Daz3D - some starting questions

Tbdannydaz

Hi all, I'm looking to use Daz3D to produce a fantasy series, but I'm not quite sure if it's what I'm after. To this end, I have a few questions: - How easy is it to create scaled characters? Specifically, I'm planning to have fairies about 1 foot high. - Am I able to import props from Blender? - How easy is it to create custom terrain and populate it with trees, etc? - Is lip sync available under the version for Windows 8.1? - Can I create custom gestures, clothing, etc? I have had some experience using Blender.

murgatroyd314

Creating scaled characters is very, very easy. Just adjust the Scale parameter. Someone else will have to answer the rest.

sriesch

scaling: super easy, just change the scale parameter.

custom terrain: DS isn't designed to create terrain.  You can use deforms, but that would be very difficult.  You could use displacement on a plane, but of course you are doing all the work in your image editor or finding height maps.  You can import a terrain from Bryce if you have Bryce, which is good at making terrains, but the material will not translate well.  If you choose the Bryce route, I can provide more detail.

Populating your terrain with trees: there are some scripts available that I have not experimented much with that you want to research.  http://www.daz3d.com/infinito-1-0 , http://www.daz3d.com/ultrascatter-advanced-instancing-for-daz-studio , http://www.daz3d.com/instances-plus-for-daz-studio . And of course you can do it manually.

custom gestures: Depends on the figure, but the common popular human figures all have joints that can be adjusted to pose them as you see fit.  The older figures at least may not look good with certain more extreme poses, newer figures I assume are better although I haven't tried them.   Not sure about animation.

custom clothing: you would need a separate modeling application to create new clothing from scrach.  You can use shaders or modify or create new materials for existing clothing in Photoshop, the effort involved ranges greatly depending on what you are trying to do.  Sometimes you can mix and match clothing items to create new outfits, but you have to worry about things poking through other things.

Unsure about the other items, others will have to answer those.

dracorn

Character Scale:

I use Measure Metrics to help me define the proper height and measurements for characters.  Scale is great, but Measure Metrics allows you to create characters to a specific height, i.e., 5'9" or 6'8".  You can change from English to Metric. 

http://www.daz3d.com/measure-metrics-for-daz-studio

I add the measure metric to the character, and then scale up/down based on the measurement.  I will increase in the Shaping tap as well as Scale - you can make parts longer like neck, torso, legs and arms.  You can also get specific body measurements, like a 36 24 36 or a bodybuilder with a 40 inch chest. 

Great product.

Terrain:

Even though Daz Studio isn't designed for terrain like Bryce, you can use TerraDome 3, which is like Bryce lite for Daz Studio. 

http://www.daz3d.com/terradome-3-iray

timmins.william ​did some experimentation with converting the materials to 3Delight starting on the following page:

http://www.daz3d.com/forums/discussion/108916/terradome3-not-a-rumor-anymore-live-in-store-whoot/p9

barbult

One thing to keep in mind when scaling a character is that bump/displacement/normal/shadow bias/AoA Shader settings, which were configured for a full size character, may look incorrect when the character is scaled way down. You will probably have to adjust those settings.