Just thought I'd let you all here know that I posted up and moch-up tutorial and you can read about it here, if you care? :)

http://www.renderosity.com/mod/forumpro/showthread.php?thread_id=2695778

I'd post in each of the various forums that I sometimes visit, but that would end up 
being too redundant and I don't want to upset the way things work around here.

Anyway, enjoy if you want to and I hope you get something out of it?

....................md :)

thx fr the link. the part about having to triangulate polygons may be difficult for poser users. any suggestions? when I tried IvyGen with a poser model, the ivy cut thru the model.

Hmmm, I haven't yet tested this with all the various formats of 3D models, though I am working to get that accomplished :)
So bare with me a little on time here, especially, since I really only get to work on this stuff over the weekend and this next coming weekend I won't be around, but I'll sure be doing my best to help when ever I can and if I can :)

Is there any particular model you are working with, I have most of the main objects, bought a ton load when DAZ messed up all our accounts in that buyout deal of Hexagon and we all got vouchers to spend on stuff, so I just bought lots of what ever looked good and then there's all those freebies out there too LOL

Anyway, I don't know how many building or wall or plant type Poser objects I have, it probably isn't all that much, since I model most of those sort of things myself in other programs I use, as I mostly just wanted animals the most and people secondly and then what ever else I thought I might like from DAZ LOL

You can email me directly if you want to at md at md-arts.com and I can spend a bit better time sorting this part out with you, but want to keep the good info still posted here so others can get something from it, of course :)

Off hand though, it sort of sounds like some of the polies just need to be flipped, i.e. their normals flipped, which they do have a button there for that, but if it's only happening to certain polies, then you would have to manually flip those, uhg, you wouldn't enjoy that much, I can tell you that right now LOL

Anyway, let me know which object it is, if you can?

I do have that one object, I think it's called, Ruins?
Should I try that or what?

OK, I'll be lurking around for the rest of the evening tonight on and off.
I'm on the west coast, so i'll still be up for quite a while.
San Diego to be more precise :)

................md :)

I can't say which object it is (product confidentiality), but it's just a figure that I exported from poser, and it looks like what you said - about half the polygons appear to be empty in ivygen, but not in carrara IIRC. yeah, go ahead and try the ruins, e.g. those by baument, stonemason or DM.

OK, well, it looks like I already figured out a work around for you that WILL work and it seems so far to work quite nicely to boot! :)

What I did was, i loaded in the Greek Ruins.
I made sure that it had most if not all, Quads for polygons, which it did.
So, I exported that out in the OBJ format, and sure enoughm, you're right, it exports it out the same way it shows up in Poser (I'm using Poser 6 until I can afford 7).

Sooo, the trick is to do this:
Export you object as a 3DS format.
This will guarenty that you WHOLE object comes out with trippled polygons.
Clear that Poser object out (new scene).
Import that 3DS object you just exported out and guess what, ALL the trippled polies will still stay intact.
Sooo, NOW you can export that again in the OBJ format this time and this time it will 
save with ALL of the trippled polies intact with the OBJ formatted object and there ya go!
All nice and ready for using in Ivy Gen for you :)
Don't worry about things like whether or not textures/materials and all that 
show up on your objects, as they aren't needed in Ivy Gen anyway, you're 
only using the program to mgenerate your Ivy with anyway.
Once you make the Ivy and export that out (also as an OBJ formated object, 
it's only format it can save to) then, simply load in your Ivy into Poser and enjoy!

Hope this helps? :)

...................md :)

First is the object after I had exported it out as a 3DS (Max) format and then imported that object right 
back into Poser and THEN exported it out again but this time as the OBJ (Wavefront) format.

And finally, you can see the results in the Ivy Gen program :)

Hope this clears things up and actually, I am totally glad you brought this subject up, 
cuz other wize I might never have thought about it, since I have several 3D programs 
I work with, it wouldn't be an issue for me, and it never occured to me that some 
people might only have one kind of 3D program, be it Poser or what ever 
else and they would have these problems then, so thanx!

............................md :)

..............md :)

And yes, I see that the ruins object comes out reversed in the Ivy Gen program, 
it doesn't look like that in Poser of course, so this is what of the issues I was refering 
to in my original posting about how the Ivy Gen program seems to have issues with Axis?

I am of course, still working at trying to find the best sollutions to mimimize 
these types of problems or at the least, come up with decent workable work 
arounds and I will sooner or later, hopefully sooner then later? LOL

I am working on that right now and will try and get some better info for you posted up soon, ok?

The most obvious method would be to simply mirror you Ivy when it's finished and 
that would solve everything, but I just want to be sure thats the best method to to do?

I'll be around though :)

............md :)

Quote - thx fr the link. the part about having to triangulate polygons may be difficult for poser users.

LOL, no kidding! I don't really know what that is exactly...something about triangles.

Right now I am trying to see if I can work out some of these odities that sometimes occure, 
like the Ivy exporting the wrong way up or upside down or mirrored, 
but I may not be able to solve those problems.
And also, I am not too experienced yet with Poser, 
I have Poser 6 and am still kinda new to it, so I'm doing the best I can :)

And of course, if others know more about what they may run into like I am, please 
post any and all sollutions you might be able to add to this topic so that way we 
all can learn and I can add these things in the next version of the tutorial.
but there may not be some answers for things, as the program (Ivy Gen) 
may just have some issues and nothing we can do about that LOL

My object comes out looking reversed when I load it into Ivy Gen, yet when I load it into Poser, it's fine.
And same thing with the generated Ivy, it looks fine, albeit backwards in Ivy Gen, 
but comes out all small in Poser and also, the leafs are all unpsidedown as well.
But this may be fixable by simply flipping the UVs when you import the OBJ.
I'll keep experimenting here though and see what I come up with?

I'll still keep my eye out though on the subject anyway :)

...................md :)

*LOL, no kidding! I don't really know what that is exactly...something about triangles.*Yes, but I gave a pretty good work around that really isn't that big of a deal actually.
It only took me a couple of minutes to do the whole thing.

Export your object as a 3DS object.
Close out what is currently loaded.
Import that same 3DS object that you just exported.
Export that right back out as a OBJ object.
And there ya go, an object that is triangulated and in the format that Ivy Gen wants, OBJ format.

Just use the settings I posted above :)

Update Note:
And yep, by Flipping the UVs on Importing the Ivy OBJ into Poser, 
that makes the leafs all the correct way and looks fine! :)
And in a few minutes here I'll have my very first Poser/Ivy Gen scene :)

............md :)

o.k., md, that 3ds export/import method should work well. thx fr the tips. as you know, triangulating an object may affect the way it morphs or accepts texture maps in poser, but that isn't a big problem with static props.

Well, what you aren't understanding here, is that it TOTALLY doesn't matter what happen to the objects that you export.
See, you "won't" be using those in your scenes.
All you are doing is making a "stand-in" object to make the Ivy on.
Once you have your ivy made, THATS all that you need.
You can toss the stand in object out for all it matters, except you 
will want it for any future experiments of course, but the point being, that you 
WILL NOT beingusing that object in your Poser scene or in any scene for that matter.
You could use them, but why?
If you already have a perfectly fine working Poser object or any 
other 3D object, why use some exported OBJ object for your scene?
You just don't need to.
I'm sure as heck not using the exported objects. 
I'm using the "original" Greek Ruins object in Poser and things are fine.
No need to use my exported objects.
You load in your Ivy and be on your way with your scene :)

Hope that clears that whole issue up about the triangulating objects and exporting 
and all that, they just are needed as stand in objects for a refference to make the ivy on.
Thats all :)

Enjoy!

...................................md :)

I'll post my sample scene later, but I'm done for the evening here :)
I just want to chill in front of the TV and doze off, now that I am nice and full from dinner :)

FIrst off, Thank you for taking the time to do a tutorial. I saw this generator when it forst came out. Quite exciting stuff.

I have been meaning to download it and play. I have tons of leaf reference I wouldn;t mind doing for it as freebies.

Do you know what is invoved for using custom textures?

As far as what is involved, I guess it wouldn't be all that much.
I would probably just take a look at the textures they already have in the 
Textures folder and see what sizes they used and like that and kinda go from there.

Those too were donated from some nice persona as well, so you see, it all goes around :)

And I sure found out something last night, I pretty much know squat about Poser LOL
The reason, so far all I've been using it for is what the name says, Posing objects.
I've never once tried to use most of the other features, namely making an actual scene in there.
I spent the whole rest of the night till nearly 3am just trying to learn how to make proper 
lighting and make that lighting work with my textures, boy was I lost LOL
I just wasn't used to working with making texturing that way at all, not the nodes part of it, 
but kinda everything else, as I work with nodes in LW and in Vue and others.

But, finally, I started to get results that I actually was trying to get from the start and this ended up 
being my very first little Poser scene sample, all just to show that you can use Ivy Gen with Poser LOL

Most of the problems that people have been asking about here so far, those were all the easy parts to me.
The scene part is what was killing me LOL
And I had to end up making my own textures from the ones they supplied 
cuz things kept coming out backwards when I went to load the Ivy into Poser.
So I had to redo a couple of the textures (I eventually figured out LOL) to get things to work.
So, here's my very first scene I ever made in Poser, so don't laugh too hard LOL

Anyway, I would love to see what textures you come up with?
I've thought of textures samples such as Money and things so you could have a money vine growing ;)
Would be fun for something, I'm sure, not realistic, but fun either way :)

OK, well, thanx all and I'm glad people are enjoying the tutorial too.
I also am glad I posted that thing in a few different forums, cuz I might othrwise never 
have known about some of these other issues that have been brought up and 
this all will be great info for the updated stuff I'll be adding to the tutorial.

.............................md :)

mdunakin, you're an absolute king among men.

I had been having a couple of problems with this fantastic free program, and from your tutorial (and reading this thread) ALL of my problems are solved.

Now to find the time to render!

shrimp, were you the guy who posted the leaf tex/transmaps for ivygen in an earlier thread? I'm tryinta recall who did that.

Thanks for the info. I am going to look into it when I have more time and definately look into some textures. I'm bookmarking this. Thanks again for the info. It is appreciated.

Triangulating an OBJ mesh is easy. ;) Open the mesh in the free UVMapper; press t to triangulate; save the mesh again.

Yeah!, there ya go!
Do what EnglishBob just suggested.
There are of course lots of free methods out there to do these things with, 
but this one might probably be the easiest, just like he suggested.

Here's the link to the UV-Mapper site too, to help you along even faster :)

http://uvmapper.com/

Enjoy!
And thanx for that extra tip there, the more the better for everyone.
I suggested the method above just to show that it all "could" be done from just Poser.
But yes, there are lots of the freebies out there as well that help make life a little easier for us.

And yes, these kinds of things I can use for the final tips and all when I go to make the addendum.

Thanx for that!

You're all also welcome too for the comments......................md :)

The little mouse is saying:
Welcome to my place, my home, my pallace... my secret garden.
Come and enjoy!

Poser 6
Greek Ruins
House Mouse
And of course, Ivy Generator

You can post any comments in the Gallery section, here:
http://www.renderosity.com/mod/gallery/index.php?image_id=1434292

Thanx...........md :)

Just poped in to say thanks for the tutorial.

This isn't mine though Miss Nancy. I think this was posted by flyerx (or something like that).

Thankfully I saved the texture anyway.

Attached Link: http://www.renderosity.com/mod/forumpro/showthread.php?message_id=2940758&ebot_calc_page#message_2940758

This is the original person who posted the freebies for all of us, his name is, Tim Ellis.

ivy_generator_Textures.zip (7,006 KB)
set of textures including normal maps etc., kindly provided by Tim Ellis 

You can download all the textures right there from the Ivy Gen site.
It's down a ways from the first links to the app that you find there on the site.

I'm really looking forward to finding some other types of Ivy leafs or 
for that matter, what about other types of just vines of various types?

I've actually thought of some fun things people "might?" want to try out?
If someone knows how to make some items such as a bunch of grapes, small sizes 
and larger sizes and less ripe colors and fully ripened versions and things like little blue
flowers and whitish yellow flowers, you could make things like grape vines in vinyards 
and honey suckle vines that love to grow on wire fences and things like that and 
just manually stick those in ater after you have the vines all made.
Since you wouldn't need a ton in your vines, this would be a completely possible thing to do :)

I know that "I" plan on doing this sort of thing.

And again, on a note I made earlier, pleassseeee remember to adjust that first slider 
up a little  and try to make your vines a little less crounded  as this will save you by 
several megs on the file sizes and of course, on the render times as well.

This is very important to NOT ever forget about while creating your cool looking vines :)

NOTE: Please post here and/or let me know if anyone creates any new versions of leafs or 
any other items that can be used with them, as I will put them all into one folder for download.

I've already talked with Thomas on posting these sorts of things, like the tutorial 
and anything else that might be relevant and I of course always let him know 
any new plans I might have before posting just to keep him in the loop.
I know he is a very busy guy and this Ivy program was really just a project 
and never really intended for him to spend much public time on it, 
or at least thats the impression I've gotten from him so far.

Oh,, and I think that maybe the textures that come with the Textures Folder, might be able 
to be changed somewhat to make smaller the file sizes of those, as I noticed they were all 
set pretty high on the quality end of things and I don't think they really need that much quality 
for little leafs that mostly aren't going to be seen that close to notice if they are less quality 
or not, from a 24bit compared to maybe a 16 bit or something, know what I mean?
I'm just saying, it might be fun just to see? if they can be changed for lessing file sizes.

.........................md :)

**Many thanks for the forced triangulation technique, mdunakin! I used Truespace to do the same thing, but your method is more organic.

The ivy generator has a lot of potential. I did an ivy over the P7 James skull and got this: 

http://www.renderosity.com/mod/gallery/index.php?image_id=1424646**

Hey!, thats pretty cool looking!
I love to see how normal things like this Ivy thing can be used in weird ways like you just used it :)
That was really neat too!

Like a cooler version of an Edward Sizzor Hands or something lOL

And you are very welcome too!
I'm glad to see that little tutorial helping some people out :)

.............md :)

regarding the idea about reducing textures from 24- to 16-bit, I think it was kupa (fractal/metacr.) who once said that they could even be reduced to 8-bit in some cases. I am guessing that the effect of texture-filtering would be to interpolate the colours in either case, raising the rendered effect back up to 24-bit, so a render with no texture-flitering would look worse (using 8-bit textures) than a render with fast texfiltering (using 8-bit textures).

Yeah, it seems that ages ago I read some things similar to that as well?
Can't remember where it was that I read that at, or I'd post the link here?

But I know that I read something like that somewhere on the net once in my life LOL

Would be curious though to see the results of the two types side by side in the same renderings.

BTW, Tim Ellis (the guy who donated the leaf textures) just added a new tutorial to the Ivy Gen site.
It's focus is on Ivy Gen and Blender, but can be used for other apps as well.
I just checked it out and it's a nice basic tutorial that has great screen shots with it too!

.......................md :)

First off I want to thank MD for the Ivy Generator, it's an excellant program!

I was thrilled to see there was a tutorial posted and downloaded it right away. I'm having a problem with it though and I can't seem to figure it out. For some reason when I play the video clip I only get audio, no video.

I have two different computers and each has a different version of Windows Media Player but neither one will play the video.

A friend of mine downloaded it and has had no problem viewing the video.

Any ideas what i'm doing wrong that is only allowing the audio part of the tutorial to play?

Thanks in advance!

first thanx, and second, just to make things clear, "I" didn't actually make the great program, Thomas Luft did, I just donated for him a tutorial to help him and the public out :)

And yes, I haven't at all forgotten about this thread nor it's content, as I am working to get together the Finals I am planning to add to, in addition to the tutorial, extra info to further explain some odd details taht I couldn't get into the tutorial as well as things that I've since found and figured out after creating that tutorial.

And I am also in contact with Tim Ellis, the donater of the Leaf Textures.
We (and anyone else who wants to donate high quality Textures) are going to be putting our efforts together to help consolidate things and make them easier for people to get more in one place.
I personally have plenty of web space and bandwidth for storage, so no probs for me there :)

Just wanted to let everyone know of these new things.

As for the video part of your question, please check out the DivX.com web site.
Here's the link, to help speed things up for you:
http://www.divx.com/divx/windows/

And the Mac version too:
http://www.divx.com/divx/mac/

And I really hope this works, cuz I have Windows Vista Ultimate on my system and recently updated my DivX and found out that it now no longer will let me compile anymore tutorials!
Nooooo! LOL
I sure hope they will get a fix out soon!?
I can't make anymore tutorial for the net until I get a new woking version that I can use of DivX Pro.

Well, I hope this helps you out?

And I "will" be back here soon :)
Been keeping my eye out on the forums to track down any issues people are running into.
So, please, anyone out there using other programs besides just Poser, let me know what things you personally ran into so I can add those tips or tricks or work arounds in my Finals update.
Same goes with any Poser people too, of course :)

Thanx again and enjoy!
And always feel free to e me with any and all questions or suggestions.
md@md-arts.com

.................................................md :)

Oh thanks for the correction, can't belive I made that mistake  LOL
We've been searching everywhere for tutorials and were happy to see you had made one.
I'm going to check out your suggestions and I appreciate the help.

One thing I forgot to mention is that my version 10 of the WMP gave a codecs error message. That may have something to do with what you mentioned also.

Thanks again for the help, much appreciated!  And thanks to Thomas Luft as well!      :)

No probs :)

Happy to be of help.

Let me know if you still run into any problems either viewing it or just have questions?
I'm in a good mood for helping people today, I have time, so I'll be around most of the day :)

......................md :)

Ok, I'm ready to give this a try but I'm stuck on the installation!  LOL

I unzipped the file and I have strange folders and have no idea where to put them:

bin
data
src

??? Please help :)

The bin folder should contain your Ivy Generator exe file and the read me file. To start the Generator, just click on the IvyGenerator.exe inside of the bin folder.

The data folder should contain the files for making a fence. klinker.png, klinker_mauer.mtl and klinker_mauer.obj files.

There should also be a textures folder which contains the leaf and branch textures for texturizing the ivy after exporting.

So this is a stand alone program and not used inside Poser?

I'm confused

Yes, it's a stand alone program.

This is a good thing, as that way it can be used for many, many people, more then just for Poser people.
You can use it in Lightwave 3D, C4D, Max, Vue and so on.

A tip for those who use Vue too, or other instancing programs:
Make a few various "small" ivy objects and use those in your instancing software.

This will cut down greatly on memory issues, as the Ivy objects can eat up huge amounts of memory easily.

Anyway, hope you enjoy the tutorial :)
And have fun with Thomas' awesome program!

And Tim has a tutorial posted at the Ivy Gen site as well.

........md :)
BTW, I keep wanting to let you know how much I love your little quote thingy there, it's toooo funny, the catnip thing LOL

Does anyone know what happened to Thomas Lufts Ivy Generator website? When I try to go there I get a page not found message. :(

Hey, you're right!

I'll have to email him and find out what the flip?

It could be a number of things, as the site was hosting by the college and all that.

I would have no problem hosting everything if he doesn't mind, so I'll see what he wants to do?
I have 4gigs of space and 800gigs of bandwidth to use.

Hopefully, I'll hear back from him though, so we'll see?

I'll let you all know what I find out, which ever the outcome will be.

OK, .....................md :)

Thanks md, the Ivy Generator is too nice of a program to let it slip through the cracks. Keep us posted! :)

He's also sometimes hard to get ahold of and I don't think he's around during the wekends, at least I've never gotten a reply from him until after a weekend.

Is there something though, in particular that maybe I could be helping you with in the mean time?

I'll do my best to help out all I can.

I haven't had a chance to get back to finishing up with my tips and tricks and all for this thing, because of other projects I am currently involved with, but I haven't fogotten and still plan to do all that soon enough :)

.............md :)

As you've noticed by now, the site is obviously back up, just in case no one knew :)

I'm still wishing I could get the time here to finish up on a few more things, and I still promise I will, soon enough.

................md :)

Thanks for the information md!