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Daz 3D Forums > 3rd Party Software > Blender Discussion

Who said Blender was hard?

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Comments

  • Joe.CotterJoe.Cotter Posts: 3,362
    August 2017

    Free ORBs sculpt brushes from WoW artist. 

  • Joe.CotterJoe.Cotter Posts: 3,362
    August 2017

    Wow, check out the Automatic Face Map Add-On coming to Blender 2.8 (part of trunk (base install) it looks like.) It will be interesting to see if this plays nice with characters imported from DAZ. :)

  • Joe.CotterJoe.Cotter Posts: 3,362
    August 2017

    I don't know if I've posted this before but even if so it's worth a repost since I think Bugzilla hits it on the mark with his Top 10 Reasons I Love Blender. This isn't just for people who already are sold on Blender, if anyone is on the fence about the software they should check out this video. :)

  • Subtropic PixelSubtropic Pixel Posts: 2,388
    August 2017

    I promised myself a long time ago that if the tool has it all there AND IS READABLE ON THE SCREEN, I would withhold my gripes until I've given it a fair chance.  I'm STILL giving it a fair chance and I refuse to complain about the UI.  I too might ultimately change my right click, though.  But it is adjustable AND readable, which make it a work of art in my mind.  A free work of art, at that.  laugh

  • nonesuch00nonesuch00 Posts: 18,714
    August 2017

    I like the right click what drives me bonkers is the left click moving that 3D cursor

  • Subtropic PixelSubtropic Pixel Posts: 2,388
    August 2017

    Well yeah, I got used to it when I was trying to model a Sig Sauer.  Maybe if I can get back to spending quality time (aka:  beaucoup hours), I'll disabuse myself of the notion of changing the default.  cheeky

  • Cris PalominoCris Palomino Posts: 12,450
    August 2017 edited August 2017

    I just ran across a really nice paid Blender addon by Andreas Esau who does very nice addons.  It's called BPainter.

    https://www.blendermarket.com/products/bpainter

    Post edited by Cris Palomino on August 2017
  • Joe.CotterJoe.Cotter Posts: 3,362
    August 2017

    Here's a couple videos from Zacharias Reinhardt that are worth the watch.

    The first is a nice (and quick) rundown of some of Eevee's settings/results, like bloom, f/stop, etc... well worth the 12 minutes: Blender 2.8 EEVEE is Awesome! I'm interested in it for animation as the render time for animation is too long to be practical for much experimentation imo.

    The second is 17 Tips to Speed Up Modeling in Blender. All of the tips are good but I particularly like the one at 17'03" where he shows adding objects snapped to the faces of another object (bolts to a surface) such that they follow the topology/orientation as they are moved.

    Check out his channel, other good stuff there, and let me know what you think. Is anyone out there playing with/following Eevee and the other new developments due out in 2.79/2.8?

  • nonesuch00nonesuch00 Posts: 18,714
    August 2017 edited August 2017

    I am reading a book by Olivier Villar that was published for Blender 2.78b and even with Blender 2.78c the UI has changed in a couple of places already.

    For rendering animations in Blender, while I will try to cycles render, but I probably will fall back to rendering with blender render engine as it's much less compute intensive and something my computer might finish.

    Post edited by nonesuch00 on August 2017
  • ebergerlyebergerly Posts: 3,255
    August 2017

    Unfortunately, since I can't really transfer my scenes from Studio to Blender, my need for Blender rendering is pretty much zero. Which is too bad, because I'd love to get involved with Evee and have my surfaces transfer directly from Studio to Blender. So for now I pretty much use Blender for making props/objects, then send them to Studio for surfacing and rendering. 

  • ebergerlyebergerly Posts: 3,255
    August 2017

    By the way, who the heck is Karlie Kloss, and why should we care that she created her own website? 

    Geez if I see that ad again I'll lose it. smiley

  • Joe.CotterJoe.Cotter Posts: 3,362
    August 2017 edited August 2017

     

    nonesuch00 said:

    I am reading a book by Olivier Villar that was published for Blender 2.78b and even with Blender 2.78c the UI has changed in a couple of places already.

    For rendering animations in Blender, while I will try to cycles render, but I probably will fall back to rendering with blender render engine as it's much less compute intensive and something my computer might finish.

    Yes, UI changes are something one has to work with as fast as graphics software, especially Blender is changing nowadays. I would reccomend trying Eevee rather then going with BI.

    Post edited by Joe.Cotter on August 2017
  • Joe.CotterJoe.Cotter Posts: 3,362
    August 2017
    ebergerly said:

    Unfortunately, since I can't really transfer my scenes from Studio to Blender, my need for Blender rendering is pretty much zero. Which is too bad, because I'd love to get involved with Evee and have my surfaces transfer directly from Studio to Blender. So for now I pretty much use Blender for making props/objects, then send them to Studio for surfacing and rendering. 

    Why can't you transfer your scenes? Blender imports FBX.

  • Joe.CotterJoe.Cotter Posts: 3,362
    August 2017

    Blender + Natron | 3D Speed Art | The Mushroom Forest. Worth the watch :)

  • ebergerlyebergerly Posts: 3,255
    August 2017

    Right, but rigging and surfaces/materials/shaders don't transfer right? I recall there's mcjTeleblender but I recall that's a rather incomplete solution. 

  • Joe.CotterJoe.Cotter Posts: 3,362
    August 2017
    ebergerly said:

    Right, but rigging and surfaces/materials/shaders don't transfer right? I recall there's mcjTeleblender but I recall that's a rather incomplete solution. 

    Correct, but rigging only matters if you are doing animation since you can pose in DS then save out. As for Materials and Shaders, they really aren't as much of an issue as people think usually, especially with the new PBR shader due out in 2.79.

  • ebergerlyebergerly Posts: 3,255
    August 2017

    I suppose, but for now it's a lot easier for me to do it all in Studio, especially since I'm using VWD for cloth and that's integrated in Studio. I just pull in meshes from Blender (for cloth or props). I can't imagine doing test renders with different poses and each time sending a pose/scene to Blender, doing a test, then jumping back to Studio, tweaking, then back to Blender....

    Too painful. Though that's from someone who's never actually done it, so maybe when Evee is final that will give me the reason to try it. 

  • InkuboInkubo Posts: 745
    August 2017

    I'm no longer sure which direction we're talking about, but I used the COLLADA export to send a rigged minotaur to Blender. Some of the bones in the head came out too short for some reason--I think maybe they are in the normal Genesis 2 Male positions rather than the much larger minotaur positions, but I've tried posing the creature in Blender, and all the bones that showed up in the right places seem to work just fine for posing the mesh.

  • ebergerlyebergerly Posts: 3,255
    August 2017

    Wow, that sounds good...

    Did you use the regular Collada or DAZ Collada? For some reason I thought there were basic incompatibilities between the two rigging systems. 

    BTW, I was looking at some recent EeVee videos and from what I can figure out, aside from Eevee being a whole different system you need to learn, it doesn't seem like it's ready for prime time yet. Some basic stuff still not working. I think. Honestly I was having difficulty understanding how Eevee works... 

  • Joe.CotterJoe.Cotter Posts: 3,362
    August 2017 edited August 2017

    Eevee is still in Beta mode atm but development is moving quickly. It will be in Blender 2.79 whenever it comes out. The node network is currently a little differrent then cycles but is meant to pretty much mimic it. The point of looking at it now is to learn what it is and how it works so that when 2.79 comes out you will be ready to start using it (if you decide it is something you want to use.)

    There is another option and that is Unreal Engine. Epic is focusing the engine on Archvis and video so that makes it a very good candidate for realtime animation. Whatever one uses, it will have a learning curve, but for anything near realtime there really isn't anything in DAZ Studio for animation at the moment and nothing that I see on the horizon. Luckily, one can export assets and use them for animation in other environments, Blender or Unreal.

    The difference between Blender and UE is two fold. The first being that Blender is a modeling program also, so if one wants to be able to manipulate the mesh objects etc... Blender has an advantage. UE is coming on strong with tools for animation and might be stronger for many things then Blender,* however it also doesn't currently have a way to composite live footage with 3d inside the app (Blender does) so one would have to use (and learn) an external compositor like Natron, DaVinci Resolve, Blackmagic Fusion (all free and powerful) or After Effects (paid.)

    * All of this is cutting edge and moving fast. With Epic's push towards animation/fx pipelines tools will be coming, but they are in Blender as well. Note, Unity was not mentioned. Unity is a good engine for creating games, but that is their focus and their strength, not so much animation, etc...

    Post edited by Joe.Cotter on August 2017
  • InkuboInkubo Posts: 745
    August 2017

    I used Collada from DAZ Studio.

    I think Eevee is scheduled for 2.8, but by then they hope to use shaders the same way as Cycles. I'm not clear on whether they will be exactly the same or something with an easy bridge, but either way, I don't think you're supposed to have to learn a whole new shader system. There are some light probe rigs you have to set up, though. I'm not really clear on how they work, but I think somehow they precalculate light in the scene so the engine doesn't have to calculate all the bounces at render time.

    About the minotaur, I'm keeping notes as I go, so hopefully I'll get it working and then be able to report back on what I did.

  • Joe.CotterJoe.Cotter Posts: 3,362
    August 2017 edited August 2017

    Something I meant to mention but forgot was exporting alembic to Blender. It ends up it's just as well as now I have a good/quick tutorial on doing just that, except it's from Maya to Blender. But, just substitute exporting alembic from DS for that portion and the rest should get you there, or at least in the ballpark.

    The only issue with this is that with Maya it makes sense since they have probably the best rigging and animation tools in the industry whereas this isn't qute the case for DS tools. However, if you are comfortable with animating in DS and working with the rig that you have in DS then this would make sense. The other advantage is that we can get premade poses to help set up our blocking poses in DS whereas in Blender we're doing everything from scratch or having to come up with a workflow were we can export individual poses to Blender and try to stitch them together after, something I haven't tried yet.

    This does bring up an interesting concept,  blocking pose libraries. Since animation optimally is tweaked per charcter/situation, we need to get our hands in to tweak but we could have possibly some good starting blocking poses for various actions, various martial arts kicks/punches/blocks or various dance steps for instance.

    Post edited by Joe.Cotter on August 2017
  • ebergerlyebergerly Posts: 3,255
    August 2017 edited August 2017

    The  more I look into this EeVee thing, the less excited I get. Yeah, the hype is you see these videos of people navigating complex scenes that are all rendered in real time without much updating. Awesome.

    However, you don't get something for nothing...

    There's a cost to the realtime results. They're much less accurate, and it's pretty much a shortcut that fakes shadows and reflections in order to get realtime response. Seems like it's geared more towards gaming and visualizing rather than accuracy. A bit like baking renders onto textures to make it respond in realtime, but the downside is you can't change anything in your scene or the bake no longer applies. 

    Funny, it's kinda the opposite or PBR. For years the renders were shortcuts that were taken in order to speed up results, then PBR comes along to make things more accurate (and slower, requiring more powerful hardware). And now we're going back to shortcuts. 

    Post edited by ebergerly on August 2017
  • nonesuch00nonesuch00 Posts: 18,714
    August 2017
    ebergerly said:

    The  more I look into this EeVee thing, the less excited I get. Yeah, the hype is you see these videos of people navigating complex scenes that are all rendered in real time without much updating. Awesome.

    However, you don't get something for nothing...

    There's a cost to the realtime results. They're much less accurate, and it's pretty much a shortcut that fakes shadows and reflections in order to get realtime response. Seems like it's geared more towards gaming and visualizing rather than accuracy. A bit like baking renders onto textures to make it respond in realtime, but the downside is you can't change anything in your scene or the bake no longer applies. 

    Funny, it's kinda the opposite or PBR. For years the renders were shortcuts that were taken in order to speed up results, then PBR comes along to make things more accurate (and slower, requiring more powerful hardware). And now we're going back to shortcuts. 

    There is the ATI Pro Renderer plugin for Blender too. Search for it on Bing or Google or whatever and you'll find an installer on an ATI wweb site for the Pro Renderer plugin

  • ebergerlyebergerly Posts: 3,255
    August 2017
    nonesuch00 said:

    There is the ATI Pro Renderer plugin for Blender too. Search for it on Bing or Google or whatever and you'll find an installer on an ATI wweb site for the Pro Renderer plugin

    Thanks, but why would we want to do that?

  • wolf359wolf359 Posts: 3,929
    August 2017

    "Right, but rigging and surfaces/materials/shaders
    don't transfer right? I recall there's mcjTeleblender
     but I recall that's a rather incomplete solution."

    Hi the mcjTeleblender script converts all image
     based Daz materials to blender shader nodes
    Obviously Pure procedural Iray shaders will need to be replaced
    with native blender shaders but this is the case when sending
    application specific procedurals out to any program with a different engine

    "Correct, but rigging only matters if you are doing animation since you can pose in DS then save out."


    I do mostly animation however transfer of rigging is not required
    in my workflow only a one time export of an .obj file to Maxon C4D

    After which I can send out different MDD data files from DS to apply
    Different animations/poses to the same textured and Lit mesh in C4D
     evey figure in this clip is an MDD animated mesh exported once from Daz studio. 

    https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B2TYEp536iB8THNhYzV3c3VXN0k/view

  • nonesuch00nonesuch00 Posts: 18,714
    August 2017
    ebergerly said:
    nonesuch00 said:

    There is the ATI Pro Renderer plugin for Blender too. Search for it on Bing or Google or whatever and you'll find an installer on an ATI wweb site for the Pro Renderer plugin

    Thanks, but why would we want to do that?

    Well, you were just complaining about how Eeevee was all hype and no realism so I tell you of a PBR renderer that is all realism and you can only say 'why would I want to do that?'

    Continue complaining then.

  • ebergerlyebergerly Posts: 3,255
    August 2017

    I wasn't attacking, just asking what benefits ATI Pro Render has. I've never heard of it, so I honestly wanted to know what it has that makes it different/better than EeVee. 

    BTW, does it work on NVIDIA-based cards?  

    Thanks. 

  • nonesuch00nonesuch00 Posts: 18,714
    August 2017
    ebergerly said:

    I wasn't attacking, just asking what benefits ATI Pro Render has. I've never heard of it, so I honestly wanted to know what it has that makes it different/better than EeVee. 

    BTW, does it work on NVIDIA-based cards?  

    Thanks. 

    If your nVidia card can run openCL 1.2 it can.

    http://www.nvidia.com/object/cuda_opencl_1.html

    Prorenderer runs on Linux too in Blender

     

    https://pro.radeon.com/en-us/radeon-prorender-for-blender-and-solidworks-now-available/

  • j cadej cade Posts: 2,310
    August 2017
    Eevee isn't replacing Cycles, it's simply another option. Of course a real-time renderer will have to take shortcuts. The biggest advantage of Eevee going forwards will be how compatible it will be with Cycles. Ideally you'll be able to model, texture, set up, etc with Eevee, and then either render with Eevee, or, if you need more perfect realism, switch to Cycles, and need to do next to no adjustments of materials etc.

    Imagine if the Daz viewport more accurately reflected what the final render would look like, you don't see a benefit to that?

    Meanwhile for folks doing stuff like archvis there's a decent chance Eevee will be good enough as is.
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