Digital Art Zone

Hi guy’s,

Am pretty new to DAZ but I have done some stuff in C4D. Now working in DAZ seems to me a solution to work fast and create some .mov character renders. I like the program and the idea, but.

As I started to learn the basics from DAZ I bumped a few times in weird actions and its confusing and frustrating to work.

- for example there is no universal path where he unpack new items and models ( i needed to copy and paste them manualy to the wright location )

- for example I buyed a package of props for Michael3 so I load a Michael3 and start adding the props on the body in the
  Loading/creating mode. When I choose an item and ad it , it looks like he’s adding it but nothing shows up ?
  Somethimes it works , sometimes it’s not? its frustrating. Do I realy do it that wrong? or is it a confusing program.

Greeths,
Guus

There is a universal path for installing content, it is called My Library, and you should find it at :C:\Users\<Your Username>\Documents\DAZ 3D\Studio\My Library, and EVERYTHING should be installed to that path, including Poser content too.

If you previously had DS3 installed, the folder holding the installed user items was called Content, and it also contained a Runtime folder for Poser content.  The new name for the Content folder in DS4 is My Library, and it is stored by default in the Documents area.  Just make sure that My Library is the last part of the path for the installer, and not any folder below it.

I don’t use any of the new layouts for DS4P, so I don;t know what Loading/Creating mode is really.  If you look in the Content Library tab (Window > Tabs > Cotent Library), it will show you everything that has been installed onto your disk.  To find M3 content, go to Poser Formats > My Library > Props, and they should all be there.  You can load them by double clickingon ghe icon, or dragging and dropping into the viewport.

You shoul also look in the Scene tab to see if the item has been loaded, it may not be in the centre of the Viewport.

Ok thanks for the explenation, i wil give it a go and do some more lessons. I need to get a hang on the timeline to, I can animate it , but I cant find the frames if I want to delete some wrong movements; I lear some lessons first. are there some lessons of the latest DAZ4 online?

Greeths,
Guus

There are a lot video tutorials on YouTube, but I’m not sure about animations.  There is an Animations forum here too though.

Hi Guus,

The DS timeline is pretty light on edit controls… at least by default. There are some free and paid for plugins which give greater control of the timeline and keyframe. I haven’t had a chance to try them in DS4.5 yet so not sure if they are all updated.

With that said you can still create and delete keyframe in the stock DS timeline. The trick is that you have to select the individual part with the keyframe you want to delete. For example, if you have a bend keyframe in Genesis’ right forearm you want to delete you have to select the right forearm. Selecting the root node of Genesis will not show that arm keyframe. Sorry if that sounds remedial but I can’t tell you how many times I have selected the root and thought “Where did all my keyframe go?” hehe.

The keyframe look like little black or white (Depending on UI) upward facing triangles in the timeline. Unfortunately, that one tick mark represents all possible functions that are keyed. For example, if you rotate the forearm, bend the forearm and scale the forearm all on one frame then you will still only have one tick mark. This makes it so you can’t delete just the bend key but leave the scale and twist.

If you like animating I would suggest using a set of three features that are included in DS which are pretty nifty!

Active pose -  The bone icon tool - It allows you to drag body parts around in an IK sort of way. It is like some of the other tools but I prefer it because of the easy pinning function so you can lock certain parts in place unless you specifically drag that part . I mapped the pin to a hot key so I can lock or unlock parts with a single button.

Puppeteer - This is the greatest thing since sliced bread if you ask me hehe. You can pose your figure for one keyframe, save that keyframe in Puppeteer then do your next key frame, save it in Puppeteer. When you have all your key actions you can scrub your mouse over the markers and the figure will transition to those keys. If you need to make a change to one of them just adjust your figure’s pose then right click the keyframe marker you want to change and select “Update Selected Pose”

The great thing about Puppeteer, other than it’s ease of use, is that it is controlled by your mouse movement so you get slight variations and it can look very natural.

When you get a Puppeteer animation just the way you want it you can record it to the time line then right click in a blank area the AniMate window and choose “Create aniBlock form Studio Keyframes” and save it. This now gives you a clip of your animation which you can reuse and mix and match with other aniblocks to create different animations in the future.

Here is a short tutorial on Puppeteer…
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3AZRYJC9RV8

I hope this helps make animating a little easier.