To your first point, clearly there is a trade-off in terms of quality.  And I agree, some of it is quite worth it.  I am still struggling with the large difference in RAM consumption between my old system and my new system.  Both running 4.12 +/- and (scroll up to the table) with G3F and G8F base loads the jump from old to new is roughly 1 GB and 2 GB respectively.  As you will note above I am being convinced the difference is morph loading and I thought character morphs was a good place to start.  Now I am not so sure.  I am more than a bit cautious/conservative so my experiment of the day may be a bit pedestrian to you.  I used my older system and created Characters - Heads and Characters - MATs folders in my Genesis 8 Female folder.  So far so good.  I moved the bits and pieces (.png, .tip and .duf files) about and proved my earlier concept.  I then moved the data files in and out of my runtime, restarting and testing RAM consumption.  I used only one (HD) figure FWSA Sharah which was lucky because it reminded me some characters acttually use morphs from a parent. . . . . But it might not be a large enough sample.  Anyways:

at idle the older system, with DAZ Studio running, consumes 214 MB, with G8F loaded the RAM consumption goes to 690 MB....Restart

removing FWSA Sharah (depends on Olympia 8) and loading G8F, the RAM consumption drops to 688 MB....(small cry)....Restart

adding FWSA Sharah Head morph and loading G8F, the RAM consumption goes to 689 MB

So.  VERY small test.  But deleting 100 characters and saving 200 MB RAM consumption is not getting me to the 2 GB RAM consumption difference between old and new systems very quickly.  Or said another way, I must have a huge amount of morph sets (as you indicate in your 'My Essentials') contributing to this load.  I am now thinking that is the place to start but I am less certain how to do that.   

I do not have the product, but I would not expect to find those morphs in the library.

Open G8F as you showed. In the parameters tab (not the Posing one), click on 'All' (outlined in red in the image) and scroll down the list of parameters (where I have put in red 'Somewhere here') or enter the morph name in the search box. That should then show it. It will be automatically included in every G8F you have.

Hope that helps,

Richard

Another SRP Bug:

a) I loaded the Ryker by RedzStudio

b) Dialed him out.

c) Dialed in Jonathan for Ollie HD 100%

d) Dialed out the Jonathan for Ollie head to 0%

e) Dialed in a FaceGen Morph

f) Have the Ryker alter character posed.

g) Have Auto Face Enhancer Pose Expression control dialed to 100%

h) The Ryker character is wearing clothing & hair parented to him.

i) Also has Jepe's Roderick SBH parented but hidden

j) Create a group Actors & parent this morphed Ryker to it

k) Favorite the FaceGen Morph used

l) Start Shape Rigger Plus

m) Check the FaceGenMorph & set tolorance to 0 & check Include Bone Alighment

n) run SRP

o) Ryker jumps all the way to T(0,0,0) / R(0,0,0) & the SHB gets all "funky" & Ryker goes into an 'A' pose (aka Genesis 8 T pose)

p) Now when I use a pose preset to go to the A pose for Dev G8M or the DAZ Studio menu to zero the Ryker pose he's in this corrupt twisted pose if I choose 'zero selected children' but if the zero pose is selected Ryker goes into the pose he was in before SRP changed him to an A pose & moved him to T(0,0,0) R(0,0,))

So very weird bugs! Also I did things you code probably wasn't coded to stop the process if it detected a character in such a configuration (AFE for G8M, Ryker but dialed into other characters, & SBH).

I first welded it in another software and imported it the right scale after a few tries 150% if I recall

I rotated the genesis 8 figure joints to match the garment then baked joint rotations on it before using the transfer utility 

posed the unfitted garment to fit a regular Genesis 8 then converted it to a prop and fitted it

Thank you all so much I really appreciate these comments. Everything that's been said makes sense. Based on what i've learned from previous feedback i've gotten, making a suit like this for Daz, I would have a heeled and no heel optioni included, along with the gloves having a non-clawed option. Those would just be an additional feature to give it a more unique feel for people wanting to use it as a borg/droid kind of outfit. It's unfortunately not equipped with a helmet. I have a helmet on the last suit I made. I'm still considering the  options. 

@WendyLuvsCatz  Thanks for showing, how long or which method was used to get the outfits to conform? Yeah I've used KB3D items in daz too. Architectural items tend to be fine to import in, nothing to shape, shift, pose so just textures need to be applied, and shaders set up. 

@wolf359  I appreciate your explanation, thanks. And that's been my exact experience and findings too. The outfits i've made without a daz genesis base I cannot get to conform to a daz figure when i import into daz. There are always deformations,. for me even minor poses caused deforming on the outfit.I'm not very experienced or great with rigging and associated techniques. But so far I did get this much done (picture attached) but was in Cinema4D, and no way to transfer rigs as far as I know. Someone told me recently DAE files will carry the rig properly between Blender and Daz, not sure if it's true but going to look into whether the DAE export from C4D would transfer into Daz and make it easier to transfer then accept the daz genesis models rig. I doubt it though.

 

Hi I am a Daz Genesis content developer.
You need to import your Default Daz Genesis figure into your modeling application and model to fit that base shape as exactly as possible.
The Daz transfer utility will do about 96% of the work of making it a conformer particulary with form fitting bodysuits,
for looser fitting clothing with collars,shirt tails etc you may have to do addtional adjustment with the joint editor or with rigidity maps and optional movement morphs.
Just my opinion, but trying to fit randomly found Clothing meshes to to Daz figures, with the Daz transfer utility, that are not modeled to the base shape is a wasteful endeavour for anyone trying to build a versatile clothing content library.
You might, Sorta/kinda, get a fit, but it will likely result in a peice of clothing that will will have limited use with even mildly exaggerated poses and will definately fail with extreme body morphs applied to the limbs/joints.

Disclaimer: I've done what research I can, so I know that if I were to use Daz figures I'd need to pay a $50 license for every single model, morph, hair, clothing, or prop I use in the game.
I'm a bit of a newbie to game development and going through tutorials atm. I'm thinking down the line when I want to experiment with NPCs or a third person player character.
I have zero background with 3D modeling and little time or interest to learn on top of Game Development, so looking for any reasonable shortcuts to aspects of game dev I can, specifically character models.
I have a lot of assets from Daz 3D I've used for comic reference, and wondering if paying $500+ in Licenses for what models I have is worth it compared to hiring out somebody to make models for me.
I'm going to start small, use stuff like Make Human and all that, but if I ever get to the point I want to make a game with more unique looking models, I'm wondering if using Daz as a shortcut is worth the $$$ compared to hiring a freelancer (as I have no time to learn the 3D modeling aspect myself).
Appreciate any advice. I've tried to look up games that have used Daz models but almost exclusively just find goofy porn visual novels, so any *actual* 3D games that have used Daz models to look at would be great.

LOL House Party was 3D using DAZ figures

 

The outfit looks good, where is it from?

I use all kinds of mesh in many formats in DS, from .LWO (lightwave) files, to .STL (CAD) files, from .SKP (Sketchup) files, to .MAX files to of course .OBJ files. Between 3dsmax and ultimate unwrap 3d I can convert most formats, create UVmaps, or create new material zones to import into DS as an OBJ. Of course i have to usually tweak materials, but that is part of the creative process IMO..

As for rigging, if it's basic rigging the transfer utility does a pretty good job in my experience. I had been wanting a detailed tactical vest forever and no PA ever delivered, so I purchased a good one in OBJ format from CGTrader and imported it and rigged it with the transfer utility. You can see it in the attached image.

i doubt that the transfer utility would do a good enough job for a sellable product, but works pretty good for personal use.

 

 I have baked a set to match the male UV, and I have used them some, too. 

How would one bake a set to the match the male UV? This sounds interesting.

I'm sorry I never saw this question. I think you need to UV swap product first for the UVs to be available, but I'm not 100% sure. The procedure is the same as baking a unique G2 or G3 skin to match the base. You use the Map Transfer tool, but instead of selecting the base for the target, you select the opposite sex base. That's where having the UV swap product comes in.

So once done you will have a full set of textures fit to the other sex. Then you can use the nice roughness textures and materials of a bluejaunte girl on males in the same way I did for Victoria. This doesn't make them look feminine at all. It compliments pretty much any skin.

I wouldn't do a good job explaining, but this thread does, and it has helpful pictures. This was what I went by when I did mine. https://www.daz3d.com/forums/discussion/95701/tutorial-converting-custom-genesis-2-uvs-to-genesis-3#latest

 

@outrider42 thank you so much for this. I spent the weekend trying to figure out how to transfer the maps from G8F to G8M. I use UV swap on the figure itself and it works well, but I want to use G8F skin on the male AFE mesh and of course you need a Male map for this.

 

I will study this thoroughly.

I used the UV swap first to get the female skin on the male. Then use the map transfer like described. I forgot I left that first step out. The process is actually pretty easy once you do it a couple times, its just getting the default templates to match the correct textures. Genesis 3/8 make this a lot easier since there are fewer different surfaces and groups than Genesis 2 had. And G8 makes it even easier because now all the related eye textures are one template. Basically all the surfaces that share the same texture are grouped together.

If you use a bluejaunte skin like say Nadya, you kind of only need to do it once, LOL. I think Nadya works particularly well because of how her fair skin settings seem to work more unilaterally with less tweaking. And like the newer BJ girls, she uses fewer maps to get the job done, and the maps are more optimized. Basically the newer BJ girls are more VRAM friendly and render slightly faster, too. So I think there is a real benefit to using newer ones like Nadya. I'm sure Ensley's would work great, too. Plus since Ensley has a new foot displacement texture, you could even convert that with this process and give the male that same foot displacement.

I can't find my Nix pictures for some reason, so I made a couple new ones. The is "Bluejaunte Nix". He is using Nadya roughness and bump maps. His base, trans color, and normals are still Nix. I used a bright light to show how the skin reflects it across the surface. This might be the closest we get to bluejaunte male without kidnapping bluejaunte. But this is why one would do that whole process, as it lets me use these new Nadya textures with ANY Genesis 8 male, even Genesis 3.

I am not using any HD morph, I don't have his. But that might be a consideration since I am using the Nadya bumps. I could maybe switch Nix bumps back in, but I still like Nadya's. Going this route does mean you are depending on your normals and mesh for those character specific details more than before. However I think the trade off is well worth it. His skin looks like skin to me. Grab a mesh body hair and you are in business.

I suppose the only real negative is the lack of a matching genital roughness texture. I think there was a free UV map at Rendo that somehow uses the torso texture on the Daz genital prop. I've never used it, so I have no idea how well it could work. But I happened to scroll over it one day looking at freebies.

Also, if you are doing some sort of comic like material, having bluejaunte skin on a male will make the men look like they belong in the same world with the bluejaunte women. That's really the biggest win, I think. There is no male that looks quite like the bluejaunte females. Now I could could place this Nix in a scene with Nadya or somebody and he would not look out of place.

Have they added the ability to load. Duf pose files with facial& body morph based animation data???

To your point about expressions - I have 44 (G8F) expression packages plus some number that are burried in the poses folder.  I don't know what the RAM consumption impact for them might be or if there is a difference between those that are in the expression folder and those that are included with poses.  And this might highlight my lack of understanding. 

You might recall early on I was talking about a number of related issues - or issues I thought were realted to this RAM thing and it included saving keyframes and zeroing a pose etc.  I might understand zeroing a figure taking a long time because all the morphs are loaded into RAM and they all have to be checked that they are zero, but zeroing the pose is not going through the pose collection, it is just checking all the bone rotations. . . .

I always thought posing was rigging/bones and shaping was morphs/mesh.  So as you have said it seems logical that expressions are at least partly (mostly) morphs (I want to say that some also move rigging like the jaw or tongue? Maybe I'm wrong.) and at least some of them (that include dials?) would be loaded into RAM and be contributing to RAM consumption.  Are there expressions that have no dials (only presets?) that behave more like poses and are not retained in RAM?  Or is the 'morph' in RAM anyways?

TheKD,

I am quite interested in comparing thoughts on this.  If I resign myself to the fact that it is the morphs that are slowing me down, and that (short of a new more powerful machine) my only option is to reduce the morph load, what might be the plan.  I also am wondering if all morphs are created equal.  If character morphs (FBMs) are sets of deltas that are sitting there waiting to be called, that's a lot of overhead.  And I have 150 G8F characters - that might be a lot.  I am thinking that it is character morphs that are having the largest impact (but I don't really know); but there may be multple sets of other morphs (like breast morphs) that are performing very similar functions.  I am perhaps thinking the other way round to you.  In my plan:

1)  Perhaps the first thing to do is to do away with those characters that I don't like/use.  Too bad I couldn't trade them in for a new model. . . .

2)  As you have said, find a way to retain the MATs for those characters that I like for only their skin or makeup and blow away the shape presets and character sliders (and killing the data file??)  

3)  I wonder in cases where there is a separate head morph, if there is a step for me where I retain the head morphs of some characters but not the bodies.  Not sure I know how to do that yet but I don't think it would be that hard.

4)  Retain completely some significantly smaller number of characters.

Steps 1 and 2 would directly reduce RAM consumption while 3 and 4 would retain an impact.

I don't know what the mix of these scenarios might be.  I have no idea what the various load implications of this equation might be.  I find myself wondering.... Are there really clever folks out there, for instance, that have (picking numbers somewhat randomly): ten complete characters that they really like (perhaps some are HD and some not) and ten additional head morphs that they sometimes mix and match.  These are then used as a basis for adjustments.  They may also have some collection of skins, as you are thinking, that they use as start points.  (With no intention to insult, I have noticed some producers have a common look to their families of characters.  Perhaps I only need a couple SASE characters.  (I have twelve x SASE; 4 x 3DUniverse, 6 x Devious Dolls, 7 x Digital Touch. . . . .)   So maybe this is not a bad approach.)

I picked my numbers specifically so I could say . . . this might reduce the contribution to RAM consumption from character morphs by 90%. 

This would be a lot of work.  And I am not sure if this is the major source of RAM consumption or not.  Thoughts??

2.Q:Can it be used in other character?

2.A:Yes ,it can fit to any shape of G8F,not only Keicy.
Load "HS 1Keicy with DFbreast "first, remove the keicy head and body shpae, then load your character shape and materials.This is the easiest way.

This is also backwards from the way that such grafts and add-ons are used in most workflows. Normally, a user loads their figure, then adds whatever graft or add-on, not the other way around.

I'd strongly suggest finding a reliable way to make this into a graft that operates in normal workflow, because of answer 3:

3.Q:Why not sell separately:

3.A:Because there were similar products before https://www.daz3d.com/fg-dforce-breast-presets-for-genesis-8-female

But my DF breast obviously different from the previous products. Separate sales make me have a tough choice in pricing.I don't want to conflict with any other products.

Your product is visibly and demonstrably different enough from the FG product that there would be little to no conflict, and would in fact encourage improvement of all such products overall. I know from my own experience with FG's product that (as good as it is), I often end up with large concavities in the breast shapes (either individual or both of them), no matter what I do to keep them from occuring. I think you've got a good, reasonable product here, that could only make the field better and more robust through cooperative competition.

 

Basically, I think making it a separate add-on would result in better products all-around. Think about how this would work as a complement to the various breast-squish-morph/pose sets out there. It would make everything better all around. :)

Not to derail this thread, but has anyone tried exporting their AME animation from Daz in Alembic format and then rendering in Marmoset Toolbag? In theory, it should work as long as the Daz Alembic exporter really is "vertex exact," as the product page says.

https://youtu.be/o2DauchvTkA

ABC render in marmoset. Once in marmoset it just play. And I can pan around the animation. Video was just a scene capt of Mamoset.

Wow, that's awesome! And I'm guessing it took a tiny fraction of the time to render compared to iRay

I don't want to derail this thread, either, but, please, what is Alembic format? Then, D.Master answered, "ABC render in Marmoset." Don't know what that means, either. Is ABC the same as Alembic? Does "I can pan aroiund the animation" mean within Marmoset? And the video D.Master posted was "just a scene caption" from Marmoset? Wasn't it a full render?

I'm just trying to understand the full potentials of this wonderful product. I'm playing around right at this moment with animaltion in DAZ Studio, Basic Open GL.

I"m really eager about this because Marmoset can apparently use Apple's Metal GPU rendering, and, I guess you know, nVidia is feuding with Apple, so it looks like iRay is out of the Question for Mac users, at least iRay in GPU (CPU only).

The Blender manual actually has a pretty good explanation of Alembic here:

https://docs.blender.org/manual/en/latest/files/import_export/alembic.html

Basically, it allows you to transfer pure mesh data (static or animated) between 3d applications, such as Daz and Marmoset, without having to worry about the usual incompatibilities that you get with formats like FBX and DAE.

Custom morphs are not animated.
1. Create morph in ZBrush
2. Animate it on the timeline.
3. Save the scene
4. Close and reopen Daz3d
Animation keys are missing from the timeline

fwiw, a recent 4.12.x change unsets the 'H' (hidden) keys setting on scenes when they are reloaded. You may have to re-set that each time you start DS/load a scene.

Also note that scene frame-counts and the like have been really wonky after reloadeding in recent releases too, but I haven't updated my system lately (last general rls, and I've played with some interim betas which didn't fix any of the animation stuff I use), as I'm really trying to get some work done - however crippled my animations tools are becoming w each update...

urg,

--ms

Hi all!

I have recently noticed that sometimes when I apply a predefined Pose on a character, his/her scale might change with no warning. If I don't pay attention a render might be ruined becuase a character is now shorter or taller than previous renders.
What is the cause of this? How can it be prevented? 

It shouldn't happen, unfortunately its all too common, the PA didn't save the poses correctly and the problem wasn't picked up during testing or QAV, they sometimes get fixed but not all the time. Its infuriating especially as its easy to avoid if the creator pays attention to what they are doing.

Some poses will move the character back to the 0,0,0 default place, some even alter the morph dials adding ones that the PA was using when creating the poses that is so frustrating a bit worse than the scaling thing as sometimes it subtle and you don't notice until much to late these poses do that

https://www.daz3d.com/capsces-poses-and-expressions-for-sakura-8-and-aiko-8

Unfortunately this isn't the first time this PA has done this sort of thing with poses which is a real shame as I love their poses but its the last set I buy from them now.

The expressions in the specific set you mention does adjust facial morphs that were included with Sakura to acheve certain looks. The following information was included in the readme:

http://docs.daz3d.com/doku.php/public/read_me/index/51759/start#product_notes
Shaping morphs that come with Sakura were used in the creation of the Sakura expression presets and will change the look of your character. If you wish to use the expressions without changing the shape of your character, try using the Aiko 8 expressions.

This should not happen with my other pose sets, unless I specifically state otherwise. If it does, the issue should be reported as suggested by Mattymanx.

I wanted to ask, is there any way to select Categories rather than folders on disk as the source?  First of all, I have my V4 poses categorized, so it would be more convenient to keep those categories, second (and more important), since the Poser format Pose library includes morph injections and mat poses, it would be easier to select categories which I already know are true poses.

You have 2 options, you the various morph sets to create a new one, or use a modeling app like Zbrush.

I just took a look at Zbrush and way out of my price range.

 

There are many alternatives to Zbrush if all you want is a basic head morph. There is Sculptris from the same company that makes Zbrush and it's free. Then, there is Blender that's been already mentioned, also free. If you are happy to pay a little more with more functionality you can try Zbrush Core, a version of Zbrush and less functionality. Then there is also Mudbox, an Autodesk app and I am not sure if there is an educational license for Mudbox too, but Autodesk has some good offers for students and if you are a student, you can give it a try. Zbrush creator might offer educational licenses too.

There are probably a lot more options for every need. Depending on what you wish to do and what functionality you desire.

Wouldn't a reliable transfer (or integration) between DS and Unity also be great for animations?

You can use Face Transfer by DAZ, FaceGen or HeadShop. There is a White Paper on pros and cons here: https://www.daz3d.com/forums/discussion/405956/white-paper-working-with-difficult-photos-in-daz-studio#latest