How to Use dForce: Creating a Blanket, Draping Clothes on Furniture, and Much More [Commercial]

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  • RGcincyRGcincy Posts: 2,835
    Sevrin said:

    Is this a superior solution to using deformers?

    I would guess you could get similar results with dFormers or push modifiers with some work. Using dForce, you let the intersecting object do the work so it will conform with whatever shape/size you are using. A finer mesh gives an even closer match (as can be seen in my previous discussion on skin indentation).  

     

    sapat said:

    That was me Rich, and I sure appreciate you even following up after all this time! Explanation is very clear. yes

    You continue to inspire me to new solutions by your questions, thanks for asking them!

  • RGcincyRGcincy Posts: 2,835
    edited October 2019

     

    76. Socks. Like the underwear of section 65, these often look painted on with no creases, drooping, or gaps. You can use dForce to give them more of a real-life appearance. The trick is you want a little movement but not so much they end up gathered below the ankles.

    a. Load a G3 figure and add some socks. I used socks from H&C Medical Scrubs Set. They are a classic striped sports crew sock. The image shows them as loaded into Daz Studio.

    b. The mesh of these socks look good, all quads. If there are any trigons, you’ll want to set bend stiffness to 0.2 (not needed with these socks).

    c. Add a dForce dynamic modifier to the socks and save the scene in case dForce crashes. Run an animated simulation to verify they deform without exploding or crashing. It’s always a good idea to test out the ability of older clothing to dForce before investing a lot of time working with it.

    d. Using default dForce surface settings with density at 180 and a gravity of 1.0, the socks droop from the top down all the way to the ankles. Only a few people would wear their socks like this!

    e. One way to reduce the droop is to reduce density to 10. The image shows they remain higher on the legs but they show a lot of loosening around the shin.

    f. Reduce density to 2 and you get this. The socks are not skin tight and there is not a lot of drooping.

    g. With changes to density only you get some gap and slump at the top of the socks. Many socks have an elastic band that hold the top in place and close to the skin. You can simulate this by using a weight map and changes in Contraction-Expansion Ratio.

    h. From the DS main menu, choose Create/New dForce Modifier Weight Node. A new child weight node will appear in the Scene pane under the selected object. Select the new weight node object, and from the Tool Settings pane, select Node Weight Map Brush in the Active Tool drop-down box. In the lower section of the pane, choose dForce Simulation::Influence Weights in the unused Maps drop-down box then click on the Add Map button. The object will turn red showing that the weights on the map are at the full strength of 1. Right click in the viewport and choose Geometry Selection/Select All. Right click in the viewport and choose Weight Editing/Fill Selected and set a value of 0%. This clears all the weight.

    i. Use the paint brush to brush influence (red color) around the shin, calves, and ankles. A dark red will create more influence. Leaving it at blue or a light red will give some influence. In this image, the sock on the right has less influence added then the sock on the left.

    j. On the Surfaces pane, set Contraction-Expansion Ratio to 105%. Run the simulation. The top of the socks and the portion around the foot which have little to no influence remain unchanged while the section with influence bulge out slightly. The foot on the right shows less bulging. You can adjust how much bulging you get by changing the Contraction-Expansion Ratio value or repainting influence weight map.

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  • RGcincyRGcincy Posts: 2,835
    edited October 2019

     

    77. Puffy Sleeves. You can use one of the methods we used on socks to add looseness and puffiness to clothing by using influence maps and Contraction-Expansion Ratio.

    a. Choose a shirt. I used one from Trading Floor Outfit for Genesis 3 Males.

    b. Add a dForce dynamic modifier. Select all surfaces and set Bend Stiffness to 0.2. This minimizes the possibility of explosions on many older clothing items. Select the buttons, collar, and cuffs surfaces and set Dynamic Strength to 0. These will move with the shirt but not be part of the simulation. This helps reduce explosions too. You can always go back and change these later if you want to tailor the look.

    c. Save the scene in case dForce crashes. Run an animated simulation to verify the shirt deforms without exploding or crashing. It’s always a good idea to test out the ability of older clothing to dForce before investing a lot of time working with it.

    d. Add a dForce Modifier Weight Node to the shirt (see step h in section 76 Socks for details). Right click in the viewport and choose Geometry Selection/Select All. Right click in the viewport and choose Weight Editing/Fill Selected and set a value of 0%. This clears all the weight.

    e. Select only the sleeves surface. Using the weight node brush, paint influence along the sleeve especially in the central section. Have little to no influence by the cuffs and shoulder seam.

    f. On the Surfaces pane, set Contraction-Expansion Ratio to 130% and Buckling Ratio to 20% for the sleeves.

    g. Set Contraction-Expansion Ratio to 120% for the shirt surface. That will loosen the fit and give some additional play for posing.

    h. Set up an animated timeline with a dancing pose at frame 8. Run the simulation to frame 10.

    i. This render shows two identical figures. The shirt on the left underwent dForce simulation. The one on the right is simply conforming. I think the puffier sleeves and shirts gives a more romantic look to this basic office shirt, useful for a dancer. (Click on image to see larger version.)

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    Post edited by RGcincy on
  • RGcincyRGcincy Posts: 2,835

    As you can see, I've been catching up by posting some examples I've done over the past few months!

    A reminder that the very first post on the first page of this thread contains a Table of Contents and the second post contains an Index to aid finding the 77 topics covered to date. I'll also be updating the PDF's soon, now that another 25 topics have been completed.

  • Leonides02Leonides02 Posts: 1,379

    RGcincy, these are fantastic! You are a dForce master!

  • RGcincyRGcincy Posts: 2,835
    edited October 2019

    thanks @Leonides02, and may dForce be with you too!

    Post edited by RGcincy on
  • sapatsapat Posts: 1,735

    Wow, imagine socks that previously looked like stove pipes can actually have new lives! And puffy shirts that the cuffs don't droop down over the hand while being dforced. You're a genius! Thanks.

  • RGcincyRGcincy Posts: 2,835

    thanks Sapat!

  • RGcincyRGcincy Posts: 2,835

    Just wanted to point out I'll be doing another webinar this coming weekend Nov 16 and 17. Details here.

    I'll be demonstrating some of the recent topics I've posted: 

    1. Cave creation with stalactites
    2. Recreation of a scene from the movie Fantastic Voyage : artery and blood cells
    3. Breast helpers
    4. Puffy sleeves and puffy trousers/pants
    5. Skin indentation
    6. Face deformation : fist fights for your characters!
    7. Blindfold and wrist constraints.
  • RGcincyRGcincy Posts: 2,835
    edited November 2019

    I've posted before about making caves using dForce, now I've gone above ground and have developed a method for making mountains. Since it may be a while before I write it up, here's a couple of renders showing what's possible.

    Foreground mountain made with dForce. Started with a primitive plane then used UltraScatterPro to scatter numerous angular spheres with different rotations and scaling, then converted the instances to objects using Instances to Objects, then used an animated simulation to drape the plane over the spheres.

    The texture fb-highlandslopes comes from 1stBastions Highland Lakeside Cabin and Dock. I used tiling of 6 horizontal and 1 vertical to get this look.

    Background mountains and lighting comes from High Peaks Skydome and HDRI. I find it goes well with the FirstBastion texture.

     

    View 1:

     

    View 2: with smoothing

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  • RGcincyRGcincy Posts: 2,835
    edited November 2019

    Another dForce mountain (foreground):

     

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  • sapatsapat Posts: 1,735

    Well, kicking myself in the fanny for not buying Ultra Scatter Pro during the sale. angry

    Without going into detail on your part since you're busy -  I've looked at Instances to Obj, and the workflow seems to be you create something in DS, use Ultra Scatter Pro to make instances, export that result as an obj, then you have to import it back into DS as an obj to do the sim and render? Just trying to make an informed decision. You can be brief just to let me know if that's the jist of it. Thanks Rich

     

  • RGcincyRGcincy Posts: 2,835

    UltrasScatterPro is good to have just in general. There is a free scatter script, I'll have to see if it works OK for this.

    The Instances to Objects script does all within DS. Your instances just become objects. It does delete the UlstrasScatterPro child during the conversion, so I save the scene before doing the conversion in case I want to easily modify the scatter.

  • RGcincyRGcincy Posts: 2,835

    I've been playing around with the mountain idea a lot. So as to not overwhelm this thread with too much on that topic, I started an art studio thread to post mountain/hill renders. I hope to write up the steps and post them here next week.

  • sapatsapat Posts: 1,735
    RGcincy said:

    UltrasScatterPro is good to have just in general. There is a free scatter script, I'll have to see if it works OK for this.

    The Instances to Objects script does all within DS. Your instances just become objects. It does delete the UlstrasScatterPro child during the conversion, so I save the scene before doing the conversion in case I want to easily modify the scatter.

    Great, thenks for the clarification about instances to obj. bookmarked the art studio thread to observe renders. Thx

  • usahawansufi6c2usahawansufi6c2 Posts: 30
    edited November 2019
    I was wondering if you could make a tutorial on how to make the hair (especially a long one) spill or flatten while the figure is lying on the bed or floor... I know there are hairs with 'lying down' morphs, but I'd like to be able to do the same to other hairs that do not come with the aforesaid morphing ability as well.
    Post edited by usahawansufi6c2 on
  • DanaTA said:

    Transporter accident for sure!  Yikes.

    Dana

    (chuckle) I did this to a G8 male once, and "transporter accident" was exactly the thought that came to mind. :) ...Horrifying. --DD

  • RGcincyRGcincy Posts: 2,835
    I was wondering if you could make a tutorial on how to make the hair (especially a long one) spill or flatten while the figure is lying on the bed or floor... I know there are hairs with 'lying down' morphs, but I'd like to be able to do the same to other hairs that do not come with the aforesaid morphing ability as well.

    Did you have a particular hair in mind?

  • RGcincy said:
    I was wondering if you could make a tutorial on how to make the hair (especially a long one) spill or flatten while the figure is lying on the bed or floor... I know there are hairs with 'lying down' morphs, but I'd like to be able to do the same to other hairs that do not come with the aforesaid morphing ability as well.

    Did you have a particular hair in mind?

    I'd say most of OOT Hairs from G3 female up to G8 female.
  • lilweeplilweep Posts: 2,501

    suggested applications:

    • D-force snow blankets - like a blanket of snow over an object to simulate snowfall.
    • D-force confetti snow particles (to again, simulate snowfall)

     

  • RGcincyRGcincy Posts: 2,835
    edited November 2019

     

    78. Creating Mountains. One of my favorite places to be is in the mountains. Turns out you can use dForce to make pretty decent looking mountains and hills. You will need a scatter script like UltraScatterPro and the script Instances to Objects unless you want to place items by hand (which is possible).

    a. Create a primitive sphere that is 20 feet in size, has 3 segments and 3 sides, and is Y-positive. It will not look like a sphere because it has so few sides.

    b. Create a primitive plane that is 200 feet in size, Y-positive with 100 divisions. Change the name to scatter plane.

    c. If not already open, go to the main menu and select Window/Panes (Tabs) and choose Script IDE. Go to that pane and open the UltraScatterPro (USP) script. Select the sphere you made in step a then click on the Execute button.

    d. On the Settings tab in the dialog box that opens, click on the Surface button. From Target Object’s drop down box choose scatter plane. Set Number of Instances to 35.

    e. On USP’s scaling tab, set scale from 100% to 350%. On the Rotation tab, set X, Y, and Z rotations to 180.

    f. Click on the Surface Scatter button at the bottom of the dialog box. The result will be something like this:

    g. The Scene pane will show the instances as a child of the scatter plane.

    h. If you want to modify the scatter, USP stores the values. Select the group name then click on the Execute button in the script IDE pane to make any changes needed.

    i. It’s good to save the file at this point as the next step is going to replace the USP items and you won’t be able to make adjustments without repeating steps c-g.

    j. Open and run the Instances to Objects script. The script will identify any instances in your scene and present a list for you to choose from. In our case, we only have one choice. Click on the check box AND click on the instances name, then click on the Execute button.

    k. The Scene pane will now show the deinstanced group in place of the instances group you had before.

    l. Create a primitive plane that is 250 feet in size, Y-positive with 250 divisions. Change the name to draping plane or mountain.

    m. Create a primitive plane that is 300 feet in size, Y-positive with 1 divisions. Change the name to ground plane. Set this plane just underneath or intersecting with the deinstanced group. Hide the scatter plane.

    n. Add a dynamic dForce modifier to the draping plane. Adjust its Y-translate value until it is above the highest sphere. Your setup prior to simulation should look something like this:  

    o. Set gravity to 2 and Air Resistance to 0 in the Simulation Settings pane.

    p. Run a single frame or 30-frame animated simulation. You may need to adjust the Stabilization Time (Simulation Settings pane) or the number of frames if the draping plane stops short of the ground plane.

    q. You may find that some of the scattered spheres have a rotation that leaves a sharp straight line in the mountain or their position and scale look out of place. You can adjust these by finding the offending sphere in the deinstanced group and modifying it by hand.

    r. Here is the draped plane now looking like a mountain.

    s. Before rendering, hide the spheres used for forming. It can also be helpful to add a smoothing modifier (from main menu select Edit/Object/Geometry/Add Smoothing Modifier. In the Parameters pane, Mesh Smoothing subgroup, have Enable Smoothing On and Smoothing Iterations set to 2 or 3.

    t. Add an appropriate texture. I like to use texture fb-highlandslopes from 1stBastions Highland Lakeside Cabin and Dock. Depending upon the look you want, set Horizontal:Vertical tiling to values like 1:2, 2:1, 1:6, or 6:1. You can also change the base color to get different looks and increase the displacement values. Add an HDRI like High Peaks Skydome and HDRI, First Light Skydome and HDRI, or Green Hills Skydome and HDRI.

    u. To see a variety of mountains made by this method, check out my Daz Forum Art Studio thread Mountains and Hills.

    v. Tip: these mountains are larger than many Daz Studio scenes and the camera controls can appear slow. Add a camera and on the X, Y, and Z-translate parameter dials, click on the gear icon at the upper right, click on Parameter Settings and set Nudge to a value like 5 or 10.

    w. If you don’t have Instances to Objects, don’t use UltraScatterPro. Instead, create duplicates of your original 3-sided sphere and manually scale, rotate and distribute your spheres over the scatter plane. Since there are only 35 or so, this is not overly hard to do. Tip: set a hotkey for the Duplicate menu item to speed the process.

    x. This used the default dForce surface parameters. There are some modifications you can make which I will discuss in future posts.

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    Post edited by RGcincy on
  • RGcincyRGcincy Posts: 2,835
    lilweep said:

    suggested applications:

    • D-force snow blankets - like a blanket of snow over an object to simulate snowfall.
    • D-force confetti snow particles (to again, simulate snowfall)

    For a snow blanket on the ground, you could follow the first part of this post without the footsteps. For a snow blanket on objects (like on top of a bench or fence, I'll have to think about that as you would probably need to trim the draped plane(possibly could use marquee selection in the geometry editor to do that).

    I'm not sure I understand the snow particles. Was it to make one or to scatter them once made?

  • RGcincyRGcincy Posts: 2,835
    edited November 2019

     

    79. Creating Rocks. This follows the same technique as for the mountains but using spheres instead of planes.

    a. Create a primitive sphere that is 1 foot in size, has 3 segments and 3 sides, and is Y-positive. It will not look like a sphere because it has so few sides. Set its name to Sphere to Scatter.

    b. Create a primitive sphere that is 4.5 feet in size, has 64 segments and 64 sides, and is Y-positive. Set Y-scale to 50%. Set its name to Scatter Sphere.

    c. If not already open, go to the main menu and select Window/Panes (Tabs) and choose Script IDE. Go to that pane and open the UltraScatterPro (USP) script. Select the sphere you made in step a then click on the Execute button.

    d. On the Settings tab in the dialog box that opens, click on the Volume button. From Target Object’s drop down box choose scatter sphere. Set Number of Instances to 75.

    e. On the Distribution tab, click on 3D Noise and from the drop down box choose Cellular. Set Zoom to 28.

    f. On USP’s scaling tab, set scale from 50% to 150%. On the Rotation tab, set X, Y, and Z rotations to 180.

    g. Click on the Volume Scatter button at the bottom of the dialog box. The result will look something like this (with and without scatter sphere showing:

     

    h. It’s good to save the file at this point as the next step is going to replace the USP items and you won’t be able to make adjustments without repeating the above steps.

    i. Open and run the Instances to Objects script. The script will identify any instances in your scene and present a list for you to choose from. In our case, we only have one choice. Click on the check box AND click on the instances name, then click on the Execute button. The Scene pane will now show the deinstanced group in place of the instances group you had before.

    j. Create a primitive sphere that is 7.5 feet in size, has 64 segments and 64 sides, and is Y-positive. Set Y-scale to 50%. Set its name to Draping Sphere.

    k. Add a dForce dynamic modifier to the draping sphere. Because it has trigons on the top and bottom points, set Stretch and Bend Stiffness to 0.1 to avoid explosions.

    l. Set gravity to 0.1 and Air Resistance to 0 in the Simulation Settings pane.

    m. Setup a 10 frame timeline. At frame 0, scale the deinstanced group so all the stones are within the bounds of the draping sphere. At frame 10, increase the scale of the group to 150%.

     n. Run an animated simulation. Your rock should look something like this after hiding the deinstanced group:

    o. You may find that some of the scattered spheres have a rotation that leaves a sharp straight line in the rock or their position and scale look out of place. You can adjust these by finding the offending sphere in the deinstanced group and modifying it by hand.

    p. Add a stone texture and render.

    q. Add a large primitive plane and do a Surface scatter with UltraScatterPro to create a field of stones.

     

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  • frankrblowfrankrblow Posts: 2,052
    edited December 2019

    I've been starting an experiment with the dForce wind node, and don't know if everyone has tried using negative numbers for wind speed to 'suck' rather than blow - you first have to edit the parameter for wind speed, of course, as it normally does not permit negative values.

    But did you also know that placing a dForce surface BEHIND the wind node also gives a 'sucking' effect? Having said that, the two methods of 'sucking' are not exactly the same and can give subtly different results, which let you have better control over how surfaces are affected. I'll leave it to you all to expand on these beginning experiments.

    In the first image, the scene contains a simple dForce flag and a wind node with a windspeed of 1 mph, but the simulation has not started.

    The second image shows the same scene with the simulation completed.

    Image three shows a negative windspeed of -1 mph.

    And the fourth image shows the windspeed as a positive 1mph, but with the wind node on the 'wrong' side of the flag.

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  • RGcincyRGcincy Posts: 2,835

    I've been starting an experiment with the dForce wind node, and don't know if everyone has tried using negative numbers for wind speed to 'suck' rather than blow - you first have to edit the parameter for wind speed, of course, as it normally does not permit negative values.

    But did you also know that placing a dForce surface BEHIND the wind node also gives a 'sucking' effect? Having said that, the two methods of 'sucking' are not exactly the same and can give subtly different results, which let you have better control over how surfaces are affected. I'll leave it to you all to expand on these beginning experiments.

     Good observations! I never thought of trying negative wind speeds or placing the wind node basically backwards. Makes sense as a real world fan blows forward by sucking air from behind. Thanks for sharing.

  • frankrblowfrankrblow Posts: 2,052

    You are welcome RGincy, and I hope this may be useful to your own experiments and tutorials. And I assume you know that using multiple wind nodes, and changing the diameter/length/falloff of each can help micromanage movement of dForce surfaces? On clothing I often use two or three wind nodes of varied parameters.

  • lilweeplilweep Posts: 2,501
    RGcincy said:
    lilweep said:

    suggested applications:

    • D-force snow blankets - like a blanket of snow over an object to simulate snowfall.
    • D-force confetti snow particles (to again, simulate snowfall)

    For a snow blanket on the ground, you could follow the first part of this post without the footsteps. For a snow blanket on objects (like on top of a bench or fence, I'll have to think about that as you would probably need to trim the draped plane(possibly could use marquee selection in the geometry editor to do that).

    I'm not sure I understand the snow particles. Was it to make one or to scatter them once made?

    Yes for snow particles, I was thinking like this, but with snow.

  • RGcincyRGcincy Posts: 2,835

    My last webinar is now available in the store: dForce Tutorial Set : Fantastic Voyage! 

  • RGcincyRGcincy Posts: 2,835

    I assume you know that using multiple wind nodes, and changing the diameter/length/falloff of each can help micromanage movement of dForce surfaces? On clothing I often use two or three wind nodes of varied parameters.

    Yes, although I haven't done much with the wind nodes. Maybe I should.

     

     

    lilweep said:

    Yes for snow particles, I was thinking like this, but with snow.

    Thanks for the clarification, now I see what you are suggesting.

  • frankrblowfrankrblow Posts: 2,052
    edited December 2019

    You are very welcome. This is one of my favourite threads, and I learn a LOT from your experiments!

    (Edit for typo)

    Post edited by frankrblow on
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