you guys are killing us... How much does daz studio cost??
j_stnk
Posts: 205
i've been looking for the price of daz studio. i know you get pro 4.6 for free but what about plugins? it says you have to purchase daz first to activate some of the plugins. ie. content creator toolkit. my "about plugins" has no plug at all along with the advanced and purchased pro plugins. i've worked with builds such as blender and make human. daz is awesome but i want to create. so how much?
Daz 3D is part of 
Connect
DAZ Productions, Inc.
7533 S Center View Ct #4664
West Jordan, UT 84084
Licensing Agreement | Terms of Service | Privacy Policy | EULA
© 2024 Daz Productions Inc. All Rights Reserved.
Comments
Daz Studio pro is free, the content creator tools are also free.
Content including some plugins are also sold in the store here.
Free CCT http://www.daz3d.com/content-creator-toolkit-cct
you "purchase' Daz for $0.00
they get you addicted on content
DAZ Marketing steals heavily from the book of King Gillette - "Give away the razor (Studio) and sell the blades (content)".
Most plugins for Studio from DAZ are built in and active; I think the only DAZ plugins that cost extra at this time are the Measure Metrics, Decimator, and Animate - you get a 30 day trial on Animate and then it defaults to the 'lite' version. None of these are needed for any basic functionality.
You need to 'purchase' Studio (for $0.00) - then download and install it. If you install with the stand-alone (.exe) installer you will need to enter the serial number to convert the limited functionality over to the full 'Pro' version. (DIM, if you use it, will plug the serial number in for you, IIRC). You can find the serial number by going to your 'My Accounts' page and then click on 'My Serial Numbers'; to enter the serial number, start Studio and then click on 'help' and then 'Register DAZ Studio'.
See Downloading and Installing DAZ Studio: a guide and FAQ For a better description of the process.
Yeah, the content creation tools are largely built into DS. There really isn't anything you need to pay for except for a handful of things.
Firstly, if you want proper keyframe animation, you'll want to purchase the add-on for that. Daz's default system has... flaws, shall we say.
Secondly, the default dynamic clothing system is about as basic as it gets without being entirely non functional. You can drape, you can animate, but there's a good chance you'll get more poke-through than a paper screen at a javelin contest. The paid plugin has a few extra options to alter the dynamic and collision settings, giving you a bit more control over that. Whether you use enough dynamic clothing to make it worth the cost is another matter.
Thirdly, there's the decimator. This is largely for people intending to use Daz figures in their games. It drastically reduces the polygon counts of target figures, and any associated outfits to a more fitting level for video games. It also may prove useful for background figures. That said, it is a paid for plugin, and even though it comes with DS, it will not function until you've purchased a separate license.
Finally, there's content. Where Daz makes their money isn't so much on the software, but on the goodies they sell you afterwards. It's an addicting hobby, and as such they offer a wealth of figures, outfits and props created by our wonderful PA's which are sold in the stores. Err... the goodies, that is. Not the PA's.
Well there are exceptions. :P
http://www.daz3d.com/thorne-for-v4
Or in my case addicted on content creation tools.
Well, honestly I found out I needed no plugins for Daz Studio thus far. Everything has been content. They have great sales like the V4 sale that is going on. I have been at this for six months and have spent too much due to all the "sales". I do have lots of stuff and Carrara. My advice is be seriously careful about the sales and use the wishlist wisely. With Daz Studio, you choose what you need and want. Then you spend away getting content.
that's what i thought. but i don't have a green plug at...shader baker bundle:, layered image editor bundle:, game developer bundle:, daz studio pro bundle:, daz studio pro (free) bundle:, daz studio advanced bundle:, content creation tools bundle:. animate 2 has one (with the empty serial# box). none of the others have a box like animate 2 for a puchase. the only serial # in "my serial numbers" page is the daz pro4.6 which i entered in one of the welcome windows not "about installed plugins" window. i have the photoshop bridge and the go z for daz listed as well but no serial #? if i have content creator toolkit and i paid $6.95 for it where do i activate it i only had a download for the install info in pdf. hummm... help? yeah, daz is easy to use on the creative end but this end has me confused. ha! besides this confusion, i've already been using the animate time lines creating movies with a blue/green screen background so i can put the characters in real life videos. their cool. so how do i content create???
sounds like wrong serial to me
oh, i was able to bring a character down to the primitive block structure but i forgot how i did it. is this the pane i should be in for cct? also when i want to save as a preset daz tells me it can't locate some file it needs.
you'll need the advanced AOA lights bundle. resistance is futile, it's a must have :lol:
not sure it's still part of the agreement, was supposed to tell 3 friends about DS for the free d/l?
Let us go one by one, it seems there could be some configuration problems.
The serial you should enter (for DAZ Studio Pro) is either entered at the welcome screen or can be entered (and changed) via the "Help" -> "Register DAZ Studio..." menu (see screenshot). The windows there also will tell you which version you currently got active (should be "Pro"). Also, if you already registered, the "DAZ Studio" -> "About" should show the "Pro" likewise (very cropped screenshot). After registration you should restart DAZ Studio and the large amount of plugins should be enabled (like "Layered Image Editor" etc.).
With regards to content, if you are seeing "blocks" instead of figures, it could be that either the content is installed in some place where DAZ Studio is not configured to look for (likely scenario) or that you have the viewport display in "Solid Bounding Box" mode. In the first case, it could be that if you installed via DIM, that you need to add the directory you installed the content to in the "Content Directory Manager" Preferences of DAZ Studio - via e.g. "DAZ Studio" -> "Preferences..." menu -> "Content Library" tab (see screenshot) and there click on "Content Directory Manager..." and see for the content sets and make sure that the content directory is added to *both* "DAZ Studio Formats" and "Poser Formats". The default directory DIM installs to on Windows is "C:\Users\Public\Documents\My DAZ 3D Library", on Mac it is "Users\Shared\My DAZ 3D Library".
Lastly, if you really bought the "Content Creator Toolkit" (as in paid dollars and not 0$ - should not happen to have to pay for it IIRC) then request a refund via a support ticket if you bought it within 30 days (DAZ has got a 30 day return policy) as those plugins are indeed part of DAZ Studio Pro already. On the DAZ web page that is done via "Help" -> "Contact Us" and then select "Submit a Help Request" and explain that you would like a refund for the "Content Creator Toolkit".
To add, the QuickStart Guide and User Guide (PDFs) might be really helpful in the beginning to familiarise yourself with the application :)
http://docs.daz3d.com/doku.php/public/software/dazstudio/4/userguide/start
You do not need the separate Content Creator Toolkit plug-in for DAZ Studio Pro 4.6, it actually says so at the bottom of the product description. If you tried installing the plug-in you most likely borked the built in version's files. Un-install the plug-in then un-install and re-install Studio.
The only difference between the original for pay DS4 Pro version and the free Pro version is the license for Decimator. The Decimator license is part of the for pay Pro version. If you are using the free version, you will have to buy a separate license in order to use it. It has to do with agreements between DAZ and creators.
The separate auto fit, texture atlas, and CCT's shown as free are there only because at one time they were sold as separate modules for users who had the free DS4 Standard version or the for pay DS4 Advanced version. The same holds true for the GoZ and PS bridge (at least I think so but I could be wrong since it's been a while).
The Dynamic Cloth Control plugin is a separate purchase and is not included in any version of DS although all versions of DS have had the basic dynamic cloth player since DS2.
Before buying a plugin for free DS4 Pro version, it's best to install it and register it. The go to the Help menu and look in about installed plugins. Any installed plugins will show a green plug.
Quote: ... but there's a good chance you'll get more poke-through than a paper screen at a javelin contest.
LOL. Very creative description. You could render that for an RRRR contest....
Quote: ..as such they offer a wealth of figures, outfits and props created by our wonderful PA's which are sold in the stores. Err... the goodies, that is. Not the PA's.
Darn it, I love a good sale.
ok, i re-entered the serial for daz pro. restarted the program and still no green plugs for plugins as fore mentioned. should i do a clean uninstall and start over as if i never installed daz on the pc? if so how do you do that. i did it before because i wanted the content on an external drive and just moving folders made a mess of it so i re-installed daz pro 4.6 and kept the recommended default paths for now until i learn how to do that properly.
also when i wanted to save or re-open a scene, the path was taking me to the daz studio 4.6 (64bit) folder with no .duf files in it. so i changed the path and made a folder called "daz scenes" in "my docs" folder and it works fine now. if this happened maybe those plugin files are elsewhere?? what files names or folders should i search for if this is so? my windows 7 has two program file folders one for 32bit and one for 64bit. the dim says plugins for daz studio 4.5+ (64bit) ...Program Files/DAZ 3D/DAZStudio4. looked there and no cct dlls? unless it is named differently?
The 'bundle' entries are headers; there should be a white triangle beside them - click it to expand the list of items in the bundle. The individual items should have the green plug.
I find that I use only a small fraction of my purchases. Out of $5000 worth of purchases, I use maybe $400 worth.
Mostly lighting packs, morph packs, Luxus. character textures, hair, clothing and a few props/environments.
The textures for some charters/clothing/hair don't look great in Lux (often due to baked ambient occlusion and high lights). So I end up not using them.
So do I, but I doubt I could afford Stonemason.
thanks to all! you're awesome! it's faster than blender build software. i can create and work faster! just have to learn more terminology and functions. now i have figure out how to organize the content since a lot of my content i've imported is not metadata. any hints or good tutorials? that's the next hurdle to get over to move faster. thanks
LOL! So true!!