Is DAZ going to update and fix the links on the documentation page?

DarthD

Most of the links do not work or the pictures are missing.
http://docs.daz3d.com/doku.php/artzone/pub/tutorials/hexagon/tutorials

http://docs.daz3d.com/doku.php/artzone/pub/tutorials/hexagon/hexvt_english

Roygee

Probably not - Daz has no interest in Hexagon, apart from selling it :)

LegalizeAdulthood

It looks to me like those are the old artzone pages and the images got lost when that old wiki was decomissioned.

Sal UK

Take a look here Looks like Daz uploaded these over the last week. ;)

https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCyhW1xnP-jn_UnFboSTp5VA

Roygee

Those look like the video snippets that were included in the PDF manual?

Wonder why Daz would upload them now - maybe taking some interest:)

Roman_K2

Hate to nit-pick, but...

I seem to keeping getting sentences that are hard to understand in the DAZ documentation, especially it seems whenever mesh density is mentioned.

Example: "To increase the precision of the displacement sculpture, it is necessary to increase the density of the mesh, so its smoothing range, or level."

What's up with that sentence, I wonder?

(Quoted text appeared on the page at http://docs.daz3d.com/doku.php/public/software/hexagon/2/referenceguide/surface_displacement_modeling/start#introduction circa early 2017)

Roygee

Just bad writing - to get a good result from displacement, the mesh density has to be pretty high, is what is meant!

Roman_K2

Thanks. Nice to have you back. I have not disappeared, I'm busy click-click-clicking on primitive shapes and BAM!!!  Sometimes weird things come out like when I was trying to make a spiral just now... I came up with something that looked like a burner on the top of an electric stove, or the business end of a space laser.

I decided to call it a new type of warp drive, and I began to render several layers in DS 4.8... the object has an amazing nozzle-like center and the mesh seems to spin tighter towards the center as well as if you look carefully you can see the NVIDIA Iray "stock" shader twisting round and round. Still haven't figured out how not to write .sdrawkcab no ym erutxet selif

Roman_K2

(Very minor) Latest version of the thing above, that started out as a strange morph/distortion/big mistake, in Hexagon.

Roman_K2

I noticed that when you "search" in the Reference Guide results tend to have camping equipment and mortgage options etc. positioned on top or before files that are only vaguely related to what you want. Arrgh. In particular searching for how to "flip normals" seems difficult.

Building a bit on my experience with the weird ion engine (and strange distortions in Hexagon) I have been trying out the primitives in the IDG Iray FX Props and Shaders set, in DAZ Studio. They obviously have different values or settings compared to ordinary, everyday primitives say... been trying to figure out exactly what makes them go. Some of the stuff is a lot of fun -- it reminds me of blacklight theatrical effects. I seem to be just on the cusp of understanding how Iray surfaces work, but I'm not there yet. Can I easily make my own primitives like a sphere, and cut the sphere in half, and send it to Hexagon for smoothing, and then have textures appear on the inside of the dish-shaped curvature?

In my screenshot here you can see the dish-shaped primitive and beside it, one of the cone-like shapes that come in the IDG special effects set. The sfx ones seem to be very transparent with optional splashy graphics that appear on the outside of the shape... for instance this cone-like shape would work for having a dragon or other space beast spit out "fire".

I am aware that Sickleyield has a long (16 min.) complicated tutorial on Iray posted, and there is the fifty-dollar one by Esha in the DAZ store.

Roman_K2

Aha, I have been referred to a page of custom scripts: https://sites.google.com/site/mcasualsdazscripts8/mcjflipobjnormals

The above page also mentions a related function the Geometry Editor in DAZ Studio, that I'd missed.

Meanwhile here's a new prompt in the documentation: PERMISSION DENIED when you try and look at "polygon selection" say -

http://docs.daz3d.com/doku.php/public/software/dazstudio/4/referenceguide/interface/viewport_tools/weight_map_brush/tool_settings_option_menu/start