3D – Page 20 – JAY VERSLUIS

Navigating 3D Space in Blender on Mac

November 16, 2016April 14, 2015 by Jay Versluis

Using Blender with the integrated Magic Trackpad on my MacBook works a treat – it’s intuitive even! It’s a nice surprise in the otherwise daunting user experience Blender has to offer. Here’s how to navigate a 3D scene using gestures: Rotate using two-finger swipe Zoom using two-finger pinch, or the PLUS and MINUS keys Pan by holding …

Comparison: 3Delight vs NVIDIA Iray for Animations

June 3, 2015April 7, 2015 by Jay Versluis

For this animation I’ve rendered the same scene twice in DAZ Studio 4.8: once with 3Delight and once with the new NVIDIA Iray engine. It’s interesting to compare the results in an animation rather than a still image due to the different challenges involved.

One thing is that the subject is illuminated differently depending on how far away it is from the camera. Another is that it’s difficult to get matching end results when mixing faster and slower hardware: Iray can take a long time to finish a render if no GPU acceleration is around.

How to render Iray with transparency in DAZ Studio

April 3, 2015 by Jay Versluis

DAZ Studio Splash

DAZ Studio 4.8 comes with a new render engine called NVIDIA Iray. From what I understand it’s similar to the Mental Ray engine and – from what I hear – is supposed to become the new default render engine in DAZ Studio. It’s not a replacement for 3Delight, just an addition – selectable on the Render Tab (under Engine).

Unlike 3Delight, Iray renders images without transparency (or alpha channel) by default, which isn’t desirable. There is of course a way to change this, and here’s how to do it.

Skeleton at the Graveyard

May 2, 2019April 1, 2015 by Jay Versluis

Yesterday I’ve animated this skeleton. The steps involved were rather complex, so I thought I’d better write down how I did it.

In principle, there are four parts to this animation:

the animation of the skeleton (using DAZ Studio and aniMate)
the cloth draping (using Marvelous Designer)
a moving fog layer (using Carrara)
a graveyard picture (from Graphic Stock)
and finally, blending it all together (in Premiere Pro)

Here’s how I did it step by step.

How to export garment animations from Marvelous Designer for use in DAZ Studio

August 22, 2019March 31, 2015 by Jay Versluis

In my previous article I’ve explained how to export an animation from DAZ Studio and import it into Marvelous Designer, where we’ve created and animated our garment. In this article I’ll show you the reverse: exporting the garment with animation and import it into DAZ Studio for rendering.

Here’s how this works in principle:

export your garment animation from Marvelous Designer as OBJ Sequence
import the sequence in DAZ Studio using Morph Loader Pro
turn all those morphs into an animation

I’ve explained the whole process step by step in this video:

How to export animations from DAZ Studio for use in Marvelous Designer

August 22, 2019March 31, 2015 by Jay Versluis

Exporting character animations from DAZ Studio for use in Marvelous Designer is a trifle complicated. In this article I will explain what works for me.

I’m using an animation created in DAZ Studio 4.7 using Michael 6, a Genesis 2 character. I will then create some clothing in Marvelous Designer 4.5, drape and animate it, and eventually export it back to DAZ Studio for rendering.

Here’s how to do it in principle:

bake aniMate blocks into DAZ Studio timeline
export OBJ file of your first animation frame
export the whole animation as MDD cache
import OBJ into Marvelous Designer
import MDD cache in Marvelous Designer
drape and animate cloth

I’ve explained the whole process step by step in this video:

Podcast: Download (Duration: 30:26 — 27.9MB)

How to display the camera frame in DAZ Studio

March 30, 2015 by Jay Versluis

By default DAZ Studio will render everything in the current viewport, whose size depends on now much space the viewport occupies on your computer screen. That’s not necessarily the size or aspect ratio you’d like to render. To frame the camera accurately, we need to be able to see what the camera sees. There are two …

How to transition from a static pose to aniBlocks in DAZ Studio

March 29, 2015 by Jay Versluis

The way aniMate works is that we can either animate characters with a traditional keyframe approach, using the standard timeline, or we can use aniBlocks. There’s no easy way to mix and match both approaches. But sometimes it’s necessary to transition from a static pose to an aniBlock to get a smooth transition. The best way to …

Getting started with the ZModeler in ZBrush

March 28, 2015 by Jay Versluis

The ZModeler is is a new feature in ZBrush 4R7. With this new gadget we can perform polygonal vertex modelling, something that was not possible before the introduction of this brush. The term “brush” is a tad of an understatement if you ask me: this “minor addition” gives ZBrush abilities that are worth about $1600, which is what …

How to turn a 3D object into conforming clothing in DAZ Studio

January 22, 2017March 27, 2015 by Jay Versluis

If a 3D object is meant to follow the morphs and movements of a DAZ character, it needs to become an item of conforming clothing. This allows a garment to be fitted to a DAZ figure, following its movements and full body morphs (at least to a certain extend). The procedure is called rigging, and …

How to export a garment from Marvelous Designer

March 26, 2015 by Jay Versluis

You can export your garment from Marvelous Designer either in OBJ or FBX format. Note that at the time if writing, FBX is highly experimental and appears not to work very well. OBJ on the other hand is doing a fine job. Head over to File – Export and choose OBJ. There’s also an option …

How to import DAZ characters into Marvelous Designer

May 8, 2015March 25, 2015 by Jay Versluis

Screen Shot 2015-03-25 at 09.24.00 Marvelous Designer comes with 7 default avatars, but it’s very easy to use your own 3D figure and create custom clothing for it.

Simply export your desired character as OBJ, including full body morphs, then import it into Marvellous Designer.

Here’s how to do with with the Genesis 2 Male character from the free essentials pack.

Exporting from DAZ Studio

Load your character into an empty scene and select it in the scene tab. It’s typically located on the right hand side in DAZ Studio.

Screen Shot 2015-03-25 at 09.31.21

Head over to File – Export and pick a location for your files: DAZ Studio will create a .OBJ and a .MTL file. It will also bring up an export dialogue in which you can specify the scale and size for your export. Those need to match the import dialogue of your other app.

Navigating 2D and 3D Space in Marvelous Designer

April 30, 2017March 21, 2015 by Jay Versluis

Sometimes it’s the simple things they don’t to tell you about in the brochure: Zooming Magic Trackpad: move two fingers up or down, much like you would scroll a web page up or down. Intuos Tablet: hold the lower button down (right-click), then drag the pen. Mouse: rotate the wheel. Moving/Panning Hold the ALT/OPT key down, then: Magic Trackpad: drag …

How to install Carrara 8.5 in Mac OS X Yosemite

September 17, 2016February 4, 2015 by Jay Versluis

I’m configuring a new Mac Mini 2012 specifically for all my 3D ventures this year. As such I’m installing all my favourite (and annoying) 3D apps fresh from scratch. Being a futuristic kind of guy I’m using “the best operating system ever” (yeah, right!) OS X Yosemite.

Over the last 7 years I’ve installed Carrara more times than I can count and in every version of OS X and Windows that I can remember, and it’s never given me any trouble – neither when installed manually or via the DAZ Install Manager.

Until today, when I’ve received the following message in OS X Yosemite: “The application cannot get the administrator access right”. Thank you, Yosemite!

What does that even mean? I thought my user account HAS admin privileges.

Turns out they’re just not administrative enough. The solution to this awkward puzzle is to login as root for the initial launch of Carrara. Which leads us to the next adventure:

How do we enable the root user in OS X?

Italian Bucca Dress Textures – now available at DAZ 3D

April 21, 2020December 31, 2014 by Jay Versluis

Before the year is out I have some great news: a texture set Julia and I made last year for DAZ 3D has finally been released after 18 months: the Italian Bucca Dress Textures. I can officially call myself a DAZ PA now – a great honour among 3D artists. This is a great incentive to make …

Navigating 3D Space in DAZ Studio

March 11, 2020November 28, 2014 by Jay Versluis

Nothing is more frustrating that not knowing how to accomplish basic tasks. Navigating 3D space in different apps using different devices in the same day is one such thing. Before I forget, here’s how to navigate your scene in DAZ Studio 4.7. Dolly You can dolly the camera in several ways: by dragging the cube icon in …

How to group objects in DAZ Studio

November 28, 2014 by Jay Versluis

Groups are helpful to keep the many items in your scene organised and grouped together. They’re like a “folder”, even though you’re not really moving items to another place. They just appear together with a heading and a disclosure triangle. For example, rather than having a character and five independent clothing items, it’ll be much …

How to edit 3rd Party Vertex Objects in Carrara

November 27, 2014 by Jay Versluis

You want to make a quick change to a 3rd party vertex object in Carrara, head over to the Modelling Room, but all your favourite tools are greyed out. What’s going on? Carrara has a feature called Protect Topology, and there’s a good chance it’s switched on for items you bought from a marketplace. It’s …

Creating a waving flag in Carrara using Soft Body Modifiers

January 12, 2019November 18, 2014 by Jay Versluis

Carrara lets you turn any object in your scene into a Soft Body object with the help of a Soft Body Modifier. To create a waving flag we need to use a combination of two modifiers: one that makes the object a “soft body”, and one that attaches it to something else, such as a …

How to render DAZ Studio scenes without DAZ Studio

June 11, 2015November 17, 2014 by Jay Versluis

DAZ Studio has one drastic drawback: while you’re rendering a scene you can’t use the app until it’s finished rendering. In fact, DAZ Studio makes use of every available CPU cycle, turning even the fastest computer into something you can’t even check your emails with while you wait for that render to finish.

That’s great for efficiency – but it also sucks because you need a second computer to keep working with, or alternatively use a second computer for rendering while you work with your main machine. Wouldn’t it be great if you could do something akin to Poser’s background rendering, something that lets you setup the next scene in DAZ Studio while it’s rendering at the same time?

I have good news: you can – thanks to something called RIB files. I didn’t know this until recently, and it works a treat. Let me explain how to use this feature.

The old Empty Smart Content Tab ploy – and how to fix it

November 9, 2014 by Jay Versluis

One morning I woke up and my entire Smart Content tab in DAZ Studio was empty. Nothing had happened since the day before when it was working perfectly fine. It just stopped working overnight.

What I had done shortly before going to bed was to install the latest service release of Poser Game Dev (SR5). If this was the cause of the problem or not will forever remain a mystery. In this article I’ll explain how I fixed this issue on my Mac.

Screen Shot 2014-11-09 at 15.06.54

Directory Structure of a Poser Runtime

November 8, 2014 by Jay Versluis

Poser is a tad – shall we say – pernickety about where it allows you to save files if you’d like them to appear in the Library. You can save files anywhere on your system of course, using the options in the File Menu, but Poser can also save files into the Library with the …

How to rotate around selected objects in Poser

November 8, 2014 by Jay Versluis

Other 3D apps rotate around the currently selected object by default. Poser does not. By default Poser chooses to rotate around the center of the universe. That’s great for characters but relatively maddening for larger scenes. The secret lies in the Display menu, in an option called Orbit Selected Mode. Select it and Poser will rotate around your …

How to use Motion Blur in Poser

November 5, 2014 by Jay Versluis

Motion-Blur-3D

Poser can two two types of Motion Blur effects: 3D Motion Blur as seen above, and 2D Motion Blur. The latter is more of a “preview” mode rather than the real thing. Motion Blur can be used on both still images to convey the idea that something is moving, as well as in animations.

I’ll focus on still images here.

Rough Guide to Poser Pro Render Settings

November 5, 2014November 5, 2014 by Jay Versluis

A few years ago I bought Prostudio by Synthetic and Blackhearted. It’s a “light preset kit” for Poser that comes with an extensive manual and many presets to start a good render, but as the author explains you really need to know something about lighting to make renders look their best. After reading the manual I took …

How to use Replicators and Surface Replicators in Carrara

November 3, 2014 by Jay Versluis

Trees

Replicators and Surface Replicators allow you to duplicate single objects and make it look like you have an armada of “stuff” in your scene. For example, you could replicate trees on a landscape or a group of people, but only load a single object into your scene.

The difference between a Replicator and a Surface Replicator is this: Replicators duplicate (replicate) your objects along all 3 axis and only need a single source object. In fact they can accommodate several source objects, but they don’t replicate along anything.

Surface Replicators on the other hand only replicate along a given surface, like a terrain or another object. Surface Replicators only obey a twi dimensional plane along whose normals your replicated objects will be aligned.

To use them, simply drag an object onto the replicator in the Assemble Room. This can be tricky: make sure the source object turns green rather than yellow – which seems to happen when you drag it too far towards the right. Click and drag it further to the left, as shown below.

As soon as you do, you’ll see your object outlined many times over in the scene as bounding boxes.

replicator

To adjust the replicator, select it and click the Wrench Icon to enter the Modelling Room. Here you can tweak the behaviour of your Replicator: along which axis you’d like to replicate how many objects, if you’d like to add some distance or rotational changes to it, that sort of thing.

You can also add other source objects here if you would like them to have the same behaviour (in case you don’t like the drag and drop action described earlier).

Screen Shot 2014-11-03 at 01.48.54

How to show the sun and the moon in Carrara

October 26, 2014 by Jay Versluis

Screen Shot 2014-10-26 at 13.44.05

Carrara has a very cool sunlight / moonlight feature that comes as part of the Realistic Sky option. With it you can transform your default distant light into the sun or the moon and reposition it in your scene.

Here’s how to do it:

Creating Morph Targets in Carrara

October 25, 2014 by Jay Versluis

Morph Targets are these little sliders in 3D objects that can move geometry without changing it. For example a door can open and close, or a character can open and close their eyes. To create one in Carrara, head over to the Vertex Modelling room and select an area in which you’d like to create …

Hexagon Features in Carrara

October 25, 2014October 18, 2014 by Jay Versluis

Many features from Hexagon have been ported over to Carrara, but not all of them are obvious and easy to find for Hexagon users. Here are my favourite features from Hexagon, and how to access them in Carrara: Tweak / Stretch Tool The one Hexagon tool I was missing most was Vertex Modelling – …

Painting textures with 2D tools using ZAppLink in ZBrush

October 17, 2014October 16, 2014 by Jay Versluis

Screen Shot 2014-10-16 at 12.28.24 ZAppLink is a ZBrush feature that allows you to use 2D painting tools to paint the texture on a 3D object, as it’s seen in the workspace. Rather than exporting, editing and re-importing textures, drawing on awkwardly layed out UVs, or solely relying on 3D painting tools, you can simply frame your object and draw on it – with anything that supports the PSD file format.

This is different to using GoZ which relies on 3D features of a painting app (such as Photoshop Extended – which I don’t have). ZAppLink allows you to use other 2D tools in your pipeline such as SketchBook Pro, Manga Studio, Corel Painter and many others.

Here’s a quick guide on how to use ZAppLink in ZBrush 4R6.

3D Archives

Exporting from DAZ Studio

How do we enable the root user in OS X?