What I Have Learned So Far
franktuttle
Posts: 67
Two days in, with Daz Studio 4.9!
With some kind assistance from the users here, I have been able to:
* Import my Victoria 7, and then add the Finely character to her.
* Dress her in Victorian gowns and shoes.
* Add hair (a Victorian updo).
* Pose her.
* Add a background.
* Light the scene.
* Fix clothing collisions.
I feel pretty good about my progress. I've found the Daz interface easy and tuitive to use. I would suggest that anyoner interested in learning this software spend an hour or two watching the tutorial videos.
The biggest surprise came when I realized even clothes have bones that must be moved when the wearer's body is put into different poses. My character's jacket followed her arms perfectly, but her skirt required repositioning with each pose. Took me a bit to figure that out, but the end results are surprising. Will post a finished render when I get the lighting right.
In short, I love DAZ3D studio. I don't have a single artistic bones in my body, but I finally bring some of the images in my head to life. Very cool!
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Comments
Glad to hear you're having fun, Frank. It can become addictive. Just remember to keep the positive attitude and that you never stop learning. Welcome to the Club!
What sort of things did you have to do to fix clothing collisions?
Hi Prixat! Regarding clothing collisions-- her outfits consisted of a dress and a coat. They came together as part of a package. The fit was perfect until I posed her; then the dress poked through the coat in several places.
What I did was click on the dress. I indicated it was collding with the coat. Then, the dress still selected, I went to the PARAMETERS pane and selected mesh smoothing and set the Collision Iterations up until the problem is solved.
At least I think that's what I did. I'm so new at this I may have missed a step.
If there's a better way to handle this I'd love to know it, thanks!
Skirts are usually (but not always) an exception to the general case of the clothes always following the figure's pose. Your figure has two legs, each with its own hierarchy of body parts from thighs to toes, but skirts (unless they've been built otherwise) usually have only one body part. This means the skirt can't pose with both legs at the same time, especially if it's a long skirt. To solve this, some clothes include movement or posing morphs that you'll need to juggle until the skirt more or less matches the legs. Another approach is to build the skirt with extra "ghost" body parts called handles that you can bend, twist and turn for a similar effect. And some clothes have both, e.g. (I think) the Morphing Fantasy Dress. It can get complicated, but eventually you'll get something that looks good.
Have fun!
Thanks, SpottedKitty! I did find -- morphs, I think they are called? -- for the skirt, including a sitting pose slider.
For now I think I'll stick with standing poses. That's challenge enough for the moment. It's amazing what difference a few tiny tweaks can make, though.
For clothing, sometimes it works better to set the collision for say a jacket to collide with the shirt under it rather than the figure itself. Fit to the V7 but change the collide in parameters to the shirt. You can also try fitting the jacket to the shirt rather than the figure. Also, turn on 'show hidden' in the parameters panel dropdown menu and you will see the fitted clothes have a bunch of parameters derived from your figure - you can adjust these to get clothes to fit better also.
Andddd... small tip for adjusting things - note at the top of the parameters and shaping etc panels there is a 'currently used' option, I find it very handy after posing or applying expressions, etc, for tweaking things to click on that rather than the entire parameters list as it lists only those items you have changed already. For items with only a few parameters this will not really help but some items can end up with a wall of sliders to sort through, especially fitted items like clothes. I mention this becasue I did not notice the currently used option for like a year :/ and it is indeed very useful.
Thanks, Gederix! I'll try the things you mentioned. I just managed to get a skirt to fit perfectly with a walking pose; you can lift up and pull back parts of the bottom, just enough to cover the back of the legs and heels. Glad the designer threw in so many adjustments!
Here's another render, of Meralda standing in the sun in her work clothes.
The figure is Finley for Victoria 7. The setting is Balinor. I think this took my poor Nvidea-free PC about six hours to create. The full image is much larger, but I cropped it because her shoes weren't quite touching the ground. Newb mistake, I know. But I am pleased with what I could salvage from the full render.
You've learned a lot! It's looking good! Does Finley have nipple morphs turned on? It looks like the vest is rather pointy, possibly distorted by nipples. A woman (I'm one, so I can say this) would wear a bra with work clothes like that, so the nipples would be contained and not causing visible clothing distortion. I've had this problem on a lot of characters that load with nipple morphs turned on. I have to hunt them down in Currently Used and dial them down to 0.
Thanks, Barbult! I'll check, honestly not sure. But that's certainly something I'll be aware of in the future.
I came home and checked, Barbult, and you were right. About the anatomy. I found a way to remove them, so I appreciate the tip. Thanks!
Spent tonight getting a long skirt to fit to to a sitting pose, and it looks pretty good! Also have her sdeated on a couch. If the render is decent I'll post it tomorrow.
I've been playing with lighting. Finally got a portrait shot with shadows and eyes on the camera!