In my case a typical project would include some scenes and figures with outfits and accessories, so I don't get lost in the asset list I mean I know exactly what is included that's why I do project folders to start with. The search for assets is done before starting the project and for that I use the daz shop or the windows search in my backup disk where I store my assets.

There's really no need for smart content if you work this way.

Anyway if you really want to, I guess you can try with "reset database" then "reimport metadata" when you start a new project. You may also try with "export user data" to keep your categories. But it's a lot of database maintenance, it may be not worth it.

nemesis10 said:

You can change the compatibility of G3 stuff so that it adds G8 compitability and won't trigger autofit.  Generic G3 figures are the same size and shape as G8.  

select Gen 3 hair product (i do this in smart content but you can do this in the library

1. Select Gen 3 hair product
2. right-click to get contextual menu
3. edit metadata
4. select Assets tab
5. select hair in Assets; it is a wearable 
6. in bottom tabs, click on Compatibilities 
7. right-click on product name
8. add compatibilities to selected product
9. select the figures you want to add such Genesis 8 female and Genesis 8 male (you will have to repeat this step for each figure since you can only do one at a time)
10. click accept after adding each compatibility.
11. close the window and apply to Gen 8 figure

Let me know if you need pictures, it is pretty easy to do though.

Nemesis awesome awesome awesome! Thanks for all the help Daz peeps! 

And I can't seem to import these files into Blender either.

Something is simply not exporting right from EmberGen even though I use the exact same settings as in the videos.

RexRed said:

I created a new folder parallel to the My Daz 3D Library and named it "8to9 Hair",

At first, I did not add the 8to9 Hair directory to my runtimes. A lot of hair items were created but they did not show up in smart content.

Once I added the folder, 8to9 Hair to my Daz runtimes, then the hair I converted after that had items being placed into a folder called, "data".

I assume these new hair items will now show up in smart content. I also figure that I need to now go back and reconvert the other hair items.

My question is, will I run into other problems using this directory that is parallel to my Daz 3D library?

The full path to my new hair directory is, D:\8to9 Hair

The full path to My Daz 3D Library directory is, D:\My Daz 3D Library

I did not want to put the new hair items into a folder in documents becasue the documents folder is on a drive that has a small amout of free space. 

I only have 475 Gen 8 male hair items to convert. 

Daz happily lets you have multiple folders for your content.  If you did not install (through DIM, Daz Connect, etc) those hairs in D:\8to9 Hair, the Daz database will not have smart content for those files and the script will not detect them as it looks for the metadata about a file.  You will have to add them like in the manual:

The Hair Converter dialog does not show some hair items when adding to the list. The Hair Converter script automatically filters out all presets that do not have a content type of Follower/Hair. This is by design to avoid unknown files as this script has been carefully crafted to try and convert hair without errors as much as possible. If you are absolutely positive that a file is a hair item, you can turn off the Check Content Type option and use the Add Files… button to add those files. If you turn this option off, any file will be added. On execution, the script will load the file, whatever it is and whatever it does. The script will still only convert items that are hair on execution. Turning this option off is ONLY recommended if you are having trouble getting the script to recognize specific hair files.

Note: Turning this option off will slow conversion because of loading a lot of false positives. You also must be very sure of which files you add to the dialog. This option does not affect the Add Directory button

It depends how you manage your project folders. In general if you want to use the smart content then you have to use dim for installing/uninstalling, otherwise the metadata can be disaligned and the cms tries to fix that. Personally I keep project folders as you do, but I use manual install and don't use the smart content.

That is, you have to pick your poison, either use the cms with dim+smart content and go slow, or use manual install and go fast but without smart content.

There's a video by Jay here about importing Embergen VDB files into Daz Studio: 

However, Embergen has changed a bit since then, and when importing the file into Daz Studio nothing shows. 

I export the Embergen VDB file with the settings as shown in the image below. ( I know in the video it's centimeter length unit, the result does not change though).

I set up the Volume surface as the image below.

All I end up with is a empty cube, with not a single bit of smoke in it as the image below, i've massively turned up the density. When importing premade Embergen VDB files downloaded from their site they works fine: https://jangafx.com/software/embergen/download/free-vdb-animations/ ;

Anyone any clue if anything changed with Embergen and Daz since then? Do the names in Embergen need to be changed to match something in Daz?

You can change the compatibility of G3 stuff so that it adds G8 compitability and won't trigger autofit.  Generic G3 figures are the same size and shape as G8.  

select Gen 3 hair product (i do this in smart content but you can do this in the library

1. Select Gen 3 hair product
2. right-click to get contextual menu
3. edit metadata
4. select Assets tab
5. select hair in Assets; it is a wearable 
6. in bottom tabs, click on Compatibilities 
7. right-click on product name
8. add compatibilities to selected product
9. select the figures you want to add such Genesis 8 female and Genesis 8 male (you will have to repeat this step for each figure since you can only do one at a time)
10. click accept after adding each compatibility.
11. close the window and apply to Gen 8 figure

Let me know if you need pictures, it is pretty easy to do though.

ValidUserName said:

crosswind said:

You used DTB to have this imported in Blender ?!  It seems a pure FBX import... Yes, DTB works but strongly recommend Diffeomorphic Daz Importer.

Hi Crosswind, thank you for your response. I appreciate your suggestion.

Yes I used the Bridge designed to import from Daz to Blender, provided by Daz to import from Daz to Blender. I'm not sure why you included the "?!" like this is a surprising thing to do. I hope that statement doesn't come off as mean spirited, I'm genuinly concerned as there was no indication that the daz to blender bridge would be non functional or that the documentation would be outdated. It leaves an impression that the Daz team is unreliable and damages the trust that I have in them as a company.
I tried the Diffeomorphic Daz Importer that you've suggested and it appears to no longer work either. This is sad, because there's lot of great content on the Daz marketplace, but there's no point in buying any of it if we can't export them and use them in our game. The interactive licenses are quite expensive as well. Usually the liscense is multiple times the cost of the product itself. I'm not sure if the price is justified if using these products are nearly impossible for anyone.
I'm happy to pay these high prices for such quality content, but not if we can't use them.

I'm sorry that '?!' gave you a strange impression but actually I just wondered Daz to Blender (DTB) bridge shoudn't give that result after importing the figure... (English is not my native tongue so somtimes I really fail to express myselft well... Sorry again! )

I ever used DTB for a period of time and even specifically made a tutorial in last June for the 'new DTB' which was released around that time..I knew the team really did lots of work on DBT. I ever communicated with Daniel on Github about 'Bend Control not working' issue, and the 'bug' had been fixed in a very short time then, really appreciated that.

However, comparing to Diffeomorphic Daz Importer (DDI), DTB is still pretty weak in terms of functionalities...no offense but just the facts after lots of experiments. Then I switched to DDI... You may see the frequency of DDI update on https://bitbucket.org/Diffeomorphic/import_daz/commits/, while DTB has not been updated for a long time... There're quite a lot relevant discussion in Blender sub-forum...

So any DDI relevant issue, pls feel free to name it in here or Blender sub-forum, we may try to help. And the author @ThomasLarsson and @Padone will be both happy to resolve any complex issues...

Here is a quick and dirty documentation of what seems to work for me now to convert G8 clothing with dForce Dynamic Surface Add-On to G9. Some of these steps may be unnecessary, I don't know. Consider this a WIP. I'd be interested in feedback if outher people try it. I realize this is not detailed, like Catherine's tutorials. I just wanted to write this down so I have something to follow the next time I find a garment to convert that has a dForce Dynamic Surface Add-On. I hope it makes sense!

• load G8 garment with addon (Augmentation Flightsuit in my test)
• turn off smoothing
• set res to base
• set subD to 0
• export garment to OBJ
• export addon to OBJ
• delete G8 garment including children (addon and adjustable weight map)
• import garment OBJ
• import addon OBJ
• load G8
• dial in g9 clone
• Transfer Utility G8 CURRENT shape to garment
• Transfer Utility G8 CURRENT shape to addon
• export garment in G9 shape to OBJ
• export addon in G9 shape to OBJ
• Close and restart Daz Studio? or just new scene?
• load G8 garment with addon again (Augmentation Flightsuit in my test)
• set res to base
• set subD to 0
• update garment base geometry vertex positions with garment G9 shape OBJ
• update addon base geometry vertex positions with addon G9 shape OBJ
• load G9
• Transfer Utility G9 Default shape to garment(with appropriate template)
• Transfer Utility garment Default shape to addon
• Set garment res and smoothing modifier back to the G8 garment's settings
• save garment asset
• save addon asset
• fix/add back items that were connected with rigid follow nodes on the G8 garment (buttons, for example)
• save wearable preset with garment, addon and push modifier weight node

crosswind said:

You used DTB to have this imported in Blender ?!  It seems a pure FBX import... Yes, DTB works but strongly recommend Diffeomorphic Daz Importer.

Hi Crosswind, thank you for your response. I appreciate your suggestion.

Yes I used the Bridge designed to import from Daz to Blender, provided by Daz to import from Daz to Blender. I'm not sure why you included the "?!" like this is a surprising thing to do. I hope that statement doesn't come off as mean spirited, I'm genuinly concerned as there was no indication that the daz to blender bridge would be non functional or that the documentation would be outdated. It leaves an impression that the Daz team is unreliable and damages the trust that I have in them as a company.
I tried the Diffeomorphic Daz Importer that you've suggested and it appears to no longer work either. This is sad, because there's lot of great content on the Daz marketplace, but there's no point in buying any of it if we can't export them and use them in our game. The interactive licenses are quite expensive as well. Usually the liscense is multiple times the cost of the product itself. I'm not sure if the price is justified if using these products are nearly impossible for anyone.
I'm happy to pay these high prices for such quality content, but not if we can't use them.

Thanks Richard, I appreciate your feedback.
I guess it "feels" like waiting for 8 miuntes loading G8. It could actually be a little faster than that.  ;)
But I usually load G8 in less than 20 seconds with project based content subsets.

Still, a CMS database created with a full content library is causing issues when saving with just a content subset library. On three of my systems, so this isn't a unique issue with my setup.
Just what exactly is DS writing metadata wise when saving something? How about having the option to turn that off?
Shutting down CMS sure takes care of that saving issue, and doesn't have a negative impact on the saved files.
Seems like I'm one of the few people using Content Directory Manager to manage content.

OK I get it...Thank you for your answer.
Would it be then more interresting to import it as morph with morph loader pro and use it, for exemple, on G8F ?

There is no 'simple" how to. The only way to get it into Daz Studio is to import as an OBJ, which means it will have no rigging and in order to pose it in Daz Studio, you will have to re-rig it from scratch since blender and DS use two different types of rigging. It will also be a stand alone chartacter which means it won't be able to use any Genesis assets like hair or clothing. The bridge AFAIK only goes from DS to Blender and not the other way around.

crosswind said:

RedSoul said:

When I convert the figure to a prop within Daz, all of the clothing and hair disappear and it's just the naked base model. How do I retain the clothes/hair?

You're not able to convert a figure with fitted wearables to a prop... all the sub-nodes will be removed unless you merge fitted figures geometry. Suggest you export / import obj...

Ah. I got it now. Thanks!

RedSoul said:

When I convert the figure to a prop within Daz, all of the clothing and hair disappear and it's just the naked base model. How do I retain the clothes/hair?

You're not able to convert a figure with fitted wearables to a prop... all the sub-nodes will be removed unless you merge fitted figures geometry. Suggest you export / import obj...

Click on File->Import and in the drop down list in the bottom right hand corner "All Formats" .

Here you can see a list of all file types DS can import. A lot of them are poser formats, but there are others as well, but none of the ones you mentioned.

Are you going to be distributing the metadata? having a file in more than one product shouldn't be an issue - I am aware of Daz store products where PAs have reused certain utilities (e.g. RiverSoftArt code snippets or the Out of touch hair Blending materials) without major problems (and those are generally with Connect installs, when each product has its own copy of the file, if different products have different versions of the file - which i don't think would be a problem here).

Padone said:

1. For the simple rig once it's generated it stays as it is, so no you don't need to reimport.

3. No, you need to clear constraints as usual, unless you do a partial baking for some reason.

Thank you for your reply.

Also I have a question that is not related to the topic.
I noticed that in version 1.7.1 MHX and Rigify added a new option called "Keep DAZ Rig". 

I read this post:https://bitbucket.org/Diffeomorphic/import_daz/issues/1528/ (actually, I don't understand it at all).

Sorry, I'm a newbie to blender, I tried it myself, I really don't understand what it does, should I use it to make animations or import poses to it(I tried it causes an error.)?

Though I'm a blender user, for such a requirement, you don't need to export the figure (with pose, wearbles, etc.) to blender as there'll be more work.... You just export the figure with all wearables to an obj file and import it back to DS then it's a Prop. Next, you may use Decimator plugin to decrease polygons / resolution as needed. Like the example I attached down below. I tweak it to 40% but maybe you don't really need to decimate it as it depends on what wearable you use on it, etc...

Okay, I'm going to preface this by saying that I am a complete noob when it comes to Blender, even though I've had it on my PC for years.

So anyway, let's say that I wanted to take a figure (Genesis 3/8-based) and import them to Blender, and then use Blender to convert said figure into a single prop with less polygons--pose, clothes, hair, and material settings included--which is then brought back into DAZ to be used in a scene so that it'd hopefully have less overhead when it comes time to render.

What would be the step-by-step way to accomplish that? Or is there a better program out there that could pull this off?