Hope this can help those who wonder how Actors, Shapes, Characters, People, Morphs, Mats, Presets re

Eric Lagel

I've been trying to put my mind around it, and this is the extent of my knowledge. Corrections welcome if I missed a point.

From the most to the least complete:

---- Actual files:

- Actor (.duf): A complete, independent character, including final shape and skin. Ready to use, in other words, what I would expect every character I purchase on the store to be. The icons for these have a blue "Actor" in the top corner. It is to note that Actors are identified as "character" file type when hovering over them, but I'll keep naming them Actors. It is possible to save your own actors using the "Save as character preset" option. This will actually create an Actor that can be directly dragged into the scene.

Genesis, Victoria 5 and Michael 5 are installed as Actors, and can be dragged directly into the scene to start working on them (even though Genesis presents little interest with its grey skin). Tori and Gabi are installed as actors, but also provide a Shape/Morph file

- Character/Preset (.dsb): A Preset that can be applied to an actor, including Shapes/Morphs and Materials/skin. Applying this item on an actor will modify its shape and its material to the target character. The icons for these have a yellow "Character" in the top corner.

Riley is installed as an actor, but also has a character preset

- Shapes/Morphs (.duf, .dsa): 2 names that define the same thing: a series of adjustments made on a base actor that transforms the shape of an actor into another character. Without a base character, they are nothing. This makes crucial to understand on which actors they need to be applied as the settings will have to have a reference. The icons for these have a yellow "Shape" in the top corner. It is important to note that Shapes and Morphs only affect the physical shape of the target Actor, but not its skin. The files are often containing the INJ or Apply words. There are often their counterparts in the same folder, with a greyed out icon and REM or OFF. These morphs allow to remove the changes made by applying the INJ Morph.

Benjamin, Candace, James, and a huge numbers of characters made by the community are installed as Morphs based on a specific actor, usually Genesis, Michael 5 or Victoria 5.

- Materials/Skin (.dsa): These can be applied on any actor corresponding to the intended shape. Ideally, they should be applied after the Shapes/Morphs have been applied, but if the shape of the actor is not too far off from the intended shape, it usually works fine (at least in my eyes). These can be affecting the appearance of the actor at various degrees: either the entire body texture, or only the head, up to the detail of nails, eyes and mouth make-up.

The characters that come as Shapes or Morph usually have a Skin/Material file associated with them.

--- Categories:

- Figures: Just a subcategory in the Smart Content and Content Library where Actors are classified. But the Figures Content Library can contain many more different things than actors.

- Characters: A subcategory of the Genesis folder within the People folder where actors can be found, and also parent of other character morphs.

- Presets: A subcategory under the DAZ3D root folder, where your hand-made actors will be stored if you save them.

- People: A main category in the main Poser and DAZ3D libraries where most of the assets related to actors can be found.

With this knowledge, I am now in the process of recreating all of the characters, and saving them as actors to be able to use them easily.

Hope this helps!

Szark

This might help further explain the different file/format extenstions http://docs.daz3d.com/doku.php/public/software/dazstudio/4/referenceguide/tech_articles/file_extensions/start

Eric Lagel

Ah yes, thanks. I actually forgot to mention the infamous .cr2 format. Which apparently is the only way to make Victoria 4.2 appear in your scene.

JimmyC_2009

eric.lagel said:

Ah yes, thanks. I actually forgot to mention the infamous .cr2 format. Which apparently is the only way to make Victoria 4.2 appear in your scene.

All DAZ 3D characters prior to Genesis, were in Poser format only. There has always been a Runtime folder either in the Content folder (DS3) or the My Library folder (DS4) for the purpose of holding Poser content.

The Base V4 figure has several morphs, A4, SF4, S4 and The Girl 4 to name a few. They rely on the V4 base being installed, and they need to be installed into the same Runtime folder as V4.

M4 is similar, H4 and Freak 4 are morphs of M4 and need the M4 base to be installed first..

Chohole

I edited your thread title slightly, as it was too long and was breaking the forum formatting. :)