[Now Available!] Lip Service for Genesis 9 [Commercial]

Silas3D

Hi everyone

Since Genesis 9 was released I know a lot of artists were disappointed that it doesn't have a separate lip surface, so it's not as quick and easy to change the color, glossiness etc.

My next product, Lip Service, will fix this issue by introducing 5 lip geografts with the following features:

• Quickly and easily add lip coloration (many presets included with product that use PBRSkin shader and Makeup surface properties)
• Directly apply Genesis 8/8.1, male and female material presets to the grafts - separate graft for each UV so that Smart Content is also supported
• Blend edges of the lip with skin using the included geometry shell wearable, with several lip liner and ombre presets available
• Convert Iray Uber-based graft lip material to PBRSkin, so that the included lip presets can be used
• Transfer Genesis 9 'Head' material to graft 'Lips' surface in 1-click using included script - note that this is only recommended for the Genesis 9 UV graft, as lips won't line up with Genesis 8 versions. This script is compatible with DS 4.24 but not the Studio 2025 Alpha as that's still in development.

I've tried to make it as flexible and easy to use as possible, so that if you've got favourite lip material presets you should be able to just load the relevant graft, select it in the scene and then apply your preset.

As with all cross generational UV products the UV won't be an exact match for the Genesis 8 figures, but it is very close, plus the geometry shell wearable included can help mask the edges if so desired.

 

Important info

 

Due to limitations with geografts, HD morphs will not transfer to the lip geografts. You can still apply the graft to a HD figure and most of the time it will look fine because of high quality texturing, but it is entirely possible there could be characters out there that rely more heavily on their HD morphs vs textured bump or normal detail.

If you need to use a blending shell and a graft, you need to add a graft before a shell, because the shell needs the surface generated by the graft to apply textures. Also, if you have any other geometry shells applied to your figure (for example eyeshadow) then the shell for that product will have an additional surface for the lips, which will need to be toggled off in the shell's Parameters tab. In both instances, the lips will otherwise appear white.

 

Store link: https://www.daz3d.com/lip-service-for-genesis-9

barbult

That's an interesting idea. I wonder why it has never been done in all this time since G9 release. Does it pose properly with expressions?

Silas3D

Indeed, hence why I thought it would be a good gap to fill :)

Yes as with other geografts most morphs and poses applied to the base figure should follow - the 4th promo above (Angela 9) shows her with a smiling expression.

My only concern would be morphs or poses that are extreme may exhibit problems, though I haven't run into anything.

Update: turns out that HD morphs don't appear to transfer to geografts. I thought at first this was because the 'Auto Follow' checkbox for certain morphs isn't always checked, but testing has shown that even when this is checked, a hidden slider for the HD morph does get transferred to the graft and set to 100% but doesn't actually affect the geometry. I'm making some enquiries to see if this is expected behaviour, a bug or if there is a workaround available. Most geografts that are created are for new anatomy (eg horns, tails etc) which come with their own dedicated HD morphs. In this case, the graft is replacing existing geometry so it doesn't have dedicated HD morphs.

Ptrope

I'm trying to use Lip Service and without any sort of documentation, it's not exactly self-explanatory. Nor is it, for me, working.

Do I need to change the lips to PBR, or is that only if I'm using PBR on the rest of the figure? I'm trying to use the script to copy the "Head" material from G9F to the lips and nothing happens - there's not even any sort of pause in the program that indicates the script is trying to run. Manually copying the surface from the head to the lips doesn't carry over all the settings, so that's out.

Ptrope

OK, I had to delete the lips and reapply them, and the script functioned.

Silas3D

@Ptrope sincere apologies for the delayed response, I've been unwell and also didn't get a notification for your posts :(

I'm glad you got it working and I'm sorry that you had some trouble with it. When I uploaded the product for testing I did include notes for a readme, but it sounds like that didn't make its way into the released product. I'll make some enquiries.

You only need to convert the lips to PBRSkin if you want to use the included lip presets (the shell blend presets use a geoshell so will work regardless).

The script does have error handling for most scenarios and will pop up a message saying what the problem is - if you're using DS Alpha 2025 though there could be some instability as the codebase is under active development and being updated regularly.

Perhaps your Genesis 9 figure wasn't selected when you originally applied the graft and then ran the script?

photonflash1_e7a0be045e

Just bought it today, and I'm having trouble getting any of the presets to appear on the LS G9 lips or shells. A readme would be helpful.

Silas3D

Hello, thanks for purchasing :)

I did include a readme section when I uploaded the product but I understand Daz doesn't include readme text files files anymore, but you can access it here (see Additional Details section):

http://docs.daz3d.com/doku.php/public/read_me/index/112258/start

To see if there is a readme included with any other product, you just need the SKU from the product page and replace it in the above url.

It may help to provide a screenshot so I can see what you're trying to do. As these are material presets, either the graft or the shell needs to be selected prior to application.

Also, make sure you don't have the geometry editor selected when applying presets, as this will cause problems for geografts. Did the graft itself apply ok on your Genesis 9 figure?

 

barbult

Silas3D said:

Hello, thanks for purchasing :)

I did include a readme section when I uploaded the product but I understand Daz doesn't include readme text files files anymore, but you can access it here (see Additional Details section):

http://docs.daz3d.com/doku.php/public/read_me/index/112258/start

To see if there is a readme included with any other product, you just need the SKU from the product page and replace it in the above url.

It may help to provide a screenshot so I can see what you're trying to do. As these are material presets, either the graft or the shell needs to be selected prior to application.

Also, make sure you don't have the geometry editor selected when applying presets, as this will cause problems for geografts. Did the graft itself apply ok on your Genesis 9 figure?

 

Its helpful to include important information like that in a PDF file included with the product, since Daz has made it difficult to find readme files. Sometimes the readme server is even offline these days. Sometimes Daz doesn't even post a readme right away for new products. Making the info readily available to your customers, right in the product, will create customer loyalty. Code 66 is a good example. When he releases a new tool, he includes a PDF manual in a helpful tutorial style the lets customers get started with their purchase right  away. 

Silas3D

@barbult whilst I appreciate the input, I'm fully aware of how important documentation can be - after all I've included it with several of my other products, and I was a software developer (front end web) for many years. That being said, I also know from experience that documentation is often ignored - but that doesn't usually deter me because I've always been the one advocating for it, along with accessibility improvements. To be perfectly honest I didn't think documentation would be necessary for this product as I thought it was fairly straightforward, which was clearly a misconception on my part - but still included some readme notes just in case. I've also advocated for having a readme link on the product page and have made loads of other suggestions, but it's not a priority for Daz. Whilst one can try to predict what problems will be faced, sometimes it has to be done retrospectively, which is why I create these forum threads to try and provide some support - which isn't something we have to do, but I try to as I know how valuable it can be for customers. This is also something I've considered not doing, because most of the time my threads are ignored, so it really is a balancing act to know what to do sometimes. Writing documentation can also be very time consuming, which in the current climate with constant sales/promotions means that we have to be increasingly more efficient with our time, that's sadly the reality. Sorry for the long message but I felt it was necessary to explain.

Silas3D

Also sorry for the lack of paragraph separation - it's almost 10pm here in the UK and adding/editing comments on mobile is a pain because it's all in plain text :(

barbult

it wasn't my intent to sound lecturing, just to point out that little things can make big customer satisfaction impacts. Yes, responding in the forum from a phone is tough!

photonflash1_e7a0be045e

Thanks for the quick response Silas3D! Found the readme, but I was hoping to find a step-by-step process to figure out why I couldn't get it to work in DS 4.23

I am applying it to Madison 9. I highlight Madison and apply the G9UV, copy head material - I see that it is properly applied in the Surfaces tab, but the Nvidia Iray view still shows it as white. I select the LS G9 Lips and attempt to apply color to it, but in the surfaces tab nothing happens, and the Iray view still shows white lips. I apply an LS shell and attempt to apply style, color , anything to it, and still nothing changes.

Can you point out what I'm doing wrong?

Thanks!

Silas3D

@photonflash1_e7a0be045e no problem, I'm running DS4.24 and don't have access to 4.23 anymore, so can't verify if its app version that's the problem - however grafts have been around for a long time so would be surprised if that was the case. The only prerequisite for Lip Service is having the PBRSkin shader installed, which of course you must have because you're using Madison 9, a Genesis 9 figure that natively uses PBRSkin as its main shader.

When you say you're highlighting Madison 9, you're selecting her in the scene tab? These are the steps I'm doing, with Iray preview active:

1. Select Madison 9 in scene tab (the top-level/root of the figure, not a bone such as hip or head)
2. Add the LS G9 Lips - Genesis 9 UV graft - lips will turn white
3. With Madison still selected, apply the LS Copy Head Material script - lips should go back to normal

If this is what you're doing and you can see that it is properly applied in the surfaces tab, it sounds like the iray preview isn't updating for some reason. A few questions:

1. Do you have anything else applied to Madison, such as other grafts (anatomical elements, horns etc) or geometry shells?
2. When you ran the script, did it cause the Iray preview to restart or did the screen stay the same?
3. After running the script, switch to texture shaded mode. Do the lips show as white or textured?
4. Switch back to Iray preview (as this will forcibly refresh Iray preview) does this then cause the textures to show up? 

Let's start with those and go from there, we'll get you up and running asap :)

Silas3D

I think I might know what the problem is - your steps listed suggest you added a lip shell after the lip graft, but if you added it before the graft it won't work properly - this is because its a classic chicken egg situation. If the shell is added first, the lip surface of the graft won't be available for the shell materials to apply, therefore on adding a graft will show white, even after the copy head material script is run.

This wouldn't be a problem if the shell had to be applied to the graft, because the preset label would make it obvious that the graft has to be applied first. However, it has to be applied to the figure, because textures are applied to both the Head and LS_G9_Lips surfaces of the shell, so that the boundary between the two surfaces are blended.

In a similar fashion, if you apply any other geoshells to the figure (either before or after, most commonly makeup) then the lip graft will create an additional surface on that shell which of course it has no awareness of, and will show white.

In both instances it's easily resolved by selecting the offending shell, going to the Parameters tab and then Shell > Visibility > Surfaces and toggling off the LS_G9_Lips surface.

That is not a scenario I considered, so first thing tomorrow I'll put together an update with some in app documentation and submit as an update to the store. I'll also see if I can tweak the preset icons a bit to make the order of application clearer!