Using Carrara without Daz/Poser, and texturing characters from photos
Omega Man
Posts: 78
Is anyone using Carrara for character animation with custom characters, without incoporating Daz or Poser. My understanding is that currently people are importing procedural shaders made for characters in other programs, then tweaking to see what they get in Carrara. Is it possible to texture heads made in Carrara from photos and split into various maps that Carrara needs to process.
A hardcore workflow equivalent of:- https://www.youtube.com/watch?time_continue=33&v=9tZoeQXTX9Q#t=32s
Would it look photorealistic to Carrara lighting in the native renderer ? Any pointers or thoughts on this would be welcome.
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A few issues- separating custom figures from realism
- use custom characters without incorporating Daz or Poser?
. Yes - have modeled, uvmapped, and rigged custom characters in Carrara without incorporating Daz or Poser. Here is a draft of one character's base mesh and head uvmap.
The characters are rigged and animated in Carrara, including facial bones to aid expressions. Here is an early draft of a facial rig and a test of draping clothing using VWD.
..
Pursue realistic shaders and realistic lighting?
Others do, but no, I do not pursue realistic shaders or realistic lighting within Carrara. However, with an appropriate mesh and UVMap, there is nothing stopping me from creating and applying Hi res texture maps for my characters and pursuing realism. Can't find it right now, but I know I adjusted a facial UV map to accept Michael 6 texture maps, so whatever can be achieved in Carrara with Genesis 2 figures could have been achieved with my custom character. There are several excellent threads on pursuing realism with Carrara shaders and lighting. Best to start with PhilW's thread on the topic.
https://www.daz3d.com/forums/discussion/25644/make-your-most-realistic-renders-ever/p1
In the meantime, here is the kind of sillyness I prefer with my non-Studio / non-Poser custom figures.
Pointers and thoughts
- Is it worth it to reinvent the wheel? Daz has done some of the hard work of figure modeling, uvmapping, joint control morphs, etc. You have rights to your rendered images of those figures. You don't have rights to the underlying mesh. Are you doing something that rights to the underlying mesh matters? For example, are you embedding the mesh in a video game engine and thus need more rights? If you just want the rendered images, maybe using the Daz figures is satisfactory.
- Carrara is a full service app, but you don't have to do everything in Carrara. Although I modeled/uvmapped/textured/rigged the above figure in Carrara, I could have modeled it in Hexagon, uvmapped it in 3DCoat, textured it in Substance Painter. etc., etc., etc. Either way, the figure could be animated and rendered in Carrara. I do some projects relying entirely on Carrara for personal satisfaction, but I do other projects incorporating other programs. For example, you could create aterrain in Bryce and bring it in Carrara. So, yes, you can do everything with Carrara, but you may have access to other stuff that you might want to incorporate.
- There are threads on specific topics ere in the forum. Ask - we will try to point you to helpful information. There are a couple threads dedicated to modeling. There are some for uvmapping, for terrains, for replicators, for...
- You can learn a lot of stuff pretty quickly by participating in monthly challenges. Typically, each challenge focuses on one or two Carrara features. Even if you don't want to participate, the challenge sticky thread at the top of the forum has links to previous challenge work inprogress threads. There is a challenge that focused on hair. There was a challenge that focused on realistic lighting. There was a challengethat focused on... Browsing those old WIP threads can accelerate the learning curve.
- Whatever you decide, come visit the forum. Ask if you have questions, share your updates even if you don't have questions. In general, we are a good bunch.
Painting on the Model - RE: "Hardcore Workflow"
Last Post - Sorry
This is specific to using carrara to paint the textures. Again, you can. Carrara does have a 3D paint function. For pointers, see this thread
.https://download.daz3d.com/forums/discussion/147656/3d-painting/p1
However, a dedicated painting program like Substance Painter, etc. would have more features and tools.
Diomede_Carrara, thanks very much, those are very interesting (and no need to apologise for being so helpful !
).
The Daz/Poser character ecosystem does confuse me because I understand that not everything is compatible with everything else in terms of clothing, morphs, textures, etc. Just out of curiosity the Carrara box covers Studio 2 and 5 Pro - does anyone know which character(s) that is please ? They seem quite good and I'm taking a wild guess they are lower poly than more modern characters.
probably Posette
only guessing mind you
RE: boxes - interesting question. There was a thread on the history of Carrara that might have info like that. I think Dart started it.
If Carrara 5 Pro was released during 2006, then its figure could be the Poser 6 character called Jessi. Some of those Poser figures had a standard res and hi res version. Here is the Carrara 5 box and the Poser 6 Jessi character. I just loaded P6 Jessi, conformed some base clothes to avoid nudity on the forum, and rendered in Carrara. I didn't adjust the Poser skin shaders for Carrara. This version of Jessi had about 36,000 polygons. I think advances in subdivision and surface materials have allowed the base figures to reduce their polygon count. Base genesis 1 only has about 19,000 polygons. My current version of my custom Brash Lonergan character only has about 7,000 polygons.
Nope. Ringo did
► History of Carrara by Ringo Monfort
Very interesting deduction. According to Firelight3D's History of Carrara (up to 2006) Poser 5 shipped in 2005, but it's very likely that they were able to get their hands on Jessie, Poser's premier figure for P6, to test and render with for their new TransPoser plugin. I've never used TransPoser, but I read that people were pretty upset when Carrara 6 didn't need/use it anymore.
As for "Realism", my friend, magaremoto, is always crossing that Uncanny Valley. Here's a link to just one of his many test renders. Seems "micro-displacement" is one of the many things he's been studying up on to generate maps for use in Carrara. But he tries all manner of tricks. Very cool to watch his progress. there are a bunch more in earlier pages of that thread.
The magaremoto image is incredible. I associate images like that with the highest of the high end - the sort of thing I'd expect to see in a Mari demo. I didn't know this was even possible in Carrara.
The character on the box for Carrara 5 was a custom piece modeled in Hexagon by Thomas Roussel, a member of the early development team for Amapi, Carrara and Hexagon. The image is titled "Carrara Muse" and can be found at this link:
https://totyo.cgsociety.org/xate/carrara-muse
Thank you de3an. I find it such a nice image, and the strange headress/hairband contraption is out of this world !
Me too!
Yeah, de3an ROCKS! So do many others around here. Nice family, this Carrara discussion forum!
Every once in a while I have the missing piece of information someone is looking for.
Absolutely! And there are many cool renders in that thread - and in the first post, I have links to the earlier Render threads before that one, each with amazing renders and discussions around them.
I find it highly worth it to just scroll through those render threads from time to time - stop at images that really blow my mind.
Also, in case you're interested, Ringo Monfort, whom was also highly involved in the development of Carrara over the years, has some really nice shaders sets for many of the Genesis line of figures, and they're very good - and very easy to use. Simply drag a file from the browser to the multi-colored ball at the upper right of the Texture room.
GKDantas has some great shaders sets for Generation 4 figures, and a bunch of other goodies for Carrara users. Note: The Iray products are for DS, not Carrara
PhilW's Carrara hair products are incredibly realistic in renders
Howie Farkes, Mmoir, and TangoAlpha make amazing, realistic scenery and other products for Carrara (Holy cow! Mmoir was culled? When did this happen? What a travesty for Carrara users world-wide!)
There's a lot of great Carrara products that are not only great to load and render, but also to disect to learn from. I've learned a LOT doing this.
Magaremoto and I (and 3dage, Mmoir and others) used to have Carrara products in the Daz 3d store to help Carrara users learn from. I used to buy products and investigate shaders, scene assembly, etc.,
Wow. I was just about to suggest Tim Payne's skies, but he's been culled now too? Argh!
while he used Hexagon, it was still part of the same family of software at the time which is cool, we still have those tools and more, it goes to show one does not need to depend on premade content as our own Current modelers wacky or otherwise still show us.
Diomede can maybe whack up an outfit like that for Moxie
I think recreating the old box arts would be fun, I never found that 8.1 Chameleon so think that was modelled too, looks like a Stezza project to me
I'll start it off with a wacky chameleon... ya'll can download it and do your thang! From the Wacky thread when I upload it after dinner
I'm sounding like an American.... slap myself lol
This figure (human) was modeled, textured and rigged by me from scratch. Rendered in Carrara, no postwork.
thx DB and Omega Man,
with such a lack of support by Daz, I try what I can to stay carrara alive and kicking in my own little way
Ringo Monfort highly involved in the development of Carrara? curious to know what was his contribution. Apart from his store, I have never noticed things like that by him
Vyusur, your characters are outstanding and very lifelike; thank you
Magagemoto, thank you so much for your kind words!
@ Vyusur: having fun with Deya lately, great character indeed
Vyusur, Wow! He's Amazing! Very nice figure, and his joints look fantastic! Very top-notch!
I really love this joint-bend demonstration
@magaremoto, thank you for purchasing, I'm glad you like her!
Dart, thank you a lot for your nice comment! Alas, I accidentally deleted his Daz version. Now he exists only in Carrara version with rigging. So I couldn't continue his development. I have to start from the very beginning. Happily, I have other WIPs of different figures for further development.
MAT Creator was prodding for some of us to make and sell a Carrara-specific figure. Maybe DAZ 3D would consider it? He sure is amazing!
This figure was rigged in Daz Studio and it was left uncompleted. I could never have it finalized in Carrara. Carrara rigging is very clumsy compared to Daz Studio rigging. Moreover, the figures rigged in DS are more versatile and they could be used in other software. Once in Carrara, the figure is locked in there forever, like this my guy.
Veronika, your figures are always amazing. Add me as a plus one regarding the limitations of Carrara-rigged figures. I tried to port my toon mermaid to Studio and Bryce, but both FBX and collada export formats from Carrara went haywire. Had to do it as an obj. I’ve rigged my claymation guy in both Carrara and Studio, and once in Studio it is much easier to add conforming stuff, etc. If rigged in Studio, can still pose and render in Carrara. On the other hand, for use just within Carrara, I do find it much easier to rig, edit, etc.
Thank you, Ted, for your kind words! I believe in your progress with your original figures and with your custom morphing characters as well.
BTW, where I can get access to displacement painting tools in Carrara? I couldn't find it anywhere.
Thanks,
You probably mean the tool in the vertex modeler. There is also a way to use the displacement tab in the shader room.
3D paint can use the displacement channel to if you allocate the image you are painting on the same map
You can also paint displacement in the vertex modeller,. and export the diplacement map.