really looks nice.Great texturing.
Hi all thank’s for the kind comments!
I’m glad peoples like it, I will start a new project soon, I hope it will be better since we as artist evolve at each models and I learned some things that gonna help me on my next one. And it’s a new kind of thing I never did before, I will have to learn about the subject before modeling it, anyway here are some answer.
mohdmistry :Keeper : Maybe I will do a tutorial withmy next character 
mohdmistry :PawWS : Eyes is like the saoul of the character, so I don’t think I show my set up for them, even if they was quick to do, like a day. I have tried 2 types of eyes set up and took the best one of the 2, but I can say in fact it’s pretty simple and it’s based on a physically correct approach of the eyes. The shader here is important, but the modeling also, to make the light scatter them in a realistic way. But it’s a whole,good eyes texture that match the skin tone face, great modeling and shader, liquid in the eyes,eyelash,etc. if one of these element failed, the eyes effect failed. So there is no miracle receipt, just observation and tweaking to get what you want is the way( and I learned a few tips on that character). If I show you some first renders test, they wasn’t so realistic, I had to tweak them to make them fit with that character.
lijueshi : I put nothing into the diffuse slot since it’s killing your front sss effect the more weight you had there, that’s a tip It’s like an unscattered effect for the diffuse so I preferred not using it.
montyband : The skin pores are done in displacement in zbrush, but I also extract a bump map to use it with combination in the sss2 to get a better bump effect, and it help a lot. Cause the vray sss2 is not so strong on the bump that is on angle with the light, so with the displacement, they are true depht skin pore so you get better bump like effect cause it capture more light in.
majid_smiley: Hey Majid I’m glad you like it thank you. Can’t wait to see your next work!
monstermaker : Hey thank you! Coming from you means a lot, I like your work to.
Tomala : Hey, honestly the trick is to see what the parameters do, just put one light and no GI, if you want my opinion when testing sss. secondly, don’t use the preset pink, it give bad result to me, pink yellow is better or the milk preset too 
as a starting point. And just use 2 maps, a bump map and a diffuse map. Put a noise in the spec amount and play with the parameters a bit, it’s pretty simple to get decent result, it took me 2 days before getting decent result. Don’t put many maps like in mr, it do not work the same way, do not need a lot of map to make it work. and use the Vray lights, do you know vray renderer by the way? That help also, I know Vray for a long time and I’m working in linear workflow, that help to.
pappete : Yeah 32 bit is your problem, Vray only support exr 32 bit, so convert it to exr or use 16 bit like I did.
oneigekko : Hi, I wrote quick only at the first post because it was a quick modeling just for doing test render for the sss2 but turned out into a complete still image. So it took 3 weeks in total with the renders tests.
If it was not of the renders test (cause I was learning and experimenting the sss2 at the same time) it would have take probably 10 days max to complete.
modeling of the head( 2 1/2 days with touch up ) new eyes models( 1 day) and hairs job (kind of 2-3 days, I did many haircut test, pretty fast to do and render with hairfarm, it took 1 min per render so I was able to do many test fast) and the textures are still basic, I took the base of the texture from an image ref, blurred it (bacause I already had skin pores details modeler and don’t wanted them on the texture since it do not match mine)
removed the highlight and then adding in photoshop some details, it took about max 2 days and the cloth took about 2 days too, I did many render test of the shader.
But quick is relative, nothing is really quick in 3d, it always take time to make the thing work great togheter.
KonginChains : hey thank you, I guess that Vray with maya or XSI you can get the same or close result, but of course Vray is implemented in a better way in max I supposed because it was created for max from the strating point. About the hairs, I use Hairfarm, an incredible hair plugins for 3dsmax, very fast to render and best quality I have seen, much better then hair and fur. I will do a tutorial when I get the time about this.
medwed : hahaha . My sss2 shader is more complicated since he is blended with a vraymat where I get more control over reflection and backscatter effect I have other test to do when I get the time. So here is a tip, but you don’t really need the blend to get great skin, I just had more control over it because the sss2 have some flaws in these area so I tried to counter them.
cherub_rock : No I did not used polypaint and by the way it’s rendered in 3dsmax with Vray.
Ohlda : thank you. Yeah it was a test (about the maps) I was wanted to do for a long time and I found it worked better.
Koutetsujeeg : thank you.
I don’T have any sss pass since It’s the direct output render, I did not rendered it using pass. And in fact, I even don’t have a sss weight map on this head. Maybe the next one I will had one, I have some new tests to do about it since vray do not work like mr, I can get different result just by playing with that.
henriquedw : if you read what I wrote in this post I give some inside about my shaderand I used vray 1.5 sp4.
shoaib : Hey thank you! glad you like it.
Folk3n : Hey merci, un peu d’encouragement francais ca fait toujours du bien.
Hi,Big guns,thanks for review.
Actually I always use 3-4 maps control with mr and MAYA,didn’t use other engine before.
But since look your thread’s quality,I try VRAY with sss2 in last week,it’s different,I think more easy control than mr,and diffuse map put on overall is better than other slot,Could you PM me ,in your opinion diffuse map put on what slot is better in this moment?
And yes,sss2 has no backscatter ,of cause won’t request you show me your method,MAX and VRAY for me are new things.
Thanks for tips I’m kinda know how to get better results with sss2 now but back scattering should be improved with next vray updates imo.
Btw, cant’t wait to see Your next project
tnk man for the tips you are the best one!!!^^…just another question:p…i have a the diffuse map but i see 2 slot for that diffuse and overall color…what the difference and who work better?..
thank for your knowledge sharing !!!
It´s funny to see how they all want to know the secret of the Vray sss2 shader. it´s so simple
PUT THE DIFFUSE MAP INTO THE SSS SLOT and then tweek the scatter radius… done!
dont touch the diffuse channel !
thanks for the suggestion.but here we are not all experienced ones as you^^… my problem it is not to know where to put that map but to understand why.usally whit the other material i put diffuse map on diffuse slot so why now i have to use sss whit diffuse map and what they serve the other two slots diffuse/overall? .thank for the patience but i only want to understand^^
pappete : Actually, if you put your map in the sss color or in the overall color, it does the same thing ( if you keep the color white of the sss color to) in fact it’s a little weird, cause the sss color must just affect the sss on some weight area only instead of all the diffuse, I had sended some recommandations to chaosgroup for updating that shader and if they do, gonna be even more awesome, it’s already a really good shader, but can be even better.
For all those used to mr fast skin maps here is translation to v-ray.
You can checkout my SSS 2 Tutorial.
Really impresive work. It was nice as well discover some improvent in sss vray shading. I’m really tired of mental ray renders, first, they are almost the same, and second, it’s really, really hard get something realistic. 
I´m not really experienced
I think it´s easy to understand. the upper skin has not really much color. did you ever saw a piece of scratched down skin? it´s almost white! the skin color comes from the deeper skin layer. and this is most of the subsurface color and the main skin color.
the diffuse shannel disables the sss effect. it is usefull for paintings on skin or make-up stuff.
the overall color works together with the subsurface color. for example… you want to get subsurface veines better controlled, you should put a veine-map into the sss slot and a diffuse in the overall slot. in this way you can control the mix of it and the main color.
the scatter color slot is for the scatter amount. bright=soft=more scatter
great work… fantastic…
@big guns:
maybe you can help me with my problem here:
http://www.zbrushcentral.com/showthread.php?t=87222
that would be great…
capu : thank you.
I guess your problem comes from your overlpapping in the unwrap near the ears. So correct it in your 3dsoft, then export it and import it into your ztool at the first sudivision, it will replace you initial mesh with the overlpaiing uv, and try again to extract the map, must work fine.
Ballo: I think the same, I’m glad to disceovered the new sss2, work much better.
pitchepuck: what is missing in the sss2 is the yellowish layer, I mean, when you look at a sharp shadow on the skin, you will see a red line followed by a thin yellow line, we can’t get this with the sss2. I wroted to Vlado about that, I hope they will correct it, in fact, the sss color must serve to do that and the overall must be used for the diffuse component. Anyway, it’s already a good shader, but can be a little better.
Amazing modelling and rendering, it could pass as a photograph any time.
I was freaking out cause I thought the ref picture was the digital render until I actually read the post. LOL. I was like HOLY *$IT
Just saw the renders. Damn, really good. could pass for a pick anyday. It’s better than some of the airbrush manipulation you see in trendy fashion magazines.
Just breathtaking. Now let’s see DD get Flynn this convincing in motion. Thanks for making this and sharing.
tnk for the help ^^
great job. thank for your comment
Great finish on this image!
What´s your workflow to extract your bumpmap from the hipoly mesh?
I tried several ways to get a bump: Using a cavity mask and convert this to a map. Using a tweaked(photoshop curves) displacement map or calculating a normal map. But in all these methods I still have the b/w values from my bigger forms in the texture. What do you do, to just have the hi freq details in your bump?
zboot: What is killing your sss is the greyscale texture in your diffuse amount slot. You don´t want to have any diffuse values on the skin, you should use this for dirt,paint/make up, hairs etc.