Why Doesn't My Render Look Like The Promo?

If you've just started out with DAZ Studio, 90% of the time the answer is "because of your lighting and render settings." This shows a comparison of the DAZ default lights, a single UberEnvironment light plus a distant light with raytraced shadows, and a more complex lighting setup which is included with this set of freebie presets. [link]

Turning down your shading rate and up your shadow and pixel samples in your render settings also make a huge difference (and will increase render time, but for good renders it's worth it).

This character skin is Benjamin M5 from DAZ. He comes with HSS settings created in and for DAZ Studio and also therefore looks much better than a character that was intended for use in Poser. Always check the readmes for .dsa materials in the file list before you buy.

This is also intended as a shorthand of this tutorial on the forum, since those can come and go so easily: [link]