Novica & Forum Members Tips & Product Reviews Pt 13

barbult

Richard Haseltine said:

barbult said:

memcneil70 said:

I have a Kitchen Aid stand mixer and just measured it, and it is approximately 18 x 14 inches. That is really rough, the tape measure snapped me. The coffee maker looks like it should be about the same size. 

Yeah, I am glad I didn't pick this one up. If you send in a Customer Service report, do you think they will get sized correctly Barbult?

No, I think a customer service report on this would be a waste of my time. It's not even a new product. If I had just purchased it, I would return it in a heartbeat, but I've had it too long. I had one other product from the same vendor that I did return, because the textures on it were really low resolution. 

It might still be worth a report, perhaps they could then include a fresh set of "real world" presets to load them at the correct size (changing the base might  break any scenes that suers had created with local scaling).

OK, I'll do it, but I have so may open tickets that never get worked, it becomes very discouraging. I'll include your suggestion as a possible fix.

Novica

@barbult  Playing devil's advocate, I have to say you'd be better off getting something done by contacting the vendor directly. See if they have posted on the forum and PM them, or ask one of our PA pals to contact them. With the site mishaps, the customer service people are SO flooded they won't touch your ticket till the year 2030. (And even that is questionable.) 

barbult

Novica said:

@barbult  Playing devil's advocate, I have to say you'd be better off getting something done by contacting the vendor directly. See if they have posted on the forum and PM them, or ask one of our PA pals to contact them. With the site mishaps, the customer service people are SO flooded they won't touch your ticket till the year 2030. (And even that is questionable.) 

I've already submitted the help request. I'll see what happens, if anything. I agree that they are probably swamped. I feel a little bad about pestering them more. Maybe it will be a diversion to see a ticket other than "the new store doesn't work".

Novica

Alright, someone may know the answer to this quicker than I can test everything, or had experience already.  Finally got the studio to start up and not pop up with the postgre message. The icons show in the studio, but I am getting block characters, and the extensive files are missing message.  I have my products on an external and it's E drive and named Daz. I can't remember in Install Manager under the Installation section, what needs to be changed to that.  I have Content Path Shortcuts changed, but didn't want to touch anything else. (Looks Greek to me.)  Does Manifest Archive or Content Database Base get changed?

I already managed to get the port from DIM to match the port in the studio CMS, it went with some whacky number like 17236 instead of 1024 (and I do remember it was 1024.)  So are my settings wrong in DIM if I am getting the blocky characters/ no textures found in the studio? The images for the products are there in the Content Library, but it looks like I am playing with LEGOS  LOL

memcneil70

17236 on my computer Novica and also in DIM Content Database Port, in Advance Settings

Stupid question, since you helped me, but your paths in DIM match your paths in Daz Content?

memcneil70

And there is a new Studio, 4.14 and a new Beta waiting for me in DIM updates!

Novica

memcneil70 said:

17236 on my computer Novica and also in DIM Content Database Port, in Advance Settings

Stupid question, since you helped me, but your paths in DIM match your paths in Daz Content?

Yes, in the studio:
Edit>Preferences>Content>Content Directory Manager>
The CMS Cluster Directory goes to C/Users/(name)/AppData/Roaming/Daz 3D/cms   and that is what DIM says for Content Database Base 
    (so are they supposed to match? Is that correct?)

and for the other 3 (still in studio) they all are E:/Daz  (the Connect Data, Daz Studio Formats, Poser Formats) 

Should I change the ports back to 17236?

memcneil70

I would try that. The only other thing I have read about this issue was to change it by 1 digit off the number, then change it back? (I never fully understood that part, so I may have misunderstood.)

 

Etamin

Novica said:

Alright, someone may know the answer to this quicker than I can test everything, or had experience already.  Finally got the studio to start up and not pop up with the postgre message. The icons show in the studio, but I am getting block characters, and the extensive files are missing message.  I have my products on an external and it's E drive and named Daz. I can't remember in Install Manager under the Installation section, what needs to be changed to that.  I have Content Path Shortcuts changed, but didn't want to touch anything else. (Looks Greek to me.)  Does Manifest Archive or Content Database Base get changed?

I already managed to get the port from DIM to match the port in the studio CMS, it went with some whacky number like 17236 instead of 1024 (and I do remember it was 1024.)  So are my settings wrong in DIM if I am getting the blocky characters/ no textures found in the studio? The images for the products are there in the Content Library, but it looks like I am playing with LEGOS  LOL

Just below the Content Pth Shortcuts dropdown box should be a rectangle box with headers Label and Path.

If there is nothing listed, click the + icon at bottom left of that box and you gave set a name (Label), and then prowse to the path you want to add.

I have never done so, but it looks like you can add multiple paths, so maybe when a drive is full, instead of moving all the content to a larger drive, perhaps you can just add new content to a second path - not sure how DIM would know which to install to.

I'm a total noob so I may be way off track though.

memcneil70

okay, I just checked my laptop after the update and DIM has 17237 in the CMS settings. And the new Studio also has that setting.

 

So, if you have two computers with Daz Studio on it, you get two different CMS numbers?

Novica

In Content Library, when you do the Daz Studio Formats, does it then go Daz>Content> (whatever)

I don't remember Content being in there. 

I'm still getting block figures.

Novica

@etamin  Yep, I already have the Content Path Shortcuts set to the E:/Daz 

Novica

@memcneil70  In the studio Content Directory Manager, do you have that C/Users/(name)/AppData/Roaming/Daz 3D/cms   for the CMS Cluster Directory? 

Leana

Novica said:

@etamin  Yep, I already have the Content Path Shortcuts set to the E:/Daz 

What do you have in E:/Daz folder? Do you have the people and data folders there directly? Do you have a folder called "content" there?

memcneil70

Let me reboot

memcneil70

Okay this is from Dragon my desktop. Customer Service helped me set the paths up.

 

memcneil70

I am headed to bed, 0330 comes early. I hope this helps?

Mary

Novica

Leana said:

What do you have in E:/Daz folder? Do you have the people and data folders there directly? Do you have a folder called "content" there?

Yes, I do. So that part is correct. I just couldn't remember it being there.

I'm running out of ideas. Both ports match, I'm not sure about that cluster thingie. They match but I'm not sure what it's supposed to be.

Novica

memcneil70 said:

I am headed to bed, 0330 comes early. I hope this helps?

Mary

Yes it does. That first one is the same as what mine shows. (the roaming file path.) The rest of mine show E:/Daz  and I know those are right. So I am befuddled.

Leana

Novica said:

Leana said:

What do you have in E:/Daz folder? Do you have the people and data folders there directly? Do you have a folder called "content" there?

Yes, I do. So that part is correct. I just couldn't remember it being there.

Actually "Content" probably shouldn't be there. Look inside that folder, does it also contain "people", "data", "runtime" or any of the other main folders?

If so, take everything inside "Content" and move it directly into "Daz".

Novica

Yes, it's all tucked under Content. It's been that way for years. I do notice this interesting file under there as well-  InstallManagerFileRegister.json      What is that? Supposed to be there?

Leana

You shouldn't have one data or runtime folder in Daz and one in Content, that won't work. As your DS content directory is Daz the main folders should all be directly in there. If there's one in content too all the files using that one will give you errors.

I don't remember what InstallManagerFileRegister.json is, and I'm on my phone so I can't check. Could be one if the utility files DIM uses to load metadata after installing something.

Novica

Okay, moved the json file directly under Daz and took everything out of Content and it worked :)  I wonder why it's worked all these years and suddenly it doesn't. I do know I had that same file path in Install Manager (the E:/Daz and didn't have this problem. I hate technology! And why the new port?

Anyway, thanks Leana, memcneil70, and Etamin. I THINK I'm back in business. G8F loaded, as did a character. 

Novica

Well, of COURSE this is just fitting, to go along with everything else today (losing all bookmarks, all apps and having to reinstall, and the printer STILL doesn't work after I installed that driver which jammed up my computer. GRRRRR)   Anyway, I've never had this happen- I am using Forest Glade as a background, and even though everything is open in Scene (eyes open) there is a huge bald section running all across the ground, like the grass wasn't there. IMay be instances, but they should show.

It shows in the viewport, and should be there. What can cause that? 

NorthOf45

InstallManagerFileRegister.json (aka Installed File Registry) keeps track of how many different products (2 or more) use a particular file so that if you uninstall one of the products, the shared file won't be uninstalled from the other product(s). It is just a list of files and how many products use it. The count gets incremented by 1 every time another product is installed that uses the file, and decreases by 1 when you uninstall a product that uses it.

It can be re-generated from DIM, in the Installation tab, by right-clicking in your Library shortcuts and selecting "Fix Installed File Registry...". DIM will scan all the install manifests looking for multiple users of files. Each library can be done separately. Okay, school's out...

outrider42

barbult said:

I was very impressed with how well it simulated in this challenging pose. The only problem I had was the black spot on her forehead, caused by the cap intersecting the character mesh. This is a common problem with hair, easily overcome by moving the cap forehead area out away from the character head. Unfortunately, the cap of this hair doesn't have any morphs to do that - not even a simple Expand All. Mesh Grabber will be able to correct this, because the cap is mesh and not dForce hair. I reduced the cap opacity to 0.2 in this render. Her arm on her head hides the thin spot, so I got by with it here.

I completely lost track of this thread, so this is quite a belated response. The easier fix for most of these mesh spots is to change the instances optimization setting in Iray Advanced settings. This is directly related to the old dark eye bug we sometimes see when away from world center, it is the same issue. Some time back Daz added a new 'auto' setting for instances. It sucks. Bad. Very bad. When they did this, that is when all of this became so much more common, because of how utterly broken the 'auto' setting is. What sucks worse is that this 'auto' is the default for every new scene you make. So I try to remember to change this setting each time I make a new scene, thankfully this setting is saved with your scene data. You can choose either speed or memory, both will be better than auto. I do not know what auto is supposed to do, I don't think Daz knows what auto is supposed to do because it sure doesn't work at all. I have never seen a situation yet where auto worked better than the other two settings and I have experimented with this (the posts are in a thread somewhere). "Auto" needs to be removed, Daz Studio went years without this setting, it clearly does not work, so kick it aside and let it go, Daz. Why this setting effects this is also really strange. As to which works best, that is up in the air. Sometimes speed works best for me, but sometimes memory does. Even more strange is that which setting works best has flipped from different Daz updates. I can literally use the same scene file and have speed work better in one Daz build, and then memory will work better in another Daz build. Try to figure that out!

Anyway, this fix works 99% of the time for me, no mesh grabber needed. I cannot recall the last time this failed to work.

barbult

outrider42 said:

barbult said:

I was very impressed with how well it simulated in this challenging pose. The only problem I had was the black spot on her forehead, caused by the cap intersecting the character mesh. This is a common problem with hair, easily overcome by moving the cap forehead area out away from the character head. Unfortunately, the cap of this hair doesn't have any morphs to do that - not even a simple Expand All. Mesh Grabber will be able to correct this, because the cap is mesh and not dForce hair. I reduced the cap opacity to 0.2 in this render. Her arm on her head hides the thin spot, so I got by with it here.

I completely lost track of this thread, so this is quite a belated response. The easier fix for most of these mesh spots is to change the instances optimization setting in Iray Advanced settings. This is directly related to the old dark eye bug we sometimes see when away from world center, it is the same issue. Some time back Daz added a new 'auto' setting for instances. It sucks. Bad. Very bad. When they did this, that is when all of this became so much more common, because of how utterly broken the 'auto' setting is. What sucks worse is that this 'auto' is the default for every new scene you make. So I try to remember to change this setting each time I make a new scene, thankfully this setting is saved with your scene data. You can choose either speed or memory, both will be better than auto. I do not know what auto is supposed to do, I don't think Daz knows what auto is supposed to do because it sure doesn't work at all. I have never seen a situation yet where auto worked better than the other two settings and I have experimented with this (the posts are in a thread somewhere). "Auto" needs to be removed, Daz Studio went years without this setting, it clearly does not work, so kick it aside and let it go, Daz. Why this setting effects this is also really strange. As to which works best, that is up in the air. Sometimes speed works best for me, but sometimes memory does. Even more strange is that which setting works best has flipped from different Daz updates. I can literally use the same scene file and have speed work better in one Daz build, and then memory will work better in another Daz build. Try to figure that out!

Anyway, this fix works 99% of the time for me, no mesh grabber needed. I cannot recall the last time this failed to work.

Thanks, I'll try that next time.

Novica

@outrider42  Hmmm, where is the Iray Advanced Settings? DUHs want to know  

nonesuch00

outrider42 said:

barbult said:

I was very impressed with how well it simulated in this challenging pose. The only problem I had was the black spot on her forehead, caused by the cap intersecting the character mesh. This is a common problem with hair, easily overcome by moving the cap forehead area out away from the character head. Unfortunately, the cap of this hair doesn't have any morphs to do that - not even a simple Expand All. Mesh Grabber will be able to correct this, because the cap is mesh and not dForce hair. I reduced the cap opacity to 0.2 in this render. Her arm on her head hides the thin spot, so I got by with it here.

 

I completely lost track of this thread, so this is quite a belated response. The easier fix for most of these mesh spots is to change the instances optimization setting in Iray Advanced settings. This is directly related to the old dark eye bug we sometimes see when away from world center, it is the same issue. Some time back Daz added a new 'auto' setting for instances. It sucks. Bad. Very bad. When they did this, that is when all of this became so much more common, because of how utterly broken the 'auto' setting is. What sucks worse is that this 'auto' is the default for every new scene you make. So I try to remember to change this setting each time I make a new scene, thankfully this setting is saved with your scene data. You can choose either speed or memory, both will be better than auto. I do not know what auto is supposed to do, I don't think Daz knows what auto is supposed to do because it sure doesn't work at all. I have never seen a situation yet where auto worked better than the other two settings and I have experimented with this (the posts are in a thread somewhere). "Auto" needs to be removed, Daz Studio went years without this setting, it clearly does not work, so kick it aside and let it go, Daz. Why this setting effects this is also really strange. As to which works best, that is up in the air. Sometimes speed works best for me, but sometimes memory does. Even more strange is that which setting works best has flipped from different Daz updates. I can literally use the same scene file and have speed work better in one Daz build, and then memory will work better in another Daz build. Try to figure that out!

Anyway, this fix works 99% of the time for me, no mesh grabber needed. I cannot recall the last time this failed to work.

That "auto" setting is supposed to enable DAZ Studio to chose to optimize your scene when rendered for one of Memory or Speed. The bug was present before that auto select was available though and if you are having those artifacts more frequently using auto than you did before that setting was available then you must of chose a setting more frequently of one of the other of memory or speed then it is 'auto' selecting for you.

I think optimizing for memory would cause this bug and not the optimizing for speed; as optimizing for memory would mean using translucency shortcuts instead of actual geometry to reduce memory footprint. Optimizing for speed should maximize geometry generated and reduce translucency used. That's just me guessing though.

memcneil70

Did anyone check out the price in the cart for the Everyday Motion bundle? I had checked out the animations and laughed, and thought why not? Tried putting it in my cart, with other new items and it went from $22.44 to $10.60! And a free Christmas pack as well. Now, I have to figure out how to use them. I have never attempted any of the animation products, even though I own them.