Cinema 4D Tip: Redshift SSS in Cinema 4D — Scale, Radius & Lighting

Subsurface Scattering (SSS) is essential for believable skin, wax, marble, jade, and any material where light penetrates and diffuses beneath the surface.

Core principles

• Scale matters: Cinema 4D’s default unit is centimeters. SSS distances live in millimeters—keep models at real-world scale or your scatter will look wrong.
• Color drives depth: Red wavelengths scatter deeper than green and blue. Skin looks warm at thin areas (ears, nose) because red travels farther.
• Lighting reveals SSS: Use soft area lights and subtle rim/backlight to show subsurface glow; SSS is almost invisible under flat front lighting.

Redshift setup (recommended)

• Use RS Standard/Material and enable Subsurface.
• Type: Random Walk for most organic assets (more accurate), Diffusion for speed.
• Weight: 0.2–0.6 for skin; 0.6–1.0 for wax.
• Color: skin toward warm peach; wax toward the base wax hue (often slightly yellow/red).
• Radius: set per channel (cm). Example starting points:
  • Skin (RGB in cm): R 0.12, G 0.06, B 0.03 (≈ 1.2/0.6/0.3 mm)
  • Wax (RGB in cm): R 0.3, G 0.15, B 0.08
• Scale: multiplies radius—adjust if your model is off by a known factor.
• Quality: raise Subsurface samples (or overall sampling) to reduce noise; enable denoiser for previews.

Skin quick recipe

• Base (albedo) map: subtle, low-contrast color. Avoid baking shadows into base.
• SSS color/radius: tint warm; use a Thickness/SSS amount map to reduce scatter in bony areas and boost in ears/nose/lips.
• Specular: dual-lobe look—primary spec IOR ~1.4 with roughness 0.25–0.35; add a broader secondary via Coat or a second spec with roughness 0.5–0.7 for hydrated sheen.
• Normals/bump: very fine pore detail; keep microdetail in Normal/Bump, not in albedo.
• Displacement: microdisplacement for pores and wrinkles; keep heights small to avoid “inflated” skin.

Wax quick recipe

• Higher SSS weight and deeper radius (red-biased).
• Lower surface roughness for a gentle soft highlight (0.15–0.3).
• Use a Thickness map to reduce glow at thick candle bases and enhance at edges and carved details.
• Place a warm backlight or candle flame light just behind/inside to showcase translucency.

Lighting and scene tips

• Use real-world light sizes and intensities; HDRI + one key area light gives readable forms.
• Soft shadows help sell depth; avoid overly contrasty lighting when judging SSS balance.
• Check scale with a 180 cm reference human or a 2 cm candle wick to validate units.

Standard/Physical fallback

• Use the Subsurface Scattering shader in the Luminance channel.
• Match scene scale, set Path Length to millimeter-like values, and tint toward warm hues.

Optimization and troubleshooting

• Inconsistent normals cause dark seams—Optimize and Align Normals before shading.
• Too much SSS makes materials look like wax; reduce Weight or Radius, or darken Thickness map.
• Noisy SSS: increase SSS/overall samples, clamp extremely bright HDRI pixels, or use denoising.

Get Cinema 4D and Redshift, plus expert advice, from NOVEDGE. Explore bundles and upgrades at NOVEDGE and keep your pipeline current with their dedicated C4D resources.