Honestly? if you gave me a pair of 6 inch heels and a pair of those stupid "ballet flat" things and told me we'd be walking for the next 4 hours, I'd take the heels, at least with the heels it would take 3 hours before they really started to hurt with all those stupid flats it takes about 10 minutes. 4 inch heels and my feet will be fine all day

 

(Seriously for some reason every single shoe company has decided that, to make up for the shoes being flat, they have to be extra narrow and all cut across the widest part of the foot)

 

I'm not claiming heels are great, just that flats are perfectly capable of sucking far more. Did you realize most flats have pretty much no padding? because they mostly don't which is something you quickly realize when you have a gravel driveway.

 

In conclusion, flats were created by the devil to give me blisters and make the back of my ankle bleed. Down with flats.

I used to do a whole lot of walking in my last job, which I held for 15 years. I did Contract Services for The Royal Parks in Central London and Outer London, so could find myself walking on a variety of surfaces.  As I was management level it was a business suit.  I settled for around 1½ - 2" heels,  not too thin. they were the best for me. Kitten heels when it was  business suits with a skirt, sometimes chunkier heels if I wore a trouser suit..

It's not just DS outfits that wouldn't work in real life. I was happily rendering the Regency Cottage as part of a period piece until I noticed that it didn't have a chimney. In the days before gas central heating, I can only imagine Regency Vicky kept warm by snuggling up to Regency Mike, and that she ran round on high heels so that he could catch her more easily!

..well the biggest Powerball (1.6$ billion) is history. there were three winning tickets one in California one in Tennessee and one in Florida.

I don't know, but it seems that whenever we get a large jackpot, more often than not the winning ticket tends to be from Florida. I'm beginning to wonder about this. True, Central Florida is known as Lightning Alley but I don't recall any history of meteor strikes there (the most recent occurred in west central Russia but no winning ticket there yet) and I haven't heard of any resident of the "Sunshine State" drowning in their dog's water bowl (though Miami has seen more frequent flooding as of late).

California I can understand as it's a large and heavily populated state. But why seemingly always Florida? Why not New York, Pennsylvania, Texas, or Illinois (or crikey, even here in Oregon, we could use some "Powerball Love" here too).

...The Why Does Someone in Florida Always Keep Winning My Powerball Complaint Thread?

Hello Everyone,

I'm currently using: Daz Studio 4.8 Pro on Windows 10 and iPiSoft's Mocap Studio 3.2.5.193 without the Biomech license.

I've setup a single camera Kinect 2 system to record mocap thru the iPiSoft products and then save them to a .BVH file format.  Which I'm currently trying to import onto a model within Daz Studio.  From a T position I've recorded data where I bend my elbow 90 degrees upward into a wave and back to T position with one arm, then lift each leg in a stationary walking action twice, followed by a second wave with the opposite arm.  Daz Studio is showing the leg movements very nicely, but the wave actions are barely moving the hands and showing no arm adjustments.

The import process seems clear cut enough.  On a Genesis 3 model (Michael)  I've expanded the details screen for the BVH Importer Options. and compared the file nodes to the figure nodes.  Here are the comparisons:

LowerSpine = Abdomen Lower

MiddleSpine = Abdomen Upper

Chest = Chest Upper

RClavicle = Right Collar

RShoulder = Right Shoulder Twist (I've tried remapping all the following Twist options to the equivalent Bend option with no visible difference)

RForearm = Right Forearm Twist

Rhand = Right Hand

LClavicle - Left Collar

LShoulder = Left Shoulder Twist

LForearm = Left Forearm Twist

LHand = Left Hand

I've left the Scene Animation Setup Options as Adjust Scene to Match the File.  I'm just running the model at the moment, nothing else loaded into the scene.

It did occur to me that perhaps the Genesis 3 model was too advanced (before I looked at the detail maps), so I tried a Genesis 2 model as a control.  It performed a bit better in that it tried to bend the elbow, but it moved the forearm forward instead of upwards.

Any thoughts?  I'll attempt to attach the .BHV file on a follow up post in case anyone wants to test with it.  I do plan to expand my camera system to a dual camera setup in order to get better positional data, but I would like to be able to show a simple demonstration what a single camera system can do to my fellow K-12 staff members next week.

Christopher Waltner

District Network Engineer

West Central School District 49-7

From various Dictionaries

Caucasian   In the racial classification developed by 19th-century anthropologists, Caucasian (or Caucasoid) included peoples whose skin colour ranged from light (in northern Europe) to dark (in parts of North Africa and India).

Caucasian   Relating to one of the traditional divisions of humankind, covering a broad group of peoples from Europe, western Asia, and parts of India and North Africa.

The Caucasian race (also Caucasoid[1] or occasionally Europid[2]) is a taxon historically used to describe the physical or biological type of some or all of the populations of Europe, North Africa, the Horn of Africa, Western Asia, Central Asia, and South Asia.[3] The term was used in biological anthropology for many people from these regions, without regard necessarily to skin tone.[4] First introduced in early racial science and anthropometry, the taxon has historically been used to denote one of the three proposed major races (Caucasoid, Mongoloid, Negroid) of humankind.[5] Although its validity and utility are disputed by many anthropologists, Caucasoid as a biological classification remains in use,[6] particularly within the field of forensic anthropology.[5]

Even within the Caucasian grouping there's a lack when it comes to the DAZ females. Most of them seem to be Scandinavians, Central Europeans and Russians. While there's a distinct lack of Mediterranean, Arabian, Semitian, Persian and Inuites among the whiter girls. We've finally got some Indian looking ones the last years though. (then I'm talking New Delhi, not Lakota, there's no Native Americans available.)

Hi mostly anonymous viewers :-)

I'm thinking of starting a service where I e-mail my cartoons out every morning - in my time zone (CAT = Central African Time) = GMT +2.  These would be the mobile-friendly version and they'd be in a format that you could forward them to other people (for those that actually know people ... ).  Anyway it would be using a service that has an automatic subscribe / unsubscribe function.  If you'd rather read them in that format the sign-up is here: http://www.outerspacetv.com/subscribe.html

Thanks for looking.

Hi. When I saw your question last night I assumed you meant backless slippers.

I've been searching for Genesis Middle Eastern/Central Asian footwear for about 6 weeks.

The only 3 slipper/soft shoes with curly toes I've found are:

https://www.daz3d.com/princess-asia

http://www.daz3d.com/just-jokin

https://www.daz3d.com/faerie-mine

grey goop can't be pretty, unless it has sparkles in it?

wanna playyy with carrara skies and animating clouds.

still haz some ravenskull to render,.was thinkin  put the halls around a central courtyard, mebbe merlin's secret garden 

Tone mapping can help, I very often have the ISO between 200 - 400 for interior scenes, but like @evilded777 pointed out above creating some meshlights/softboxes to fill out the lighting can really help out without having to mess too much with tone mapping - the interior scene below has a single 4x2 trough light for the corridor from IG Iray Lights and Shaders - Architectural Lights, 2 scounces in the room from an iRay lighting props pack, a central ceiling light from the iRay Architectural Lighting rig and a HDRI from Skies of iRadiance - Night Sky HDRIs for Iray (set to 0.26 intensity) for light from the (unable to see them!) windows. I was pleasantly surprised at how the lighting turned out as I was happy with the setup I just let my lighting test render run to this result.

Actually, its for a series of renders.  I need a top view of the park, to kinda show the fullness of the park. Then i need a more concentrated side view to show a side perspective of the first.  Then i need a even more concentrated view like a walkway path.  I think i can "cheat" and just use an image of the first, since its primarily just an overhead, setup shot, but i need a set to duplicate the other two scenes.  The last scene is the most involved and will include a number of figures and props.  I was hoping i could acomplish this with one set.  All of which happens at night time.
Blooming Alley is a very nice set and very comparative to some other images Ive seen of Central Park, but it doesnt quite fit the bill for what i need.

Based on the first reference photo you shared, you may want to consider looking into http://www.daz3d.com/kaleidoscope to help flesh out whatever set of distance-viewed trees and greenery you wish to use. Kaleidoscope is one of those tools that has a bit of a learning curve but will save you from doing a lot of tedious instancing and postwork yourself. I've never tried it with animation but it works well for stills.

Unfortunately, I don't know of any single set that can do all that you'd want to capture in the other two reference photos. An enterprising vendor might take notice of this and eventually put out a product based on large public parks such as Boston Common and Central Park but in the short term it looks like kitbashing is in order.

Im trying a number of ideas to pull this off.  Maybe even scaling back some of the original scenes i planned and changing it up a little.  This is for a 5-6 panel scene and purchasing multiple sets for such a small set of renders i think is becoming impractical.  Im hoping i could pull off the distance scenes with a little postwork with existing images and props; and just worry about the ground scene with what I have, or free ground plane props and add some trees, maybe a background (maybe both) and call it a day.
-MJ

.

Unfortunately, I don't know of any single set that can do all that you'd want to capture in the other two reference photos. An enterprising vendor might take notice of this and eventually put out a product based on large public parks such as Boston Common and Central Park but in the short term it looks like kitbashing is in order.

 

And if they do the price may be very costly.

At least one vendor has made such a set but the price is astronomical: http://www.turbosquid.com/3d-models/manhattan-district-block01-3d-max/988862

Actually, its for a series of renders.  I need a top view of the park, to kinda show the fullness of the park. Then i need a more concentrated side view to show a side perspective of the first.  Then i need a even more concentrated view like a walkway path.  I think i can "cheat" and just use an image of the first, since its primarily just an overhead, setup shot, but i need a set to duplicate the other two scenes.  The last scene is the most involved and will include a number of figures and props.  I was hoping i could acomplish this with one set.  All of which happens at night time.
Blooming Alley is a very nice set and very comparative to some other images Ive seen of Central Park, but it doesnt quite fit the bill for what i need.

Based on the first reference photo you shared, you may want to consider looking into http://www.daz3d.com/kaleidoscope to help flesh out whatever set of distance-viewed trees and greenery you wish to use. Kaleidoscope is one of those tools that has a bit of a learning curve but will save you from doing a lot of tedious instancing and postwork yourself. I've never tried it with animation but it works well for stills.

Unfortunately, I don't know of any single set that can do all that you'd want to capture in the other two reference photos. An enterprising vendor might take notice of this and eventually put out a product based on large public parks such as Boston Common and Central Park but in the short term it looks like kitbashing is in order.

Actually, its for a series of renders.  I need a top view of the park, to kinda show the fullness of the park. Then i need a more concentrated side view to show a side perspective of the first.  Then i need a even more concentrated view like a walkway path.  I think i can "cheat" and just use an image of the first, since its primarily just an overhead, setup shot, but i need a set to duplicate the other two scenes.  The last scene is the most involved and will include a number of figures and props.  I was hoping i could acomplish this with one set.  All of which happens at night time.
Blooming Alley is a very nice set and very comparative to some other images Ive seen of Central Park, but it doesnt quite fit the bill for what i need.

What type of render do you want to do? A panoramic or something up-close? For up close, I recommend Blooming Alley as Charlie Judge did. If you're looking for something that really telegraphs "Central Park" to tourists, you'll need to pick up some hansom cab models to go with Millenium Horse as the famous horse-and-buggy sets Central Park apart from other large urban spaces worldwide.

Central Park is also known for its many statues. Most of what is available under "statues" at DAZ and elsewhere are classical-style statues that Central Park does not have many of. You can make your own statues by posing a character of your choice in 19th century formal wear, and then applying a metal shader to make the whole thing look like it's bronze. Most Central Park statues are metal, but if you're looking for a stone look, there are several shader packages available. I personally use http://www.daz3d.com/artist-studio-poses-and-shader-presets whenever I fake a statue, as all its shaders can be used on any character or prop as long as I use 3Delight.

I am looking for a Central Park-like set.  Walkways, park benches, grassy areas, trees, etc. 
Any ideas?
-MJ

I know the freebies aren't supported but are the ones which were discounted at 75 % off covered?  I purchased the Heavy Motorcycle Road Cruiser and DS keeps crashing if it is in the scene when I go to render.  I finally found that out by eliminatiion and have now wasted an afternoon with nothing to show as bike was fairly central to the scene.  Aaaargh.  If it is supported I'll send off a report to DAZ, not that they seem to ever respond to bugs ...

DAZ will most likely build a Linux (Android) version at some point in the future if they want to stay relevant since the mobile market is just ramping up and is already rolling over the desktop market in so many areas. With increased hardware performance and overall developments that are already currently in the works in the mobile platform it's the place to be.

This isn't to say that the desktop market won't be their primary platform for a while now but I'm hoping that someone at DAZ is forward enough to realize that a mobile platform for DAZ content is going to take some development and that sooner is better then later in at least getting their feet wet, even if it (the first version or two) isn't something they end up releasing to the general public. If they do that, then developing for Linux takes on a different cost/benefit ratio. This type of realization will happen for more companies as they jar themselves loose of the traditional paradygm we've all been mired in.

Again, the desktop isn't going away soon, but there is a transition period where a new paradygm becomes dominant and we as a society have stepped into it.

Side note: mobile doesn't mean small screens as we think of it today. New mobile platforms are gearing up to be a central processing system that can attach to various hardware and displays. This is part of the 'paradygm shift' I'm referring to. And yes, desktops will continue to have a hardware advantage over mobile, but as focus switches, that advantage starts to wane (eventually... talking a while in the future,) just as it did for mini computers. While this shift might take 5+ years to be strongly evident across the board, foundations take a while to put in place.

One more relevant point on this is how I've been stressing paradygm shift rather then evolution. We often think of evolution when someone says paradygm shift, but they are very different. With a paradygm shift, there are changes that come that have no relationship to the previous paradygm. New ways of thinking and doing. The most common mistake people make is to think in terms of an evolution when a paradygm shift is going on. By definition, with a paradygm shift, we don't know all of the pieces that are going to be in the final analysis. Everyone is guessing and grabbing. We can't plan the same as with an evolution of technology. What seems to work best is to put a reasonable amount of resources into staying current without overcommiting to technology that is changing faster then quicksand, but we must put some resources into it so we don't get left behind. When the changes come, we need to be prepared to take advantage of them rather the scrambling to come up to speed. At least this is my take after watching this industry for more years then I care to admit (for what that's worth.)

Agreed.

You get those saying the PC is dead, without considering what a PC is; it's a personal computer, and it is very much alive, and even more personal and portable than ever.

IoT (internet of things) will bring so many new ways of doing the same old crap; the securty concerns are scary though; companies are ignoring. Just like IBM did thirty or so years ago.

....quiet day, only 50 emails (instead of 112 or so) this morning. Still a few "contribute to my campaign/our cause now!" ones.  Sheesh one would think there'd be a bit of decorum observed for the holidays.

There was actually a threat of snow for today in the hills around the city, but that has since been cancelled. Doesn't look like a white Christmas through most of the US unless you live in the mountains. 66° in Centerpoint NY, 72° in Austin, good day to have a holiday picnic I guess,  Even in the low 40s in Milwaukee.  In the southeast Santa will need a pontoon boat and his rain gear to make the rounds tonight.

Watch out in East Central Texas this Saturday, Possibility of tornadoes.

...interesting.  In the Iray render settings tab under General. is the render target set to "New Window" or "Direct to File"?. 

New Window.

...as I am using two displays, I cannot replicate the issue.

The render window with the Stop/Resume/Cancel buttons should automatically appear in front of the application window once rendering begins. 

Could you post a few screenshots?

 

And...

Happy Birthday!!!

Dana

 

+1  BIRTHDAY wishes

 

...and thank you. Yep, one more trip around the central main sequence G type stellar primary for me. Another 584,000,000+ miles travelled in the "logbook".

As of today I am eligible for early Social Security Retirement if I so choose, as well as senior discounts on Amtrak.

With every year that passes I would expect my odds to win the Lotto should increase as usually it's only us old buggers who seem to win it.

and many more :)