To DAZ3D - make properly rigger skirts in your products!

KatteyKattey Posts: 2,899
edited July 2013 in The Commons

So I got Gladiator out of tiny hope that promo shots were incorrect and the skirt doesn't follow legs. I was wrong and I will be returning this product because the quality of rigging is that low.

I understand that making properly rigged 4-bone skirt (front, back, left, right handles) is no longer anybody's priority but is that this hard to rename four bones that you got from autofitting process through transfer utility, smooth weightmaps a bit and resave the item? Is that this hard to spend a bit more time on the item and leave customers significantly more happy?

And before I'll be told that this is PA product that is bought by DAZ3D, if I'm not mistaken LadyLittleFox told when asked about deWinter (DO with her name and similar problem) that only mesh was done by her and the rigging was done by some other DAZ3D person so I presume it is quite possible that DAZ3D only buys meshes and makes a quick-and-dirty rigging by themselves to save on price of DOs; I can assume that Umblefugly isn't one who did the rigging. But even if this isn't a case and rigging is done by PAs, the quality standard should really be upped on this sort of outfits because I'm getting tired of skirts that follow the legs for no finking reason. PAs items are slightly better with this but many DOs - especially male items I'm buying - have a truly lazy rigging. Especially egregious example is Horned Barbarian where there is a loincloth at front and back of the body but it still moves with legs in the most unnatural way instead of being rigged with two simple ghost bones (front/back).

Real skirts don't behave like that! We are no longer in Poser 4 era, we can have ghost handles now! Or make proper movement morphs instead, that we can use it with autofit.

I can fix it myself but I won't bother because fixing this stuff it is not a process I'm paying money for.

Post edited by Kattey on
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Comments

  • larsmidnattlarsmidnatt Posts: 4,511
    edited July 2013

    Agreed the lame rigging on skirts is one of the reasons I don't spend here much anymore. I'm willing to pay for quality products, but most of the skirts I've seen in the last couple of years are not rigged well and I get frustrated.

    And yeah I can fix em myself, but it seems silly that all the buyers should have to do that after the product comes out when it can be done prior to release and save everyone time.

    Post edited by larsmidnatt on
  • icprncssicprncss Posts: 3,694
    edited December 1969

    If the rig isn't going to have body handles then the skirt should at the very least have movement morphs.

  • KatteyKattey Posts: 2,899
    edited July 2013

    icprncss said:
    If the rig isn't going to have body handles then the skirt should at the very least have movement morphs.

    If skirt follows legs, movement morphs won't do much good because in each pose the morphs will be quite destroyed by involuntary follow-up of skirt with legs.

    And this product doesn't have any movement morphs (any morphs at all) anyway.

    The worse thing for me is that a lot of genesis male 'barbarian' outfits have this problem, and this is stuff I buy a lot, I have almost all of them. Horned Barbarian has this problem. Heracles has this problem. Legion has this problem. Praetorian has this problem. I love man-skirts like that but I'm getting subpar, lazy rigging quality. Even if meshes are good and textures are good if it doesn't move right I can't use it for anything that is not zero pose. And I'm tired of fixing problems that shouldn't be in those products in the first place and paying my own money for that sort of 'quality', thus encouraging it.

    Primordial Barbarian Clothing thankfully have a good rigging - somebody took care to add a bunch of handles to the loincloth. But this is a rare case.

    And female items have it too. Altanthya has this problem. Kameez has this problem. deWinter has this problem, to list a few.

    I don't know who is doing the rigging in those DOs but PAs get their name attached to this rigging.

    Post edited by Kattey on
  • Zev0Zev0 Posts: 7,039
    edited December 1969

    Agree with the above comments. What I do is click on the thigh bone of the clothing and rotate it manually to get some sort of flexibility. But ye, gimme handles or morphs.

  • Serene NightSerene Night Posts: 17,552
    edited December 1969

    Yes this is frustrating. By now rigging for skirst should be standard in clothing and outfits.

  • KatteyKattey Posts: 2,899
    edited July 2013

    Yes this is frustrating. By now rigging for skirst should be standard in clothing and outfits.

    Funny but it was - in Generation 4 at least, if not in Generation 3. Weightmapping did change the way the ghost handles can be made, so you can't have 8 overlapping handles + one big one like it was in many Gen4 clothes.

    But weightmapped rigging still doesn't prevent the rigging of four simple handles for knee-length skirts. Or at least it doesn't prevent a fixing Thigh bones so the skirt doesn't follow up the legs.

    Post edited by Kattey on
  • ZenrelZenrel Posts: 245
    edited December 1969

    I totally agree with this. Last night I bought the fairytale dress and was getting frustrated with the skirt looking unnatural in some poses. It took a long time to get the right look I want.

  • KatteyKattey Posts: 2,899
    edited December 1969

    Long skirts have it even worse than knee-length. Most of them can't sit or kneel well (if at all), not mentioning that there are no adjustment, style or wind morphs for them - I'm not even talking about carefully made ghost handles. Those things were common in Gen4 but now they are rarity.

  • Carola OCarola O Posts: 3,818
    edited December 1969

    I can't even do any of those fixes myself.. don't even have a clue on where to start :/

  • KatteyKattey Posts: 2,899
    edited July 2013

    Carola O said:
    I can't even do any of those fixes myself.. don't even have a clue on where to start :/

    1. To unfollow skirt from legs you need to unfollow thigh and shin bones in the skirt. For that you need to start joint editor (Alt-Shift-J according to my hotkeys) or Tools -> Joint Editor from top menu.

    2. In Scene tab or in a view (I usually use Scene tab) select the bone you'll be unfollowing, like lThigh bone in the skirt. Not in Genesis/Figure, in the skirt.

    3. Right-click on this selected bone, it should popup a menu.

    4. In this menu select Edit and then Rename Node. It should popup a little panel with two lines: Node Name and Node Label
    Node Name is an inner name of the node, Node Label is the 'outer' name you see in Scene tab.

    5. Change Node Name from lThigh to lThigh1 or something else like that - the idea that Node Name should be different from lThigh.
    Change Node Label to lThighHandle or something like that although this is more for convenience, and Node Label doesn't matter that much.

    6. Do the same rename process for rThigh (should be something like rThigh1) and both lShin and rShin.

    7. You won't see the changes immediately so you should save your modified skirt as Save As -> Support Assets -> Figure/Prop with a new name.

    8. Load your new skirt, it should have legs unfollowed.

    Better be to use weightmapping brush tool to smooth maps a bit so they'd behave less like legs and more like handles but so far this is it.

    This is a simple process but I, as a customer, shouldn't be one doing this fix.

    Post edited by Kattey on
  • SiscaSisca Posts: 875
    edited December 1969

    Agreed. I actually spent more on the Miss Fisher's Wardrobe sets specifically because I wanted to support someone that took the time to add in all of the morphs to allow the outfit to be used for something besides standing fairly straight without me having to spend hours fixing it.

    I'm not talking about some sort of extreme fantasy/combat pose. I'm talking about the simple lady sitting in a chair with her legs crossed pose.

  • Midnight_storiesMidnight_stories Posts: 4,112
    edited December 1969

    You know this is not a one click operation for starters if you have something like a skirt or loincloth you have to rig it for genesis first then you have to re-rig it for every morph you do for it. Because they are non-standard bones and don't auto follow, you have to reposition the bones for the morph and do a ERC freeze then there a real chance of getting duplicate error on top of that but I hope that's fixed. I had to do it for the Lycan hunter and it was not easy task believe you me. Probably the best thing to do before buying is look at the morph list and it will give you an indication. I think I will list stuff like this from now on if ever I do any more stuff like that. But I will always give a morph to move it out the way of the legs that's a given.

  • KatteyKattey Posts: 2,899
    edited July 2013

    You know this is not a one click operation for starters if you have something like a skirt or loincloth you have to rig it for genesis first then you have to re-rig it for every morph you do for it.
    My initial post was about skirts following legs. Fixing this is a simple matter of renaming nodes.

    Because they are non-standard bones and don't auto follow, you have to reposition the bones for the morph and do a ERC freeze then there a real chance of getting duplicate error on top of that but I hope that's fixed.
    There is a script that fixes double IDs
    And I've just tested a Gladiator skirt with renamed nodes (so it doesn't follow up legs) on extreme morphs like Freak, MrHyde and such, and renamed nodes do autofollow a main changed rigging somewhat, I think because hip/pelvis bone still autofollows. Even my custom skirt that had no leg bones from the very beginning also autoadjusts its ghost bones to main rigging enough to be functional.

    Not a single-click. sure, but clothing creation was never a single-click process. This is why people pay for products instead of doing them themselves. If DAZ3D is ok with releasing lazily rigged products they should not be surprised that people don't buy their stuff that much, unisex shape or not.

    Probably the best thing to do before buying is look at the morph list and it will give you an indication.


    I know how to buy stuff but thank you. What I'm saying is that the quality of products like skirts is very low and it should be higher. I can't buy functional things because most outfits are not functioning well for my purposes.

    I think I will list stuff like this from now on if ever I do any more stuff like that. But I will always give a morph to move it out the way of the legs that's a given.
    Thank you. Morphs are much appreciated and they translate better with autofit to boot.

    Post edited by Kattey on
  • Midnight_storiesMidnight_stories Posts: 4,112
    edited December 1969

    Kattey said:
    You know this is not a one click operation for starters if you have something like a skirt or loincloth you have to rig it for genesis first then you have to re-rig it for every morph you do for it.
    My initial post was about skirts following legs. Fixing this is a simple matter of renaming nodes.

    Because they are non-standard bones and don't auto follow, you have to reposition the bones for the morph and do a ERC freeze then there a real chance of getting duplicate error on top of that but I hope that's fixed.
    There is a script that fixes double IDs
    And I've just tested a Gladiator skirt with renamed nodes (so it doesn't follow up legs) on extreme morphs like Freak, MrHyde and such, and renamed nodes do autofollow a main changed rigging somewhat, I think because hip/pelvis bone still autofollows. Even my custom skirt that had no leg bones from the very beginning also autoadjusts its ghost bones to main rigging enough to be functional.

    Not a single-click. sure, but clothing creation was never a single-click process. This is why people pay for products instead of doing them themselves. If DAZ3D is ok with releasing lazily rigged products they should not be surprised that people don't buy their stuff that much, unisex shape or not.

    Probably the best thing to do before buying is look at the morph list and it will give you an indication.


    I know how to buy stuff but thank you. What I'm saying is that the quality of products like skirts is very low and it should be higher. I can't buy functional things because most outfits are not functioning well for my purposes.

    I think I will list stuff like this from now on if ever I do any more stuff like that. But I will always give a morph to move it out the way of the legs that's a given.


    Thank you. Morphs are much appreciated and they translate better with autofit to boot.
    Thanks for the script where was that when I need it LOL!
    On a more serious note I do understand where you're coming from.
    Cheers
  • BarubaryBarubary Posts: 1,200
    edited July 2013

    Yeah, between this, the general lack of movement or adjustment morphs and the more often than not unnecessarily skin-tight fitting clothes, DAZ, particularly in Gen5 and 6, have given me quite a few reasons to skip over their clothing products.

    There are exceptions of course.

    Post edited by Barubary on
  • zigraphixzigraphix Posts: 2,787
    edited December 1969

    Rigging skirts in Genesis with weight maps is quite different than rigging with the old falloff zone system, and I think it is taking content creators time to develop new methods to make skirts look as they were at their best with the old rigging. Also, very recently (DS 4.6) some changes were made to the weight map tools that helped creators who want to use ghost bones-- until that happened, they were extremely difficult to set up, and small changes would have unexpected and unwanted consequences.

    I'm not trying to say the "follows legs" rigging is good, just that there are reasons weightmapped skirt rigging has lagged a bit from what customers had gotten used to with falloff zone rigging. I'm hoping we'll start to see many improvements now that the tools have been updated.

  • KatteyKattey Posts: 2,899
    edited July 2013

    Thanks for the script where was that when I need it LOL!
    On a more serious note I do understand where you're coming from.
    Cheers

    Cheers! :)
    And this is Richard Haseltine who made this script, we all should thank him too :)

    zigraphix, I'm just saying - even if no nice ghost handles are fully yet possible, at least unfollow legs or provide some morphs, anything. Just using transfer utility and not doing anything else for skirts is not comfortable to end user and creates a subpar product.

    I mean, for old gods of Mars sake, those are barbarian clothes! Barbarians wreck stuff, they don't stand still!

    Post edited by Kattey on
  • WendyLuvsCatzWendyLuvsCatz Posts: 37,711
    edited December 1969

    MS, I like your lycanhunter skirt and it's bones as I can use spring settings on it for animation in iClone
    any skirts with a decent amount of rigging (4 or more handle segments) work well esp if I can add some bones mid way down to follow knee twist (yes iClone has a seperate bone for this) so walking poke through is minimized but the skirt still springs independantly of legs
    I realize posing is the main priority not doing animated figures but an eight handled with at least 3 child bones skirt is excellent for the latter for me
    I can also use track in Carrara on it.
    This looks so much better than the weight painted leg following skirts.

  • WendyLuvsCatzWendyLuvsCatz Posts: 37,711
    edited December 1969

    one cheat (no good for content creation but very usefull for me personally for my own animation renders) is to use a triax skirt made by someone else (Genesis mfd is good) with handles instead of genesis as the source in the transfer utility.
    I usually use both kinds btw as I need leg follow and no leg follow depending on what I am doing.

  • zigraphixzigraphix Posts: 2,787
    edited December 1969

    Kattey said:
    Thanks for the script where was that when I need it LOL!
    On a more serious note I do understand where you're coming from.
    Cheers

    Cheers! :)
    And this is Richard Haseltine who made this script, we all should thank him too :)

    zigraphix, I'm just saying - even if no nice ghost handles are fully yet possible, at least unfollow legs or provide some morphs, anything. Just using transfer utility and not doing anything else for skirts is not comfortable to end user and creates a subpar product.

    I mean, for old gods of Mars sake, those are barbarian clothes! Barbarians wreck stuff, they don't stand still!

    I'm not sure what QA was requiring of content creators up to this point (my rigging isn't good enough to submit products). There may have been a thought that "follow the legs" rigging was easier for users, for a while there.

    Xena had some really splendid outfits that followed the thighs but added JCMs for movement, with third generation figures. I loved them because they were so easy to use, and they looked great. But I think it's harder to get that combination of ease of use and great looks with the new tech-- or at least, creators are still working on developing "tricks of the trade" to achieve this. Remember, it took quite a while for content creators to get to the stage we were at with falloff zones, prior to weightmaps. It takes time for the developer community to learn how to squeeze the best results out of new tech. :)

    And I'm still hoping some third-party developer will step up to providing a plugin to implement soft-body physics on any clothing, so we can just drape skirts and wide sleeves. :lol:

  • larsmidnattlarsmidnatt Posts: 4,511
    edited July 2013

    I must be the only person tired of the excuses all the time. Should people have inferior products because vendors have issues with the new tech? Why should people use the new tech then?

    I don't buy excuses, and I don't buy the products that aren't worth my time to correct.

    this isn't the first issue brought up on the forum by end-users that someone stepped in to say "Well geez by gosh the reason is X". Don't care. Not sure why I would :) I want stuff that works. End of story.

    Post edited by larsmidnatt on
  • JennKJennK Posts: 834
    edited December 1969

    I too agree with this. I am relatively new to the world of 3D art and don't understand how to fix things myself. Thanks Kattey for the instructions on the bones.

    What irritates me is the fact that some skirts meant specifically for Genesis when you pose them have a weird black line down the front as if her skirt got caught between her thighs. Yet I see the promo images and Genesis is in the same pose yet their promo image doesn't have that line. It gets very frustrating to buy stuff that in the end I can not use because it takes longer to find and figure out the fix.

    That being said there are some great PA's out there who add the extra morphs or ghost bones and those I have no problem spending money on.

  • JabbaJabba Posts: 1,458
    edited December 1969

    Is it hard work? Of course it's hard work, that's why we're prepared to pay for it in the first place!

    If it's a freebie, no problem, you get what you pay for... but charge me money, and I'll have expected you to put in the effort to make it a useful item instead of virtual cosplay that is useless for anything other than static portrait poses, especially when it's supposed to be a warrior costume.

    For a while now, I've simply not bought costumes that do not have movement morphs etc listed on the product page, as that inevitebly means there are none. Some of them are great looking outfits too, but completely useless to me because they ended up churned-out only with auto-follow and no custom movement options. I've requested in the past, but enough people must be buying for the extra effort to be considered a waste of time.

    Trousers/pants can usually be ok of course because they encase the legs anyway, the big issue is with flowing robes (including certain sleeves), skirts, tabbards, loincloths, tassets etc.

    Well, we've been promised improved clothing with Genesis 2 Female, so it will be interesting to see if that really happens, or if the auto-follow fudge continues to spoil otherwise great outfits.

  • KatteyKattey Posts: 2,899
    edited July 2013

    I must be the only person tired of the excuses all the time. Should people have inferior products because vendors have issues with the new tech?
    No, you aren't the only one. It has been more than two years since Genesis came out and not only tools and core rigging processes didn't improve much (which I think DAZ3D should work on instead of making gender-split figures that don't fix any problems) but most vendors still make skirts like in Poser 3 era.

    Why should people use the new tech then?
    For Genesis you don't have much choice, actually. I'd rather use old spherical rigging for skirts but I can't, only weightmapped.

    this isn't the first issue brought up on the forum by end-users that someone stepped in to say "Well geez by gosh the reason is X". Don't care. Not sure why I would :) I want stuff that works. End of story.


    Same here.
    That being said there are some great PA’s out there who add the extra morphs or ghost bones and those I have no problem spending money on.
    Exactly.
    Post edited by Kattey on
  • ZenrelZenrel Posts: 245
    edited December 1969

    Thanks for that guide Kattey. I do hope for newer dresses or anything that's around the legs have morphs. It saddens me that most dresses I really like have to be standing pose without legs too far apart or too close to each other to look decent.

  • Dream CutterDream Cutter Posts: 1,222
    edited July 2013

    I always wonder why GRAVITY MAP (axial force) MAPS haven't been yet developed. Its such an obvious way to handle this effect broadly in 3D figure design. I would design it so that you define the level of gravitational force for the figures 3 axis using a paint scheme similar to weight maps. Then rendering and animation engines could take advantage of this effect in combination with dynamic (conforming) mesh effects to produce realistic material, cable, aged skin. Imagine painting the figure face cheeks and eye bags green with Gravity Paint (TM*) and crank up the age modifier with gravity active.

    *Technology available for immediate licensing. :) http://dreamcutter.com

    Post edited by Dream Cutter on
  • icprncssicprncss Posts: 3,694
    edited December 1969

    I must be the only person tired of the excuses all the time. Should people have inferior products because vendors have issues with the new tech? Why should people use the new tech then?

    I don't buy excuses, and I don't buy the products that aren't worth my time to correct.

    this isn't the first issue brought up on the forum by end-users that someone stepped in to say "Well geez by gosh the reason is X". Don't care. Not sure why I would :) I want stuff that works. End of story.

    No, you're not, I tend to vote more with my wallet because I would hope people refusing to purchase or returning items that are inferior would speak louder than any forum post.

    DAZ has a 30 day return policy. If you feel the products you have purchased within the last 30 days are inferior, return them and make it clear why. Maybe the DAZ PTB will care and maybe they won't. It's hard to tell anymore what's important to them and what isn't. Even if they don't care, at least you can get your money back and you are not stuck with an inferior product.

  • RAMWolffRAMWolff Posts: 10,140
    edited December 1969

    As usual Kattey is the bearer of wisdom. I totally agree. I remember there was this lovely set that Mec4D had made with long skirts but when she was showing the promos of the Genesis figure moving the skirt looked really weird to me. Not moving nicely or naturally. I remember skirts and gowns all the way back to Gen 3 (Aiko mostly because she was the only Gen 3 figure I liked enough to use) and found the skirt handles were easy to use. In how todays morphs are done I'd def put them in the root so there were top most and folks wouldn't have to dig all the way down to the skirt handle nodes though.

    I'm really hoping that SicklyYield's upcoming product for Gene-02F will have some better fast rigging options for skirts and gowns providing FULL proper rigging rather than the default Genesis rig being installed into the skirts and gowns. It's really really annoying and off putting to me as well!

  • KatteyKattey Posts: 2,899
    edited July 2013

    RAMWolff said:
    As usual Kattey is the bearer of wisdom.

    Argh, the pressure of being a wisewoman! Now I need to go somewhere and severely overreact over a trifle! :D

    I could use a trifle, actually -_-

    Post edited by Kattey on
  • RenpatsuRenpatsu Posts: 828
    edited July 2013

    Overall I agree as well and what I usually do is hand pick the few vendors who provide a good rigging and preferably movement morphs on top. There are a few vendors who do exceptional work in this regard and set the standard for me. Learning by buying and trying I guess.

    For the vendors who do provide movement handles and/or morphs, it helps your buyers (and yourself) if this information is provided in some form, be it as text on the product page or even as promo shots - like it is often done on R'osity. Just listing the duf / cr2 files in the "What's included" page doesn't cut it for me. Either way, over time I did get to know which vendors to avoid.

    Post edited by Renpatsu on
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