Looking for some help, please. Hope this is the right area...

So I'm attempting to "re-create" myself with Michael 4. I've loaded up some morphs, spun the dials to shift the eyes, nose, mouth, etc. around, and then afterwards, I select the head and go to "Spawn Morph Target". I give it a name, and then I've got my very own dial for my custom face.

I set all the rest of the dials back to zero, and then set my custom morph to 1. It works great for the actual face itself. But the eyes don't move with the eyeholes, nor do the teeth/inner mouth move with the mouth. How do I get those to move to their correct places as well? I've posted a screenshot of what I mean.

Also, is there a morph to make the jawline/chin less pronounced? I don't have a chiseled jawline or prominent chin, my chin just kinda curves into my neck, and no morph that I can find from the Morphs++ pack seems to have the type of morphs I need. Enclosed a pic to show what I'm talking about.

I'd recommend watching the Fiery Genesis tutorial and the Dragonslayer tutorial, which will show you where to find the content (skin textures, clothing, lights, etc.) that come with the program.

Here's a thread that may help as well, since they answer some commonly asked questions for when you're first starting out.

Genesis doesn't look like much in its gray form, but it can do so much more than Victoria 4 or Michael 4. (Keep in mind that all of the fifth generation figures, such as Hiro 5, Michael 5, Victoria 5, and Stephanie 5, are shapes for Genesis)

I have tried a few different hairs. First I tried Desir Hair by AlfaSeed available at RunTimeDNA.

http://www.runtimedna.com/DesirHair.html

This is a high polygon count hair, and the render times confirm that. The renders below took about 1 hour 45 min each.

This hair is for V4 and has fits for Aiko 4 and Michael 4. All the other other V4 hair that I have can be auto fit to genesis characters, but this hair cannot. The auto fit item does not appear in the right click menu. If I select the Desir hair and do Edit -> Figure -> Fit to it says "You must select a figure in the scene to perform this action."

In spite of that, the character below is a Genesis based character (Reby Sky for Genesis) and I did manage to manually fit the hair to her. I had to adjust the Y position and I used a puff up morph to cover her ear (this hair does not normally cover the ears as you can see in the promo renders).

This is a messy hair style. It probably looks best in action scenes or when being blown by the wind, rather than this kind of a image.

Blond is probably one of the worst hair colors with this kind of lighting to get to look realistic. The darker areas under the ribbons the hair textures are applied to show more easily. This hair seems to have smaller ribbons and more of them. I think the light brownish color looks more natural than the blond.

Ok, so I am a bit confused. After watching the tutorial I have tried the following.

1. I loaded up a genesis character
2. I selected the Dark Thorn pants from DAZ Studio Formats/My Library/People/Michael 4/Clothing

Do I need to install the Poser versions or Legacy files of this to get this to work? I have only been installing using the DS or DSON installers previously.

I also tried loading up Michael 4 via the Poser tab and trying it that way and still nothing.

i tried it from my day job computer, has the same problem and error message.

http://www.daz3d.com/shop/michael-4-morphs

JimmyC_2009 said:

vindazi said:

Are there V4/M4/Gn characters that come with the hair already on? Almost all of them are advertised with hair on but it is hard to find characters with head hair than genital hair. Since most healthy people have hair, it would seem that hair would come with the figure. It could be detachable etc. but hair that just worked with a figure would be useful. What am I missing?

If you go to the Store page, and use the search term 'Hair' you will find loads of them.
On the Product Description, it will tell you what figure(s) the hair has been designed to fit, like...

Compatible 3D Figures
Michael 4, The Kids 4, Hiro 4

If hair came as part of a character, it would make the itme very expensive indeed, and if you bought the item with a particular hair, it may not fit to other models as well, which is the whole point. Some hair for example, has fits for V4, A4, M4, H4 K4 and even Genesis too. It is a much better idea to buy the hair that you like, and apply it to a model you also like.
Everyone has hair, it's true (more or less, in my case less), but it does not all look the same. There is nothing to stop you from buying a hair item each time you buy a new character, but it might work out to be very expensive.

You make valid points. However, I am not asking that ALL content come with hair. But if you put out a base figure like an Mt with and without Gn. Seems you could just as easy do the same with hair. The hair could be dialed to make longer shorter etc in the parameters tab. If you wanted it to be bald, click the bald check box or instal the hairless version.

The example you give are for the hair. What I need is for the figure. I.e., I need the figure to say "has been tested and works easily with this hair :-). I am finding I spend way to much time "shopping" for content. Then I find something I like and it doesn't work with the figure. Really puts a cramp of creativity when you spend hours try to "buy" something.

I hope this is understood as a discussion rather than a rant.

vindazi said:

Are there V4/M4/Gn characters that come with the hair already on? Almost all of them are advertised with hair on but it is hard to find characters with head hair than genital hair. Since most healthy people have hair, it would seem that hair would come with the figure. It could be detachable etc. but hair that just worked with a figure would be useful. What am I missing?

If you go to the Store page, and use the search term 'Hair' you will find loads of them.
On the Product Description, it will tell you what figure(s) the hair has been designed to fit, like...

Compatible 3D Figures
Michael 4, The Kids 4, Hiro 4

If hair came as part of a character, it would make the itme very expensive indeed, and if you bought the item with a particular hair, it may not fit to other models as well, which is the whole point. Some hair for example, has fits for V4, A4, M4, H4 K4 and even Genesis too. It is a much better idea to buy the hair that you like, and apply it to a model you also like.
Everyone has hair, it's true (more or less, in my case less), but it does not all look the same. There is nothing to stop you from buying a hair item each time you buy a new character, but it might work out to be very expensive.

Hey people!

Something has stopped working!
I lip-synced some dialog to the Michael 4 character using the built in tool in DAZ 4.5 (32-bit).
Everything looks good: mouth moves synced to the .wav file, head nods, eyes blink...
I save the file to come back and work on it later.
I come back later, open the file and...
No mouth movements!
His head still bobs, but his mouth is clamped shut and his voice must be coming out of his ears!

I opened some of my old projects with M4 and V4 - same thing no one's mouths are moving anymore!
My Genesis projects still work (knock wood).

Does anyone have any ideas what has gone amiss?
Thanks for any clues!

Erich

Heres an 8 step Tutorial on Adding custom shapes to clothing Ive just written.

1) Morph Genesis into the shape you want to work on and export it to OBJ. (IMPORTANT: Ensure the Scale of genesis is always set to 100%, V5, A3 Reby, the stephanies and other all reduce Genesis's scale, make them 100% before you export)

2) Import the morphed Geneis in to modller and you wantever poly edit tool you have to fit the clothing well to the shape, (but just make sure you do not add or remove a single vert or poly) - when satistfied export it back to Obj and call it FBMshapename.
Example: 'FBMVictoria5' for V5, 'FBMBasicFemale' for Basic Female... etc. This will save you having to rename it in morphloader pro.

3) Load Genesis and you rigged item in to the scene and select Genesis

4) Dial in the the shape to Genesis that you have just modified the clothing for, then dial it back out again or Zero genesis (This is so Daz Generates one and gives you access the correct Property Group path in morph loader pro.

5) Now unselect genesis an select your clothing item. Open Morph Loader pro, You might need to bind a keyboard short cut for it in your settings. I bind the 'M' key to it.

6) Click choose morph and browes to your exported OBJ.

7) Expand the item in morphloader pro (click on the little down arrow next to its name) and set the following options in the steps below.

Property Group: here you must choose the correct path, Determine the target characters type is it female or male? Toon or realworld?
Victoria and stephanies etc go under Actor/Female/Realworld,
Aiko and Hitomi would go under Actor/Female/Stylized,
Basic Child would go under Actor/universal/realworld.
Michael 4 Would go under Actor/male/Realworld
Got it?
When you did step 4 ^ above, this will make the correct path avaliable to you in the drop down menu in morph loader pro, So you wont have to fiddle about, finding it ot typing it in.

Create Control property: Set to 'NO'.

Reverse Deformations: Set to 'NO'

Overwrite Existing: Set to "Deltas and ERC Links"

8) DONE! Click load and now test, when you dial the shape in genesis, you clothing should morph in to your custom shape.

Trouble shooting: If Morphloader didnt give you an error but it doesnt work, try saving the clothing item and reloading it.
If that fails, re run ML Pro check your property group path and OBJ file names are correct, because those are the only other things that can cause it to fail if you make a mistake.
Lastly - just as an F.Y.I, your Custom morph .DSF's are save to My Library/Data/Your Name/Your Product/Clothing Item name/Morphs.

Also Im happy to answer questions too, feel free to PM me.

Good luck.

FSMCDesigns said:

Fauvist said:

Richard Haseltine said:

You could use Texture Converter 2 with the Michael 4 and Victoria 4 plugins to literally convert the maps, of course.

Is there a Genesis plugin for Texture Converter 2? I can't find it.

No, but why do you need one. didn't you get the M4 map to work? the MEC4D script doesn't convert the textures, it should only create the texture layout for the figure, which means any M4 texture now works and then in the material room you can apply any of the other M4 textures such as disp, spec, etc..

Well, I'm confused. The M4 map worked, but I want to use a displacement map in addition, and Richard wrote: "The UV set is a setting for the whole material, it isn’t a setting for the texture as it is in Lightwave or modo, so you can’t mix different mapping on the same zone (you can use different maps on different material zones on a single figure). You could use Texture Converter 2 with the Michael 4 and Victoria 4 plugins to literally convert the maps, of course."

He seems to be saying I can't mix different maps for the same zone - and you seem to be saying that it's no problem.

Fauvist said:

Richard Haseltine said:

You could use Texture Converter 2 with the Michael 4 and Victoria 4 plugins to literally convert the maps, of course.

Is there a Genesis plugin for Texture Converter 2? I can't find it.

No, but why do you need one. didn't you get the M4 map to work? the MEC4D script doesn't convert the textures, it should only create the texture layout for the figure, which means any M4 texture now works and then in the material room you can apply any of the other M4 textures such as disp, spec, etc..

Richard Haseltine said:

You could use Texture Converter 2 with the Michael 4 and Victoria 4 plugins to literally convert the maps, of course.

Is there a Genesis plugin for Texture Converter 2? I can't find it.

The UV set is a setting for the whole material, it isn't a setting for the texture as it is in Lightwave or modo, so you can't mix different mapping on the same zone (you can use different maps on different material zones on a single figure). You could use Texture Converter 2 with the Michael 4 and Victoria 4 plugins to literally convert the maps, of course.

Jaderail said:

You are Correct, I found my FULL M4 CC injector. Is one folder above the seperate injectors.

All of the block-injection poses I have, including the creature morphs, are in the DAZ's Michael 4>Morph Injections folder, with subfoldrs for the individual injection poses.

HI Riggswolfe :)

There will be some scenes which you can now create in the 8.5 beta, which won't load the same,. or at all,. in C8.1

For example : anything with genesis. :-/

But, there are other new features of the C8.5 beta, which will cause some issues in transferring to the (current retail release) of C8.1,... simply because the exist only in current Beta C8.5,

So, The ability to transfer scenes "Backwards" from newer version of a program will be less,... because of the different technology and functions which have been added to the newer version

Carrara will still have the ability to transfer older scenes, shaders, and objects, from C6, C7, or C8,. To C8.5

Going Forwards, is fine, but, Going Backwards,.. may not be :(

In Carrara,
if you save your file,. try to save it from the Assembly room,. ..rather than from another room like the vertex modeller, or the shader room,
Also , .. try to close down any open shader pane's and colour pane's.

These are all being held in Memory while they're open, and if you've been Changing, Swapping or generally adjusting things...
All of those adjustment are being held in an "Undo" list,..
so,. for example,

If you load V4,. (from your Daz or Poser) Content Runtime,... and then you change the default skin, ..then change it to another skin,....
All of those are held in case you want to Undo.

The vertex modeller, has the ability to open several objects, and each modelling screen,. holds all the information for that model,. plus any undo..
So,. remember, before you close Carrara, and save the file.. .. close any modelling, or shaders,... the go to the assembly room, and use the "Remove unused" options,. since the will remove any Shaders, Models, etc which are "Not Currently Active" in the scene

one last thing,.. How are you loading figures,...?

You have entries like "BlMillMan_etc...

If you're using the Carrara Content Browser to See, your Current DS or Poser stuff,. then you should see then loaded with their proper names EG: Michael 4,..Victoria 4 etc.

Hope it helps :)

All DAZ 3D Poser items before Genesis will work correctly in Poser 7. Genesis and any Genesis related items will NOT work in Poser 7 or Poser 8.
Any Victoria 4 or Michael 4 figures will work correctly in your version of Poser.

Anyone know of a modern looking non-sci-fi gunbelt/holster for Michael 4? I'm having trouble finding one and I've been looking for quite a while. :/ The one I was going to use (from Hardcore M4) just looks too sci-fi for what I need which is for an adventurer style character. It needs to be for commercial use. I'd be very grateful for any links to products because most stores' search functions leave much to be desired. The gunbelt/holster could be for other figures too (except Genesis) because I have XDresser to convert things with. Thanks for any help!

I'm having this problem, as well. I figured out how to install SOME of my content, but not all of it. V4 installed to the public/documents/Poser9 Content folder, and she shows up in my library. Woohoo! But M4 will not. I get an error message that says "When used with Poser TM, "Michael 4 Base" must be installed to the same directory as the application executable, due to restrictions on support file locations. Please select the directory that contains your Poser executable." Okay, fine. No problem. I tried installing it to the Poser 9 directory, just as I used to do with Poser 8. No deal. Either way, he doesn't show up in my library. I'm starting to feel pretty stupid...

jeeperz said:

Lord Ganthor said:

So, ya wanna story, do ya? Hokay, how'ziss? Wussa 'pon a time on da mythical Island of York dere was a magical place called Central Park. Central Park was da home to da mythical Beer Brewin' Elves whoes jobs it wuz t' gadder all udda mythical Brew Berries what grew on da bushes in da Park. The Brew Elves would crushes da berries t' make da beer for Ol' St. Nick sos he could fly 'round da woild deliverin' packages 'n' presents t' all da people uddda Oith. De End. Oh, and dey made pizza, too. De End.

1.) Shawn for M4++ Character Morph. Registration Required.

2.) Moustache 19th from Top.

3.) Mitch Hair

4.) Unforgiven for Aiko 3 Cigar Prop Only. Download Link on Right.

5.) Gruffles the Elf]Gruffles the Elf Registration Required.

6.) Pizza Box with Pizza Registration Required.

7.) Pressoir Registration Required.

8.) Wooden Crate with Apples Registration Required.

9.) Nikisatez's Free Tree Stump Registration Requied.

10.) Le-seau Registration Required. It's the bucket.

11.) Cardbord Box 1st Item.

12.) Fence 3DS Format.

The Santa Claus Outfit for Michael 3 was a free give-away from Most Digital Creations for the 2010 season and is now only available as a paid for item. So, I guess it's a paid for now? Also paid for, Michael 4, Morphs++ and Michael 3 (to set up the Santa Claus outfit). The beer bottles used in the render are, alas, no longer available.

The 3DS Models in this render were converted to .obj format for import into Studio using PoserRay, available Through This Link Converts Lightwave and 3DS files into .OBJ format files. Free and easy to use.

Some of the items used in the render were Poser or Daz Studio dependent and were replaced with native Bryce materials for effect. Figure set-up in Studio 2.3 (I'm havin' a tough time with 4.5, okay?!?) and final render in Bryce 7.1 (that I got to work!). No postwork save for addition of signature and copyright notice.

and what would a contest be without an appearance by da real man

Lord Ganthor said:

So, ya wanna story, do ya? Hokay, how'ziss? Wussa 'pon a time on da mythical Island of York dere was a magical place called Central Park. Central Park was da home to da mythical Beer Brewin' Elves whoes jobs it wuz t' gadder all udda mythical Brew Berries what grew on da bushes in da Park. The Brew Elves would crushes da berries t' make da beer for Ol' St. Nick sos he could fly 'round da woild deliverin' packages 'n' presents t' all da people uddda Oith. De End. Oh, and dey made pizza, too. De End.

1.) Shawn for M4++ Character Morph. Registration Required.

2.) Moustache 19th from Top.

3.) Mitch Hair

4.) Unforgiven for Aiko 3 Cigar Prop Only. Download Link on Right.

5.) Gruffles the Elf]Gruffles the Elf Registration Required.

6.) Pizza Box with Pizza Registration Required.

7.) Pressoir Registration Required.

8.) Wooden Crate with Apples Registration Required.

9.) Nikisatez's Free Tree Stump Registration Requied.

10.) Le-seau Registration Required. It's the bucket.

11.) Cardbord Box 1st Item.

12.) Fence 3DS Format.

The Santa Claus Outfit for Michael 3 was a free give-away from Most Digital Creations for the 2010 season and is now only available as a paid for item. So, I guess it's a paid for now? Also paid for, Michael 4, Morphs++ and Michael 3 (to set up the Santa Claus outfit). The beer bottles used in the render are, alas, no longer available.

The 3DS Models in this render were converted to .obj format for import into Studio using PoserRay, available Through This Link Converts Lightwave and 3DS files into .OBJ format files. Free and easy to use.

Some of the items used in the render were Poser or Daz Studio dependent and were replaced with native Bryce materials for effect. Figure set-up in Studio 2.3 (I'm havin' a tough time with 4.5, okay?!?) and final render in Bryce 7.1 (that I got to work!). No postwork save for addition of signature and copyright notice.

and what would a contest be without an appearance by da real man