I could understand, what you plan,, but I could not figure out,, about your detail step (what is the problem at current,, though I do not know you can finish your plan,, with  curernt direciton)

I know,,  make catapila or manifacture watch belts,, by rigging  is actually difficult in daz studio, without more complex ERC type offered,, them maybe script can work for such purpose.

anyway,,  "But the morph is not copied to the parented props"  means,, you expect,,  morph parent obj, then it link with child obj morph?  If it is just parented,, you can not save it as Figure or prop.

you can only keep ERC link,, as the scene,, (that means, when you load the prop, it lost link,, it only keep link about current scene I think)

But,, I really can not understand clear,, your plan detail  ^^;   (though it is interesting,, but I may not plan those type rigs, in daz studio,, may plan with another 3d aprication, which offere more

physics tool eg,, i clone,, or blender and driver,, or Carrara may work (with add on may need,, I do not knnow)

Ok, I've done some testing and I have to say it is a nice product. Its value is in its utility, as it covers multiple generations of figures. And it is those old figures that really benefit from this product. After all, Genesis 3 figures are pretty much optimized (IMO) for Iray already. All you really need are good lights to take advantage of Genesis 3 most of the time (again, my opinion.) But for all figures that predate Iray, this very different. Converting those old characters for V/M4, G1 and G2 to iray is often a pain. However, this is not the only product out there that can convert such a figure to Iray. I also have Iray Smart Converter for several generations of figures, and I love that product! So the question is simple, how do they compare?

Lets find out!

First off, out of the box, one key feature difference between NGS and ISC is that ISC has a feature called "Geocraft Transfer" that allows you to transfer the settings you make in ICS to other geometries...like geneitals. Unfortunately, NGS does not have any option for this. Yo must do it manually. Overall, ICS has a better menu set up, it is very easy to read and understand, and it offers 6 options up front. You can choose between Caucasian and African, and BOTH of these have 3 different settings to choose from. I like that a lot, and this solves the problem that Serene Night has with pale skin quite easily. But the performance of the product is what matters most. So lets look at a couple of tests.

First up, I tried Belle 6 at a distance. I did nothing special at all. I did exactly this:

Load Belle. Load Cat's Meow Hair. Load Basic Clothes. Select ISC or NGS, and then hit render. Extremely simple. Also, this first test shall be in Daz 4.8.

First here she is in Daz 4.8 at default settings. Second is ISC, third pic is NGS. For ISC, I chose Caucasian setting #2.

NOTE: On all these images in my posts, if you right click and choose to open in a new window, you can see the full image.

So in Daz 4.8, at default settings, NGS comes out a bit blue. ISC looks real nice. Next up is the 4.9 BETA. This is the previous beta, not te newest one. We'll skip the default Belle.

First up is ISC, the NGS. Again, these are all at default values.

In 4.9 things are closer.It is worth pointing out that ISC will recognize what version of Daz you use, between 4.8 and 4.9, and adjust accordingly. Thise is probably why it looks better in 4.8, as it has a specific setting just for 4.8. The most striking thing is how Belle's side catches the light in NGS, while it is more flat in ICS, even though the lighting is the same. The other big difference is how the light catches the eyes. ICS has a much bigger and softer eye catch reflection than NGS. This can be good or bad depending on your preferences. This time ISC is a bit darker than it is in 4.8.

Lets zoom in. This time I made a change to the hair, using a Twisted Hair color. Otherwise, everything is the same. This time we'll just do 4.9. First ICS, then NGS.

This time I have to say I think ICS really shines. Her cheeks look more alive. So IMO, Round 1 goes to ICS. But Belle is kind of a unique skin, lets look at something totally different. And while I give the nod on this test to ISC, we have to remember both products have options to adjust things.

To keep this post from becoming too huge, the next test will be another post.

I'm wondering if any folks use or has used Carrara Enhanced Remote Control.  Will it my help me once I start learning and animating in Carrara.
 

I do know what Bryce is, and how it differs from Carrara.  But the specific differences between the two has nothing to do with my general point.

Actually it does,. it's the specific differences between these programs which are the reason for the different levels of content available to each application, and why both Bryce and Carrara have lower levels of products avaliable than daz studio.

Actually, it doesn't.  We are simply talking past each other.

As a longtime 3d user, and insider into the workings of Carrara, you have developed a strong opinion about why Carrara is not promoted by Daz in general:  it is a content creation software and Daz is more interested in selling content.

I'm sure there is some truth to this.  My first, most general point is, I don't think it is the whole truth.  Carrara users are in a unique position.  Carrara users can also easily USE Daz content, more than most other 3D content creation programs.  People like Dart and myself actually enjoy buying Daz content for use in Carrara.  Are we the only Carrara users who buy content?  Of course not.  There is a complaint thread on this forum where dozens of Carrara users have reported on the stunningly large amount of content they have purchased from Daz over the years.  Carrara users have the choice to use content, or to make content.  The evidence points to the fact that Carrara users in general buy an impressive amount of content.  So the idea that Daz neglects Carrara development because its users only create content, and do not buy it, is seemingly a sterotype that has some obvious limits.  That is my general point.

The second general point, was that Daz has made almost no investment in Carrara-specific content, indicating to me a lack of corporate support.  I brought up Bryce, not to quibble about how it is specifically different from Carrara, but because it too is a content creation software, and also neglected by Daz.  I also understand that both programs have less Daz Original products available to them than does Studio.  But the degree of difference surprised me very much.  Further, I would have suspected that Bryce would have less corporate support than Carrara - in terms of DO products - but the reverse was true.  That was my other general point.

Daz studio, and Poser depend entirely upon using models created for use in those programs.

they're shipped with a bunch of Content to get you up and running, and a catalogue of content available to purchase.

There are no tools to alow the user to model your own content from scratch in those programs.

I have to disagree.  I contacted and worked with a guy several years ago, a PA, who created all his products in Studio. It's not as friendly as Carrara, but a lot can be done there.

Daz Studio was developed by Daz3D,. it's their own product,.  as such it receives a lot of love and attention.

before developing Daz Studio, Daz3D was a business which sold "content" for use in Poser. and still is.

 

Bryce is a Landscape generation tool,.  It's sold as software to create landscapes.  that's always been It's primary role.

Daz3d purchased this program several years ago,. they didn't originally develop it.

a few years ago,.a "bridge" was developed,. a software transfer of data from Studio, into a scene in Bryce.

This offered Daz Studio users,. the option to purchase Bryce,.   to allow them to place a figure from daz studio,. into a Bryce landscape.

Carrara is a suite of tools which include some landscape and environment features, (like Bryce). but also includes the ability to load and use content from Poser or Daz Studio,. or allow the user to create their own models,  or landscapes, or plants,. or whatever they feel like making.

it also includes dynamic hair,. particle systems, forces, and physics.

Like Bryce,. Carrara was also purchased by Daz3D,.

I know all this, but it is probably good for readers here who don't   I am very new to Carrara, but have been with Studio - off and on - since 2007.  I own Bryce and Hex, but have not used them.

The different Features, or capabilities of each program, dictate what levels of prebuilt content their users would need.

If the program is sold to people who want to create unique 3D worlds, fill them with unique characters,. animate those characters,  or use their imagination to create something which didn't exist yesterday,. then it's less likely that those people would be demanding to purchase a lot of premade content.

Less likely, yes, but not to the degree of current lack of Daz support in the marketplace.

so, why don't they all use carrara ? ,. I think the simple answer is that they're quite happy doing what they're doing in DS, and they don't need any other features.

until they want to go further, and realise that they need features which Studio, or Poser doesn't have,. then they'll look at other 3D programs including Carrara.

I've heard others express similar reasonable-sounding thoughts.  It certainly sounds logical, almost like a "natural order of things."   But my own investigation into Carrara has caused me to question this conclusion.  I think that users are less happy with Studio than you think, and are more than willing to stretch their boundaries if Carrara can be made friendly enough.  I also expect few here to agree with me.  All I know is, the status quo is not going to be kind to Carrara.  Either something changes, or it could easily go the way of the Amiga.  That's my sole motivation in getting involved in these kind of discussions.

sorry for the long explanation,. but you're constantly comparing things which aren't really comparable, and it's difficult to simply explain what the differences are and why different softwares would have different users , with different goals, and different levels of demand for premade content.

I appreciate that you care about my progress, and want to set me straight!

:sigh: Another morph question. Michael 4's feet are not as nice as they could be no matter what I do with them. There is a product that helps called Perfect Toes for V4, M4 and Genesis, however as the same morphs must be injected no matter if it's Mike or Vicky I'm not sure if it qualifies. If not, does anybody know where I can find feet fixes for Michael 4? The only ones I've found so far are all for Victoria and even though they do work on M4 I'm thinking they're also not suitable for this contest.

I'm not familiar with that particular product.  However, if the same morphs are used for all figures, I would consider those morphs to be more gender neutral.  I don't see any reason to disqualify an image using such gender neutral morphs.

:sigh: Another morph question. Michael 4's feet are not as nice as they could be no matter what I do with them. There is a product that helps called Perfect Toes for V4, M4 and Genesis, however as the same morphs must be injected no matter if it's Mike or Vicky I'm not sure if it qualifies. If not, does anybody know where I can find feet fixes for Michael 4? The only ones I've found so far are all for Victoria and even though they do work on M4 I'm thinking they're also not suitable for this contest.

pm the PA, or pm Sabby, Fred and Second Circle if they don't answer here.

I seem to recall seeing a character with a lot of that effects, freckles etc; I forget if here or there. But it is in the last couple or so weeks; it's always possible is a customer morph of a character too, which makes it harder to find, if so.

I do know what Bryce is, and how it differs from Carrara.  But the specific differences between the two has nothing to do with my general point.

Actually it does,. it's the specific differences between these programs which are the reason for the different levels of content available to each application, and why both Bryce and Carrara have lower levels of products avaliable than daz studio.

each program is capable of doing different things.

Hopefully the user is aware of the features of each, and those form the decision to purchase that specific product,. before they actually make that purchase.

Daz studio, and Poser depend entirely upon using models created for use in those programs.

they're shipped with a bunch of Content to get you up and running, and a catalogue of content available to purchase.

There are no tools to alow the user to model your own content from scratch in those programs.

Daz Studio was developed by Daz3D,. it's their own product,.  as such it receives a lot of love and attention.

before developing Daz Studio, Daz3D was a business which sold "content" for use in Poser. and still is.

Bryce is a Landscape generation tool,.  It's sold as software to create landscapes.  that's always been It's primary role.

Daz3d purchased this program several years ago,. they didn't originally develop it.

a few years ago,.a "bridge" was developed,. a software transfer of data from Studio, into a scene in Bryce.

This offered Daz Studio users,. the option to purchase Bryce,.   to allow them to place a figure from daz studio,. into a Bryce landscape.

Carrara is a suite of tools which include some landscape and environment features, (like Bryce). but also includes the ability to load and use content from Poser or Daz Studio,. or allow the user to create their own models,  or landscapes, or plants,. or whatever they feel like making.

it also includes dynamic hair,. particle systems, forces, and physics.

Like Bryce,. Carrara was also purchased by Daz3D,.

The different Features, or capabilities of each program, dictate what levels of prebuilt content their users would need.

If the program is sold to people who want to create unique 3D worlds, fill them with unique characters,. animate those characters,  or use their imagination to create something which didn't exist yesterday,. then it's less likely that those people would be demanding to purchase a lot of premade content.

If the program is sold specifically to allow the user to create unique landscapes and environments,. it's also less likely that they would have a huge demand for premade content.

If the program is sold to only allow the user to load and pose premade models, and render an image of that,. then there is a high likelyhood of those users purchasing more premade content.

I'm not saying that purchasing premade content is bad, or wrong,. ..it can make many things easier and faster to achieve.

i'm trying to explain why different programs would have different levels of premade content available for them.

My point was that many more Bryce-specific products are OFFERED by Daz than are Carrara products.  And they are more interesting products.

  And the point was made to specifically counter the argument that Daz doesn't OFFER Carrara products because it is a content creation package.

Your saying that more Bryce items are available than Carrara items ,.  I'd expect that to be the case,. and the main reason is becuase of what Carrara was built to do,. Allow the user complete creative freedom.

why is the largest amount of items available in the store, for Daz Studio and Poser ?

could it be that the users simply want to make an image quickly, with the least effort and as little though as possible.

do you think that Daz Studio is free, to help people,. or is it a strategy designed to drive sales.

DS users, can already use most of their DS content,. directly in Carrara,. the same applies to Poser users.

so, why don't they all use carrara ? ,. I think the simple answer is that they're quite happy doing what they're doing in DS, and they don't need any other features.

until they want to go further, and realise that they need features which Studio, or Poser doesn't have,. then they'll look at other 3D programs including Carrara.

sorry for the long explanation,. but you're constantly comparing things which aren't really comparable, and it's difficult to simply explain what the differences are and why different softwares would have different users , with different goals, and different levels of demand for premade content.

I hope that clarifies some stuff, and makes some sense. :)

I see that there are no news ( more than 1 year ago ) about something to make the roll movement of chain links. There are scripts but for tracks as a simple prop. But not for independent links.

Now the idea is to use a main prop ( the middle object in the attached figure ) as a map that will be changed using morphs for each link step in the advance. And each link of the tracks, as parented objects could follow their nearest point of the main prop repeating the move. Is a lot of work ( so many morphs as steps of a full cycle ) but could run. The idea is to reduce the work of move each link, moving ( morphing ) only 1 prop ( the main map of moment for all links ) and let that the links follow that. And in fact went well but in part.

The problem is that having this in the DAZ Studio, ( links parented to the plain main object ) I can pass the main object morphed for the first step. But the morph is not copied to the parented props. Only in 1 case I passed the morph to all the objects ( I don't know why not now ) but in that case the morph passed to the main object right, but bad to the parented objects. This is... 1 morph in the main, and 5 different morphs in the parented objects. What am i doing bad or what am i missing ? Thanks.

Javier

It is well known artists have a certain style and that's reflected in their work. That is why so many characters seem to have the same look to people even those not paired as Girl 7 & Guy 7 are. To get away from that one will have to treat the models they make of characters not as art but as technically precise models of people. Then you will see the more of a natural looking variance in new DAZ 3D characters. 

I used the Morph Packs and FaceGen Pro to completely hide that a character was G3M as Guy 7 looked too much like Girl 7, they could be brother or sister or distant relatives but you'd say they were both from the same region of the world (same region of the Old World, that effect is largely disappeared in the New World) for sure. I, for one, was glad Guy 7 looked like Girl 7 ethnically or as a sibling or relative.

I will buy these ethnicity morphs packs or use that functionality via FaceGen Pro 1.9. You can get around the problem easily the same way just spend a bit of money and time doing it.

It doesn't make any difference what shape is applied when you AutoFit - it just fits to the base figure, then applies an auto-generated morph (which is created dyanmically, so it isn't stored with the asset).

cool and truly artistic works here showing how multipurpose this 3d tool can be

w.i.p. yet another skin test on Achilles, a G3M morph by Linday

I don't suppose you could let me know if this preset comes with separate HD morphs, or do you have to apply the entire character shape for the HD morphs? Ta.

It seems to me that the "HD" part might be in the morphs. I did a side by side of the Narkissa character next to just the base Genesis 3 female with the morphs added to her and the mats added to her, and it looks pretty much the same to me. 

The one on the right is Narkissa the one of the left is base Genesis 3 female with the Narkissa morph and skin loaded on her. 

To me they look pretty much the same. It MIGHT be my imagination but there MIGHT be slightly more detail to the Narkissa character, but it's hard to tell if that's true or just my brain telling me that because I know it's Narkissa on the right. lol 

Try uppingthe sub-d. I found that to make a difference. And there is a tiny bit of difference, as you say.

I opened this thread in January, now we are in November and the situation is not changed, rather is become ridiculous...

I understand that publishers need to sell what the market ask for, but practically you can create the same characters just morphing a bit the basic G3F...
I know is supposed to reproduce good looking (mostly caucasic) women but c'mon, take a day off, do a walk around and have a look at how many gorgeous women exist without the somatic of basic V7/G3F! 

Fortunately when you feel that you're not getting what you need, then you use the morph packs to make what you need. I'll disagree with youf assessment, since there are a few different characters in the store now. Most times when people create these threads, they are just looking at DAZ originals, I would actually start looking at the PA items and also look at the store with more frequency as most times you will take time off and miss those unique characters and they get buried in the store. But you're going to have a hard time telling PAs to make things that don't cover their costs; so maybe you're at the point to start making things yourself. That's how I got started. 

Just a suggestion.

The expert (my wife, the OB nurse) pegged the age at between 3 and 9 months.  I did have an even younger morph to go with it, but like the skin texture it hasn't been able to be recovered.

Sorry, I have a question... Could the contest hosts please clarify the "no female morphs" rule for the case of the originlal Genesis? // because if I do enter, I will most likely use this figure //

For instance, I have a number of MR morph kits, like those by Thorneworks here in the store. Does this rule mean I can dial in morphs from this one:

http://www.daz3d.com/genesis-body-morph-resource-kit-2

- but not this one? http://www.daz3d.com/genesis-head-morph-resource-kit-1

I don't see a problem with the first one as they are all male morphs.  The second one might be a little dodgier as they are specifically V4 morphs for Genesis even though they are just facial morphs.  It would be better if you can manage to stick with just the male morphs.

Not really...but...I'll package up what I have and post it.

I was going to make a skin texture for what I was doing but lost most of work files to a hard drive crash.   The morph files were fine and are just sitting here.  I'll see if I can get it packed up tonight.

I don't suppose you could let me know if this preset comes with separate HD morphs, or do you have to apply the entire character shape for the HD morphs? Ta.

It seems to me that the "HD" part might be in the morphs. I did a side by side of the Narkissa character next to just the base Genesis 3 female with the morphs added to her and the mats added to her, and it looks pretty much the same to me. 

The one on the right is Narkissa the one of the left is base Genesis 3 female with the Narkissa morph and skin loaded on her. 

To me they look pretty much the same. It MIGHT be my imagination but there MIGHT be slightly more detail to the Narkissa character, but it's hard to tell if that's true or just my brain telling me that because I know it's Narkissa on the right. lol 

@mmoir Nice haloween animations. So this was a group effort from people that got together in the carrara forum? cool.

I really like the wind blowing trees and leaves in the spooky night animation. very cool effects. I actually have Carrara and was originally going to use it but the only thing I have actually really used it for was to make a pair of shoes made for genesis 3 fit Hiro 3 and to make a hair morph. and export to Poser. Keep em coming!

@mindsong thanks. I actually licensed the song at the end from someone else because I thought it really fit in with the theme. IE 90's buffy or Charmed style show but animated.