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cgTrader

Philippi_ChildPhilippi_Child Posts: 665
in The Commons

Has anyone ever purchased anything from this site? What were your impressions?

Comments

  • nemesis10nemesis10 Posts: 3,877

    Philippi_Child said:

    Has anyone ever purchased anything from this site? What were your impressions?

    I have quite a few times and everything went fine.  

  • Griffin AvidGriffin Avid Posts: 3,832

    I buy a lot from there (among other sites). 

    1) Check the format (not everything FBX will import into Daz)

    2) Double check whether or not it has UVs (Think outer skin) and Textures. Many items will have materials created by the rendering engine and not have actual textures you can use.

    3) Quality Control is hit or miss. Some items will be "game-ready" and work just fine. Others will NOT be optimized and freeze your machine. (look for reviews). Some DO NOT look good close up.

    4) Sort by price both ways- so you can see the full range. Some 4-dollar items will work better than the 50-dollar items.

    5) Beware of items from video games, Manga, anime and such. There's tons of products based on established IPs. Always google the name and read the description very carefully.

    6) Organize your purchases from the start. I save all files in a folder with the exact name of the item and save copies of the promo art in the folder itself and the general directory.

    7) Characters/figures are NOT RIGGED for daz Studio. So they will not move or take poses. What I have done- is broken a product up into peices and glued them into place on top of a Daz figure as a workaround.

    8) Once you import, you'll need to check the scale. Sometimes you can't see the item because it is so small, other times you can't see an imported item because it's so big. Either re-import or adjust scale yourself.

    9) You may need to go to the surfaces tab and adjust opacity for some imports.

    10) For items that do work and have doors, latches and any kind of mobility, you may be able to use Blender to Export the items in pieces and use a Null (to attach items and control their centerpoints) to make them swivel, turn, open and close as you see fit.

  • hjakehjake Posts: 1,306

    Griffin Avid said:

    I buy a lot from there (among other sites). 

    1) Check the format (not everything FBX will import into Daz)

    ....

    10) For items that do work and have doors, latches and any kind of mobility, you may be able to use Blender to Export the items in pieces and use a Null (to attach items and control their centerpoints) to make them swivel, turn, open and close as you see fit.

     

    That is an excellent checklist. 

  • Richard HaseltineRichard Haseltine Posts: 108,979

    hjake said:

    Griffin Avid said:

    I buy a lot from there (among other sites). 

    1) Check the format (not everything FBX will import into Daz)

    ....

    10) For items that do work and have doors, latches and any kind of mobility, you may be able to use Blender to Export the items in pieces and use a Null (to attach items and control their centerpoints) to make them swivel, turn, open and close as you see fit.

     

    That is an excellent checklist. 

    Daz Studio can now import separate objects via OBJ, if the Read Objects option is selected, and has always been able to import groups.

  • lilweeplilweep Posts: 2,775

    CGTrader is generally fine.  You will find a lot of people selling stolen assets or scamming people with AI generated meshes, so just have some modicum of intelligence and situational awareness.

    All the problems around "conversion" and "importing" are usually quite trivial to resolve unless it is some extremely complicated asset (like an environment with hundreds of parts) or something rigged.

    E.g., above they claim fbx is difficult to import into Daz.  No, you import into Blender and export it out again as obj. This is not a concern.

  • Philippi_ChildPhilippi_Child Posts: 665

    Thanks!

  • 3Diva3Diva Posts: 12,000

    Griffin Avid said:

    I buy a lot from there (among other sites). 

    1) Check the format (not everything FBX will import into Daz)

    2) Double check whether or not it has UVs (Think outer skin) and Textures. Many items will have materials created by the rendering engine and not have actual textures you can use.

    3) Quality Control is hit or miss. Some items will be "game-ready" and work just fine. Others will NOT be optimized and freeze your machine. (look for reviews). Some DO NOT look good close up.

    4) Sort by price both ways- so you can see the full range. Some 4-dollar items will work better than the 50-dollar items.

    5) Beware of items from video games, Manga, anime and such. There's tons of products based on established IPs. Always google the name and read the description very carefully.

    6) Organize your purchases from the start. I save all files in a folder with the exact name of the item and save copies of the promo art in the folder itself and the general directory.

    7) Characters/figures are NOT RIGGED for daz Studio. So they will not move or take poses. What I have done- is broken a product up into peices and glued them into place on top of a Daz figure as a workaround.

    8) Once you import, you'll need to check the scale. Sometimes you can't see the item because it is so small, other times you can't see an imported item because it's so big. Either re-import or adjust scale yourself.

    9) You may need to go to the surfaces tab and adjust opacity for some imports.

    10) For items that do work and have doors, latches and any kind of mobility, you may be able to use Blender to Export the items in pieces and use a Null (to attach items and control their centerpoints) to make them swivel, turn, open and close as you see fit.

    An excellent checklist and list of potential pitfalls - and it's fairly universal in that some of that applies to other sites that sell 3D assets. Thank you, Griffin Avid!

  • DareshiranuDareshiranu Posts: 261

    lilweep said:

    CGTrader is generally fine.  You will find a lot of people selling stolen assets or scamming people with AI generated meshes, so just have some modicum of intelligence and situational awareness.

    All the problems around "conversion" and "importing" are usually quite trivial to resolve unless it is some extremely complicated asset (like an environment with hundreds of parts) or something rigged.

    E.g., above they claim fbx is difficult to import into Daz.  No, you import into Blender and export it out again as obj. This is not a concern.

    What is an AI generated mesh? I understand the words, but I don't quite get how an AI engine would generate a mesh particularly or how it would differ from any other mesh in an identifiable way. But that might be my ignorance of the nuances of AI showing. 

  • FSMCDesignsFSMCDesigns Posts: 12,847

    Dareshiranu said:

    lilweep said:

    CGTrader is generally fine.  You will find a lot of people selling stolen assets or scamming people with AI generated meshes, so just have some modicum of intelligence and situational awareness.

    All the problems around "conversion" and "importing" are usually quite trivial to resolve unless it is some extremely complicated asset (like an environment with hundreds of parts) or something rigged.

    E.g., above they claim fbx is difficult to import into Daz.  No, you import into Blender and export it out again as obj. This is not a concern.

    What is an AI generated mesh? I understand the words, but I don't quite get how an AI engine would generate a mesh particularly or how it would differ from any other mesh in an identifiable way. But that might be my ignorance of the nuances of AI showing. 

    It's mesh generated with a AI app and not the usual 3D app like Max, Maya or Zbrush. Some top AI tools used are MeshyAI, Kaedim, Luma AI, etc

  • DareshiranuDareshiranu Posts: 261
    edited February 20

     

    Dareshiranu said:

    lilweep said:

    CGTrader is generally fine.  You will find a lot of people selling stolen assets or scamming people with AI generated meshes, so just have some modicum of intelligence and situational awareness.

    All the problems around "conversion" and "importing" are usually quite trivial to resolve unless it is some extremely complicated asset (like an environment with hundreds of parts) or something rigged.

    E.g., above they claim fbx is difficult to import into Daz.  No, you import into Blender and export it out again as obj. This is not a concern.

    What is an AI generated mesh? I understand the words, but I don't quite get how an AI engine would generate a mesh particularly or how it would differ from any other mesh in an identifiable way. But that might be my ignorance of the nuances of AI showing. 

    Broadly speaking, I use AI for some things. I find it useful for scraping information so long as I don't always rely upon it as the sole source of information, it does provide reasonably good overviews on topics and can assist in digging down into a topic. I've used generative AI for very specific purposes and dabbled in local models to a thus far limited extent. I understand the concept of "vibe coding" and I have a friend who is and has been a project manager at Google, and elsewhere for years and understand pretty well the utility (or limited utility) of AI for programming - though it can apparently be useful for documentation as I understand it. I've heard about the use of AI for generating 3D models, I was just looking for something a little more tangible than vague warnings. Some people have a natural antipathy toward AI, while others are drawn toward it with an equally strong reaction. I just look upon it as a tool that's still in flux and hoped to hear something solid. What is the scam, exactly? Can you define it? I'm not trying to argue here, I would just like to know, in your opinion, what the issue is with greater specificity. 

    Post edited by frank0314 on
  • OceanOcean Posts: 5
    edited February 19

    Anyone can generate models with AI for relatively cheap, if not for free, therefore if someone is selling them under the auspices of having created them on their own, without any disclosure, this is dishonest practice.  If someone markets a model behind AI-generated or AI-enhanced promos, again this subjects customers to an asymmetry of information and they cannot know what they are buying.  At the moment, there is a lot of this happening on 3D Marketplaces, particularly the one in the OP.

    Post edited by Ocean on
  • PixelPiePixelPie Posts: 376
    edited February 20

    Adobe Stager can generate text to AI meshes much the same way text to image works; I think it uses firefly for that but i may be mistaken.  I like CGTrader, Great checklist

    Post edited by PixelPie on
  • Cam FoxCam Fox Posts: 326

    FYI with CG Trader you have to do a password reset if you don't log in for 6 months. I don't know what their account retention policies are but it's a good idea to download and archive whatever you buy.

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