Importing Rigged Characters from Games into Daz.
TapiocaTundra
Posts: 268
First off I am no expert in this area in fact I am very good at making mistakes, my work flow is usually jump in first, then do some research after which follows a lot of trial and error some back to the drawing board stuff then slowly, I sometimes get some positive results.
I have been experimenting with importing characters "with rigging" from various games to discover if there was an easy or quick way to set them up to pose and animate in Daz Studio.
In this case I chose an older Ubisoft game called XIII built with the unreal engine, and have had some success, although with a little work inside Daz Studio to adjust the rigging.
I wondered if anyone has a similar interest and what their methods might be to extract the meshes from a game and then to bring them into Daz Studio to set up.
I will be happy to answer any questions.
Thanks.
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Hi can you tell me how you did this.
I use transfer utility and my char gets messed up
Hope you got your transfer utility question sorted omg.... in my above example it was just a case of importing a collada file and re organizing the bones back into position, no transfer here.
Hello guys,
I'm quite interested too, I'm actually also looking at this, I need to get precise procedures to animate my low poly meshes (I have successfully extracted Citra mesh from FC3 & cleaned her jewelry - approx. to 13K) & now want to know exactly the best & quickest way to get crazy with her in my Racer simulator (Racer.nl).
Ideally talking, I was imagining to get a custom Python script to export directly to a dof + DSkeleton file (check Racer.nl/tutorial + Racer.nl/reference), but anyway, I know well Maya & 3DS Max Bipeds, which is normally how I do things. Our C++ coder/dev (Ruud Van Gaal) had provided us kindly with a skeleton 3DS Max script to export the bones/joints network from Bipeds into Racer.
The big idea is to animate sexy girls, drivers & pit people easily & quickly, all done in DAZ & then somehow manage to get it into Racer, which is a free & advanced & ever evolving simulator. I was also thinking to import the whole terrain in DAZ to align correctly my skeletal meshes. I've made some amazing procedural cities & actually I'm pioneering in this domain. Some pictures will follow, if there's some interested people !
My Racer limitation ingame are the number of bones (I'll ask kindly Ruud to increase them) & the geode (mesh) which is max. around 20K for each single mesh. I'll give some more infos on all creations I already made & showcase for others who want to merge ALL BEST WORLDS into their favorite game engines.
So, any tip / trick is welcomed...I'll do some testing like you both & see what's the main issues, if there's any ! I hope we get some answers from DAZ creators/devs, so we can start showcasing to the world some really cool stuff which would inevitably last more time doing it via Maya, 3DS Max or SoftImage.
I'm unfortunately quite new to DAZ approx. 2 days, but nothing fears me in the 3D animation/modeling world & have 4 year 3D Animation knowledge, also been working with some "Universal Film" professional as a debugger/tester for a real free custom 3D Animation Maya Plugin for Crytek 2 & 3 Sandbox....
Let's UNLEASH everything & do some crazy stuff !
Just a reminder: please make sure you've checked the EULA for the games and their meshes for what is allowed, and that the DAZ 3D EULA does not allow putting meshes purchased here into games without a Game Developer License, except for personal use.
And even if you purchase a game developer license, that only covers making a new game, not using DAZ 3D meshes in an existing one.
The game developer EULA itself doesn't even appear to exist anymore. How is DAZ selling a license they won't show people?
The game developer EULA itself doesn't even appear to exist anymore. How is DAZ selling a license they won't show people?
Here it is:
http://www.daz3d.com/indie-game-developer-license
Here it is:
http://www.daz3d.com/indie-game-developer-license
That's not the EULA, though. It's only a way to shell out money for a license - with not a clue in the world as to what in the name of common sense you might actually be buying.
http://www.daz3d.com/eula
See the section headed: 3.0 DAZ Commercial Real-time Addendum
Aha.
That does cover more than one game, though. It's also impossible to find searching the "DAZ 3D Game Developer EULA" title referenced on the store pages, since no document called "DAZ 3D Game Developer EULA" exists publicly at the moment. Doesn't help that it's referenced as separate from the normal EULA.
This site needs an overhaul so badly it's not even funny anymore.
Actually, I found it by googling that exact phrase.
Actually, I found it by googling that exact phrase.
I suppose your version of Google must be completely different from mine. None of the results from searching "DAZ 3D Game Developer EULA" [include quotes so it actually searches for the phrase] are actually the EULA, and multiple of them refer to the Game Developer EULA as being separate from the normal one, much like the description you are shown when on the store pages for the 'items' themselves.
I'm curious to know what you searched. Entering it as individual words [rather than a phrase as it should be searched if it's the title of a document] doesn't bring it up until the third page, and there's no clue that it's actually the [ostensibly separate as mentioned in so many other places] Game Developer EULA until you read through it. Even then with the DAZ site's propensity for multiple EULAs scattered about, there's nothing to indicate this is indeed what you should be looking at since the store pages list the Game Developer EULA as different from the "regular DAZ 3D EULA."
There is a massive problem here. At one point I was purchasing things from the store under no less than 3 different license agreements. They haven't even bothered to tag them with the date and a "supersedes:" section.
EDIT: I had a link to the search but the forum software breaks it so it searches by words instead of the phrase.
Not sure what you are trying to say here fixmypcmike, that we are not allowed to use Daz as a mod tool or what? I do not see any problems in this thread, therefore no need for any keyboard police!
Not sure what you are trying to say here fixmypcmike, that we are not allowed to use Daz as a mod tool or what? I do not see any problems in this thread, therefore no need for any keyboard police!
Short version: Tinkering around with in-game models might be a copyright infringement for that game. Make sure you know what the rules are regarding the models you're using, and what they allow them to be used for.
Short version: Tinkering around with in-game models might be a copyright infringement for that game. Make sure you know what the rules are regarding the models you're using, and what they allow them to be used for.
Bah! another cop.Go play with your own games and do not try to teach your elders what they already know this thread is a perfectly legit discussion and that is all it is, if you do not have anything positive to say then better keep quiet. End of.
Not sure what you are trying to say here fixmypcmike, that we are not allowed to use Daz as a mod tool or what? I do not see any problems in this thread, therefore no need for any keyboard police!The implication is that all EULAs continue to apply. The use of DAZ models and content in games is restricted to those products for which specific Game Developers licenses haved been payed for. You should check the licenses of any games / game engines before reverse engineering their content for even personal use in any medium as many/most restrict that process as well.
First off, the only mention in this thread of using daz models and content in games has been by you administrators in fact the thread simply asked about importing games characters into daz but has now been bullied by said admins jumping on it as far as I see without good cause.
Secondly, you will find that many or most games/engines provide tools to mod the games that they produce and have released the Sdk's along with their games. They encourage it.! quite the opposite to your restrictions. How else are the next generation of games designers and programmers going to learn.
This forum is about sharing and furthering our knowledge, helping each other to learn. This thread started out as a simple question to do just that, it has now been hijacked, thanks a bunch.
Short version: Tinkering around with in-game models might be a copyright infringement for that game. Make sure you know what the rules are regarding the models you're using, and what they allow them to be used for.
Bah! another cop.Go play with your own games and do not try to teach your elders what they already know this thread is a perfectly legit discussion and that is all it is, if you do not have anything positive to say then better keep quiet. End of.
I wasn't playing 'cop' as you put it, just pointing out things which need to be considered before you start. It was neither positive, nor negative just a statement of the facts. I should point out that I have developed computer games myself. I have a bachelor's degree in programming with a focus in C# and C++. One of the reasons I got into 3D modeling in the first place was for developing characters to be used in video games, so I'm by no means new to altering figures and importing them from multiple platforms since it's how I learned the majority of my skills.
Daz can import a decent range of characters, and you can rig them inside the program. I tend to use 3D Studio Max for rigging characters, so I confess I don't have much information on doing it within Daz Studio. Due to the in-depth nature of the topic, there is however a tutorial available for purchase in the Daz Store. It covers all of the basics as well as many of the advanced topics, making it an ideal catch-all solution if you ever need to rig characters in DS.
I'll list the link here, in case.
Yea, ok Hearald, and I am no robber, you say that Daz can import a decent range of characters, my question was importing 'rigged characters' not quite the same thing, you see. Other software uses fbx or collada in a different way to Daz and the results can be more productive, on importing into Daz the results are depressing. Have you any similar experience with Daz?
Try Blender, there are plug-ins for importing/exporting most game formats.
Good point and very true, but if I was interested in importing rigged meshes into Blender I would likely be asking at the Blender forum.
I use it, but mainly because it has a particularly good video sequencer/compositor, which rare in the free graphic world and not for 3d.
I have also found that certain python "plugins" scripts only work for certain versions of Blender, and are either not updated or just will not work with newer versions, so trying to establish the version of blender to use is sometimes a time consuming problem.
There a re a number of sites with work-flows for converting game figures to DS, or more often, to other programs. Tipically conversion to FBX works, but sometimes you need to reconvert it. I believe Wendy mentioned more than once that importing in Carrara and then reexporting to FBX made it easier to digest for DS. XIII uses Unreal engine so UE Viewer (http://www.gildor.org/en/projects/umodel) should work, however according to their site it seems it doesn't export animation from XIII at all (OTOH, the engine number is very low, it may have changed in the meantime).
Another exporter is XNALara but it seems it died and became XPS. I haven't tried it yet, but I've stumbled on many many sites that use it successfully for other programs, but it's more than worth a shot. XPS download link: http://xnalaraitalia.deviantart.com/journal/XPS-10-9-5-4-Anni-Edition-356218440
Collada import is a bit broken at the moment in DS, BTW, I have a bug report on it.
Yes ReDave I have Gildor's UE viewer and of course used it to get the figure mesh, I have downloaded xps,thank you for the link and will have a look, it always amazes me how much work people put into these kind of programmes.
I have seen Wendy's info a while back, it made me inquisitive to experiment myself.
Do you think the Daz Studio Collada import is really "broken" or just not fully implemented, I feel the latter. Almost like it is restricted.
thanks you have re-enforced my research so far.
Collada used to work, it was in fact intended as the main interchange format between DAZ3D's programs at one point, but it has been broken for quite a while now. Specifically if you select Animated it only appears to export the first frame, with some bones a bit off. Unity export (as drop-down on the Collada exporter) has been a strong point of DS but I haven't tried it recently.
Indeed, the energy people put into games can be surprising! ;-) But better to put it in games than in a whole lot of other things. I'm very much a gamer myself.