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Newbee question

hien.henrynhien.henryn Posts: 0
edited August 2012 in New Users

Hi all,
I am new to DAZ. After a week of exploring, I am confused.
Please correct me if I am wrong for the following understanding of DAZ:

1) DAZ 4 came with Genesis, a prototype figure, no gender, no age, no emotion specific.

2) Users need to purchase specific "models" (Micheal/Victoria/etc.) that can somehow
transform into this Genesis. These "models" came with some preset poses (still gestures)
and some basic animation (walk, jump, etc.) and emotion (sad, smile, happy, etc.)

3) Users then buy some more Clothes/Hair styles/Skin/Background Props
to dress these characters to work for their needs, either still photographic
or animations.

Most of the sold models are so beautiful and handsome. I indeed only need everyday "characters".
What do I need to buy in order to, for example, turn a beautiful Victoria to a simple cross-eye, old Asian
woman? Pls don't tell me to buy the "Ethnic bundles", which again, provide the "bold and beautiful" Asians.

4) About directories, I chose E: drive for the Content. So from now on, anything I buy
with .exe or .zip need to "go" to this "E:\...\Content\Runtime" directory, regardless I have installed DAZ
program in C: drive in the first place?

Post edited by hien.henryn on

Comments

  • atticanneatticanne Posts: 3,009
    edited August 2012

    hien.henryn said:
    Hi all,
    I am new to DAZ. After a week of exploring, I am confused.
    Please correct me if I am wrong for the following understanding of DAZ:

    1) DAZ 4 came with Genesis, a prototype figure, no gender, no age, no emotion specific. Yes

    2) Users need to purchase specific "models" (Micheal/Victoria/etc.) that can somehow
    transform into this Genesis. These "models" came with some preset poses (still gestures)
    and some basic animation (walk, jump, etc.) and emotion (sad, smile, happy, etc.) Genesis transforms into Michael, Victoria, Basic Child, etc

    3) Users then buy some more Clothes/Hair styles/Skin/Background Props
    to dress these characters to work for their needs, either still photographic
    or animations. Yes

    Most of the sold models are so beautiful and handsome. I indeed only need everyday "characters".
    What do I need to buy in order to, for example, turn a beautiful Victoria to a simple cross-eye, old Asian
    woman? Pls don't tell me to buy the "Ethnic bundles", which again, provide the "bold and beautiful" Asians. You can check out ShareCG or http:/www./most-digital-creations.com. There are lots of freebies available both here in the Store or Freepository and other sites. You can also play with your sliders and see what you come up with.

    4) About directories, I chose E: drive for the Content. So from now on, anything I buy
    with .exe or .zip need to "go" to this "E:\...\Content\Runtime" directory, regardless I have installed DAZ
    program in C: drive in the first place?

    Yes, but DS4 uses My Library instead of Content.
    Post edited by atticanne on
  • fixmypcmikefixmypcmike Posts: 19,565
    edited December 1969

    Genesis comes with basic male, female and child figures and textures. Your content always gets installed to the folder CONTAINING the Runtime folder, in your case E:\\...\Content

  • BlumBlumShubBlumBlumShub Posts: 1,108
    edited December 1969

    Using Genesis you can create your own man or woman by loading the basic male or female versions and using the morph dials to change many, very detailed, aspects of the characters. You don't absolutely need the other models, but if you plan to use Genesis I recommend getting Victoria 5 and Michael 5 PURELY because they include more dials to twiddle with, and some clothing is specifically designed to work with those characters.

  • Scott LivingstonScott Livingston Posts: 4,331
    edited December 1969

    hien.henryn said:
    Most of the sold models are so beautiful and handsome. I indeed only need everyday "characters".
    What do I need to buy in order to, for example, turn a beautiful Victoria to a simple cross-eye, old Asian
    woman? Pls don't tell me to buy the "Ethnic bundles", which again, provide the "bold and beautiful" Asians.

    That would be a challenge, but it's certainly doable (and will likely get easier in the future as more Genesis content is released). The cross-eyed thing is easy: even without buying any extra content, you can select each eye independently and move it around using the Posing tab in DAZ Studio (alternatively, you can buy Real Emotions for DAZ Studio 4, which has built-in cross-eyed poses). So the missing elements would be aging morphs, ethnic morphs, and an appropriate skin texture.

    Full aging morphs for Genesis don't really exist yet, but I've heard that they are in the works, and you can see an example of what they'll look like here: http://www.daz3d.com/media/products/genesis/michael/genesis-figure-platform-diagram.jpg (the figure labeled "Old"). There are other morphs available now which can affect the apparent age of the figure. I'd recommend getting this package: http://www.daz3d.com/shop/genesis-starter-bundle which contains the Evolutions morphs, including a Face Young morph that you can dial in the negative direction, crows' feet, and more. This one might come in handy, too (I personally don't own it, but it's on my wishlist): http://www.daz3d.com/shop/wicked-fairytale-morphs

    For ethnic morphs, you can either use the Ethnicity for Genesis: Asian set (I know the promo pics look younger and more beautiful, but some of that is due to the skin texture, and keep in mind that you can blend these morphs with others to create a less idealized look), or an Asian character like Naoki (http://www.daz3d.com/shop/naoki-for-v4-and-v5), or use the Evolutions morphs mentioned above. The Evolutions morphs alone can be used to create a convincing Asian face (I've done this), but it'll take some time and effort.

    For a skin texture, look around to see if you can find one that will suit your needs. Or maybe someone else can recommend a specific one. If you can't find a perfect texture, keep in mind that an older non-Asian texture might work well when combined with ethnic morphs, and a younger Asian texture might look good when combined with aging morphs, and ideally some displacement maps. You might consider Aged for V4 and M4 (http://www.daz3d.com/shop/aged-for-v4-m4) for the textures, especially the displacement maps. Note, however, that while you won't be able to use the aging morphs that that product includes unless you get the Generation X plugin (http://www.daz3d.com/shop/genesis-generation-x). That plug-in will enable you to use any morphs from 4th Generation characters, so it will expand your options considerably (since the 4th generation characters have been around longer, there are many more products made for them than for Genesis). I don't own it though, so I can't speak much about that.

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