Getting on the 9 train, or not

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  • CHWTCHWT Posts: 1,179

    Directly converted my character from G8 to G9. Used Masculine Skin 04 Mat, Iris 05 Deep Brown, Eyebrows Card Style 06 Thick, Eyelashes Style Sparse 01 Upper + Sparse 02 Lower + Color Black Upper + Color Black Lower

    I don't like the brows in the "essentials extension". They are very comical when used on male characters, or too thin or too arched or make the character super angry or about to burst into tears (like shown here on my character). The fiber brows don't look that great either. I think it's the brows that ruin the realism of the character. I am looking forward to the brows merchant resources from RedzStudio and Chevybabe

    Eyes and lashes look great. But I still want super dark brown almost black irises in upcoming merchant resources, though as far as I know even Natural Eyes for G9 doesn't have dark brown almost black irises

    Another thing I find is that G9 sucks up light like a black hole. Not sure if it is because I am rendering in DS 4.15 with DS 4.20 resources installed. G8 rendered with this particular HDRI background looks overexposed but for G9 it seems to be the right amount of lighting.

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  • CHWT said:

    Another thing I find is that G9 sucks up light like a black hole. Not sure if it is because I am rendering in DS 4.15 with DS 4.20 resources installed. G8 rendered with this particular HDRI background looks overexposed but for G9 it seems to be the right amount of lighting.

     The iray version is different from 4.15 to 4.21 and the G9 mats were optimized for the current version unfortunately. If you're interested, you can run the public beta in parallel with the release version and not mess anything up, and you can see if that makes a difference for you.

  • AllenArtAllenArt Posts: 7,169

    CHWT said:

    Directly converted my character from G8 to G9. Used Masculine Skin 04 Mat, Iris 05 Deep Brown, Eyebrows Card Style 06 Thick, Eyelashes Style Sparse 01 Upper + Sparse 02 Lower + Color Black Upper + Color Black Lower

    I don't like the brows in the "essentials extension". They are very comical when used on male characters, or too thin or too arched or make the character super angry or about to burst into tears (like shown here on my character). The fiber brows don't look that great either. I think it's the brows that ruin the realism of the character. I am looking forward to the brows merchant resources from RedzStudio and Chevybabe

    Eyes and lashes look great. But I still want super dark brown almost black irises in upcoming merchant resources, though as far as I know even Natural Eyes for G9 doesn't have dark brown almost black irises

    Another thing I find is that G9 sucks up light like a black hole. Not sure if it is because I am rendering in DS 4.15 with DS 4.20 resources installed. G8 rendered with this particular HDRI background looks overexposed but for G9 it seems to be the right amount of lighting.

    Good thing is, if you don't like G9's brows, the G8 brows from the Daz O's and Chevybabe25's for G8 autofit pretty well :)

  • CHWTCHWT Posts: 1,179
    AllenArt said:

    CHWT said:

    Directly converted my character from G8 to G9. Used Masculine Skin 04 Mat, Iris 05 Deep Brown, Eyebrows Card Style 06 Thick, Eyelashes Style Sparse 01 Upper + Sparse 02 Lower + Color Black Upper + Color Black Lower

    I don't like the brows in the "essentials extension". They are very comical when used on male characters, or too thin or too arched or make the character super angry or about to burst into tears (like shown here on my character). The fiber brows don't look that great either. I think it's the brows that ruin the realism of the character. I am looking forward to the brows merchant resources from RedzStudio and Chevybabe

    Eyes and lashes look great. But I still want super dark brown almost black irises in upcoming merchant resources, though as far as I know even Natural Eyes for G9 doesn't have dark brown almost black irises

    Another thing I find is that G9 sucks up light like a black hole. Not sure if it is because I am rendering in DS 4.15 with DS 4.20 resources installed. G8 rendered with this particular HDRI background looks overexposed but for G9 it seems to be the right amount of lighting.

    Good thing is, if you don't like G9's brows, the G8 brows from the Daz O's and Chevybabe25's for G8 autofit pretty well :)

    Glad to hear that, thanks for the heads up!
  • maikdeckermaikdecker Posts: 2,752

    ChangelingChick said:

    They are not, in fact. :)

    The frustration is, we've been working with G9 and have seen all the improvements and how much easier and better it is as a whole than previous generations. While the forums are indeed a very small percentage of the user base, it's hard to see something you're excited about get bashed completely (#1)-- especially when a lot of the complaints are unrelated to the actual product (like a sale being shortened), or simply wrong because people don't know how it works yet. But the phrase "calling time of death" was used by a user here in the forums who used it about G9 (#2), so I'm not sure how it's unfriendly. It is dishearteneing to see so many people unwilling to give something new a chance (#3). A real chance that is. If you go into something expecting to hate it, you'll find a reason to. 

    #1: There might be also different options involved?!? Especially concerning the "bashing" part... for one seeing his beloved product getting (rightfully?!?) criticized falls into the category... for someone else it's just... critic given. From my uninvolved standpoint - as I don't need G9 but not bother about it existing in either way - I have seen little to none bashing in this thread.

    #2: I have to admit, that I don't parse this forum too religiously. So if anybody else than Oso3D than I didn't see it. And in that case I would have apologize, but if it was first time by OsoD3 as a judgement about how critcs voice their opinions in this thread, I still think of that formulation as unfriendly towards these critics.

    #3: Again, a quite personal thing... I can't really understand why people not bothering about G9 as it doesn't fulfills their needs would be disheartening for you. Imagine yourself as the designer of the newest Lamborghini. And thousands people state "looks nice, but wtf would I be supposed to do with a Lamborghini, when I can reach all places that I have to go to by bicycle or public transport?"  Would that be disheartening for you? Or just an result that should be expected by producing a product that quite a few people do not really need... or afford (due to PC equipment for example) or just do not really WANT to have.

     

  • What has been sold that is usually included? The Daz named characters usually had only a couple of makeups and eye colours, notthing like the level found in most PA sets, and I'm pretty sure that other character bundles have had add-ons make-up sets included. This time the base maps are considerably better than the previous Starter Essentials maps. This time the anatomical elements do not require a bundle purchase (you do have to buy a character with maps to use them, but that has always been true). The morph sets seem broadly comparable to previous generations.

    I can understand the complaint about the issue with custom nipples/navels - but how many PAs or endors/freebie makers elsewhere ddi make custom nipples or navels? Not none, but a lot of characters just use the stock versions as I recall.

    People are worried about the greater system demands, but mostly that is based on mis-understanding - it's only the detail maps thata re 8K, not the bulk of the textures, and the mesh resolution is comparable to the fourth generation figures (and is equivalent to about one level of SubD baked onto the base mesh for previous Genesis versions, all of which loaded with at least three levels of SubD).

  • memcneil70memcneil70 Posts: 4,115

    I found another use for G9 that might be overlooked. Fitting an outfit that is giving you fits with G8 onto G9. I did it with the Chill Outfit when trying to see why it didn't fit Frida for Victioria 8 and there was something off. But loaded Victoria 9 and the outfit, using the auto-fit categories, fit really well, even the boots, which would not fit onto Frida at all. 

  • GordigGordig Posts: 10,058

    maikdecker said:

    #3: Again, a quite personal thing... I can't really understand why people not bothering about G9 as it doesn't fulfills their needs would be disheartening for you. 

    The issue certainly isn't people "not bothering" about G9; the issue is a small handful of people shouting the same complaints over and over, when they could simply not use it and move on with their lives.

  • vrba79vrba79 Posts: 1,398
    edited November 2022
    Yeah, I mean tell us the product just isn't for us, but don't gaslight us.
    Post edited by vrba79 on
  • vrba79 said:

    Yeah, I mean tell us the product just isn't for us, but don't gaslight us.

    Over what?

  • OK< I see that the Genesis Genitals do include maps (though the name doesn't match the base character) and the Genesis 2. However, it is not new for there to be no maps for the base textures - there were none in Genesis 3's versions and I am fairly sure there were none in 8/8.1

  • vrba79vrba79 Posts: 1,398
    edited November 2022

    I'm looking over the material zones on the base figure right now, and they've almost regressed to Poser 4 levels of simplified. Yeah, the inner mouth and eyes have their own zones, but where's the lips? Why can I have individually mapped eyes, but not seperately mapped lips? Who thought that was progress? Even the eye maps are oversimplified! Oh, but each eye MOISTURE has a map zone? This ranks right up there with on-disc DLC in ideas that should have gotten someone fired.

    Know what was nice about older meshes, like Genesis 1 and 2? You had material zones for stuff like lips, nipples, the different parts of the eyes, etc. This could be used to great effect for NPR work, to achieve these very nice and clean results.

    Was this oversimplification was done to make us more dependent on certain vendors? Who can say, but it sure feels like it.

    Needless to say, this was one of the few times I actually used DIM to uninstall something.

    Post edited by vrba79 on
  • tsroemitsroemi Posts: 2,744

    Reading ChangelingChick's and Oso3d's thoughts, I feel rather bad for not caring so much for G9. Mind you, I never 'bashed' her in any way, as far as I'm aware; she seems like a nice enough figure really, and V9 definitely has a very sweet face. I'm also seeing people doing quite cool things with the morph packages already.

    But I personally just can't keep spending here like I did for G8 over the past couple of years, and I also don't want to anymore. I feel like I've turned into a sort of DAZ products hoover, with the dollars flying out of my pockets so quickly, 135 pages in my store library and barely a render a month to show for them. I own such lovely items, but I can't even remember where to find them because there's such an immense amount of stuff! It's suffocating me, creativity-wise. I don't want this to continue. So I'm basically taking the release of G9 as my chance to (hopefully) get off the shopaholic train, which is what it has become for me. Again, this is just me personally, and I'm truly sorry for being unsupportive of the PAs in this way. If G9 stuff can be made to be compatible with G8, I will surely buy a new piece now and then, it's not like I'll stop shopping here completely, or exclusively old stuff. It's way too much fun for that, still ;-)

    I also really, REALLY wish they hadn't cut off our poor DAZ+ sale for G9, or at least given us much more fanfare for her introduction - like others (and myself) already said. DAZ used to know how to party soooo much better than this ...

  • AllenArtAllenArt Posts: 7,169

    vrba79 said:

    I'm looking over the material zones on the base figure right now, and they've almost regressed to Poser 4 levels of simplified. Yeah, the inner mouth and eyes have their own zones, but where's the lips? Why can I have individually mapped eyes, but not seperately mapped lips? Who thought that was progress? Even the eye maps are oversimplified! Oh, but each eye MOISTURE has a map zone? This ranks right up there with on-disc DLC in ideas that should have gotten someone fired.

    Know what was nice about older meshes, like Genesis 1 and 2? You had material zones for stuff like lips, nipples, the different parts of the eyes, etc. This could be used to great effect for NPR work, to achieve these very nice and clean results.

    Was this oversimplification was done to make us more dependent on certain vendors? Who can say, but it sure feels like it.

    Needless to say, this was one of the few times I actually used DIM to uninstall something.

    They did away with lip zones because colorizing it looked horrible. There was a crisp line around the outside if you didn't use a mask and since you had to if you wanted a nice transition anyway, they just went went the complete mask route. Any material zone on a human with a distinct outline looks unrealistic - including lips, nipples, irises, etc. Now, I won't disagree that for NPR work they're probably an advantage, but I think the majority of DS users are leaning realistic or they wouldn't have designed G9 like they did. I'm sure they didn't design it just to piss off 3DL users or NPR users. It's just that they have to draw the line somewhere and, since they're a business, they're going to do it on the side that makes them the most money. There's nothing personal about it, really. They're not trying to make you dependent on more vendors. In fact you don't even have to USE G9 and you can go on your merry way using something earlier and that is more suited to your needs. Believe it or not, I'm not thrilled with the idea of buying stuff all over again, especially in this economic climate (and neither is the hubby..lol), but I like to try and keep up with the tech if I can and since I actually like G9, it's not difficult. I just need to be more choosy than I used to be. But, if G9 doesn't suit your needs, then don't use it. They certainly aren't going to change anything about it at this point, no matter how much complaining goes on.

  • Oso3DOso3D Posts: 15,011

    Tsroemi: oh no need to feel bad at all! Many of us are feeling budget pinches. Every new generation has an evaluation and consideration of investment and what products are available.

    These and questions like 'Im unclear, what are the actual improvements with g9? Why does it work this way?' are clear and positive and engaging.

    I welcome positivity.

  • vrba79vrba79 Posts: 1,398
    edited November 2022

    AllenArt, Some of us work almost exclusively in NPR. On that front G9 is a [rude noise]. Daz3D chose this. The potential customers don't get a say. The PAs will cheer for literally anything Daz3D makes, so I give zero [concern] what they have to say on the matter.

    If the shoe was on the other foot, I wouldn't be telling the people who rely on photorealistic options for their work to eat dirt and sit out entire product generation. Kinda like how while I no longer use 3Delight, I still champion supporting it, or something comperable, for people with a less than ideal GPU, but that's a different discussion.

     

    Post edited by Richard Haseltine on
  • MadaMada Posts: 1,991
    edited November 2022

    vrba79 said:

    AllenArt, Some of us work almost exclusively in NPR. On that front G9 is a [rude noise]. Daz3D chose this. The potential customers don't get a say. The PAs will cheer for literally anything Daz3D makes, so I give zero [concern] what they have to say on the matter.

    If the shoe was on the other foot, I wouldn't be telling the people who rely on photorealistic options for their work to eat dirt and sit out entire product generation. Kinda like how while I no longer use 3Delight, I still champion supporting it, or something comperable, for people with a less than ideal GPU, but that's a different discussion.

     

    I am sorry to hear that G9 is a [rude noise] for you - it certainly was not planned. Since everything is done with masks and layers now which is a lot more customisable, I don't see any reason why a set of masks/texture templates can't be set up that will give you the hard line effect?

    It actually sounds like for your use case scenario that setting up new material zones according to the old style would be beneficial, since you don't need the photorealistic textures for it?

    Post edited by Richard Haseltine on
  • MadaMada Posts: 1,991

    alienarea said:

    I'm still missing a simple mouth open / close slider.

    In case you didn't find it - ​it’s Jaw Open now because that’s what Apple calls it in ARKIT.

  • AllenArtAllenArt Posts: 7,169
    edited November 2022

    vrba79 said:

    AllenArt, Some of us work almost exclusively in NPR. On that front G9 is a [rude noise]. Daz3D chose this. The potential customers don't get a say. The PAs will cheer for literally anything Daz3D makes, so I give zero [concern] what they have to say on the matter.

    If the shoe was on the other foot, I wouldn't be telling the people who rely on photorealistic options for their work to eat dirt and sit out entire product generation. Kinda like how while I no longer use 3Delight, I still champion supporting it, or something comperable, for people with a less than ideal GPU, but that's a different discussion.

     

    I don't recall seeing anyone telling anyone else to "eat dirt". frown 

    Post edited by Richard Haseltine on
  • davesodaveso Posts: 7,014
    edited November 2022

    AllenArt said:

    vrba79 said:

    AllenArt, Some of us work almost exclusively in NPR. On that front G9 is a [rude noise]. Daz3D chose this. The potential customers don't get a say. The PAs will cheer for literally anything Daz3D makes, so I give zero [concern] what they have to say on the matter.

    If the shoe was on the other foot, I wouldn't be telling the people who rely on photorealistic options for their work to eat dirt and sit out entire product generation. Kinda like how while I no longer use 3Delight, I still champion supporting it, or something comperable, for people with a less than ideal GPU, but that's a different discussion.

     

    I don't recall seeing anyone telling anyone else to "eat dirt". frown 

    it does build up immunity.  

    Post edited by Richard Haseltine on
  • savagestugsavagestug Posts: 172
    edited November 2022

    vrba79 said:

    AllenArt, Some of us work almost exclusively in NPR. On that front G9 is a [rude noise]. Daz3D chose this. The potential customers don't get a say. The PAs will cheer for literally anything Daz3D makes, so I give zero [concern] what they have to say on the matter.

    If the shoe was on the other foot, I wouldn't be telling the people who rely on photorealistic options for their work to eat dirt and sit out entire product generation. Kinda like how while I no longer use 3Delight, I still champion supporting it, or something comperable, for people with a less than ideal GPU, but that's a different discussion.

     

    Don't see how G9 is anymore of a [rude noise] than G3, G8, or G8.1.

    Post edited by Richard Haseltine on
  • almahiedraalmahiedra Posts: 1,352

    sueya said:

    I have a lot of G8 content I haven't fully utilised so I'm not jumping on the G9 train at the moment.

    Waiting for a script/tool that allows me to use G8 skins with G9. Also pose converter would be useful.

    Cayman Studios is working in a product related to legacy skins from G8 to G9 

  • maikdecker said:

    #1: There might be also different options involved?!? Especially concerning the "bashing" part... for one seeing his beloved product getting (rightfully?!?) criticized falls into the category... for someone else it's just... critic given. From my uninvolved standpoint - as I don't need G9 but not bother about it existing in either way - I have seen little to none bashing in this thread.

    #2: I have to admit, that I don't parse this forum too religiously. So if anybody else than Oso3D than I didn't see it. And in that case I would have apologize, but if it was first time by OsoD3 as a judgement about how critcs voice their opinions in this thread, I still think of that formulation as unfriendly towards these critics.

    #3: Again, a quite personal thing... I can't really understand why people not bothering about G9 as it doesn't fulfills their needs would be disheartening for you. Imagine yourself as the designer of the newest Lamborghini. And thousands people state "looks nice, but wtf would I be supposed to do with a Lamborghini, when I can reach all places that I have to go to by bicycle or public transport?"  Would that be disheartening for you? Or just an result that should be expected by producing a product that quite a few people do not really need... or afford (due to PC equipment for example) or just do not really WANT to have.

     

    1) Criticism is fine if it's constructive. We don't mind constructive criticism or discussion at all. But that would include suggestions for improvement as well. I appreciate that you haven't seen a lot of the bashing because the mods have been fairly diligent in trimming the threads (this one included) to be more constructive in nature, but there's been a lot already deleted. And criticism should also be open to dialogue, but it doesn't seem to be. The vendors have been accused of being shills that will endorse anything Daz releases. There's no discussion to be had there.

    2) This was a user, not Oso3D, and it was the day after G9 was released. I believe the phrase was "I'm calling it! Time of death on G9, 24 hours" or something similar. It may have been trimmed out since then, but it was certainly burned in my mind. 

    3) Not bothering with G9 isn't disheartening. And your car comparison doesn't really hold since it's one of the more expensive ones and G9 is free. It's more like people not wanting the free samples at the grocery store. Which is also fine. But when you don't take a sample at the store, you don't tell the person that offered it to you all the ways the sample is awful without having tried it. Don't want is fine, but anyone using current DS assets is capable of using G9. Not wanting to, fine. No quarrel with that at all. But I'd point out that it's been 2 years since people were speculating/expecting and asking for G9 in these very forums, so it's definitely something that was indeed wanted. Not by everyone, of course. There are still people happily using Aiko 3. If that's what you want to use, there's nothing wrong with that, and we're happy for you to continue doing so. This is a new figure for people who are interested in keeping up with current technologies and industry standards, and if that doesn't appeal to certain folks, that's fine, but I just don't see the benefit in bashing the products. I say bashing because a lot of the complaints are based on incorrect information and assumptions. And again, hats off to the mod crew because they're trimming that sort of stuff fairly quickly, but it still gets seen. But there have been a lot of threads that have outright insulted the mods and the vendors. Richard has been remarkably patient with outright personal attacks against himself (and I mean very personal and very nasty) and has shown me why I could never be a forum mod.

  • kyoto kidkyoto kid Posts: 41,057

    Masterstroke said:

    I agree. Gen9 is in many ways 2 steps forward one step back, and what REALLY pisses me off is that G8.1 is still so new (The funny thing is G8.1 had finally hit the point where it had enough unqiue morphs and support that I was willing to overlook my bugbears with it (incompatability with many Geoshell products, the screwy UV, and less compatibility with non-standard auto-fit clones) to start using it.

    In fact, I think the mistake is Genesis 8.1, not Genesis 9.
    That's why I didn't take G8.1 seriously and pretty much ignored it. Nothing of the G8.1 version justified a new figure. It could have all been done on G8 alone.
    People shouldn't be angry about G9, the should about G8.1 instead.

    ...8.1 seemed totally useless to me as I don't do much in the way of close-ups and portraits so the higher definition PBR skin wasn't really important.  To tell the truth, I didn't even consider  G8 as a much of an improvement over G3 (save for a few more interesting characters than just the usual stable) as the only major changes were in the expression morphing (and I already had the Face Control Rig).  The only 8.1 charcters I have are Pippy Fae and the Spindle Fae. 

  • almahiedraalmahiedra Posts: 1,352

    vrba79 said:

    I wish Daz3D and the PAs understood that not everyone wants everything hyper-realistic. Each new figure base has less and less anime/cartoon/stylzed stuff. I mean look at Aiko 8. She doesn't resemble her forebearers in the least. I can only assume Aiko 9 is just gonna look like a photorealistic Japanese woman, who happens to be named Aiko.

     I believe that what Daz3D and the PAs understand refers to the direct sales data that they possess and that allow them to know what most of their customers really want, unlike what individual customers, without access to the data can theorize.

    I would love to have stylized figures as the focus of DAZ, as that’s what I like. But apparently it’s not so.

  • vrba79vrba79 Posts: 1,398
    edited November 2022

    They can afford to ignore us, because there's no serious competition. This entire ecosystem runs on Daz3D figures. So even outside shops are dependant on them. Poser is a mere shell of itself, so they run unopposed.

    Post edited by vrba79 on
  • MadaMada Posts: 1,991

    vrba79 said:

    They can afford to ignore us, because there's no serious competition. This entire ecosystem runs on Daz3D figures. So even outside shops are dependant on them. Poser is a mere shell of itself, so they run unopposed.

    I tried to answer a bit higher above - in case it got missed :) Surely its possible to set up masks or a new UV map to accomplish what you want - you're not after photo realistic materials so it won't matter if there's a lips material with a hard line?

  • MadaMada Posts: 1,991
    edited November 2022

    In fact with the new layers system you'll be able to add a lot of stylized effects as well, the texel density transition is much improved and with masks you're not limited to just the material zones any more, you can expand or contract zones on the fly.

    Post edited by Mada on
  • Oso3DOso3D Posts: 15,011

    GiGi_7 said:

    vrba79 said:

    I wish Daz3D and the PAs understood that not everyone wants everything hyper-realistic. Each new figure base has less and less anime/cartoon/stylzed stuff. I mean look at Aiko 8. She doesn't resemble her forebearers in the least. I can only assume Aiko 9 is just gonna look like a photorealistic Japanese woman, who happens to be named Aiko.

     I believe that what Daz3D and the PAs understand refers to the direct sales data that they possess and that allow them to know what most of their customers really want, unlike what individual customers, without access to the data can theorize.

    I would love to have stylized figures as the focus of DAZ, as that’s what I like. But apparently it’s not so.

    I actually suspect we're going to see more stylized stuff for G9 than we have in the past.

    I mean, there's already toon kids and it's been less than a month.

     

  • PadonePadone Posts: 3,700
    edited November 2022

    Richard Haseltine said:

    People are worried about the greater system demands, but mostly that is based on mis-understanding - it's only the detail maps thata re 8K, not the bulk of the textures, and the mesh resolution is comparable to the fourth generation figures (and is equivalent to about one level of SubD baked onto the base mesh for previous Genesis versions, all of which loaded with at least three levels of SubD).

    Richard no, G9 is HD based in that the base mesh is simple quads and all the details are done in HD. If you want the HD details to be decently defined you need a high level of subdivision, apart the 8K maps. With G3 G8 you can avoid HD since you have detailed topology, with G9 you can't. Also, as for HD itself, with G3 G8 you need a lower level of subdivision since you already have detailed topology.

    Again it's not the mesh density that matters, it's the topology, how the geometry flow is used to define the body features. A good topology can use a low mesh density and provide great details. A bad topology, as in the G9 case, doesn't provide details even with a higher mesh density, simply because there's not the geometry flow for that, so you need HD sculpting.

    Post edited by Padone on
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