The presets tabs, like Smart Content, need the files to have categories, compatibilities, and types (for presets the type has to be the right one for the pane - in this case Shader or Materials presets). The simplest way to do it is to have a suitable target selected in the Viewport, then drag the file from the Content Library under Daz Studio Formats into the desired category in Smart content, then select the type in the pop-up dialogue. You may then have to right-click>Edit Metadata to adjust the compatibility to be broad enough.

I've tried in the past and after numerous fruitless attempts, given up on adding new shaders into the Daz presets directory.
Copy and paste doesn't seem to work.
Does anyone know of any tutorial that clearly and simply instructs you on how to add/import a new shader (.duf and .duf.png) file into the Daz presets directory that doesn't include 15 pages of step by step BS on building the watch?
All I want to know is how to add or import these two shader files into the presets library.

Yes, the Runtime for the Poser files merges with the Runtime for textures and metadata for native DS files in the root folder of your content directory. Mac users do have to be careful when trying to merge two folders, but that is generally true - not just for a particular file type.

crosswind said:

Nirguin said:

I already did it and had the same problem
Yes I did it in blender, I didn't use any modifiers, just the sculpt mode
Even if I just export it and import it again as a morph without modifying anything I still have the problem that the geometry doesn't match

Okay, Blender is just the culprit... Have you noticed that 1 vertex is lost after importing OBJ into Blender ? ( turn "Statistics" on firstly...)  The vertices count in DS is 22733 but 22732 in Blender. (screenshot 1)
Neither of the latest or Legacy OBJ importer in Blender helps. (Legacy way is discontinued in ver 4.0+)

Never check "Remove Unused Vertices" if you want to export an object and bring it back to DS as a morph... because if you check it, you'll get a "wrongly exported" OBJ from this sort of case. If you uncheck the option, at least you can correctly send it to other non-Blender 3D applications for manipulation and bring it back to DS as a morph with no issue...

How to fix this case ~~
- It's pretty similar to another case I ever helped with trouble-shooting: https://www.daz3d.com/forums/discussion/692276/import-problem-from-blender#latest
- Import the scene into Blender with Diffeomorophic Daz Importer... It's the only way to make this sort of case work in Blender as far as I experiment... (screenshot 2)

 OOOooooo, it hadn't occurred to me to see the total number of vertices, this is the first time this has happened to me, I'll be careful next time, thank you.

mwasielewski1990 said:

Nirguin said:

I already did it and had the same problem
Yes I did it in blender, I didn't use any modifiers, just the sculpt mode
Even if I just export it and import it again as a morph without modifying anything I still have the problem that the geometry doesn't match

Try importing and exporting (to and from Blender) as Legacy OBJ instead of standard. Had the same issue a while ago. Also, try to import the morphed item "as-is" to DAZ to check if the axis orientation is correct, because blender by default does

Forward: -Z

Up: Y

while DAZ needs:

Forward: X

Up: Y

Hope this helps :)

I think Legacy OBJ is for older versions of blender since the one I use is not available (I use the 4.1)
But I found the solution 
I thought that for some reason the buttons were causing the problem so I hid them with the geometry editor but I also had to delete them but by mistake I clicked on "delete unused vertices" apparently there was only one vertex that was causing the error, I exported and imported again and the morph no longer gave me the error
I don't know why it worked but I'm happy, thank for the help!.

Nirguin said:

I already did it and had the same problem
Yes I did it in blender, I didn't use any modifiers, just the sculpt mode
Even if I just export it and import it again as a morph without modifying anything I still have the problem that the geometry doesn't match

Okay, Blender is just the culprit... Have you noticed that 1 vertex is lost after importing OBJ into Blender ? ( turn "Statistics" on firstly...)  The vertices count in DS is 22733 but 22732 in Blender. (screenshot 1)
Neither of the latest or Legacy OBJ importer in Blender helps. (Legacy way is discontinued in ver 4.0+)

Never check "Remove Unused Vertices" if you want to export an object and bring it back to DS as a morph... because if you check it, you'll get a "wrongly exported" OBJ from this sort of case. If you uncheck the option, at least you can correctly send it to other non-Blender 3D applications for manipulation and bring it back to DS as a morph with no issue...

How to fix this case ~~
- It's pretty similar to another case I ever helped with trouble-shooting: https://www.daz3d.com/forums/discussion/692276/import-problem-from-blender#latest
- Import the scene into Blender with Diffeomorophic Daz Importer...  (screenshot 2)
or, as OP found it himself, delete unused vertecis !

Nirguin said:

I already did it and had the same problem
Yes I did it in blender, I didn't use any modifiers, just the sculpt mode
Even if I just export it and import it again as a morph without modifying anything I still have the problem that the geometry doesn't match

Try importing and exporting (to and from Blender) as Legacy OBJ instead of standard. Had the same issue a while ago. Also, try to import the morphed item "as-is" to DAZ to check if the axis orientation is correct, because blender by default does

Forward: -Z

Up: Y

while DAZ needs:

Forward: X

Up: Y

Hope this helps :)

I already did it and had the same problem
Yes I did it in blender, I didn't use any modifiers, just the sculpt mode
Even if I just export it and import it again as a morph without modifying anything I still have the problem that the geometry doesn't match

Hi,

DazStudio was widely used to create animations for Second Life before the appearance of Bento which corresponds to the improved skeleton.

When Second Life increased the number of bones for the bodymesh, DazStudio lost some of its interest, because it cannot create animations for the bones of the hands and other facial bones corresponding to the new skeleton of Second Life.

DazStudio can however create animations for the main bones which in some cases can be sufficient, even if the result is a little old-fashioned.

Currently the best tool to create animations in Second Life is Avastar which is used with Blender.

If you want to use DazStudio, you can export your files in BVH format and import them into Second Life with your viewer.
I do not use the Black Dragon viewer, but Firestorm which imports animations in anim or bvh format without any problem.
In conclusion, you don't need to worry about the unit used to describe the value of the angles of rotations.

teechurz_7c41d96282 said:

I thought about trying to send it into Blender, but my knowledge of Blender is limited, to say the least. 

Any tips?

Have you tried setting different values of Angle... it still didn't work ?

Anyway, if you want to remesh the mirror in Blender, try these steps:
- In a new scene, load the car. With Geometry Editor, select the surfaces of Mirror only, Ctrl + /, Delete Selected Polygons. Export the mirror to OBJ and Import it into Blender. (ss1 ~ 2)
- Use QuadriFlow Remesh to remesh the mirror. Export the mirror to OBJ. (ss3 ~ 4)
- Import OBJ into DS, the scene you're making, add SubD as you wish and parent it to the Car. Hide the original mirror surface and test the render (ss5 ~ 6)

jim_doria said:

• Similarly, I still never use the Smart Content pane. From what I understand, it's selective and won't show non-DAZ content like freebies etc. I've always just used the Content Library pane.

Piggybacking on what @crosswind offered, it’s very easy to create a Daz Studio Product from anything in your Content Library.  I’ve done this hundreds of times for content manually installed from Renderosity and other third-party sites.  A Product can have assets from one content item or from several different items.  For example, you could create a Product just from the items in Content A, or from items in Content A, Content B, and Content C, etc.

Once created, a Product appears in Smart Content.  You’ll need to add metadata (not difficult) via the Content Library and assign Categories to items and create a thumbnail to store in the  Runtime/Support folder.

I'd attach a screen capture of an example from my Content Library but the forums are not taking attachments at present.

Edit - Image now attached.

Iray Decals have certain limits in handling and exporting, and handling LIE through the LIE editor is, well, only fit for easy tasks as well. If you want to add a local texture element on characters, say a scratch, mud splat, vampire bite, whatever in a specific spot you have to do it yourself.

This means exporting to an external program, re-import etc. 

If we had a projection system that lets you position a decal in Daz, not Iray, then bake it into the LIE layer by command we could have arbitrary positioning. 

Artists could sell elements instead of fixed position overlays. 

1) Stick to using Smart Content as the 1st priority... Never give up eating for fear of choking.

2) Why you cannot find what you've bought in Smart Content ? Because Daz gave no or wrong metadata in the product packages (IM Packages), especially in the past 3 months when lots of emigrees from Rendo rushed in this store... It is never Smart Content's fault.

3) So be cautious, after you install newly-bought products, check one by one if they appeare in your Smart Content, sort by Last Update : Recent First, beforehand.

4) There're quite a few tricks and tips of how to well use Smart Content, creating / fixing Products as well as metadata no matter in IM package or in Smart Content after installation.

5) One day, when you had 2 Mil asset items in your Libraries... direct dumping files as well as searching in Content Library would definitely turn into a nightmare... esp. probably you'd already wasted a great deal of your valuable time before you realized that... 

depending on the type of model, the manual way is to use File/Import

though I'm a Windows user so that may not work on your system. 

Richard Haseltine said:

crosswind said:

Again... if you really rely on metadata which needs to be accurate enough, there're usually two ways: Content Wizard and Creating Product manually. Which do you prefer ?

For using Content Wizard, check this post firstly to take a look at how it primarily works : https://www.daz3d.com/forums/discussion/comment/8741736/#Comment_8741736 (I believe you've already watched the tutorial from RiverSoftArt on youtube...)
- pros: fast, accurate, can generate IM package for installing via DIM, so as to give you enablement of auto-Intallation / Uninstallation
- cons: requires a bit technical skills

For Creating Product manually... I may give you detailed tutorial if you want to go for this way..
- pros: free of charge, a bit easier than using Content Wizard
- cons: every product goes to LOCAL USER rather than accurate Stores... no capability of generating IM package, yada yada ~~

You can create stores using http://docs.daz3d.com/doku.php/public/software/dazstudio/4/referenceguide/scripting/api_reference/samples/metadata/add_store_id/start and then assign products to them as needed - I have two for freebies, commercial and non-commercial, where More information goes to the readme and one for Renderosity, where More Information goes to the product page.

Thanks ! I didn't know this script before. I used to create stores directly in dzcontent... Since I used Content Wizard, the script can well create them all, then I just need to select a store from the dropdown list when installing a Product, very convenient.

Another issue is: after creating a Product in Content Library and changing Store in Content DB, the LOCAL_USER dsa/dsx files are still in support folder, I wonder if it's a default behavior or not...

crosswind said:

Again... if you really rely on metadata which needs to be accurate enough, there're usually two ways: Content Wizard and Creating Product manually. Which do you prefer ?

For using Content Wizard, check this post firstly to take a look at how it primarily works : https://www.daz3d.com/forums/discussion/comment/8741736/#Comment_8741736 (I believe you've already watched the tutorial from RiverSoftArt on youtube...)
- pros: fast, accurate, can generate IM package for installing via DIM, so as to give you enablement of auto-Intallation / Uninstallation
- cons: requires a bit technical skills

For Creating Product manually... I may give you detailed tutorial if you want to go for this way..
- pros: free of charge, a bit easier than using Content Wizard
- cons: every product goes to LOCAL USER rather than accurate Stores... no capability of generating IM package, yada yada ~~

You can create stores using http://docs.daz3d.com/doku.php/public/software/dazstudio/4/referenceguide/scripting/api_reference/samples/metadata/add_store_id/start and then assign products to them as needed - I have two for freebies, commercial and non-commercial, where More information goes to the readme and one for Renderosity, where More Information goes to the product page.

Again... if you really rely on metadata which needs to be accurate enough, there're usually two ways: Content Wizard and Creating Product manually. Which do you prefer ?

For using Content Wizard, check this post firstly to take a look at how it primarily works : https://www.daz3d.com/forums/discussion/comment/8741736/#Comment_8741736 (I believe you've already watched the tutorial from RiverSoftArt on youtube...)
- pros: fast, accurate, can generate IM package for installing via DIM, so as to give you enablement of auto-Intallation / Uninstallation
- cons: requires a bit technical skills

For Creating Product manually... I may give you detailed tutorial if you want to go for this way..
- pros: free of charge, a bit easier than using Content Wizard
- cons: every product goes to LOCAL USER rather than accurate Stores... no capability of generating IM package, yada yada ~~

Does it even have working metadata? Usually products that do are set up so that they can be isntalled through DIM. Personally I unpack so that the Data, Runtime, and user-facing folders for the product are in an empty (or largely empty) content directory. From there I can test it, create metadata if needed (check to see if it already has a /Runtime/Support folder with a .dsx file for the data and a thumbnail - if it does use the Content DB Maintenence tool from the content Library option menu, the lined/hamburger button in the top corner, to Reimport Metadata and check just the new product) and once done just move it into the main content directory (all the DS stuff, except for custom actions, uses relative paths so it doesn't care which content directory it is in or what that is called as long as everything remains in the correct relative psotion within the content directory).

Okay, after some serious problems with files I bought from Daz, which were unmarked add-ons, I went to Renderosity to purchase a base outfit so the add-on I bought for it would work. Turns out to be 7 zip files.

What is the best way to install those files into Daz with working metadata?

zombiewhacker said:

Is database corruption when installing the beta still an issue?

The tutorial Serene Night points to warns, "if you are upgrading from Daz Studio 4.8, it is highly recommended that you backup your content database in Daz Studio 4.8 before launching Daz Studio 4.10." But those versions were both longago.

It's annecdotal evidence but I've been using the beta on both OSX and Windows for a while and have not had any database corruption issues with it. Also, I don't think I have seen any forum posts about any such thing from anyone else which can be linked to the beta.

However, even if it does not state it anywhere, when using anything labelled as "Beta" you should always expect some bugs/issues. You might get lucky and not notice any but by definition a "Beta release" has not yet received the full amount of user-testing and/or the seal of approval from whoever is releasing it and so should be used under some form of "at your own risk".

With regards to the CMS/Database, if you do not make many manual changes yourself then it's not the end of the word if it corrupts since you can restore/rebuild the metadata from the /runtime/support files. If you do make lots of manual categorisation changes then you should probably regularly export these whether you use the Beta or normal version anyway.