[DevonCory]

I realised last week that I was getting tired of saying that there wasn’t enough FMG around, and I decided to do something about it. Following Greycat’s (NSFW) advice, I thought I could start rendering on the cheap and so I downloaded DAZ Studio. Now, while I used to be pretty handy with a pen and a brush, I haven’t really used those in an artistic fashion in over 15 years. And even if I still have some skills with those, 3D rendering is a completely different beast.

Now, I’m always up for a challenge, and I need a creative outlet in my life anyway. I’ll probably do a bunch of research, look at tutorials and stuff, but I’m curious to know if anyone around here knows a bit about DAZ Studio. I’ve spent the weekend looking through the damn thing, but I would certainly appreciate any tips and tricks people can suggest. I’m also interested in hearing people’s opinions about other DAZ products like the Victoria Model or the Victoria Muscle Morphs package. I’m not going to go on a shopping spree yet, but these two products certainly look nice.

Oh, and freebies, if you have any to recommend. There’s quite a few on Renderosity, but I really don’t know where to start with these. Making sure the models have nipples and genitalia is a good start, but breasts and muscles enhancers, as well as clothes and textures are certainly on my 'to get' list.

Thanks! ;D

[ScottG]

Nice to see another Daz|Studio user joining the ranks.  I've been using Daz for about 2 years now and it has taken much of that to get a nice stockpile of clothes, props, scenes, etc.  So even though Daz|Studio is free, most of the good stuff is not.  Since you are starting out, I would definitely recommend joining the Platinum Club at Daz3d.com.  Many of the scenes that are priced at $19.99 are reduced to $1.99 for platinum club members while other items are reduced 50-60%.

As far as Victoria 4.2 (V4.2) and her muscle morphs are concerned, they are well worth the money.  I haven't made up my mind about the V4.2 Elite morphs just yet as I don't think they will really add much to what we can already do without them.  Do not buy too many items for the body morphs because they simply turn the dials that you can already turn yourself and you will turn them to a much higher degree than they ever will.

Next, pay attention to the full body morphs (fbm's) and partial body morphs (pbm's) that come built into clothing.  Many of them only have some of the fbm's and some of the pbm's and you will run into problems getting them to fit your very large women.

Also, when you purchase hair for your models, while long hair always looks good on a woman, you get alot of poke-thru and overlapping at the shoulders, breasts, and shoulders.  There are several hair styles that are just above shoulder length and still look good.  Personally, I really like the long hair styles, so I still use them and try to manipulate them as much as possible to acheive an acceptable look.

Lastly, when creating a render, remember that if you don't have to have the clothes and hair fitting perfectly all the way around a model, you only have to have it fitting well on the parts that are viewable in the rendering.  Don't waste your time getting the hair and clothing just right on the back side when the people seeing the render can't even see that part.

I hope I have not overloaded you with information and if you have any more questions, you have come to the right place.  There are a few Daz|Studio users here and many great Poser users as well.

[Lingster]

The one problem with DAZ Studio vs. Poser is that DS lacks dynamic clothing, which means you can't really achieve that natural clothing look on an very well-developed body, unless you're designing the clothing models yourself.

[ScottG]

The one problem with DAZ Studio vs. Poser is that DS lacks dynamic clothing, which means you can't really achieve that natural clothing look on an very well-developed body, unless you're designing the clothing models yourself.

Thanks Lingster, I didn't know that.  I've been trying to find things to justify switching to Poser but I haven't found enough yet.  That is a pretty good one though.

[Lingster]

Supposedly there will be some equivalent to 'dynamic clothing' in an upcoming DS release.

[DevonCory]

Thank you for your comments and advices guys. I'll most likely keep using DAZ instead of poser, since I'm just learning this stuff. Who knows, by the time I get good at it (in a few years or so :D), DAZ might support dynamic clothing.

Alright, time to go hunt some freebies!

[Lingster]

Well, the hope is that DAZ Studio will be clearly superior to Poser within another three or four years.

[Tigersan]

Thanks Lingster, I didn't know that.  I've been trying to find things to justify switching to Poser but I haven't found enough yet.  That is a pretty good one though.

I can give you some… First and most important (for me) on Poser8.0(Pro) is 64Bit rendering which is really faster, it uses up to 4 cores (since poser 7.0). Dynamic clothes, Dynamic hair (which i dont use much, but i will have to start once i start animating more) it has very evolved materials room you can stack multiple textures together using blender nodes… I use it for displacements one is soft other little harder and third ripped then i dont have to constantly go to PS to change displacement maps, i use dials on the blenders… possibilities with material room are almost endless and i wont hesitate to say almost professional… I'm learning Maya now and its nothing like maya but pretty close… hmm what else. Pretty much all that comes to my mind. Poser is very picky about graphic cards so be sure to create a profile for it with ALL effects Off such as antialiasing, anisotropic filtering etc, you dont need that for preview, and with complicated scenes it will slow you down.

One thing that Poser doesnt have is hardware rendering using vga card. I would have no use of it anyways because it doesnt render displacements, but its fast and good for low resolution animations… Dont know much about D|S export options, but poser is able to export whole scenes to maya or 3dstudio max with certain plugins (including fully poseable models along with animations if they are animated), and is able to render to flash…

I think I put it all on the table hope this helps you pick what suits your needs more.

[ScottG]

Wow, thanks Tigersan.  That's quite a few good reasons to switch.  I could switch to Poser 7 pretty easily but Poser Pro is currently just too pricey for me.  Anyway, thanks again!

[Tigersan]

I dont use poser pro either because it seems to load textures erroneously on my previously saved scenes and characters…. dunno whats up, hoping theyll fix it soon because it renders faster.

[Author]

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