Jump to content

Welcome to NiGHTS COMMUNiTY
Register now to gain access to all of our features. Once registered and logged in, you will be able to create topics, post replies to existing threads, give reputation to your fellow members, get your own private messenger, post status updates, manage your profile and so much more. If you already have an account, login here - otherwise create an account for free today!
Photo

Poser model, technology is trying to defeat me


  • Please log in to reply
8 replies to this topic

#1
Sand3

Sand3

    Lurker

  • Visitor
  • PipPip
  • 27 posts
  • Location:Seattle
So I'm getting to the culmination of a four-year project, most of those four years being the time it took me to learn to 3D model well enough to make something I'm really satisfied with.

So the reason I started learning to 3D model in the first place was that I wanted to make a NiGHTS character for Poser and Daz. I was kind of inspired by LittleDragon's awesome Krystal (Starfox) character, and also the pictures Kichigai's made in StudioMax. At first the thought was just for pretty pictures, but now I've started learning animation (Carrara) with the intent of doing so much more.

In any event, I've spent four years building up the skills to do this *right*, and this week I've finally been preparing the geometries to make the journey over to Daz to be rigged and turned into a beta-version that I can share with the internets at large and start building some motion files. Today I finally finished all his body maps (the way colors/textures are put onto 3D models) and then broke the object up into vertex groups; the vertex groups define how the "bones" will go into him so that he can move and flex gracefully.

I finished all that about an hour ago, and sent him from my modeling program over to Daz to be rigged (given a skeleton so he can move). I'm really excited at this point, because I'm thinking that I can have a beta to release by the end of the coming week, maybe.

WRONG! Daz is throwing my vertex-groupings into a blender and ruining them so that I can't stick a skeleton into him. What?! I've successfully rigged with Daz before, and I have no idea what just happened, and it's really pissing me off.

*sigh* Well, anyway, here's a shot of the base body as it is tonight and shots of clothed versions that are a month out of date (newer version has different hands and head). Click for larger views.

Posted Image

Posted Image

PS: Don't worry, the arms/wrists will be invisible, you're just seeing him without any materials right now.

#2
Noctourne Wonderland

Noctourne Wonderland

    Crazy Regular

  • Visitor
  • PipPipPipPipPip
  • 2,150 posts
  • Gender:Male
  • Location:Down the Rabbit Hole
  • Interests:Punk, New Wave, horror movies, German Expressionism, cabarets, exotica. Long live VHS!
Good work! The only issue would be how far apart NiGHTS' legs are.

#3
Nyx

Nyx

    Dreamer

  • Visitor
  • PipPipPipPip
  • 215 posts
  • Gender:Female
That model looks fantastic! And I admire your dedication -- 3D modeling is hard! :)

Unfortunately, I'm not much good with actual modeling -- and I'm not quite familiar with DAZ, either. I've had a similar problem in Poser once before, though. I hope I won't be too annoying if I offer some suggestions? :D

I don't know which 3D software you used to create the model, but out of curiosity -- did you assign 'weights', like Blender's 'weight paint', to your vertex groups? I know it affects the bones in a model, but I don't know if it would cause the error you're getting...

Err... I'll bet you've already seen these, but I'll put them here just in case...? DAZ 3D's official Youtube has a two part tutorial on skeleton setup... Perhaps using it as a checklist might help?

Again, incredible work!

#4
Sand3

Sand3

    Lurker

  • Visitor
  • PipPip
  • 27 posts
  • Location:Seattle
Noctourne Wonderland--

Actually, I made the proportions to exactly match the JoD player model (I thought the legs looked pretty weird zeroed too. Before I had the game mesh, in an older version of the model, I'd given him a little bit rounder thighs.) Well, mostly anyways, since there wasn't a solid body inside of the game mesh (you don't want to be using unnecessary polygons when modeling for a game,) so I had to guess on the arm-width. I was actually most surprized at how large the barrel of NiGHTS' chest is. I felt really weird about making his boots overlap when he's in a zero-pose, but that's the way the JoD model was, and I'm obessive-compulsive, so...

Nyx--

Actually, I use Blender for most of my moddeling (I love the keyboard shortcuts,) so you're in the right neighborhood, except that Blender's rigging system isn't compatible with pretty much *any* other program, and definitely not Poser, I can't do any rigging in there. What I do is assign all the vertices to the groups each bone will be attatched to; I can group them in Blender and then I move those over to Daz Setup Tools to stick them to the skeleton and then adjust the skeleton and affected area (like the color-spectrum in Blender weight-painting) inside of there.

I have seen those videos yes, and they weren't nearly as useful to me as a five-minute text tutorial somebody wrote me on the Daz forums. Mostly because it's not really doing what I was trying to do at the time. I've rigged with Daz before, the issue wasn't the rigging process itself, just that I couldn't find my vertex groups.

So the story on the groups was that I copied my bone-hierarchy list (which I used as a basis for naming the vertex groups) from the hierarchy tab on the left side of the screen, and apparently I was supposed to copy it from the hierarchy tab on the *right* side of the screen. I don't know why the two hierarchy lists for the same character would be different, but apparently they are... Which is really dumb. I think V4's match up... not sure why A3's don't...

TLDR, I needed to take out the spaces.

But anyway, I've now managed to fit NiGHTS into a skeleton (I started with A3's for scale and then rearranged all the joint positions to fit my mesh) and now I'm trying to adjust the effected-area of each joint so that he doesn't get all lumpy and weird when he moves. Fun times. Tonight's problem is that I can't find dial-controls for the root-side of the effected-area point in order to make the limbs symmetrical.

TLDR, NiGHTS is currently a lumpy space-princess and I'm waiting for a reply to the query I posted on the Daz help-forum.

Posted Image

#5
Nyx

Nyx

    Dreamer

  • Visitor
  • PipPipPipPip
  • 215 posts
  • Gender:Female
Ah, I see. I'm not very well-versed in Blender, and I think Lightwave has something similar, so that's what was confusing me. Sorry. :D

#6
Noctourne Wonderland

Noctourne Wonderland

    Crazy Regular

  • Visitor
  • PipPipPipPipPip
  • 2,150 posts
  • Gender:Male
  • Location:Down the Rabbit Hole
  • Interests:Punk, New Wave, horror movies, German Expressionism, cabarets, exotica. Long live VHS!

Noctourne Wonderland--

Actually, I made the proportions to exactly match the JoD player model (I thought the legs looked pretty weird zeroed too. Before I had the game mesh, in an older version of the model, I'd given him a little bit rounder thighs.) Well, mostly anyways, since there wasn't a solid body inside of the game mesh (you don't want to be using unnecessary polygons when modeling for a game,) so I had to guess on the arm-width. I was actually most surprized at how large the barrel of NiGHTS' chest is. I felt really weird about making his boots overlap when he's in a zero-pose, but that's the way the JoD model was, and I'm obessive-compulsive, so...

That makes the model even more amazing. I hope the Daz problems can be fixed soon!

#7
Sand3

Sand3

    Lurker

  • Visitor
  • PipPip
  • 27 posts
  • Location:Seattle
Apparently I have more nodes than I'm supposed to or something; I've left a message back to the person helping me how I get rid of the non-useful ones. Even if I do have a fix for it tonight though, I should hold off working on it for a day or two, my arm is really sore today from the modeling and stuff so I want to give it a rest.

#8
Veranai

Veranai

    Lurker

  • Visitor
  • PipPip
  • 17 posts
  • Gender:Female
  • Location:U.S.A.
  • Interests:Reading. Drawing. Anime. Videogames. History. Cooking. Baking. Music in general.
A lumpy space princess is still a princess~ NiGHTS is a pretty boy!

But really, I can hardy wait to see this in color. owo

#9
Sand3

Sand3

    Lurker

  • Visitor
  • PipPip
  • 27 posts
  • Location:Seattle

A lumpy space princess is still a princess~ NiGHTS is a pretty boy!

But really, I can hardy wait to see this in color. owo


He's a pretty something anyway. The color will mostly be pretty simple, I've UV mapped him, but I'm not going to make extensive use of the maps at this point because for the most part he's a lot of solid colored bits. I'm going to put a different level of shininess on his body and vest and boots though, like his promo-picture for Tennis, with the PVC-looking vest and boots and a more matte unitard/skin/whatever. I already have the little art-nouveau pattern for his JoD outfit drawn up in Illustrator (did that a few years back, actually...), so at this point the only major thing left to do is color his face a little, add a bit of highlight to the cheeks and some dark to the eyelids and such. I'll probably do that this weekend if my arm is better.




0 user(s) are reading this topic

0 members, 0 guests, 0 anonymous users