why can't Carrara import the huge meshes DAZ studio can

I have found Carrara will choke on anything too complex if it can load it at all

yet DAZ studio can easily load 15 million poly Incendia fractal meshes

I have wondered what causes this limitation and if there is some way I can get around it

other than chopping said fractals up into little bits  in DAZ studio with the geometry editor ( yes I  can actually do that too but not ideal)

Comments

  • StezzaStezza Posts: 7,988

    I often wonder that as well...

    I have read somewhere over the years ( either in this forum or the old one ) that the Carrara OBJ importer is to blame... 

    other than that I have no idea... 

  • WendyLuvsCatzWendyLuvsCatz Posts: 38,037
    edited August 2018

    the  fractal shown  near the end of this video for example will  load in DS

    and Octane render standalone which is where I rendered it as OrDS 2 does not do projection mapping correctly animated unlike our lovely OR4C

    Absolutely no way on earth I can get it into Carrara

    actually even Zbrush cannot zremesh it or anything either though it does at least  load it, DS seems to cope better with huge meshes than most my other software

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  • WendyLuvsCatzWendyLuvsCatz Posts: 38,037
    Stezza said:

    I often wonder that as well...

    I have read somewhere over the years ( either in this forum or the old one ) that the Carrara OBJ importer is to blame... 

    other than that I have no idea... 

    mmm interesting maybe I must try another format then

  • Bunyip02Bunyip02 Posts: 8,334

    Saving and re-opening very large files can also be a hassle.

  • WendyLuvsCatzWendyLuvsCatz Posts: 38,037
    edited August 2018

    well no idea how long it took, I was asleep, but FBX from Zbrush and .car of the obj from Hexagon both worked!

    Hexagon beta 64 bit loadedthe obj easily and exported it as a .car file so is possibly the best route of the two.

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  • WendyLuvsCatzWendyLuvsCatz Posts: 38,037

    it saves compressed a quite reasonable 61MB

  • Bunyip02Bunyip02 Posts: 8,334
    th3Digit said:

    well no idea how long it took, I was asleep, but FBX from Zbrush and .car of the obj from Hexagon both worked!

    Hexagon beta 64 bit loadedthe obj easily and exported it as a .car file so is possibly the best route of the two.

    Thanks for the idea of Hexagon to Carrara Wendy.

    I was importing some freebie obj files, but they kept coming in as one object which is a PITA for applying shaders. So I opened one of the obj's in Hexagon where it provided the full list of component parts, then exported from Hexagon to Carrara. Opened the new Carrara file and it has the full list of component parts, which will make it a breeze to apply shaders !!!!!

  • IvyIvy Posts: 7,164
    th3Digit said:

    I have found Carrara will choke on anything too complex if it can load it at all

    yet DAZ studio can easily load 15 million poly Incendia fractal meshes

    I have wondered what causes this limitation and if there is some way I can get around it

    other than chopping said fractals up into little bits  in DAZ studio with the geometry editor ( yes I  can actually do that too but not ideal)

    you know I never relies that.   I guess this might be one of the reasons I have a hard time with Carrara Wendy.  tend to build huge sets in Daz Studio. I create all my story boards and test scenes before i start my animation and after animating with daz so long i found it rather hard to fits the same scene content in carrara that fits easily in daz . Then if you do manange to get the content into carrara then you need to reduce textures and manage ploy size to speed up render times.  then I start getting lost and  and quickly loose interested with working with cararra & go back to daz

  • DiomedeDiomede Posts: 15,125

    Ivy, whatever you are doing, it works.  Keep on keeping on.  yes

    I have the opposite problem.  I can build huge environments in Carrara with figures, plants, buildings, and trees cluttering the place up and I have no problem.  I try the same thing in Studio and everything grinds to a halt and test renders become unbearably long.  I'm pretty sure it is a matter of being comfortable with the program's preview modes, render settings, and that sort of thing.  I am getting better in Studio but it is slow going for me.

     

    Wendy, for the fractal, do you know the formula?  Dare I suggest Carrara's formula modeler?  The scene resource hit would become almost nothing for saving and managing, but render times increase.

  • IvyIvy Posts: 7,164

    Hi Diomede

    One of the reasons I got carrara was for the great physics which are awesome. But when you start loading mountians for a volcano ,smoke  clouds and atmosphere panes, it takes me 2 days to render one frame with just one light...lol and that is like at 600 x 340 dpi its pretty discouraging.   when for me in studio I can render scenes at 3080 x 2040 dpi rendering a frame in about 45 seconds using UE2. or IBL  . But like I said I think a lot of it has to do with I've been working with daz so long its really hard to get use to other software requirements But I am still plugging away ..

  • DiomedeDiomede Posts: 15,125
    edited August 2018

    Here is one of my entries for the most recent Carrara challenge.  Click to see full size.  Volcano, smoke, lava flows, realistic sea, forests on the slopes, steam rising from the lava hitting the sea.  I wouldn't even know how to begin trying to do this in Studio.  Key word is "I" meaning that I would not know how to do it in Studio, not that it can't be done. Have learning ultrascatter on my list but hear there is a new super ultrascatter update on the way. I'm sure I will get better at Studio when I learn those things.  But whatever tool gets the job done.  As I said, you are doing great with Studio.  I'm slowly learning that software as well.

    Post edited by Diomede on
  • IvyIvy Posts: 7,164

    That looks great did you animate that scene?

  • DiomedeDiomede Posts: 15,125
    edited August 2018

    It is a still image.  If I was going to animate it, the elements that would need to be dealt with are the sea, the steam, the lava flows, and the smoke.  The sea is just a terrain that is replicated in the "seamless" mode.  It would be relatively straightforward to animate the sea with an object modifier, there is even a wave preset.  The steam is made up of volumetric clouds.  I could keyframe them and move them around, but I think it might be just as effective to change the cloud settings through the timeline (make them increase and decrease opacity/density or maybe change the randomization seed).  The smoke was made with Carrara's dynamic hair and converted with a free plugin.  This was done to fulfill a requirement of the challenge.  Without that requirement, it would probably be better to do the smoke with a particle emitter and some blur.  

     

    The lava flows are a duplicate of the underlying terrain with some adjustments.  Couple of options.  Could apply wave modifiers.  Another option would be to try Alvin's free FLUIDOS plugin.  I believe he is working on a version of FLUIDOS for Studio.  If so, you are going to love it!

     

    Anyway, I'm not trying to convert you to Carrara.  You have a workflow that seems to work very well for you.  Just reporting that managing scene resources and render times is more difficult for me in Studio than for me in Carrara.  I'm sure it is because I am so familiar with Carrara.

    Post edited by Diomede on
  • UnifiedBrainUnifiedBrain Posts: 3,588
    th3Digit said:

    well no idea how long it took, I was asleep, but FBX from Zbrush and .car of the obj from Hexagon both worked!

    Hexagon beta 64 bit loadedthe obj easily and exported it as a .car file so is possibly the best route of the two.

    Thank you Wendy!  This is awesome to know.

  • AlbertoAlberto Posts: 1,411

    Inspired by Diomede's Volcano:

    image

    Maybe Chickenzilla home?

  • MistaraMistara Posts: 38,675
    edited August 2018

    is hexagon beta a freeb?

    n/m

    found it but no standalone installer. is install manager only

     

    Post edited by Mistara on
  • UnifiedBrainUnifiedBrain Posts: 3,588
    Alberto said:

    Inspired by Diomede's Volcano:

    image

    Maybe Chickenzilla home?

    Pretty awesome, Alberto!

  • DiomedeDiomede Posts: 15,125
    Alberto said:

    Inspired by Diomede's Volcano:

    image

    Maybe Chickenzilla home?

    Pretty awesome, Alberto!

    this volcano is really amazing!  I especially like the little details like the splash in the ocean near the end.  Chickenzilla would be proud to call the island home, but also quite afraid of the volcano.

     

    beautiful work

     

  • 3drendero3drendero Posts: 2,024

    Does anyone have a large freebie obj file to test the Hexagon method?
    Thinking about writing a short CarraraCafe news article, since forum tips here get lost easily.

  • mindsongmindsong Posts: 1,701
    Mistara said:

    is hexagon beta a freeb?

    n/m

    found it but no standalone installer. is install manager only

    I believe you can extract the DIM installer into a standalone folder, and run the beta version from there.

    can't check now, but I don't think there was much/any registry/post-install stuff during the installation.

    hope that's the case...,

    --ms

     

  • MistaraMistara Posts: 38,675
    mindsong said:
    Mistara said:

    is hexagon beta a freeb?

    n/m

    found it but no standalone installer. is install manager only

    I believe you can extract the DIM installer into a standalone folder, and run the beta version from there.

    can't check now, but I don't think there was much/any registry/post-install stuff during the installation.

    hope that's the case...,

    --ms

     

    ty!

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