AR Pro vs MHX

Jovanni

Hello everyone. In some threads about Blender and character exports I came across a mention of the Auto Rig Pro addon. A few months ago I bought it from a store.
But I only used it a few times to try it out. I'm mostly happy with the MHX setup with diffeomorphic. It's automated and I get a converted character in a couple of minutes.
It seems with Auto Rig Pro I have to manually convert the character every time? Correct bone placement and such. Can you share your experience?
Do I have to stick with MHX or are there ways to automate the conversion process for AR PRO? And what are the benefits? Thank you.

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wolf359

ARP has the best general purpose mocap retargeter
outside of Autodesk motion builder.
something to consider unless you plan to hand key everything from scratch.

Also you may find (or need) some really cool characters from sources other than Daz genesis/Diffeo.
Much easier to rig with ARP in minutes

TheMysteryIsThePoint

I've never used MHX, but ARP is a world class IK rig and has the added benefit of Quick Rig. Quick Rig can add a highly capable IK rig to an existing armature, without modifying it, which is extremely important if you want to get the animation back to DS.

I've settled on ARP as my choice, but I know that people whose opinion I trust also stand behind MHX, and also Rigify, the more or less official Blender rigger.

If I've gone with ARP, it's mainly because of Quick Rig.

 

 

Jovanni

I've tried converting a character with Quick Rig and it works pretty well. It even has a shapekey re-targeting feature (JCM morphs) It also already has a preset for DAZ rig. I tried it on Genesis 8.

But it's not without its downsides (for me personally). I couldn't find a gaze controller. And there seems to be no way to add it. All the eyelid and eye bones are stacked in one point. With MHX I can use downloaded expressions from daz studio and FACS. With ARP these possibilities are lost. Or I just couldn't set it up properly. 

I would like to mention ARP's excellent IK system. It has Soft IK. I am not quite sure how it works. But a lot of IK systems have the problem that when the bone stops hitting the target, it straightens out rather abruptly. And if you have a lot of movement in that borderline state where the bone is reaching in and out, you're going to see jerks. ARP and its Soft IK seem to have less of a problem with this.

wolf359

With MHX I can use downloaded expressions from daz studio and FACS. With ARP these possibilities are lost. Or I just couldn't set it up properly. 

 

@Jovanni
Hi, if you import G8  via diffeo you can still use your Daz facial expressions & shape key/visemes and even load mimic lipsynch
after replacing the Daz body rig with an ARP rig.

TheMysteryIsThePoint

Jovanni said:

I've tried converting a character with Quick Rig and it works pretty well. It even has a shapekey re-targeting feature (JCM morphs) It also already has a preset for DAZ rig. I tried it on Genesis 8.

But it's not without its downsides (for me personally). I couldn't find a gaze controller. And there seems to be no way to add it. All the eyelid and eye bones are stacked in one point. With MHX I can use downloaded expressions from daz studio and FACS. With ARP these possibilities are lost. Or I just couldn't set it up properly. 

I would like to mention ARP's excellent IK system. It has Soft IK. I am not quite sure how it works. But a lot of IK systems have the problem that when the bone stops hitting the target, it straightens out rather abruptly. And if you have a lot of movement in that borderline state where the bone is reaching in and out, you're going to see jerks. ARP and its Soft IK seem to have less of a problem with this.

For facial expressions, I think the FaceIt addon is a pretty good option. It takes time, but the results are pretty good. The stock expressions from DAZ, even the FACS based ones,  often trigger the Uncanny Valley affect for me.