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First glance at Headus UV Layout, is mediocre with a grain of salt. There is a cool feature for loading up OBJ files.
However, as this is a Trial version, and the first time starting the thing up, I'm not sure it worked completely, yet.
I Right-clicked and dragged the OBJ over to the UV Layout Icon, and in the menu was a "Open With" Option. That was the result. Looking at the screen-cap, it is obvious that this is a very simple interface with minimal junk to bog down the computer (I hope). I think the first thing I need to do is click that "Try Hobbyist Version" as there is no way I'll have the funds for the 'Pro' version.
No Dongles nor Ether IDs required (That's a good thing, as the last one I tried for a Prosonus thing, wiped the Eprom in my graphics card, "Never Again".). I have an EVGA GeForce 6800GT (512MB GDDR3, PCI Express x16 SLI Support), mint condition, not even a hundred hours on it's fan, The Eprom is blank thanks to the iLock driver required by a Prosonus audio interface.
Enough of that, back to UV Layout.
Odd. When I type the 'Shift-PrtScrn' keys, it opens up other windows.
That's going to make life interesting, lol.
(EDIT) As of this Post, I have no clue what I'm looking at in the above screen caps. It apparently is showing the 3D model that I tried to load, however I know nothing beyond that. So I've been watching vids, and hoping there explaining exactly what there doing as stuff 'Just Happens' on the screen (What key did you press to make that happen!?), lol.
yeah apparently have to shift print screen twice to get something to paste into paint, I've not figured out how to save out an image from that window that pops up in a place I can find... thoguh not tried very hard either.
Yea, That is about all I use the PrtScrn key for, screen-caps. That is just the first time I've seen a program use it for something else.
Taking five, to look at some stuff. L-to-R is FW Eve (NJA Ponytail Hair), FWSA Serena (XTech Dreadlock Ponytail), and FWSA Amalthea for Ninive6 (Ballet Bun).
The outfit on the left and right is set up with colors from Las Vegas for Serena Show Girl (not included in that Serena Bundle), and Serena in the center is sporting an orange included in the "Serena Show Girl" outfit (included in that Serena Bundle). The pose is from a Cabaret set and slightely adjusted.
Taking another five, to look at some stuff. L-to-R is FW Eve (NJA Ponytail Hair), FWSA Serena (XTech Dreadlock Ponytail), and FWSA Amalthea for Ninive6 (Ballet Bun).
The outfit on the left and right is set up with colors from Las Vegas for Serena Show Girl (not included in that Serena Bundle), and Serena in the center is sporting an orange included in the "Serena Show Girl" outfit (included in that Serena Bundle). Completely different pose from a different pose set, and I still ended up redoing almost all of it to better match what the human body dose (Or correcting things the human body dose not do naturally, lol).
Looks like a few more started to join the fun. Back left is Ziva for Aiko 6 with Viking Hair for G2F, and back right is Wachiwi (shape 2) with Solange Hair.
Serena is wearing the other color option included in the 'Show Girl' outfit, and that being mostly white allows other colors to be added in the surface tab (Yes shader sets can also be used, it's got many zones). The other four are using color options from that "Las Vegas" color set for the outfit.
I love the birds LOL
Thanks. Unfortunately, as with most Prehistoric avian fellows, the joints are not quite the same. And with some, like Enantiornithes (opposite birds), the joints are completely wrong for doing things like ballet. So given there valiant attempt, ArchaeopteryxDR and MicroraptorDR had to "Check Out". Don't ask me what there going to do with blank checks, I don't want to know, lol.
I'm sure it is highly disadvised to attempt ballet in high heels, to put it lightly. Ballet footwear (Pointe shoes) are incredibly complex, and designed to protect your Ankle Toe and Foot bones, unlike your average or lesser high heels.
The Blank check, Thanks mjc1016. This is with SubD and D-forms to bend them a tad for the poses.
LOL yeah, I did a lot of research on show girl costumes before I started making that outfit and almost without exeption in all the photos I found they wore ballroom dance shoes so I modeled them after a pair of such that I had in college when I took some classes and was in the ballroom dance club. Most of the photos showed 2 to 2 1/2 in heels, I made those about 3 inches to better please the 3D markets but still be mostly realistic. There are plenty of dresses for G2 that would make great dance outfits but they all have stupidly unrealistic heels that no sane woman would try to dance in (It's hard enough to walk forward in 5 inch heels, much less try to back up) So I filled the void.
Yea, I was looking more at the angle of the foot rather then measuring the heal spike length (deadly weapons), lol. In the Past, I used the Wachiwi Moccisons for a few (as they looked closer to Pointe shoes), and I did get a set of Pointe shoes more recently for G2F (I don't remember where it went in the runtime, or what set it was from).
Another really good choice for low heal to no heal shoes is the 'Patchwork' set by Esha. Any of the tops work with any of the lower part of the set. So knee heigh boots with no heal is possible with the set for example.
http://www.daz3d.com/patchwork-shoes-1
http://www.daz3d.com/patchwork-shoes-2
http://www.daz3d.com/patchwork-shoes-3
http://www.daz3d.com/patchwork-shoes-4
http://www.daz3d.com/patchwork-shoes-5
http://www.daz3d.com/patchwork-shoes-6
However, I've yet to try to get the Las Vegas for Serena Show Girl to match up to any of the other shoe options out there, I just got the set yesterday.
I haven't posted much the past few days regarding Headus UV Layout. I was watching vids and filling sticky notes with chicken scratches.
I was also having difficulty getting the UV map parts to, well, do anything. 'R', 'I', ctrl-I, shift-I, 'tab', 'K', etc. Apparently the Hotkeys for doing that, are lobotomized. And stupid if you ask me, you must first select a version to try, before they will even begin to function, Each time you open the program, lol.
Then, the keys start to work for manipulating the UV map layout, lol.
That looks really close to what I wanted for that cube.
I have not posted much lately, I kind of got absorbed in moving dots around in hex, lol.
And working on a 'Little Project' that I had hoped to fumble threw a tad quicker then things are progressing. I've got most of the work done on the short and taler box-like braziers, and have started working on the 'Torch' part for them.
Fisty had done an incredible job with the bowl geometry and the UV layout, and I was trying to preserve that while making the gas-pipe a tad shorter on the smaller brazier one.
Headus is fighting me a tad with that, and that is about where I'm at. I'm about to set up some 'Figure/Prop Assets" of the four braziers (and the two torches), and match up some icons for them. The mat-presets are still in the works as well.
In separate news, the release of the "Growing Up for" G3F did not escape me, and I do hope to experiment with that some in the near future, Especially the no high heels posture dial, lol.
(EDIT 11:35utc)
I thought I had moved that down enough to clear the 'Material" label on the icon, apparently not, lol.
The fun continues. At least I don't need to redo all of them.
I hate those little type flags at the top.. since I moved my content to the server raid I don't see them but I know most people do so I have to design my icons to account for an overlay that I can't actually see. Fun fun.
I have a GIMP file saved for making icons...with the overlay as a separate layer (just a generic one) to check the layout. Problem is, I seldom use it.
Yea, I was leaning more towards guessing, and assuming if it covered up some of the torch bowl inner surface it would be fine. Also the labels only end up there, if there is metadata for that, and the icon-labels didn't show up in 4.9beta as a result. I'm guessing it is more complex then just selecting "Props architecture decor" when saving the Figure Prop asset. So, in any case, I did get some Material presets done. I'll add the settings to the 'Rock shader' later on.
And I also did a funny render. Remember Sabby-Bunny from that "Designer Lights Goa'uld trap", lol. And Wilmap's Vintage dress
http://www.sharecg.com/v/77244/gallery/21/DAZ-Studio/G2F-Vintage-Style-Dress
Nothing beats a Jaffa when you need things done around the mother ship.
No, I have not done much else for the Ha'tak walls. It's been fermenting in the back of my mind.
P.S. No ArchaeopteryxDRs or MicroraptorDRs were harmed during the making of the above render.
Somewhat embarrassing, yet good to find it early I guess. I was so focused on making sure each map was from the correct folder, I completely missed one part of one Brazier, and had some of the settings off a tad, lol. I'm also looking at how the things render performance wise as well. There backdrop items, and should not consume more resources to render (within reason) then the primary subject of the render.
That is probably a good reason for doing a few renders before you release something. It also helps not being completely under a 'deadline', so I can go about this calmly and as needed.
Thus I'm remaking the six offending presets. The embarrassing part is that missing part on the short one was staring me in the face, and I didn't notice it, lol.
Been plugging away, burning allot of "Noon oil" of late, lol. So I added one more preset for one of the Braziers, and have been looking at fundamental things, like a write-up and promos for the things.
Much to be doing's, not much time.
Not to say, a lot of hamming away on the 'i' and 'Backspace' keys, lol.
Hmm, whom do we have here.
Looks like a mix of Olympia6 and SASE Elize, with possibly a few other dials. With last years Ginger Snap Outfit for G2F/G2M. Using the "G-Suit 2 HD" as stockings using the AElflaed's Fancy - Shaders.
The other items... ZDG Braziers Project. Merry Christmas y'all.
The flames are from Kadix's errrrr V3Digitimes "Soldiers of Magic: Serpio" set.
It is that time of the year, and honestly, I'm lacking inspiration for once. I have no plot or story at all in mind, and just started tossing stuff together.
Left to right, FWSA Yulia HD, EJ Tatijana, and FWSA Paloma. The shoes are from the Ginger Snap Outfit (simply auto fitted without further adjustments). The hat, earrings, and dress is from Yulia's Finery.
Honestly I could have done a lot better with this render, tho at least the outfit and Yulia is there without any major detractors. I simply dropped the dress on her and posed using a preset Dance pose. The hat did take a little bit of adjustment to get it on the hair (using the included dials). I think I will have some coffee and look at this scene a tad more, it's kind of lacking unlike the figures and outfits.
(some time later)
The appearance of the world on fire was NOT what I had in mind, tho I guess it works for an evil Goa'uld. I'll need to find a better planet for outside I guess.
A day late and a dollar short I guess is the phrase. Here is FWSA Yulia, and that cool outfit, in a Not-so-Evil render.
Again, the shoes are from last years Gingersnap outfit, just tossed on the feet with NO adjustments at all. Enjoy y'all.
As for the braziers, it was a very helpful experiment with making things, as the geometry was relatively simple (cubes, cylinders, and slices of a sphere). Tho I admit my firs few 'Chicken' scratches was not all that great. I had overlapping cylinders, and an incredible amount of unused UV map from my slicing up the Studio primitives. Case and point, the one above started life as nothing more that a 'Shadow of a shape', and I had an idea (intuition from the rest of the scene) of what it may possibly look. So yea, a considerable amount of creativity to turn a shadow into something, lol. So I sliced up a sphere and a cylinder and mapped out my idea.
And then I set out to make the legs. I thought I wanted stripes there, so I did a major No-No.
So, that mountain of disjointed parts, and horrible overlapping geometry. I can laugh about it now because I know better then to make actual stuff that way. Tho it was an easy way to get a concept out of my head and into the computer. Fisty had asked if there was another Brazier for her to look at the UV mapping on, and I (with regret now) gave her that mountain of 'Junk' to play with. I am so sorry, I didn't know at the time just how bad that thing was. She threw it out except for the concept, and did it from scratch.
The biggest thing I noticed (aside from the seams being a single part welded together) was the complete remake of the center of the circles. They no longer converged to a single point, and use quads completely (not N-gons, oops). As you can see in the render above, her work is just completely incredible.
Brazier1 was no where near as bad, it just did not like Smoothing. And I was having difficulty at the time getting to grips with UV mapping.
That orange cube is just there to help me line up the edge cubes, and d-form them into shape and position with that odd angle.
In all, it was a lot of fun and difficulty making them. I'm going to look at that 'Chamber some more, tho My first idea didn't pan out all that well. I was initially thinking of something like Notre Dame Cathedral turned inside out, with all the imposing flying buttresses on the inside. Unfortunately I think in Inches and Feet, and Studio positions stuff in centimeters. So it didn't quite come out how I wanted, lol. So I'm off to fuss with that concept some more.
I almost completely remade the first one too, you just didn't notice because the 1st one wasn't as bad.
It's much easier to UV map one quardrant and then copy/rotate it rather than fixing all the seperate parts and then UV mapping 100 little pieces. I replaced 95% of #1's geometry, only about 60% of #4's - that one I mostly just removed the overlapping mesh and cut/welded/edge beveled the center rings so they could take sub-d and displacement without looking weird.
But all of that had the desired effect.. you're a natural tinkerer, you took what I had done, ripped it apart and scrutinized it, and have learned quite a bit from it.
Edit: and it uses quads completely, n-gons are baaadd mkay. (and what I had origionally that were messing it up, I'm surprised it loaded at all and didn't crash DS) Your original #4 didn't have any n-gons, just lots of overlapping mesh. Your original #1 did have quite a few due to whatever weird processes you ran it through origonally.
I didn't know it was that extensive on the first one, sorry.
Ripped apart, not exactly. I did look at them a bit, and ask my self how in the world did you make a circle with n-gons with Hexagon, lol. Perhaps in a year or so, I'll think it is easy, nothing at all, and make circles with an arm behind my back and my eyes closed. lol.
So, I'm mapping simple parts (cubes, pillars, wedges, etc), to try to make that "Notre Dame Cathedral turned inside out" chamber again. I've also been looking at a few other things for 'inspiration' as well.
Now granted, I'm not going to try to do any of the above as 'Replicas' or anything like that, it is only inspiration of concepts. I'm not going to be doing curved surfaces, as they require a lot of geometry compared to flat things, and that will make some of this rather interesting I think. I learned the lesson from that Ha'tak pillar texture thing (it is painful to use a lot of them), lol.
The silly things I do, just to try to get a mental grasp of metric sizes, lol.
N-gons from Quads using Studio and Hexagone, with a litle bad luck in the mix. I can't guarantee that I'l reproduce it this time, tho it kept cropping up when I was working on slightly more complex shapes. In any case, lets assume I have a stack of cubes in studio that I'm putting together for something, and I need to edit one of them...
So I take that 2 division Cube, and send it to hex.
Then in Hex, I select the 'Cube' in that scene tab, and go to vertex modeling tab. I select the slice tool thing.
And I make a slice (Free Tesselate). Then I select a vertex (line) anywhere and move it.
That's it. Don't know why or how. After moving the line, sometimes seams open up that are invisible in that view until you tyr to do something across one, like adding another slice (Free Tesselate) or moving a corner that happens to be on the open seam. If all your doing is adding corner protection loops using the "Free Tesselate", it shows up as an incomplete line around the thing, resulting in a 5-sided n-gone at the end of the slice where it stopped.
So, it happed to me before. All I did was slice a cube and bend the outer ends up at an angle. Then I started to add corner protection, lol. Can you see the open seam on this thing? I didn't until I tried to UV map the thing, lol.
Let me make a slice across it, and give you a few more 5-sided N-gons, lol.
So, back when making the First Brazier, I had no way of seeing the N-gons vs Quads (without UV mapping software,) and I had no clue it was happening at all. In fact, the only way I found out about the above open seam, was I was trying to 'weld' it together in Headus UV layout, and it just refused to become a continuous section of map.
Now I know that when there is a blue line in headus that is NOT on the edge of the model, it is an open seam.
(EDIT) Here you go.
I had redone the "Free Tesselate" horizontally so I could wrap that bezel around the outside of the armrests, and when I was moving dots on the corners for the shape, It just reviled a open seam.
This is just wild, lol. I set out to make a seat with a 45 degree beveled front, and decided that I would try having the armrests forward of the seat.
There is just no angle to get a good look at this thing without it looking like it is bending and twisting all up. It is just wrong, I like it. I dub thee, the "Opto Distort Chair", lol.
lol.
Well, that was rather tedious to UV map out, tho with some DG Shader Essentials 2 wood textures and some AElflaed's Fancy - Shaders, I am impressed.
Now this is not shipping today, I need to make some mats I can include with the thing. I think FWSA Yulia may possibly be thinking this one is a tad bit more comfortable then that other thing, lol.
Convert your height to metrics and think from there. At least, this approach helped me to have a better "feel" for your feet-inches-wtf system =P
I don't think you quite get what an n-gon is.. it's a polygon with more than 4 points, and I my bowls don't have any. Poser and DS prefer 4 point polys and will deal with 3 point polys mostly fine as long as they are not too long and thin. What you're seeing is where I reduce 3 lines down into 1, it makes a diamond quad rather than a recatangle quad. It's a very useful trick for reducing polygon count where it's not needed, I usually have a few above and to the sides of the breasts so they can have enough geometry but there isn't too much going over the shoulders or around the back.
I sometimes miss unconnected lines until I get it into UV Layout too.. good thing it colors them for us, huh? =) As for n-gons you can check for them like this:
Need more coffee, lol. That is a wealth of 'Bread crumbs' that Fisty posted (Thanks), and I've been giving it a try. I think I have found every possibly way that Hexagon indicates that it just dose not want to do something, lol.
I did get the top of the cylinder to look really nice with Quads, and yet the bottom of the cylinder is another mater entirely. Something I've not screen-capped as I'm rather focused when it happens, is sometimes Hex will just put random lines in the middle of a face or across a few somewhere at random. So, lots of fun.
Ah, that chair. I was looking at how it dealt with subD, as I'm guessing a few people will want to put a Dform on the cushion to make it look more real, and I found a few edges that were not quite straight. I did kind of rush threw a few steps so I could get a glimpse of the thing, and going back short of redoing the geometry is not going to require that much repeating hours of work already done. As it turns out, this is just a matter of adjusting the existing UV maps on one part.
And I discovered I had diced some things up in a bad way in my haste to se this thing in Studio.
So, I'm going over this with a fine toothed comb, looking for other mistakes with the UV map dice-up, lol.
The Optional chair back is now in the works,
and I've been trying out some textures with the help of Fisty (And Alessa for G2F with some of the 'Comfort' testing, lol.).
I still have a lot to go on the back, tho it is already looking very nice so far. Oh, and Alessa is with a random Alt Shader from somewhere, That's not her normal mats.
Don't worry, the chair will get bigger, lol. I decided to scale Genesis down to "Dave inches" for some fit-testing of the chair-back.
I think the thing is looking really good at this point.
Random thoughts about rigging. I had considered making the back of the chair and the support arm a single object with a bone to recline the seat back. However, my bone rigging skills are practically nonexistent, and I have yet to get something far more simpler rigged, lol. I had also discovered a few difficulties with rigged items that made using them later on incredibly difficult. Like the entire item becomes non selectable in the view-field, in that when you click on it the item behind it gets selected like it is not there at all. (Found the fix for that, thanks Slosh and Richard).
http://www.daz3d.com/forums/discussion/comment/347604/#Comment_347604
Also, the mesh becomes attached in an odd way when it is converted to a rigged figure mesh. So when a part is moved by a bone, all parts in the proximity bend with it. So that support arm would end up bending when the back is reclined, and I'm not seeing a simple way to get around that at this time. So I opted to make that two separate props that are stacked in the scene tab. I think it makes life easier all around, and it is one less thing for me to worry about.
I have this nasty feeling I'm going to be giving D-form lessons, in order to use the mesh on the seat cushions. I'll deal with that bridge when I get to it, lol. I'm sure there has got to be vids somewhere for adding the D-form tab, adding a D-form to an object, and using them to deform the surface of the object. It's not that difficult once done once, it's just a few little quarks here and there and knowing what to click to make it happen.
So, in any case, I need to do a render to show the cushions deformed along with a few other things.
Wow! lol. I didn't make it very far this morning before a major discrepancy was discovered.
I know I've got to have more then just that floating around here somewhere for G3F hair, lol. Looks like another "Operation Where Is That Thing DIM Put In My Computer".
I've noticed of late, allot of hair styles for G3F only appear when Generation six figures are selected, and Vice-versa. I would not be surprised if this is another meta-data mistake like that.
Possibly? /People/Genesis 3 Female/Hair/EmmaAndJordi/Charice Hair/Charice Hair.duf
(EDIT 16Jan2016) The smart tab metadata appears to be completely missing for Charice hair. At least it is not in the wrong place.