. But if you want an option to override how much the skylight influences SSS that’s not a bug, it’s a feature request.
You would probably have better luck with reporting the bug that opacity doesn’t affect SSS for either SSS or the two sided foliage model using a movable skylight because it’s easy to see that it’s not working. You could also limit the skylight influence on SSS if that worked properly.
But really if you want to not have SSS interact with the skylight at all, replace it with ambient cubemaps.
If Static Skylight is working fine but both Stationary and Movable are giving flat results then there is a bug or it’s a design problem and needs to change.
Again, we need to control how much skylight influence SSS. Reducing Opacity in material would result in reduced SSS under both indirect and direct light.
I don’t understand why we keep having to reiterate. Nobody is saying skylights shouldn’t affect SSS at all. They should have a multiplier of some sort (or some other solution) so that they can affect less than other lights in your scenes. This is to suite the general usage of skylights. As it is, I can’t have my SSS look the way I want it under a spotlight and the way I want it under a skylight at the same time.
I’m honestly quite angry that this is being backlogged without any kind of official comment. For outdoor scenes, properly functioning SSS is an absolute must, and at this moment it’s just being blatantly ignored. You’re not making it easier for people running outdoor scenes.
And in response to this:
Nice idea, reducing the SSS brightness. The only not-so-minor issue there, is that it also gets rid of the SSS in direct lighting, meaning we might as well throw the entire effect out the window. The entire problem here is the lack of control for specifically one of the two kinds of light (direct/indirect), instead of both at the same time.
Parameter on each light allowing us to dictate how much it influences SSS, anyone?