Geografting for High Resolution Genesis 3 (SOLVED!!!)
Thomas Windar
Posts: 272
Alright, so here's a problem I just couldn't fix myself.
I've been making a Geograft for the Genesis 3 feet and everything seems to work "kinda" alright until I switch the Genesis 3 Model to "High Resolution" instead of "Base".
Here's how my process looks like:
- I send Genesis 3 female to Hexagon via Hexagon Bridge.
- I extract a ring and an extra one of it as well for safety in the desired location.
- I create the geograft of a Paw.
- I send it to Daz Studio via Bridge.
- I do all the necessary steps with transfer utility.
- I setup the polygons that are supposed to hide.
- I setup the ring to be the one to merge to the Figure.
- I fit the Paw to the foot. The polygons now vanish in the places I asked for.
- When going to High Resolution there is a small ring of polygons that creates a hole between the prop and foot.
Why is this happening? Should I convert the Geograft to SubD before the Transfer Utlity? Am I missing something?
I tried exporting the figure in different formats but I cannot get a High Resolution model of Genesis 3 Female to Hexagon to prepare a ring.
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Comments
For some reason the vertices aren't welding, so when you apply SubD the exposed edges shrink back and open up a gap. I don't know why this is happening, however. You are sure that there is no overlap between the geograft mesh and the figure mesh with the polygons hidden - they are making an edge-to-edge join?
What version of Studio are you using?
I'm using the 4.8, 64-bit Public Build +Beta+ version for this. I also use Hexagon 2.5 for the creation of modelling.
Here's how this problem looks.
It seems to be fine when stays still, but when you bend it but the polygons displace... when I look at the Wireframe it shows that the edges are not in the same place, but that's after SubD conversion.
Wait, you just said something that makes me wonder... Let me put more detail on how I do this.
I'm using a Geografting tutorial by blondie9999. What I am supposed to do for the Geograft is to:
- Make an "Outer Ring" extracted from the original figure.
- Make the geograft on it (make sure the Outer Ring is not changed in any way)
- (For safety I extracted two rings to make sure the outer is not changed)
- Then import it to DAZ Studio
- Apply Transfer Utility to it.
- Unfit the Geograft
- Select the Outer Ring surfaces and select them as Graft Faces for Fitted Figure
- Afterwards the polygons that are INSIDE the ring on the FIGURE are selected and set as Auto-Hide to Graft (not selecting the polygons that are the ring itself)
- Afterwards fit the item onto the figure.
- Done.
I applied Convert to SubD once I finished the Geograft so that the graft can use "High Resolution" like the Figure.
However even without the SubD conversion the thing does not work. I am kinda running out of ideas on how to make this work to be honest. Did I have to select a different ring? Is my process at fault? Did I forget to do something?
The only thing I could come up with is that maybe the edges don't match, but Hexagon stated point by point and edge by edge that the sizes and positions are all the same. I checked it selecting each one of them and they "fit". So either I am missing something or maybe the export/import does something...
.
Add the ring polygons to the hide group and try again - does it work then?
Umm...there was a fix between the last beta and the first 'release' version of 4.8 that...
Fixed a grafting issue where the mesh would not update correctly
You may want to update to the most recent version 4.8.0.59.
Tried both. I am using the 4.8.0.59 version now and the problem still happens, even if add polygons on the ring, outside the ring, inside the ring in all variations.
The edges don't weld at all.
I even tried to just copy the mesh from Genesis 3 Female with completely no changes done. I just copied the lower half and tried to perform the Geografting in all ways. It does not weld as well.
The only thing I can come up with is either the ring I create is somehow created wrong in Hexagon OR there is some weird error in DAZ. Unless (which is possible) I am missing something in the process....
Alright, I finally found the solution to my problem. And here is a step-by-step process I used that made it all work. (Just in case it might help someone else with a similar problem like mine).
- Obtain an Outer Ring from from the Genesis 3 (or other figure you desire) where you are putting your geograft.
- Add whatever new shapes you need in there to create your custom part.
- Send the model to DAZ.
- Bring Genesis 3 to the field.
- Transfer Utility from Genesis 3 to your Geograft (Un-check "Fit to" and in "Content Type" choose Follower/Attachment/-bodypartwheregeograftresides)
- Convert the Geograft to SubD.
- Switch Resoultion of Both Genesis 3 and geograft to "Base".
- Use Geometry editor and Select the Outer Ring of the Geograft (the one you obtained from the figure).
- Geometry Assignment -> Set Graft Faces for fitted figure -> Genesis 3
- Now choose your Genesis 3 and using Geometry Editor select the polygons that are COVERED by the Geograft (including the Outer Ring you took from the figure).
- Geometry Assignment -> Set Auto Hide Faces -> Your Geograft
- Now Using Geometry Editor select a Ring of Polygons AROUND the "Outer Ring" of the Geograft (so basically a ring of polygons that directly touch the geograft and that should "weld" with the Geograft)
- Geometry Assignment -> Set Graft Faces for fitted figure -> Your Geograft
- Now Choose the Universal Tool (Important or else you will not see the welded surfaces)
- Fit the Geograft to Genesis 3.
- Set Resolution to High Resolution on Genesis 3 (the Geograft will now FOLLOW it).
And it works!
Took me some time to figure this out, but as I expected - I was missing a step in the process. I guess this problem is now solved.
Thomas, rather belatedly, thanks for these instructions.
I had also been following blondie9999's tutorial, and had run into just this problem on the SubD. In the tutorial it had explicitly said not to select the grafting loops, and then omitted to mention that the grafting loops on Genesis were different from the grafting loops on the Geo-Graft! A fiendish piece of misdirection - I doubt I would have worked it out myself, so thanks again.
thanks for sharing Thomas. I did get this to work on my own but probably forgot the voodoo used at this point (it's been a while). was a lot of trial and error so haven't been excited about trying again..
To clarify, it was not an intended mis-direction, the tutorial was written before certain changes were made to the work-flow ;-)
Thank you! :-)
Yet to try the solution - but thank you. Exactly the problem I was having. It is that 3rd step - set the parent figure graft back to the geograft child. I'll get that in my head - Graft - Hide - Graft
Thanks Thomas...
I'm still struggling with this.
I can't seem to get consistent results .. even following your instructions to the letter.
It looked like I was successful once - basically just cloning G3F hands and following the instructions. The test was changing the base figure resolution and seeing the graft follow with no break in the mesh. So far, so good... but
I saved the Geografted hands as a figure/prop/attachment asset, quit and relaunched DS and applied the graft to a new base figure. Now, base figure's hands don't hide when graft is applied. What is the correct procedure for saving geograft assets?
I'm using GoZ and Zbrush for this, and using forearm/wrist polys for the graft faces.
Basically just send G3F to Zbrush, delete all geo except hands, send back to DS, and create new object when prompted. The geometry should be exact.
Tried again from scratch, this time using slightly modified geometry for the graft (I'm just trying to remove a finger). Exactly followed the same process - now the gap has returned, and the graft will NOT follow the resolution of the parent/base no matter what I do (btw, "create SubD" is check by default when using Goz back to DS - I've tried it both ways -- checking it and creating subD afterwards doesn't seem to make a difference). I do notice that when in Geometry editor things get slow when switching between figure and graft geometry. Had to go back and forth a few times to select the correct polys for grafting/hiding/grafting.
It's killin' me. It should not be this difficult.
I posted this tutorial several years ago which may be of help. I'm not aware of any changes that would cause this method to fail, but I haven't done any Geo-Grafting recently. One step that caused at least one person confusion in the past is that you must leave the Geometry Editor tool (e.g. switch to unversal manipulator tool) for the graft to apply seamlessly. For example, if you do a viewport render in Geometry Editor mode you will see a pronounced seam.
I can't comment on ZBrush import/export as I use Blender. I haven't experienced any inconsistent results with my own Geo-Grafting. Of course the shared ring of polys must be very close or you will get splits. There is a little tolerance, however, but not much.
Save Geo-Grafts using save as Support Asset...Figure/Prop Assets as you would with a clothing item.
Thanks Hiro...
It turns out that my problem was entirely my fault.
Apparently while in Zbrush the ring faces of my graft were being moved imperceptibly. It took me a long time to track this down but I was able to eventually get it straightened out.
Thank you Thomas for posting your solution to this, this is exactly the problem I am facing, and what I was trying to fix in relation to my other question (which you also answered) pointing me to geo-grafting. I can only imagine the amount of trial and error this took to get it working, so again, many thanks for sharing.
Is it absolutely critical that the outer ring (outside the section that is to be hidden when the geograft is in place) be done? The geograft I'm working on now is a royal pain to even get the first two steps done, due to it being a partial head plate, so I was wondering if I had to fight with it more to get that last part done.
So this is the problem I am having.... despite following all the steps to the tutorials I've found, I cannot get my geograft to work properly. When I import it it appears a distance AWAY from the figure, and even if I move it, the "fit to" step always teleports it back, leaving holes in my figure where it is supposed to be. All I did for the import export process was a) select the area desired b) delete the rest of the mesh c) import the remaining portion to blender as a .obj d) change the interior in blender, leaving the exterior ring alone (I didn't move it around the stage even!) e) save this as obj. and import to DAZ. And it appears in the wrong spot, instead of in it's proper position on the figure. Help?
Thanks this bailed me out big time, Cheer!
This is an older thread, but no other recent threads are quite as relevant.
I've spent the day with a geograft attempt that is simply not working and I can't figure why. This is an iteration of a model that has successfully geografted before so I know it can work - but I can't see what's wrong. The attachement has 32 vertices on the outside of the grafting ring, but what I've noticed is that in the .dsf file of the saved graft, only 15 vertex pairs are specified in the "graft" statement for "vertex pairs". The number of "hidden polys" in the statement appears to be correct, and indeed the desired polys do hide. I've looked and looked at the wire meshes and cannot see any difference between the target weld vertices and the source weld vertices. And just to make things interesting, although there are 15 vertex pairs in the .dsf file definition, only 12 vertices on the two models appear to have welded.
Does anyone have any suggestions on how to either fix or work around this issue? Cheers, Lx
FWIF - AND AN SIDE ... although most tutorials seem to say the grafting rings on the target and attachement should be the same, there are some tutorials, and my experiements today seem to confirm, that the target ring can actually be the ring of faces OUTSIDE the attachment grafting ring. Either specification of the target grafting ring seems to deliver the same result, all focused on the OUTSIDE of the grafting ring (if the same ring is specified) or the SHARED EDGES (if "nested" rings are specified). Curious. Clearly, the underlying DAZ process somehow looks only at the relevant EDGES despite us specifying SURFACES.
Theweld happens (or not) on a ring of vertices, not a ring of polygons.
Thanks, RIchard. my loose terminology referring to edges. I presume it's just an artefact of the DAZ tools that they use faces to specify the edges which define the vertices which weld.
No thoughts on what might have gone wrong with my missing 17 vertex pairs and the 3 pairs that failed to actually weld? I'm going to tinker the model boundaries (yet again) in the hope I can get some improvement. Lx
So ... a big mea culpa from me. It appears the weld requirement is very finickity. The vertices need to be VERY closely aligned. Not good enough to inspect the wireframes in DAZ. To get the vertices aligned I had to (jump into Hexagon and) zoom-zoom-zoom right in to tweak the non-welders. An even then, it took multiple teaks on certain vertices, despite my first, second and third best efforts. It would be good if there was somewhere to specify the tolerance for the weld differences, but I haven't found it.
A TIP for those playing around with geograft tweaks. Set up the neccessary "graft" and "hide" faces as selection groups in the geometry editor. Makes re-trying the grafting a much quicker and more certain process.
Does the vertex snapping in Hexagon not work? Though I would usually take the desired loop from the figue and then add the new geometry insdie that to avoid any potential mis-alignment.
Thanks for the pointer, Richard, I only know Hexagon as far as I minimally need to so I'll have to learn snapping from one model to another. Good to know it exists. The attachment model is several years old with many iterations and 101 morphs on it now. It's too easy to inadvertently nudge the whole thing here or there or just a vertex or 50, which is what happened. It all started with the loop from the figure, but back in the mists of time. Cheers. Lx
Thanks @Thomas Winder for sharing the info! I have the Blondie tutorial which was excellent at the time but DS has since had changes which make it much harder to follow.