Features that you could slap yourself for not figuring out sooner.

vrba79

I just figured out that distance lights can be parented to cameras.

...I've been using D|S since Genesis 1 came out...and I'm just now figuring this out.

Anyone else have a similar moment?

DaWaterRat

Better still, you can look through distant and spotlights (select from the camera dropdown) to "see" their position...

nonesuch00

DaWaterRat said:

Better still, you can look through distant and spotlights (select from the camera dropdown) to "see" their position...

Oh, that is nice

Digital Lite Design

Depth Canvases.  :)

xyer0

Digital Lite Design said:

Depth Canvases.  :)

@Digital_Lite_Design could you elaborate please?

Serene Night

When I first started ds I didn't know I could make my own camera. I was constantly frustrated because I would save and the perspective view would be altered and I would spend hours putting perspective back lol!

BlueIrene

Lots of things, especially things I briefly knew once, went 'Oooh!' about and then almost immediately forgot. The one that still niggles me a bit is grappling with the geometry editor, realising it would have solved so many problems when material zones weren't enough for my needs, then giving it up as 'too difficult'. I warily returned to it about a year later only to find that it held no difficulties for me at all. Maybe I was just 'ready' for it by then. I use it all the time now - editing material zones is as quick and simple as editing an e-mail.

Another 'why haven't I been doing this sooner?' thing is adjusting hair when trying to fit it to a figure before parenting. Viewing it in wireframe mode was the best I could come up with to enable me to see what I was doing with the scalp, until the day came (after many months of doing it in this dopey fashion!) when I realised I could select the material zones of everything except the scalp and hide them, quickly adust the hair (the scalp of which is now clearly visible) then bump the opacity of the material zones back up again. D'oh! :)

AlienRenders

You don't need to parent an item to have it fitted on a character. This is necessary for fbx exports where you only want to export the figure and certain items. If an item is parented, it won't repect that item's visibility state if you export the parent figure when exporting to fbx.

If you want to set your own Sun location when using Sun-Sky setting, just move your camera to where you want the Sun to be. This way, you'll get a good view of what angle you're illuminating your scene. Then create a new Null object and select the option to copy the viewport's transforms. Now set that null object as the Sun node in the Environment settings. Move the camera back to its proper location. You can now move the null Sun node later if need be. You can use this technique to position all sorts of things. New cameras, lights, etc. If the option to copy the viewport's transforms isn't there, create a camera or null and parent the new item to it.

Smoothing surfaces in problematic areas can sometimes be done by lowering the smoothing angle instead of increasing the subdivisions. Not sure if it alters rendering times, but it certainly uses less memory.

 

zombietaggerung

AlienRenders said:

You don't need to parent an item to have it fitted on a character. This is necessary for fbx exports where you only want to export the figure and certain items. If an item is parented, it won't repect that item's visibility state if you export the parent figure when exporting to fbx.

If you want to set your own Sun location when using Sun-Sky setting, just move your camera to where you want the Sun to be. This way, you'll get a good view of what angle you're illuminating your scene. Then create a new Null object and select the option to copy the viewport's transforms. Now set that null object as the Sun node in the Environment settings. Move the camera back to its proper location. You can now move the null Sun node later if need be. You can use this technique to position all sorts of things. New cameras, lights, etc. If the option to copy the viewport's transforms isn't there, create a camera or null and parent the new item to it.

Smoothing surfaces in problematic areas can sometimes be done by lowering the smoothing angle instead of increasing the subdivisions. Not sure if it alters rendering times, but it certainly uses less memory.

 

I had no idea you could do this with the Sun/Sky. This is BRILLIANT! 

Seven193

You can hide lights and entire characters with groups.

Create -> New Group.
Parent character/light to group.
Hide the group, and everything under it disappears.  No need to uncheck a dozen checkmarks to do it.

nicstt

Local Camera Dimensions.

Cameras > Dimensions > Use Local Demensions.

Great for producing a smaller (or larger) render resolution than the scene is set for.

F3

Customise Daz Studio

I use it most often for customising the scripts menu.

F3 > Menus Tab > click the Main Menu then Scripts plus (+) symbol.

Oso3D

That reminds me... can someone explain what smoothing angle is/does?

 

BlueIrene

I have been wishing for ages that there was a way to bring more order to my chaotic scripts menu! Sorted - thank you :)

nicstt said:

F3

Customise Daz Studio

I use it most often for customising the scripts menu.

F3 > Menus Tab > click the Main Menu then Scripts plus (+) symbol.

 

nicstt

timmins.william said:

That reminds me... can someone explain what smoothing angle is/does?

 

What Will said /nod

 

Astracadia said:

I have been wishing for ages that there was a way to bring more order to my chaotic scripts menu! Sorted - thank you :)

nicstt said:

F3

Customise Daz Studio

I use it most often for customising the scripts menu.

F3 > Menus Tab > click the Main Menu then Scripts plus (+) symbol.

 

Welcome. I'll pass your thanks on to Richard; he responded to a post I'd made. :)

FSMCDesigns

Discovering custom actions (right click on the item and it goes to the scripts drop down for quick access) was a huge time saver for me with items I use often. Can't imagine not using it now.

j cade

timmins.william said:

That reminds me... can someone explain what smoothing angle is/does?

 

Ooh lets see if I can explain this semi-intelligibly.

First thing: It might help to think of smoothing as faking subdivision

 

 

The difference between smoothing on/off is easier to explain.

Smoothing off will make meshes look faceted, every edge is hard, very evident corners between every mesh (think of tour mesh in wireframe mode imaging all those lines as sharp), It can be useful for doing things like gemstones very low poly.

Smoothing on and angle set to 0 tells the render engine "nope it doesn't matter what the mesh looks like try and pretend its smooth" of course since this is an approximation if you have a very low poly mesh with sharp angles and smoothing all the way on you can run into artifacts.

Smoothing angle tells the engine at what point to pretend the mesh is smooth. If its set to 0 than everything is smoothed If its set to 89 (the default) than the engine will treat any faces that come together in a right angle or smaller as hard edges and any obtuse angles as smooth.

 

and because a picture is worth a thousand words:

Faceted

Smooth although this low poly you get some weirdness,note the silhouette , and shadow terminator problem

L'Adair

I just learned a new one today, watching a video by Sickleyield.

In the sene tab, if you select multiple bones that move in the same direction, (for example the left and right foot bones of a figure,) then in the parameters tab, also select the same, you can move them at the same time.

I've been using the Geometry Editor for maybe a year, and I only just discovered Selection Sets. Now if something is only temporary, I assign it to a set and I don't mess up the surfaces!

Singular Blues

Daz Script.

L'Adair

Singular Blues said:

Daz Script.

RGcincy

I recently discovered push modifiers - very handy to make large/small changes to geometry

Chanteur-de-Vent

Used to think DOF was something only Octane users could use, until someone explained how to use it in DAZ. 

Ruphuss

nice thread

mcorr

forget what it's called, but it's a node, decal or something where you can -- for example -- make a wall in a room invisible and then with a camera outside the room look inside the room without the outside lighting affecting how the camera captures how you set up the lighting in the room. this can be very useful when you are backing up a camera into a wall and can only get the field of view you want by locating the camera outside the room.

Richard Haseltine

mcorr said:

forget what it's called, but it's a node, decal or something where you can -- for example -- make a wall in a room invisible and then with a camera outside the room look inside the room without the outside lighting affecting how the picture of the camera outside captures how you set up the lighting in the room. this can be very useful when you are backing up a camera into a wall and can only get the field of view you want by locating the camera outside the room.

Iray Section Plane, with Clip Lights turned on in Parameters.

mcorr

Richard Haseltine said:

mcorr said:

forget what it's called, but it's a node, decal or something where you can -- for example -- make a wall in a room invisible and then with a camera outside the room look inside the room without the outside lighting affecting how the picture of the camera outside captures how you set up the lighting in the room. this can be very useful when you are backing up a camera into a wall and can only get the field of view you want by locating the camera outside the room.

Iray Section Plane, with Clip Lights turned on in Parameters.

yes that was exactly the way you described it the first time I read your explanation .... thank you Richard for that cool tip!!

RKane_1

Ryzan said:

You can hide lights and entire characters with groups.

Create -> New Group.
Parent character/light to group.
Hide the group, and everything under it disappears.  No need to uncheck a dozen checkmarks to do it.

Do this with your light and camara rig to move them all at once (or just parent them to each other)

Do it with each individual character to render one a a time.

Do this with your set to turn it invisible to get clutter out of the way and work on the main model's pose or texture

StratDragon

parent your NULL to the object you attach to the NULL if the object was not centered to begin with, then un-parent the NULL and parent the object to the NULL.
You can use the translation tool in the view window in visible view of the object and not just the translation in the parameter menu (e.g. your NULL is not 1000KM from your object, it's close or right there.) You can do this by copying the object in the scene tab then pasting to the NULL but I use Casuals parent script

Now does anyone know a script that will let me export just one segment of a scene as an OBJ without having to "invisible" hundreds of other scene assets, including but far limited to just figures? 

JeremyD

Ryzan said:

You can hide lights and entire characters with groups.

Create -> New Group.
Parent character/light to group.
Hide the group, and everything under it disappears.  No need to uncheck a dozen checkmarks to do it.

Yep! This is one of my favorite things to do when organizing my scene.. put everything into groups so I can hide things quickly. 

nicstt

StratDragon said:

parent your NULL to the object you attach to the NULL if the object was not centered to begin with, then un-parent the NULL and parent the object to the NULL.
You can use the translation tool in the view window in visible view of the object and not just the translation in the parameter menu (e.g. your NULL is not 1000KM from your object, it's close or right there.) You can do this by copying the object in the scene tab then pasting to the NULL but I use Casuals parent script

Now does anyone know a script that will let me export just one segment of a scene as an OBJ without having to "invisible" hundreds of other scene assets, including but far limited to just figures? 

Pretty sure that you can select them all; yeh, right click and select children or one of the other options (scene tab). You can also invert selection too; I seem to remember Richard explaining something, but didn't try it out when I saw his explanation, as I was doing something else, but hopefully someone else will fill in the blanks.

... But select what you want to be visible, invert selection and invis them - might work.

kaotkbliss

I just figured out that "yes! you can loop-select multiple poly's in geometry editor!"

Selecting each poly 1 by 1 was a real PITA

Fletcher

Cntrl key to mix things up. Mix up poses, mix up materials. Cntrl e cntrl s cntrl d cntrl l... beautiful cntrl key.