Help on DAZ/Poser for skinning.

Someone told me they use Poser for checking their skins out; on how they line up and look on avatar, but I've no clue where to put my files to view and fix it before uploading. Thing is, I use DAZ because my copy of Poser 5 won't work on my new computer.


Anyone have any helpful words to show me how to copy my skin files to view on the av and view my work before uploading?

Greatly appreciate any help.

Hi!

You use DAZ what? DAZ makes more than one product, you know.

Using the company name, instead of the product name, just makes it more difficult for those trying to help you to know what you are talking about. It's like saying "Adobe." Adobe what? Photoshop? Illustrator? Flash? (Yes, Flash is now an Adobe product; just another reason not to use a company name when referring to a product. Grrrr! Sorry, but it's a real button of mine, kind of like saying "Alpha Layer" to Chosen. )

I'm going to assume that you mean DAZ Studio, because you mention it along with Poser, and not Bryce, (which is also a DAZ product.) If I've guessed wrong, please let me know, and I'll give you the instructions to preview in Bryce.

To preview clothing and skins on the Avatar in Studio, first download the Avatar from SL. Then

1. Go to the File menu, to Import, and Import the Avatar .obj file. (Yes, it will import the .cr2 file, but if all you are doing is looking at textures, all that does is add another step.)

2. Open the Surfaces window, if it's not already open. (Command/ctrl 1)

3. In the Surfaces window, click the long button, which says <No Selection>, and choose a Material from the drop down list; say, "Material_Upperbody."

4. In the Basic tab, click on the long button under Color, which says None. Choose "Browse for Image" from the menu, and browse for the image file. (It needs to be in .tif, .png, or .jpg format. .psd and .tga files won't work, sadly.)

5. It will show up on the avatar in the window. If you don't see it, make sure that the window display is set to "Texture Shaded." (Under the flippy to the right of the View menu, at the top of the window.)

6. Repeat for any additional textures.

Hope this helps!

Oh, and by the way, DAZ Studio is a free download, for anyone else who wants to preview their textures without spending $L.

(edited to add last line.)

ok anyone have instructions on how to do the same thing in poser?

But of Course!

Ummm... Poser 5 or Poser 6.

Here's the instructions for Poser 5. If you need the ones for 6, let me know.

Okay! It's a little complicated, but not hard. I'm going to tell you, without illos, to save time and download. But if you can't figure it out from this, and you want to see screenshots, let me know.

1. Open Poser, and make sure the correct figure is loaded, etc.

2. Click on the tab at the top that says, "Material." This opens the Material room, which looks a little different. Once there, you'll see a large window which is probably empty. At the top of it there is a menu which lists, "Object", "Material", and "Node Options."

3. Click on the Object menu in that window, and choose the correct figure from the drop down list. Probably Figure 1. The "PoserSurface" panel for one of the Materials will open. You'll be able to tell which one from the color at the top, since the default SL AV is, shall we say, brightly colored.

4. Click on the Material Menu, and choose the correct material from the list. They are named Material_Lowerbody, Material_Upperbody, and so on. You'll want the same name as the Template you were working on, of course.

5. Click on the Diffuse Color swatch, at the top of the PoserSurface panel, and change its color to white. This acts like a tint, and will affect the colors of your material.

6. Click on the little icon directly to the right of the Diffuse Color Swatch. It looks like a plug, or something. When you click on it, a menu will fly out, that says "Disconnect" (which is probably dimmed) and "New Node."

7. Mouse over "New Node," which will open another fly out.

8. Mouse over "2D Textures" (at the bottom) which will open another fly out.

9. Choose "image_map" from the last fly out. A new panel will appear, titled Image_Map, and connected to the Diffuse Color with a cyan line (although you probably won't see that unless you drag the window to the right.)

10. Click directly on the word "None" next to "Image_Source". It's in the first line of the Image_Map panel. Another dialog window opens, that has a drop down menu of all textures currently loaded (Probably "No Texture" and "Ground Default Texture'.) Below that is a button labeled "Browse."

11. Click the "Browse" button.

12. You will (finally!) get to a normal browser window. Find your texture, and Open it. Its name will appear in the dialog from step 11.

13. Click OK to accept the texture. It will appear on the AV, and also at the bottom of the PoserSurface window.

14. Repeat steps 3-13 for each Material.

15. Click on the "Pose" tab at the top of the window to return to the Pose Room, which is the one where you do the work in Poser.

Yeah, I agree that all of that is much more complex than it needs to be; but it's set up to do a lot of stuff that we aren't using, when we're just checking image maps. And the complexity is for that (or so they tell me.)

Also, it goes very quickly once you get used to it.

So, let me know if you need screen shots!

Im curious to know which version you used, beause I just dowloaded studio, tried to follow the instructions, and nothing is working, nothing is where you are saying to look. Please help! Thanks!

Robin,

If you have instructions/screenshots for Poser 6, I'd be so greatful

Hi Merlot! I was using DAZ Studio 1.0. I'm downloading the newest version now, and will post the instructions as soon as I figure it out.

MadamG, here are the instructions for Poser 6.

Assuming that your figure is loaded, and Poser is open;

1. Click on the Material tab to open the Material Room. Exactly like you would for Poser 5.

2. Choose Object and Material from the large window menu, just to the right of the "Simple" and "Advanced" tabs. This is assuming that you are using the Simple tab, and works exactly like the first mini-tut post.

3. Click the Color Swatch under Diffuse Color, and change it to White. This is to eliminate the tinting, as before.

4. Click the empty square under Diffuse Color. This opens the Texture Manager window, which has a preview window! Nice addition.

5. Click the Browse button, and browse to your texture. This, also, works the same way it did. Except that if you look in the menu, there are a lot more things pre-loaded. By the way, if you've already loaded a texture, you can just choose it from the drop down menu.

6. Click OK, and admire the texture on the model. Of course, you won't actually see it on the model unless you have the Document Display Style set to Texture Shaded, (click the little ball with the stripes on it in that portion of the interface to change it,) but you can see it when you render, regardless.

If you want to use the Alpha maps, just click the Advanced tab, and it seems to be exactly the same interface that we had in Poser 5. At least, it all works exactly the same way. So just follow those instructions.

You still can't see the alpha on the model until you Render, by the way.

Hope this helps!

Okay, I've checked it out. Not that much about this particular thing has changed; there are just a few differences that might throw you off at first.

But, just to make it easy to print and read the instructions, here are the new ones for DAZ Studio.

1. Go to the File menu, to Import, and Import the Avatar .obj file. Choose "From Poser" in the dialog box that opens when you do this, so the figure will be large enough to see. Leave everything else at the default. (Yes, it will import the .cr2 file, but if all you are doing is looking at textures, all that does is add another step.)

2. Open the Surfaces window, if it's not already open. (View > Tabs > Surfaces) If you see a list of materials, that's good. Just click on the one you want, and go from there. If you don't, you can use the flippy triangle at the top right corner of the dialog to "Show Surface List" (Or you can do without, which is pretty much like the older version of the program, and just follow the directions from that one, which are above.)

3. Choose a Material from the list; say, "Material_Upperbody."

4. In the Basic tab, click on the long button under the numbers below Color | Diffuse, which says None. Choose "Browse for Image" from the menu, and browse for the image file. (It needs to be in .tif, .png, or .jpg format. .psd and .tga files won't work, sadly.)

5. It will show up on the avatar in the window. If you don't see it, make sure that the window display is set to "Texture Shaded." (Under the flippy to the right of the View menu, at the top of the window.)

6. Repeat for any additional textures.

To Rotate, Pan, or Zoom, drag the mouse on the buttons at the upper right of the viewport. (Clicking on them doesn't give you a tool. You need to drag right or left directly on the icon.)

You'll only be able to apply one image per material, but hey, what do you want from a free program.

One of the things you can do now is view the wireframe on the texture, by choosing "Wire Texture Shaded" from the flippy by the View menu in the main viewport. That might be helpful, since it's like looking at the UV Map on the image.

So, there you go!

I downloaded DAZ Studio a week ago and used Robin's instructions with no problem. The complicated part was getting my clothes on the model. Once I figured that out, it was a snap.

This so needs a sticky. Robin thank you for this information you are so LOVED!

Hugz Robin!! Work great!

Here is a technique I use in DAZ to give the model skin and clothes. If I want to try on a new article of clothing, say a new shirt, I will add a skin layer as my background.

I used Jinny Fonzarelli’s free skin that she included in her sample pack. I just lightened the skin tone a little to match mine and, when I save the image to tiff, I have a shirt complete with skin to apply to my DAZ Studio model. Looks great!

Jinny Fonzarelli's Clothing Templates Sampler Thread

Jen

Hi Robin,

Just downloaded Daz Studio and followed the new instructions you posted.

But when I tried to make the avatar try on TIFF files of my clothes, her skin turned black. And the long skirt she was wearing turned into pants and covered her feet as well.

Am I doing something wrong?

Plus when I upload revisions of the same blouse, it doesn't update in Daz. Frustrated.

Stella - Yes, the SL avatar will have black skin in DAZ Studio. I used Jinny’s skin texture and add it as the background layer under my clothes. This puts a real skin (minus eyes) on the model.

To get a skirt to fit, you have to upload the SL skirt into DAZ. It is found in the SL package in the Clothes Folder. The skirt will then fit. However, you will get a large full length skirt. Your clothing design will show and the silver SL skirt will stick out below it. I haven’t figured out how to get rid of this, yet.


Change the name of your uploaded item each time. Then select the new updated item.


I hope this helps you

Jen

Yep. That's what you get. Any areas that have transparency show up as black in Daz. If this isn't what you want, you can combine various images in Photoshop, before you import them, to see what things will look like in SL, as Jennifer has said.

This works with everything, by the way, not just skins. So, for instance, if you want to see what the vest you are working on will look like under the jacket, open both documents, use the Alpha channel to select the Jacket (Select > Load Selection) hold down the Shift key, and drag it onto the Vest document. Then load the combined image into Studio to see what it will all look like.

Jennifer, to make the part of the skirt that you don't want visible to "go away," you'll need to load a separate Transparency Image. (Studio doesn't read embedded alphas, as you know.)

To do that, just open the Channel palette, and click on the Alpha Channel to select it (it will get an open eye icon, and the other four channels will lose theirs.) Then Select All (Command/ctrl A) and Copy (Command/ctrl C.) Create a New document, and Paste. It will paste as a Layer, not a Channel. (You'll be able to see it in all four channels, or the one if you are using Grayscale, but there will be no Alpha Channel.)

Save that document. I find it easiest to save it as "Name of File) Trsp.tif", where (Name of File) is ... ummm ... the name of the file that matches this transparency.

Now, in Studio's Surfaces tab, select the Skirt material, and click the Advanced tab. You'll see a whole list of attributes. Scroll down to Opacity. If there's nothing under that, and it goes straight to Bump, click the flippy triangle to the left of the word to open the Opacity options.

You'll see something that says Opacity Strength, which should be set at 100%. To the right of that is a white triangle in a button. Click on it, and you'll open a menu that allows you to browse for an image. Do that, and choose your "Name Trsp.tif". You'll see the bottom of the skirt disappear. (Opacity Strength should remain at 100%.)

The rest may also get funky and weird, but that's just because of the Open GL in Studio. If you Render, you should see it correctly.

Hope this helps!

Thank you Robin! I've used DAZ|Studio since the early beta stages, and could not have explained this half as concisely as you have. Well done!

1. Go to the File menu, to Import, and Import the Avatar .obj file. Choose "From Poser" in the dialog box that opens when you do this, so the figure will be large enough to see. Leave everything else at the default. (Yes, it will import the .cr2 file, but if all you are doing is looking at textures, all that does is add another step.)~~ Quote from Robin.

Will someone please tell me where I find this Avatar.obj file? Please post a link to it here. I have been looking all afternoon.

Here you go.

http://secondlife.com/community/avatar.php

It's in there.

Hope this helps!

bump

Raises hand for Poser 6.

I take it there's no way to paint on the 3d model in Poser, is there?

I just downloaded DAZ to try it out, but when I imported the avatar, it just... wasn't there. Am I doing something wrong?

Hi Kiasaid!

I'm guessing that it was there, but was too small to see. The Poser people, for some reason, are miniscule.

Don't import at 100%; use the Poser import preset from the drop down menu in the Import dialog, if it's still there. (I don't have the latest version, but I'd be surprised if they'd taken that away.) If it's not, import at 25000%. (Yes, twenty-five thousand. That's not a typo.) That's a little larger than the Poser preset, but since you just want to see the figure, not compose a scene, it's an easier number to remember.

If that doesn't fix it, then if you could post exactly what you did, we can tell if you missed a step, or something. Otherwise, it's kind of hard to know.

Hope this helps!

I have DAZ Studio and have downloaded some of the files made specifically for DAZ avatars from the DAZ website. I wondered if it's possible to upload the clothes/skins from DAZ to use in SL if I buy them from DAZ? Is there anything special I need to do for that, such as put them on the SL avatar files first? Thanks for a reply

edit to add: I won't be selling the skins or clothes in SL, these are just for personal use.

You're really asking two questions. One, is it technically possible, and two, is it legal. I'll take them one at time.

The answer to the first question is yes, it's technically possible. It would take a lot of work though, as the textures for DAZ/Poser models are arranged very differently from those for SL models. The UV's are different, the template layout is different. Converting one to the other would take a lot of skill. If you possess such skill, then technically you COULD do it.

The answer to the lega question is no, absolutely not; you can't do this. The DAZ license expressly forbids dirivitive works from their models. Here's are the relevant portions, exerpted from the legally binding license to which you agreed when you downloaded DAZ's products. I'll quote them exactly and then summarize in plain english what they mean for you:

This part basically means that as soon as you install any DAZ product on your computer, you are legally bound to do what the license says. You are entering into this agreement of your own free will. It is a legal contract between you and DAZ 3D Productions, Inc. If do anything the contract says you can't do, you will have committed a crime against DAZ, for which you will be legally liable.


This part says that you have license to use DAZ's models and all related data that comes with them only in accordance with the terms of the license agreement. You cannot use the models or any portion of them for any other purpose. For simplicity purposes from this point on, the models themselves and all their related materials will be known simply as "3-D Models", so whenever anything in the agreement uses that term, it's talking about every part of every model, including the textures.


This part says that DAZ owns the copyright to the models and all their parts, and that you will do everything within your power to protect DAZ's rights. Further, if you're talking about a model that DAZ aquired from someone else before you bought it from DAZ, you must also respect any rights that that other person may have. In other words, you can't pull textures off the models and put them somewhere else without the express permission of DAZ and whoever else may have created the model.


This part says you can copy the models or any of their parts, but you can only put the copies on your own computer. You can also use the models for your own projects such as movies, pictures, etc, and publish those projects any way you want, but you cannot publish the models themselves or any of their parts seperately from the finished project, and you cannot export any part of the model (including the textures) to any usable format off of your own computer. You also can't get around this by making your own version based on DAZ's models (including textures). Therefore, uploading DAZ's textures to SL, modified or unmodified, would be out of the question.


This part says that you can't give the models or any of their parts to anyone else for any reason unless DAZ gives you written permission. You also can't take the models apart in any way (like extracting their textures) or create dirivitive works from them (which is what your SL clothing would be).



So there you go. You can't legally use DAZ's stuff for SL unless DAZ gives you their permission to do it. If you want to put their stuff in SL, ask them if it's okay with them. If they say no, which they probably will, then that's the end of it. Please respect copyright.

Oh, and just to be thorough, the fact that you wouldn't be selling the stuff is completely irrelevent. It's a common misconception that copyright infringement is related to sales. It's not. If you don't own the copyright, you can't copy the work for any reason, sales or no sales. You potentially make it worse for yourself if you do sell the copies since you're amplifying the crime, but it's still illegal and wrong whether you sell or not. (The only exception is for backup purposes. You can make a backup copy of software and music that you own, but that's it. Altering a texture to fit the avatar model and then transferring the texture to SL obviously couldn't be considerred making a backup.)

To just add something to what Chosen said; buying DAZ products is like buying almost anything else for the computer.

If you've ever read any EULA (End User License Agreement,) you realize that you don't buy things for the computer. All that's for sale, for nearly everything, is a license to use the thing on a single computer, on a number of computers, or on your main computer and home/laptop computer (depending on the license.)

Since you don't own it, it's not "yours", and you can't do anything with it except what the actual owner allows you to do. Which certainly doesn't include decompiling or making derivative works.

And before someone comes on here and says, "Oh, who cares?" the answer is the creator of the piece cares. And many of the people who create things for DAZ and Poser are here, too, creating things for SL, and they will take action if they see you violating their copyright.