We’re excited to announce that an update to the AI Render plugin will be released on September 1!
Fully compatible with iClone 8.6, Character Creator 4.6, and the newly released Character Creator 5.
For users who prefer not to update iClone or CC yet, you can still update the AI Render plugin itself. Step-by-step instructions will be provided in the release note.
Includes fixes and enhancements to several critical functions for a smoother workflow.
Important Note: If you update to iClone 8.6 or CC 4.6 now, the current AI Render plugin will not be supported. Please wait for the September 1 release for full compatibility. If you already updated and need to roll back, follow these steps:
Uninstall the current version of iClone/Character Creator (via Hub).
Reinstall iClone 8.54 / Character Creator 4.54 using the installers below.
Run the patch in the original AI Render installer you installed before.
do you have more concise instructions to downgrade. I followed the link above and i’ve located the last Hub executables e.g. reallusion_HUB_544_4002.exe but when i click it, it just tells me my current version is the latest and that I don’t need to replace it?
So I’ve tried the newest version of the AI Render Plugin and…I don’t like it. It’s not all bad. It does details a little better. Definitely captures tattoos and some other features with more accuracy. Muscle tone as well. The old AI plugin struggled with that, although I did tweak it to be able to capture muscle tone and some skin details. But this one simply will NOT give me the look I want no matter whether I use HD Realistic Image style or Photorealism Image style or any other style.
Above is the render I did in the old AI Render plugin using Photorealism style. I didn’t need ANY prompts - this just spit out immediately and it was perfect. I couldn’t have been happier.
These are the images I’m getting with the new AI Render plugin. And they’re pretty consistently bad. I did include one image using the HD Realistic Image style, but what’s most remarkable is even with A LOT of prompting I can’t get the plugin to do green eyes. I CANNOT get anywhere near the image of that first plugin - and this is a REALLY small sample size. I have done over a hundred renders with another character, using different lighting setups, different prompts, changing the sliders and it just CANNOT get back to where it was. Not sure why. I primarily use the Photorealism Image style, that’s my preference. Anyway, those are my gripes.
Face detailing can messes up portraits pretty badly.
While Ksampler is running I can see the result would be just fine, but then detailing kicks in and the face goes sour.
Detailing is a nice feature for distant shots, but not for closeups.
We should have an option to turn it ON/OFF manually.
Above is a facial render from the old AI render plugin. It NAILED this expression and look. Now it DID mess up the tattoo on her shoulder, which the new plugin does do much better.
Here’s the same model in CC5 doing the same facial expression with the new render plugin:
It also over exposes her face. The skin on her face doesn’t match the skin on the rest of her body. It doesn’t do that all of the time but some of the time it does and it’s very frustrating. And the skin lightening effect is bad on dark skinned characters. Here’s the old AI render plugin on a darker skinned model:
Brilliant!!! Chef’s kiss on the quality. And this was the FIRST time. Here’s my first effort on a different model with nearly the same skin color (actually a LITTLE closer to my own skin color):
But it took a PROMPT for his darker skin to show up. And he’s not smiling AT ALL. It doesn’t look better than the native CC5 render.
Basically, as you said, we need to turn off that facial detailing software. It makes everything worse. Until it gets fixed there’s no reason for me to use it. I haven’t done a single render using the new plugin that even comes close to any of the old plugin renders. Even turning the denoise slider down to .13 it doesn’t give me anything near the native CC5 render. It needs a lot of tuning to me.
One thing this updated version of the AI plugin tool does better than the prior one was body details. I wanted to see if it could capture the face along with the body with a minimal loss of quality. It did.
So my early conclusion is ALWAYS turn off the face detailer. It CAN do facial expressions, but it’s a little hit or miss, but at least it will change the facial expression to something else, whereas the other one seemed not even try to read facial expressions.
Of course, I’ve only been playing with it for the last 3 hours. I’m still tweaking it to get the best renders possible.
now i am jealous… have similar problems with the facedetailer and desperately tried to find a way to switch it off, may i ask you for help there too? or do i have to wait for the next version (when about will this one come?)
greetings
thanks a lot, this hotfix works great, the facedetailer produces some really good looking faces for the models, the problem is, they just dont look like the models i created anymore, now i can create without the detailer again… in general i really love this AI rendering, even if it still got some limits (especially for animations)… also installed comfy UI on my computer and started to learn to handle it
greetings and thanks again
Important Note: If you update to iClone 8.6 or CC 4.6 now, the current AI Render plugin will not be supported. Please wait for the September 1 release for full compatibility. If you already updated and need to roll back, follow these steps:
AI Render Update is live — now compatible with iClone 8.54/8.6, CC4.54/4.6, and CC5.
AI Render Plugin 0901 Version Release Note
