Alternative PowerPose Templates (Genesis 1, 2, 3, 8, 8.1, 9)
PowerPose templates for figures have been hit or miss (or missing). The default templates are a couple of decades old and don't always hold up. It is up to DAZ to provide the official versions, but what if they don't do so in a timely manner? We're still waiting for Genesis 3 templates.
Genesis 9 templates are promised soon, but when? I have created something to help you in the meantime with at least the basic controls (body, hands, and simple head controls). I am not even going to attempt the face controls, just too many dots (edit: okay, I did the dots). There will probably be a Face Control Attachment like Genesis 8.1 at some point.
Genesis 9 (below)
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These Genesis 9 PowerPose templates are based on the functionality of the G8/G8.1 PowerPose. Those were, of course, encrypted, so they could not be edited. Genesis 3 was sadly left behind (hm-m-m), so there was nothing even vaguely current to be based on.
(old screencaps removed, obsolete)
All the Node points drive the raw transforms (General->Transforms->Rotation), either individually or in groups, but they do trigger the Base Corrective morphs so the joints look natural, except for the eyes. Using the raw transforms caused them to jump outwards about 3 degrees each, so I used the Pose Controls, which give much better results. I kept the head controls simple, because there are just too many combos that could be made with the existing Pose Controls for the eyes and face, no one would be satisfied.
The PowerPose folder does not exist by default (yet), but there are two ways to get it. You can save a version of the default template (use any name, they will be replaced anyway) while in Edit Mode in the PowerPose tab. This will create the folder and copy the default files. Navigate to that folder ("data\DAZ 3D\Genesis 9\Base\Tools\PowerPose") and delete everything except bipedDynamics.dsx (that's a DAZ resource that I can't share).
You can also create the folder manually. You will need to copy bipedDynamics.dsx from any other PowerPose folder or from "Program Files\DAZ 3D\DAZStudio4[ Public Build]\plugins\PowerPose". I am not sure how relevant it is now, but it has been around unchanged for years. Most of the bones seem to fit in somehow with the regular expressions, except maybe the new Spine nodes, but that didn't seem to interfere.
Take the files from the download and drop them in the PowerPose folder. That's all you need. You might need to restart Studio and/or reload G9 for it to see the correct template files. Select your G9 figure and PowerPose away...
MEGA download version 1 (inactive)
Version 2 post
Version 3 post (NEW!)
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Disclaimer: These files are provided free of charge, as-is, with no restrictions, just don't claim them as your own. Not responsible for data loss or damage due to misuse or improper installation. Use at your own risk (which is, you know, none, but I have to say that).
Studio has all the tools needed to create and edit the PowerPose templates (but not entirely user-friendly). These templates are editable, so feel free to experiment with your own mods if you prefer a different property, or want more controls.
Right-click on the PowerPose background to select Edit Mode (sometimes it takes a couple of attempts if you move even one pixel when clicking the mouse button).
Right-click on a Node point (round dot) to change the label, the position or the node used.
While a Node point is selected, right-click the label or the blank space to the right of the mouse diagram showing the direction of movement (vertical or horizontal) to edit the action. You can change the property used, the direction, and the sensitivity (size). Only General Transforms can be used with node points (Translate, Rotate, and Scale).
Right-click on a Group Node point (round dot with a fringe) to change the label, the position or the set of nodes used. Nodes may be added or removed, and don't forget to click the tiny +/- buttons at the right to actually add/remove the node.
Select a node from the list and set its property, direction and size as with a single node point. Repeat for all nodes you want to use. Not all nodes are required to have a property for all actions, but the node must be included in the group if it is used by any one action. To remove a property, click somewhere below the listed properties (i.e., the blank area) when choosing one.
Right-click on a Property point (diamond) to edit any of its data like a Node point. The difference is that a Property point can act on any property. To access them, select the appropriate node on the figure when setting the actions for the mouse buttons. Selecting the base figure will expose everything to the Property selector, including Actor and Pose Controls, among others.
A few tips to keep in mind if editing the templates:
1) Save often. Click the Template Set drop-down list and select "Save As..." (see 4 below). Edit a point to change the node, the parameter, the sign, the sensitivity, whatever, then save before doing anything else. Changing focus away from the figure, or trying to make too many changes will lose your work since the last save.
2) If selecting a node, you have to navigate down to it one level at a time from the base, the UI does not recall your last selection or the current node (that's 13 levels down to finger Pinky 3).
3) Save often. Lose your work more than three times and you will take the time and effort to save it. Often.
4) The "Save As..." UI does not remember your previous choices or even which template you are working on. You must select "Type: Base" and enter "Name" Genesis 9" every time you save. Choose "Yes" to overwrite the existing .dsx files when prompted (once per file, so, four times total). If you save as an Add-on, New Set (the default settings), a new template set will be saved in another folder under the PowerPose folder and will be listed in the Template Set drop-down list. Just delete them if you don't want them.
Edit: To work with more than one template set, save each as an Add-on. This will save the template set to a new folder under "Sets" in the PowerPose folder, with the Template Set Name you entered. It does not change the internal name of the template set, which must always be the same. Both will be available from the Template Set selection list. See additional notes here.
5) Did I mention to save?
6) For quick fixes, you can edit the .dsx files directly, they are plain XML text, but rather terse and cryptic. Saving them this way you won't need to save them again inside PowerPose. Any syntax errors will prevent the files from loading, but no error messages, so have backups
They work beautifully :-) Thank you so much
Trial and error at first. There are only so many things to do at each step. Once you go through it once, it becomes easy. Tedious, but you see the progress immediately.
Before Genesis 9 was announced, I had been toying with a Genesis 3 version, so I had most of it figured out. However, I imagined that it would get lost and forgotten in the ensuing chaos of a G9 release frenzy.
Coming soon...
More Head controls, using many more of the available Pose Controls from the Parameters tab. Plus, the Face Template, with a full set of node controls.
(screenshots removed, see below for full set)
Yeah!!!
Ooooh very usefull. Thank you very much.
Thank you!!!!!!!!!!!!
thanks
very helpfull
I had time to add some controls to the Head template, and make a Face template with a full set of upper and lower face rig controls. The number of bones in the face has been greatly reduced for G9 compared to G8/8.1, so it wasn't too difficult. It took me longer to make the color map of the corresponding zones. It's not just about the bone location, its all in the associated weight maps.
The Head template uses a lot more of the Pose Controls from the Parameters tab. Many of the Pose Controls have been divided into two complementary movements, like Brow Up/Brow Down, so they had to be placed on different mouse buttons (one property per control, max four per point). Many controls only work in one direction, like "Mouth Upper Up" and "Mouth Lower Down". I tried to pair up complementary controls to get an organic feel to the posing, like Nose Sneer and Cheek Squint. Start with the sneer then add some squint to make the expression more intense. Or start with the squint, then add some sneer. Most controls have a left and a right channel to pose one side at a time.
On controls where there is action in all four directions, you have to be careful not to drift up/down (right/left) when dragging left/right (up/down) if you didn't want the other's movement. That's nothing new, but with most of the new pairings that work only in one direction, you can use a diagonal movement to isolate one effect from the other. It's just the nature of the G9 Pose Controls.
For example, "Mouth Upper Up" is combined with "Mouth Smile". "Mouth Upper Up" is, naturally, (left) mouse drag up, but only above the mouth line, you can't drag the upper lip down below its zero position. "Mouth Smile" is (left) mouse drag right, dragging left of the zero position does nothing. So, you can combine the two (Mouth Upper Up and Mouth Smile) by dragging up and to the right. If you only want the "Mouth Smile", drag to the right and down a little to avoid adding "Mouth Upper Up". Conversely, to add "Mouth Upper Up" without any "Mouth Smile", drag up and a little to the left. To remove the two of them, drag down to the left, or alt-click on the point.
I tried to be consistent with the movements. Drag up is "Up" or "more of this effect", drag down is "Down" or "less of this effect". Similarly, drag right is "Right" or "more of this", drag left is "Left" or "less of this". The Jaw opens with a drag "Down", but it is also "more of this", so be reasonable. Also note that, for example, Mouth Close (which moves only the lips) is only appropriate with the Jaw open, as well for the Tongue controls.
Most of the controls on the Face template are like G8/8.1 (X and Y Translation, and Y and X Rotation) for the two mouse buttons, with a few exceptions around the chin and cheeks because of the bone orientation with respect to the surface. Spinning the cheeks around the X-axis doesn't accomplish much, so I used Z-Rotate. I couldn't resist putting the Z-Translate on the chin, with X-Rotate, for a distinctive lantern jaw (best done in profile).
On the Face template you can manipulate the bones directly for a more granular control, or go beyond what the Pose Controls will let you do (nothing new there), e.g., drag the Upper Lip down below the zero position. If you have the Parameters tab open, it will display the currently selected node in case you want to adjust some of the other properties. It is hard to fit six degrees of freedom onto four 2-dimensional controls, and what about scaling? That could be four more... (The Face Control Attachment should be able to handle all that.)
Okay, enough talk. You can download the latest at the following link:
MEGA Download (Version 2)
If this is your first time, follow the instructions earlier. If updating, just replace what you have.
If you wish to use more than one template set, see later instructions here.
Thanks again!
n.b. to all using this, after following the instructions and installing this, zip up the folder to use as a Backup for Reinstallation after Program Updates ;-)
Because I'm a lunatic, when I was making my powerpose templates, I just used Notepad.
The built-in tools could use some TLC. I did use NP++ for repeating groups of controls where the only difference was L or R, or to tweak the point locations. Those <lmb_horiz>, <lmb_vert>, <rmb_horiz>, <rmb_vert> start looking the same after a while, though.
Thanks so much for all the extra work you did!
You're welcome. Enjoy!
Thanks for doing this, it works really well.
I had a minor issue finding the correct folder until I realised that I have both a Daz 3D and a Daz3d folder in the data folder. Also a Daz folder.
Wow, this must have been a huge amount of work. Thanks for the excellent instructions, too. I gave it a try on Michael 9. I went a little crazy on his ears. I've only tried that head and face templates so far.
Very nice. Thank you. Happy Holidays
OK, I'm a dunce and just getting around to installing stuff. What directory do I drop this folder into?
It goes into "data\DAZ 3D\Genesis 9\Base\Tools\PowerPose", but be careful, the "Genesis 9 Starter Essentials" update will intermingle with them when you install it. Keep a pair of parallel folders to hold each set, and copy one or the other to the PowerPose folder to use it. I suggest installing the update first, copy and rename the PowerPose folder, then add the alternates to a new PoserPose folder.
Mine are installed like this.
They don't seem to intermingle in the file structure. I followed your installation instructions where I create the folder from inside PowerPose in the edit mode.
Both your set and the new Daz set are accessible from PowerPose as separate entities, as far as I can tell. BUT, when I select your template set it doesn't switch to your template graphics. If I have your set selected and change to a different template (Face, for example), it shows your template graphic, but it says Base (Genesis 9) as the template set. So something is not working right in this configuration, I guess.
Your set was working great before the Daz set was delivered in the latest essentials update. What is the point of having template sets, if we can't reliably switch between sets? Should the Daz templates be in the sets folder, in their own folder?
Hmm. I wonder about the bipedDynamics.dsx now. The Daz G9 version has some differences from the older version we copied into the alternate set. Should the newer one from Daz be used with the alternate set now, or would that mess it up?
I have tried to make the Sets work, but from what I can tell, the "geometries" name has to be unique in the templates used for a given figure. So, given that the figure must have a fixed name, you can't use more than one set per named figure. I can make it work once, but then it seems to latch in on the one selected, and can't go back.
You might have noticed this on G8.1, where, if you have a G8.1M and G8.1F in the scene, switching between them will change the templates the first time, but after that they stay stuck on the second one, and don't switch back again. I found that the "geometries" name in a new, from-scratch, template for G8.1M/F is actually "Genesis8". The underscore in the Node name "Genesis8_1Male" or "Genesis 8_1Female" seems to trip up the PowerPose code. The non-uniqueness of "Genesis8" for the two prevents the proper switching of templates.
I'll take a look at the bipedDynamics file...
Okay, the bipedDynamix file is used to match up the node names with node labels. The new one has refreshed the node names actually used, no more lButt, rButt, but also removed upper/lower neck, abdomen and chest and added neck1, neck2, spine1, spine2, etc. When editing the templates, you see the node labels in the node selection drop-downs. The node names are the behind-the-scenes id's of the bones, which you probably shouldn't change. What you see in the Scene tab are the node labels, the user-friendly id's given to the bones, which could vary, I guess, so bipedDynamics tries to match them up. From what I gather, it was used in the original incarnation to avoid having to customize every figure by providing a universal system to match the "standard" node names with a variety of node labels from different figures. You might recall how on Genesis 3, the Bend didn't work on some nodes, like the Thigh, because the generic template was used, and there was no match in bipedDynamics for, e.g., lThighBend or lThighTwist, just lThigh.
All that said, I tried my templates with the new bipedDynamics and it made no difference. I explicitly mapped every node used, so apparently bipedDynamics doesn't really affect it. I don't know how DAZ uses it in their templates, since they are encrypted, but they might be taking advantage of the name and label matching.
(edit: small inconsequential typo)
Thanks folks!
With @Barbult's help, I figured out how to get the two sets of templates to work together. Turns out the template sets' internal names must be the same, not just the internal target geometry's name. I had changed my own development set's name to help distinguish it in the PowerPose Template Set title so that the user would know which was being used when switching, but that is obviously not an option.
So, it is a simple matter to implement, using what is available to you now. The Genesis 9 Starter Essentials installs the DAZ version of the templates to "data\DAZ 3D\Genesis 9\Base\Tools\PowerPose". To be able to switch between them and another, both must be present in separate folders in a "Sets " folder under the PowerPose folder, so create a folder named "Sets" under folder "PowerPose". Pick a name you want to see in the PowerPose Template Set selection list, like, maybe "Genesis 9 DAZ", and create a folder under "Sets" with that name. Pick another name for the alternate set of templates which you would like to see in the selection list, say "Genesis 9 Alternate", and create another folder under "Sets" with that name.
Copy the entire set of templates in the PowerPose folder from DAZ into the corresponding folder you created under "Sets". Copy the alternative templates into the second folder under "Sets" (Genesis 9 Alternate, in my example). Now, you will have the choice between the two while working on your scene, and you can switch between back and forth between the two at any time. The two subfolders in Sets are required, otherwise there is no way to get back to the first set if you change template sets. The selection list will show the names of the two folders, but once loaded, will display the internal name, Genesis 9, in both cases. The only gotcha is that the displayed template does not immediately switch to the one from the set selected, you must select another template (body, hands, head, or face) to see the actual change.
Note that the template set in the root PowerPose folder is the default when you select your figure. (If there is no template set in the root PowerPose folder, it will use the ancient generic template set). If you navigate away from the figure, and return to it, the default set will again be selected, even if you had previously changed it. So, if you prefer to use the alternate set by default, delete the DAZ templates from the root PowerPose folder (they will still be available to select at any time if you keep them in the Sets folder), and copy (don't move) the alternate set to the PowerPose folder.
I hope that is clear. Sorry for the earlier confusion.
So like this then?
\data\DAZ 3D\Genesis 9\Base\Tools\PowerPose\Sets\Genesis 9 ALT
Yup, that looks correct.
OK, cool! Here is a screen grab of what I did just now. Does this look like it's going to be OK?