How to save a group of material preset?
James
Posts: 1,045
How to save a group of material preset?
It seem save as material preset can only save one object surfaces.
What if I wanted to save a group of them?
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That's a hierarchical material preset.
Yes, to be exact, you may Group them first, select the Group node, save as an H.Material Preset. Or in another way, e.g.: if you have 10 objects, make them hierarchical firstly, i.e. parent object 2 ~ 10 to object 1, select object 1, save as an H.Material Preset.
Then the saved H.Material Preset can be either applied on the root node or any of the sub-nodes.
Okay, I have modeled my house and the H.Materials.
Now I want to distribute them.
How to do it, so people can use it?
Do I just need to make the folders and save it as scene asset?
The professional way:
- In your Daz Library, create a sub-folder with your "vendor name" ( for instance, let's say: James3D ) under Environments folder...
- If you provide texture maps, create your vendor + product sub-folders in Runtime\Textures folder. Move all the texture maps to "Runtime\Textures\James3D\House", then assign maps to the house in DS from this folder.
- Save Figure/Prop assets into Environments\James3D\House , with your vendor name. The related DSF files will be saved to Data folder, like: Data\James3D\House... if you define them correctly in Figure/Prop Save Options dialogue.
- Save all needed Presets to Environments\James3D\House. You can create sub-folders like \Materials as you wish
Then collect all these folders (Data\James3D\House, Environments\James3D\House, Runtime\Textures\James3D\House ) with keeping the folder structure unchanged ! ZIP them in the root directory of the ZIP file. Then you may share it with your friends or publish it to your store.
If you have Content Wizard, you even can make an IM installation package. It'll be convenient for the users to install / uninstall it via DIM.
Is there a way to move texture maps without have to reassign them again?
Batch replacing the path of texture maps in Presets DUF files with Notepad++... should be the only quickest way.
Method: Open all Preset DUF files, Batch Replace the old path with "runtime\textures\James3D\House"
Then load your House, apply a Preset for testing, then resave Figure/Prop asset.
How to save the whole house?
I can only save one object with save as Figure/Prop Save
If they're multiple Props, you can directly save them as a Scene Asset, that'll be quicker.
If you're making something with the intention of distribution, it's advisable to create a separate runtime for that product, so that all of the files are saved separately from all your other content. Doesn't help you at this point in this project, but advice for the future.
Yes, better set up a separate Daz Library, for instance, My Products
If I set My Products folder,
My products > Environment > Myhouse
I put my runtime/textures and data and others in it.
when people put it the house in different folder ex, MyDAZ3D Library folder, when they load the house, won't the textures be missing ?
When inside a content library, DS uses relatively paths.
I.e. it doesn't include the name of the content library. So when yoú save it it shall include the data, runtime and environment foldes, so the product in enironment will look for data in the data-folder, and textures in the texture folder, and therefore also work for other independant of where they decide to unpack it.
Nope, they won't be missing and they'll work well. Don't forget that DS always check and load things from relative path. One can place the product folders into any of his / her Daz Libraries that're configured in Content Directory Manager...
I'd recommend giving the files and folders a name a bit more specific than just "House", because you might create another house some day.
save as = H.Material Preset
@crosswind
How to use Content Wizard to make installation zip. I watched the officila tutorial of the product, but he didn't explain how to do it.
What you want is Content Package Assistant more so than Content Wizard.
First, I would strongly recommend Content Wizard rather than Content Package Assitant, especially after I helped to fix some issues for a folk who used the latter.
You can check my short version tutorial in this thread, and see the problems of CPA tool... https://www.daz3d.com/forums/discussion/comment/8741736/#Comment_8741736
After clicking the button of "Install Smart Content" in Content Wizard, the button of "Export Zip Files...." next to it will be active. Click it to generate an IM package. Then install it via DIM and check if all metadata are correct before you distributing the package.