Diffeo vs FBX when to switch

wolf359

Hi a quick look at the options for getting Daz/poser figures other than G8, into Blender.

nonesuch00

thanks

wolf359

nonesuch00 said:

thanks

Most welcome !

csaa

 wolf359 thanks for sharing this. I found it very informative. I also appreciate the flourishes you added, such as [06:17]  "... this excludes the various 3rd party figures with exotic non standard rigging that have come and gone during that period and have since taken their place in the forgotten ashbin of Poser history .." With such feeling there!

 

wolf359 said:

Hi a quick look at the options for getting Daz/poser figures other than G8, into Blender.

Padone

To import legacy figures with diffeomorphic you have to convert both the rig and the materials first. That's two steps.

1. edit > figure > rigging > convert to weight mapping
2. shader presets > iray > daz uber > iray uber base

 

wolf359

@Padone, I am aware of those options however in the case of that stonemason mech , I don't need converted weight mapping nor do I need volume based SSS. I animate . Legacy poser figures with the simplified poser 4 era rigging bring their animation into Blender with perfect fidelity as simple FBX. Converting the rigging is not necessary from an animators perspective. Lastly non PBR,image based textures are far easier to Display as Anime shaders as can be seen in my" Ghost in the shell" animations.

Padone

@wolf359 Ok I was just completing information. I find it "strange" that fbx materials come in right since from what I know fbx is strongly limited, that is, the texture must be directly linked to the shader that's not common in daz figures.

nonesuch00

Padone said:

To import legacy figures with diffeomorphic you have to convert both the rig and the materials first. That's two steps.

1. edit > figure > rigging > convert to weight mapping
2. shader presets > iray > daz uber > iray uber base

I thought from Genesis 1 onto Genesis 8.1, they are all, already, weight mapping?

wolf359

@Padone,

Actually Daz  inc (unlike poser) has done an excellent job of keeping up with the latest version of the Autodesk FBX exporter AFAIK.

however there remain some issues with trying to export animated G8 figures to blender via FBX as myself and other animators like  @benniewoodell

have reported

 

For me, All roads must lead to Blender.

 

Wether exporting animated characters from the Reallusion or Daz studio.

 

All roads must lead to Blender.

 

Diffeomorphic is  indeed ,the most  complete, modern solution for the modern Daz figures( G8/8.1) and most props & sets exported to blender.

However FBX remains a viable option  in a hybrid pipeline where you may need to just slap a Daz studio aniblock  on some legacy poser figure or mech with no need for JCM,s and Iray material emulation.

and send him to blender( already animated) textured and ready go.

 

 

And example of this hybrid approach is this scene

A mixture of  genesis 1 and a legacy(red & white) poser mech with motion from endorphin, imported via FBX as well  as the entire environment and helicopter.

Seamlessly integrated with Characters from the RL side of the pipeline , in one action shot.

All rendered with the toon matcap viewport display requiring no special grease pencil or toon shader node setups. In Blender

 

 

Now with  this cycles render of a Daz G8 female speaking up close

Obviously Diffeo with its skin shader setups ,was the better choice.

 

 

 

 

It all depends on the objective and people need to understand all of their options

For using external content in blender.. not just one.

 

 

 

 

Padone

@wolf359 Thank you for your explanation and examples and for sharing your workflow.

@nonesuch00 For legacy we mean V4 and below. Technically G1 G2 is triax and imported as general weight in diffeomorphic.

juvesatriani

Lately my projects need to work with old character like Cookie - Chip - Gumdrop and original Star + original Toon Generation . 

In DAZ Studio I can doing " Fake hybrid / Frankenstein" technique to avoid wardrobe limitations but not sure if exporting using Diffeo or DTB will end with clean figure mesh 

I want to know if those models can be converted just like @padone mentioned above , or using FBX/OBJ - bring to Mixamo and using Blender Mixamo Control add on are the better solution ?

And for  @Wolf359  Thanks for the tutorials 

Padone

@juvesatriani Yes legacy models can be converted as explained above. As I see it in general you should get better materials using diffeo, I mean if you want to use eevee or cycles. Then I understand @wolf359 uses matcap for better speed so most eevee features are lost in the process. But, if the model only wires textures directly to the shader then fbx should be fine too, that depends on the model.

wolf359

@Padone For clarification I only use matcap for quick and easy global anime shading because IMHO the node based toon shading techniques I have seen are extremely labor intensive and don't produce the look I prefer for anime.

 

@juvesatriani 

I actually  still have the chip figure by lady littlefox.

I tried a Diffeo import but the textures were a nightmare and there was some other error message regarding his shoes and shorts that did not Want to trouble shoot.

So I baked  a legacy aniblock to the figure  in Daz studio and exported him as FBX.

There were some problems with his fake mesh object eye reflections being offset from the rest of the eye but I easily fixed by simply deleting the

Animation from the fake eye reflection meshes And repositioning them in place.

 

 

 

Padone

wolf359 said:

I tried a Diffeo import but the textures were a nightmare

Did you convert to uber first as explained above for legacy figures ?

Don't know about chip, but below it's cookie just converted and exported. Rendered in eevee. Did nothing else. Looks the same as daz studio to me and the textures are good.

nonesuch00

juvesatriani said:

Lately my projects need to work with old character like Cookie - Chip - Gumdrop and original Star + original Toon Generation . 

In DAZ Studio I can doing " Fake hybrid / Frankenstein" technique to avoid wardrobe limitations but not sure if exporting using Diffeo or DTB will end with clean figure mesh 

I want to know if those models can be converted just like @padone mentioned above , or using FBX/OBJ - bring to Mixamo and using Blender Mixamo Control add on are the better solution ?

And for  @Wolf359  Thanks for the tutorials 

Those I've done in the past using DAZ's old FBX exporter (binary) easily enough but usually I wind up adjusting the material sets in the game engine.

juvesatriani

@Wolf359 @Padone @Nonesuch00 Thanks for information. I`ll try each technique to see which handy for different scenarios . 

One thing I need to know more about Hybrid/Frankestein method and how to export correctly without double mesh or skeleton rig .

I.E  I`m using Chip /Cookie /Gumdrop head in G8 body . In Daz Studio I can easily hide body parts I dont need it .

Exporting in OBJ format definetly can help making those hybrib to be one mesh , but the rig will be lost right ? With Mixamo I can easily give them new rig but thats mean I cannot import G8 pose anymore .

Fortunately there is Mixamo Control Add on for blender so that will make easy for me to pose and animate those hybrid .

So I want to know if using FBX exporter I can ignore invisible body parts like G8 Head but keeping rig in another body part ? Or maybe there are another solution for my case ? Like Modifying Cloth to fit the original /non hybrid Cookie -Chip -Gumdrop models or doing frankenstein in Blender ?

Ohh I need to mention that main reason I`m doing hybrid so I can accessing G3-G8 Wardrobe library

Thanks again guys 

 

Padone

@juvesatriani As for diffeomorphic it will correctly import hidden nodes. So you'll get the same as daz studio.

wolf359

juvesatriani said:

@Wolf359 @Padone @Nonesuch00 Thanks for information. I`ll try each technique to see which handy for different scenarios . 

One thing I need to know more about Hybrid/Frankestein method and how to export correctly without double mesh or skeleton rig .

I.E  I`m using Chip /Cookie /Gumdrop head in G8 body . In Daz Studio I can easily hide body parts I dont need it .

Exporting in OBJ format definetly can help making those hybrib to be one mesh , but the rig will be lost right ? With Mixamo I can easily give them new rig but thats mean I cannot import G8 pose anymore .

Fortunately there is Mixamo Control Add on for blender so that will make easy for me to pose and animate those hybrid .

So I want to know if using FBX exporter I can ignore invisible body parts like G8 Head but keeping rig in another body part ? Or maybe there are another solution for my case ? Like Modifying Cloth to fit the original /non hybrid Cookie -Chip -Gumdrop models or doing frankenstein in Blender ?

Ohh I need to mention that main reason I`m doing hybrid so I can accessing G3-G8 Wardrobe library

Thanks again guys 

 

That Mixamo control rig add-on only works with Characters that have been uploaded/re-rigged with a mixamo skeleton Just FYI

wolf359

Fortunately there is Mixamo Control Add on for blender so that will make easy for me to pose and animate those hybrid .

@juvesatriani
That new Mixamo control rig add-on is a nice tool 

Of course by replacing the rigging with a Mixamo rig (to use the control rig,)
You won’t get a face rig and lose all Daz studio/diffeo options for lip sync and facial
essentially moving your character completely out of the Daz eco system until you go back to Daz studio  and convert another.

BTW here are some quick tips for adjust the skin shaders for EEVEE rendering.

Padone

As for diffeomorphic, I see there's a minor caveat with the cookie rig because daz studio can't keep dforms when converting to general weight. This may apply to other legacy figures too if they use dforms so I'm reporting here a easy workaround. Basically you export the figure converted to prop and use it as shapekey in blender.

in daz studio:

1. make a copy of the figure and convert to prop (edit > figure > rigging > convert to prop)
2. convert the figure materials to uber (select the materials and apply the uber shader)
3. convert the figure rig to general weight (edit > figure > rigging > convert to weight mapping), here you will lose the dforms
4. export to blender

in blender:

1. import the figure
2. use the prop as shapekey for the figure (shape keys panel > menu > join as shapes)

Below we see the cookie eyes that pop out when converting to general weight in daz studio because they lose the dform. Then the result in blender after applying the prop as shapekey.

 

edit. You can also convert the dform to a morph in daz studio using the dform panel, that's probably easier. This way you don't need the prop. Please note that for cookie the dform is used to animate the eyes, so it's not only for deformation but for animation too. In this case in blender you can animate the eye texture instead, that's a easy workaround.

juvesatriani

Padone said:

As for diffeomorphic, I see there's a minor caveat with the cookie rig because daz studio can't keep dforms when converting to general weight. This may apply to other legacy figures too if they use dforms so I'm reporting here a easy workaround. Basically you export the figure converted to prop and use it as shapekey in blender.

in daz studio:

1. make a copy of the figure and convert to prop (edit > figure > rigging > convert to prop)
2. convert the figure materials to uber (select the materials and apply the uber shader)
3. convert the figure rig to general weight (edit > figure > rigging > convert to weight mapping), here you will lose the dforms
4. export to blender

in blender:

1. import the figure
2. use the prop as shapekey for the figure (shape keys panel > menu > join as shapes)

Below we see the cookie eyes that pop out when converting to general weight in daz studio because they lose the dform. Then the result in blender after applying the prop as shapekey.

 

Thanks for tips that really handy information 

Singular3D

Padone said:

@wolf359 Thank you for your explanation and examples and for sharing your workflow.

@nonesuch00 For legacy we mean V4 and below. Technically G1 G2 is triax and imported as general weight in diffeomorphic.

For V4/M4 I use converter to get the figures to G8
- Genesis Generation X2
- XTransfer - Genesis 3 to Genesis 8 Converter
- Blacksmith3D's Texture Transformer

Thus I got my old assets as G8/M8 to Blender as well.

Of course you need to adjust the texture maps, but i do that anyway.