How can you make a high quality character as a vendor to sell on daz?
Would seem obvious to anyone that all anyone would have to do is do some editing to a pre existing character and add different textures and bingo! but obviously no I assume the process is much more drawn out and time consuming.
So in a nutshell: What would constitute a high quality character to sell as a vendor at daz? What is also the hardest parts?
Daz 3D is part of 
Connect
DAZ Productions, Inc.
224 S 200 W, Suite #250
Salt Lake City, UT 84101
Licensing Agreement | Terms of Service | Privacy Policy | EULA
© 2024 Daz Productions Inc. All Rights Reserved.
Comments
Do you mean a new character from scratch, or a character using G8F for example? There is a lot of work involved in either one, but creating your own unique high quality charater from scratch is very difficult and time consuming.
The "add different textures" bit. Creating morphs isn't hard.
how is it very difficult and time consuming please. In either method.
I'm off to work now, but I'll try to give a brief overview after I get home later. But the real key is, the more "realistic" it is, more work is required. Unfortunately it's more of a logarithmic scale than linear. So that last 10% gets very "expensive".
yes let me know more when you are back please.
I'll try to give you the basic information for a good overview.
For creating your own figure from scratch, similar to what you get with G8, you would need to do the following (note, it's a huge amount of work, easily a year or more??);
1) Create your own mesh from the ground up you will need a 3D modeling software, there are a lot to chose from (free to thousands of dollars). The key for modeling would be getting the proportions right, and having good mesh topology to enable proper bending/movement when the figure is rigged (adding bones to make the figure move). There are a lot of human figure modeling tutorials available on the web (check YouTube first). You would also need to UV map the figure to minimize texture distortions. You will also need to weight map the figure to the "joints" for it to bend/deform properly as it is posed. Oh, and don't forget the mouth and eyes, the need to be modeled as well.
2) Create and implement all the needed Joint Control Morphs (JCM), and Morph Controlled Morphs (MCM), to ensure that the figure bends in a realistic way (weight mapping will only give you a starting point, these morphs will fix the more extreme bends the basic skeleton/weight-mapping can't). Most, if not all joints will need to have these additional morphs.
3. Create all the additional morphs needed for the user to modify the base figure to their liking (like the base G8F Body Morph and G8F Head Morph packages from DAZ 3D). Without the morphs, the figure will not be very popular.
4. Create the texture maps and shaders for the figure. The best way to do this would be to purchase reference photos from somewhere like 3D.SK and use zBrush, 3DCoat, Mudbox, BlackSmith3D, or similar 3D paint software to create realistic seamless textures for your model (sounds easy, but it really is a lot of work, with big learning curve, but can be fun). For more info on this process you can do a YouTube search for 3d skin texturing, and you'll find a lot of videos about the subject.
5. Clothing - to be successful, any figure will need clothing, and a lot of it! Another area where it can get difficult. You might be able to include autofit clones to use cloths from one, or all, of the Genesis versions, but I'm pretty sure you would need permission from DAZ 3D to do that. So you would either need to have people willing to make clothing, include instructions for people to make their own autofit clone, or use some sort of clothing convertor.
Creating a figure based on Genesis 8: This is much easier!! (But can still be a lot of work)
1) Create your figure morphs in a modeling software (or use one of the Merchant resource packages for creating morphs). You may also need to create JCM and MCM morphs if you deviate from the base G8 figure a lot, more extreme shapes/morphs will need more corrective morphs. I think this tutorial by Sickleyield (she has great tutorials) would be a good starting point for anyone new to this process: How to Create a New Custom Daz Studio Character
2) Create the texture maps and shaders for your figure. There are a couple of ways to do this. 1) Do like above and create your own from photos, or 2) Use a merchant resource texture set (some are available here). Option 2 may be the easier option for your first character, but to create a high quality character it typically will take a lot of editing and work on your part. You will probably need a program like I mentioned above to make the texture set a high quality seamless texture (it can be done without a 3D paint program, but it's a lot more difficult). Again, for more info on this process you can do a YouTube search for 3d skin texturing, and you'll find a lot of videos about it. Of course you will need to set all the textures up for optimal rendering in Iray and possibly 3Delight too.
And finally, you'll need to present your product at it's best (renders) to get it accepted at the store of your choice, and to make people want to buy it (this is another huge factor and learning curve).
Hope this helps a bit (and makes sense). It can be a lot of work, but fun too.
Hey thanks for taking the time to do a long detailed reply like this. Yes this is complex. Am willing to learn still but I am curious: hat would be the benefits exactly for someone to do it the longer method?
You'd be creating a unique character which you hold full copyright to.
Additionally, you will learn along the way.