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Subject: Antonia - Opinions?


shante ( ) posted Fri, 02 October 2009 at 11:51 PM

Quote -  Shante.. how about this?
(used the opportunity to show off the EyesClosed morph as well ;) )

The new version, now with 85 morphs is up for grabs.

Oh that is beautiful. Try one with just the side of the lower lip and eyes flirting!


odf ( ) posted Sat, 03 October 2009 at 1:32 AM

I have a question.

How many blank morph channels (and corresponding body dials) should I put into Antonia's next CR2? I just checked V4, which has 100 altogether - 50 reserved for DAZ and 50 community channels, if I understand correctly. Is that a good number? Of course there would be no "PBMDC_xx", just "PBMCC_00" up to "PBMCC_99".

Oh, and the head has a few more, 140 in total, which I guess makes sense.

Too many? Too few? Just right? Mind you, there's always PMD, and besides I'm still pondering an ingenious new scheme for better injection poses. But since we have so many morphs for Antonia already, I think we need to build in some support right now for the techniques that people have traditionally been using.

-- I'm not mad at you, just Westphalian.


MikeJ ( ) posted Sat, 03 October 2009 at 3:56 AM · edited Sat, 03 October 2009 at 3:56 AM

Well, unless the original open mouth morph has been fixed to remove the head bob situation, it's not going to be good for making morphs using it, as any morphs made with it will also do the head bob.

So as I mentioned a few posts back, I put an open mouth morph I made on the dev site that can be used as a starting point, and the head stays in place on that one.



MikeJ ( ) posted Sat, 03 October 2009 at 4:04 AM

Quote - I have a question.

How many blank morph channels (and corresponding body dials) should I put into Antonia's next CR2? I just checked V4, which has 100 altogether - 50 reserved for DAZ and 50 community channels, if I understand correctly. Is that a good number? Of course there would be no "PBMDC_xx", just "PBMCC_00" up to "PBMCC_99".

Oh, and the head has a few more, 140 in total, which I guess makes sense.

Too many? Too few? Just right? Mind you, there's always PMD, and besides I'm still pondering an ingenious new scheme for better injection poses. But since we have so many morphs for Antonia already, I think we need to build in some support right now for the techniques that people have traditionally been using.

Well I couldn't say, really, but I wanted to bring up again the subject of clothes.
Someone mentioned way back that Antonia's rigging would make conforming clothes very difficult, and I was wondering exactly what that means - if it's true and what can be done about it.
I'd like to model some clothes for her, but I'm wondering if there are some sort of  standards that need to be followed, such as topology and poly flow, to accommodate for her rigging?
I don't know jack about rigging in Poser, but I could at least build and UV map some simple clothing items for her.
So in other words, is it worth it to start modeling some clothing, or is it true that the rigging will make that a problem?



odf ( ) posted Sat, 03 October 2009 at 4:23 AM

Quote - Well, unless the original open mouth morph has been fixed to remove the head bob situation, it's not going to be good for making morphs using it, as any morphs made with it will also do the head bob.

So as I mentioned a few posts back, I put an open mouth morph I made on the dev site that can be used as a starting point, and the head stays in place on that one.

One morph should not use another morph, anyway. Morphs need to be independent.

If I remember right, the intention was to open the mouth in order to see the teeth and tongue. For that purpose, it doesn't matter if the head shifts by an infinitesimal amount.

-- I'm not mad at you, just Westphalian.


MikeJ ( ) posted Sat, 03 October 2009 at 4:28 AM · edited Sat, 03 October 2009 at 4:30 AM

Quote -
One morph should not use another morph, anyway. Morphs need to be independent.

If I remember right, the intention was to open the mouth in order to see the teeth and tongue. For that purpose, it doesn't matter if the head shifts by an infinitesimal amount.

Yeah, I guess you're right about her wanting to see the teeth, but I was under the impression she wanted an open mouth morph to build other morphs off of also.

But what's wrong with building morphs off others?
I mean for example, I'm not going to do hours of morphing to get one phoneme, then repeat the whole process to get another similar phoneme - I'm going to start with one base open mouth morph and build all of them from that one.



TrekkieGrrrl ( ) posted Sat, 03 October 2009 at 5:05 AM

 Mostly I wanted the open mouth to be able to properly select only the lower lip and mouth parts. Then I can do my own open mouth and everything. But as it is, with the program I use, I keep getting some of the upper lip polygons selected when I try. And that gives her an eerie "stitched-lips-together" look when I try to pry them apart L

So if I could open her mouth enough to grab the lip, that should do it.

And I wondered if the tongue was jointed or not. It came out as one group in my program so I figured it wasn't. I may have been wrong though.

Anyway even with movement and jointed tongues, some poses are easier made with a morph. And how would you do a "tongue furl"  without a morph? :)

The number of injection channels.. Well.. as you can see, I've made 85 for the head alone by now (well a few are technically for the tongue and jaws, but anyway.. let's say 80 for the head) so 100 in all wouldn't leave much room for other. And I'm not done yet either L 
There is of course PMD injections but that doesn't work with DS, does it? (I dunno about DS, never really used it) Or is she going to be a Pure  Poser figure anyway? What with VSS and all, that wouldn't work in DS anyway... I'm personally fine with PMD injections. They're easy to make and I can just do a pose file that injects the proper groups as well, I've done that with my other face morph packs. So I don't need a lot of injection channels personally. But some may find that way of distributing morphs easier.

Mike you're right about morphs working together. As an example, I used the CheekbonesRotate morph I made to do the EyesSmile as well. Or at least the same selection of vertices as were in the CheekbonesRotate. And phonemes are typically built from existing morphs, too :)

But I'll have a look at the open mouth. I don't think it matters if her head moves a smidgeon, not for my purpose.

And ODF, I've sent you an email with my address :)

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odf ( ) posted Sat, 03 October 2009 at 7:39 AM · edited Sat, 03 October 2009 at 7:41 AM

Quote -
But what's wrong with building morphs off others?
I mean for example, I'm not going to do hours of morphing to get one phoneme, then repeat the whole process to get another similar phoneme - I'm going to start with one base open mouth morph and build all of them from that one.

Phonemes are in fact a great example of what not to do. To put it bluntly: phonemes are a stupid idea. I'll give you two reasons why:

Firstly, why make all those separate shapes when for 90 percent or more of your voice acting needs, combining just three morphs at the right settings - open, wide and narrow - will do perfectly fine?

Secondly, there's no such thing as a unique shape for most of the sounds we make in speaking. For many of the vowels for example, we have quite a range of lip shapes that will work, and which one you'll see in a speaker depends on the sounds that came before. If you use phonemes religiously to match sounds, you'll get an animation that looks extremely silly and not at all realistic.

Of course, you shouldn't believe a noob like me about the phonemes. Believe Jason Osipa instead. If you have some green stuff to spare, I highly recommend his book Stop Staring. It was a real eye-opener for me.

Back to reusing morphs: in general, it's usually a better idea to identify your basic building blocks. If you want one character with big breasts and small areolae and another character with big breasts and large areolae, it's much more efficient and useful to make just one morph for the breasts and one for the areolae, and then combine those to get what you want.

Of course sometimes it might be useful to build from an existing morph. But I'd bet in most of those cases it would be even more useful to look at what's different between the morph you already have and the one you want to build and make a morph for just that aspect that's different.

-- I'm not mad at you, just Westphalian.


MikeJ ( ) posted Sat, 03 October 2009 at 7:54 AM

Well, OK, the phoneme example was just a ferinstance.
For the record, as far as your other examples, yeah, I wouldn't morph those things as a whole, and would only do small parts. That's how I've always done it anyway.

But as far as mouth opening, I think that's a little different. Forget about phonemes, but I would use an open mouth morph as a base for, say an open wide morph or a scream morph or anything similar.
My point was that if I already have an open mouth OBJ file and all it does is open normally, I'm going to use it as a base to make an open wide morph, not completely redo it from scratch.



odf ( ) posted Sat, 03 October 2009 at 8:23 AM · edited Sat, 03 October 2009 at 8:23 AM

Quote -
But as far as mouth opening, I think that's a little different. Forget about phonemes, but I would use an open mouth morph as a base for, say an open wide morph or a scream morph or anything similar.

Fair enough, and an open versus open wide might be a good example (I haven't tried it myself). Sometimes, you have a wide range that just can't be captured by a single morph. Although after I'd done the open wide, I'd certainly test it at smaller values and see if I still needed the original open.

I think a scream could actually be done well as a combination. Again, Jason Osipa has great examples of that principle. With just a small number of basic morphs, rigged in the right way (in Poser terms that means with some sensible ERC dials to drive them) one can achieve an amazing range of expressions. But I'll tell you more when I've actually implemented that for Antonia. :laugh:

-- I'm not mad at you, just Westphalian.


JOELGLAINE ( ) posted Sat, 03 October 2009 at 9:35 AM

 A quick comment on morphs in general, odf--GROUP them!

The face should have:

Eyes/Brows  
Nose
Mouth
Full Face expressions
Shaping morphs:
  Head
  Brow
  Eyes
  Nose
  Lips
  Cheeks
  Chin
  Full Face morphs

The groupings should be self explaining.  They are several poses and python scripts for putting morphs into some kind of order.

I recently tried Apollo and didn't like him because if I have to spend five minutes looking for a 'mouth open' morph, it's too much trouble to use the figure.  If he had groups in his morphs to organize things things, I might use him.  He is NOT the only figure like that, either.  Grouping is something that's only been around for four or five years and not all figures have that, even now.

It'd be nice if Antonia was one of them.

I cannot save the world. Only my little piece of it. If we all act together, we can save the world.--Nelson Mandela
An  inconsistent hobgoblin is the fool of little minds
Taking "Just do it" to a whole new level!   


bagginsbill ( ) posted Sat, 03 October 2009 at 9:38 AM · edited Sat, 03 October 2009 at 9:39 AM

Did you know you can group them after the fact?

You can make a pz2 file that creates any grouping you want. Just name the parameters where you want them grouped. Even after the parameters already exist in some other organization (or disorganized) this works.


Renderosity forum reply notifications are wonky. If I read a follow-up in a thread, but I don't myself reply, then notifications no longer happen AT ALL on that thread. So if I seem to be ignoring a question, that's why. (Updated September 23, 2019)


Believable3D ( ) posted Sat, 03 October 2009 at 9:41 AM

Quote -
Firstly, why make all those separate shapes when for 90 percent or more of your voice acting needs, combining just three morphs at the right settings - open, wide and narrow - will do perfectly fine?

Secondly, there's no such thing as a unique shape for most of the sounds we make in speaking. For many of the vowels for example, we have quite a range of lip shapes that will work, and which one you'll see in a speaker depends on the sounds that came before. If you use phonemes religiously to match sounds, you'll get an animation that looks extremely silly and not at all realistic.

I assumed phonemes weren't simply about the lips, but also the tongue.

I dunno. There are people who lip read. Maybe they'd be the best to ask about the differences. :)

______________

Hardware: AMD Ryzen 9 3900X/MSI MAG570 Tomahawk X570/Zotac Geforce GTX 1650 Super 4GB/32GB OLOy RAM

Software: Windows 10 Professional/Poser Pro 11/Photoshop/Postworkshop 3


odf ( ) posted Sat, 03 October 2009 at 10:04 AM

Quote -
I assumed phonemes weren't simply about the lips, but also the tongue.

I dunno. There are people who lip read. Maybe they'd be the best to ask about the differences. :)

I'm sure lip readers would pay more attention to the tongue and might see the difference. Most people who don't read lips won't.

At any rate, what does the tongue do? In-out and up-down. So you can add two more morphs to the three I've mentioned, and maybe a "lower lip in" for the F if you're really fussy, and that should combine to give you all your phonemes. But: all of those will be general purpose morphs. You can reuse them for any expression you like.

-- I'm not mad at you, just Westphalian.


odf ( ) posted Sat, 03 October 2009 at 10:12 AM · edited Sat, 03 October 2009 at 10:15 AM

Quote - Did you know you can group them after the fact?

You can make a pz2 file that creates any grouping you want. Just name the parameters where you want them grouped. Even after the parameters already exist in some other organization (or disorganized) this works.

 
Excellent tip! I've never really thought of that.

The big catch is that you can't do it incrementally. If you specify grouping in a pose file, it throws away all the existing grouping.

Or has that changed in P8?

Little OT: BB, you're getting a lot of heat regarding the new library interface, so I'd just like to say that I'm a big fan. On my machine, it worked smoothly right from the start and never let me down. Then again, I run my Windows XP under Virtualbox on my Linux machine, so the firewall sits on the host and I don't need to use any braindamaged Windows firewall.

-- I'm not mad at you, just Westphalian.


RAMWorks ( ) posted Sat, 03 October 2009 at 10:30 AM

Quote - Did you know you can group them after the fact?

You can make a pz2 file that creates any grouping you want. Just name the parameters where you want them grouped. Even after the parameters already exist in some other organization (or disorganized) this works.

Grouped morphs is so much cleaner and easy to work with so you don't have all the morphs smushed together.  Hope this is done as well!!  😄 

---Wolff On The Prowl---

My Store is HERE

My Freebies are HERE  


Faery_Light ( ) posted Sat, 03 October 2009 at 12:17 PM
Online Now!

Question...which UV map are you releasing with the final version?

I want to finish my pz2 and DS sets soon if my hands will permit.


Let me introduce you to my multiple personalities. :)
     BluEcho...Faery_Light...Faery_Souls.


bagginsbill ( ) posted Sat, 03 October 2009 at 3:20 PM

Quote - > Quote - Did you know you can group them after the fact?

You can make a pz2 file that creates any grouping you want. Just name the parameters where you want them grouped. Even after the parameters already exist in some other organization (or disorganized) this works.

 
Excellent tip! I've never really thought of that.

The big catch is that you can't do it incrementally. If you specify grouping in a pose file, it throws away all the existing grouping.

Or has that changed in P8?

Is that statement from experience or a rumor you heard?

My experience with Apollo and my AMUCFS shader is that only the parameters mentioned move into the groups mentioned. All other stuff remains.


Renderosity forum reply notifications are wonky. If I read a follow-up in a thread, but I don't myself reply, then notifications no longer happen AT ALL on that thread. So if I seem to be ignoring a question, that's why. (Updated September 23, 2019)


lesbentley ( ) posted Sat, 03 October 2009 at 3:52 PM

Quote - How many blank morph channels (and corresponding body dials) should I put into Antonia's next CR2?

That's a very hard question to answer. Whilst blank channels don't take up a lot of space, when you have many of them in each actor, it all adds up. Personally I favour a more complex system with different numbers in different actors. Say 10 in the finger joints and toes. 20 in hands and feet. 160 or more in the head. 70 in the collars and hip. 50 in all other parts.

I know this idea would cause some confusion, but I really don't see the point of having 100 channels in rPinkie3. I think that very few people are going to morph the fingers and toes, not many will morph the hands and feet. The head always gets the most attention, followed inevitably by the breasts, and as Antonia has genitals these will probably receive a fair bit of attention too.

Just my 2 cents worth.

P.S. I recommend MikeJ's mouth open morph.


MikeJ ( ) posted Sat, 03 October 2009 at 4:02 PM · edited Sat, 03 October 2009 at 4:07 PM

file_440642.png

> Quote - > Question...which UV map are you releasing with the final version? > > I want to finish my pz2 and DS sets soon if my hands will permit.

Well it's my understanding that that will be up to you guys, the texture makers.
Basically, I think, whichever version is preferred will become the "official" Antonia UVs.

Earlier today I sent my most recent revision to Olaf. It was mapped to the low poly version of Antonia - or rather, the special one Olaf gave me so as to facilitate SubD mapping - and he's going to do his thing on subdividing it with his program, to get the high res version from it.

So now the low res version and the high res version will both be able to use the same maps.
Other updates I made include a little better (IMO) mapping around the feet, ears, gums and teeth, and more logical placement and grouping of the UVs.
Also, the toe cap object is now lined up exactly with the corresponding polys on the feet... Or rather, the important ones, the first two rows of polys in the "invisible" surface are.
(Thanks, BB, that stocking stuff was a real good exercise in seeing how far I could stretch the limits of my temper and patience. ;-) )

Anyhow, I think it's the best version yet, and I'm pretty sure it's the final version. Although as I told Olaf, I'm not opposed to doing more editing to accommodate you texture makers, if need be, if there's a consensus, and if it makes sense. :-)

I don't want to upload an actual OBJ or CR2 file just yet, but I'm attaching a screen shot showing what's what. It's split up into different UV regions (out of the 0-1 space) in this pic, but all that changed for the final version was that I moved it all into 0-1. The UVs themselves, as well as the spacing and grouping remained the same.
When Olaf gets back to me with a link to the subdivided version I can then make texture templates for both versions and upload all that stuff - OBJs and CR2s and templates.

In the attached image, the toe caps are overlapping the feet UVs, but that's the way it's supposed to be...
I didn't want to make a separate image, but the "release" version for y'all to check out will include templates for the legs/feet only, as well as the toecaps only, and the two together, as shown above.

As BB would say, click image for full size.


And I haven't forgotten about the single, non overlapping UVS I was going to make for Low Antonia, by request, and I will be uploading a link to that shortly, probably early next week. It will most likely be about the same as this one, but all packed into the 0-1 UV space, with nothing overlapping. Ideal for ZBrush, or just for people who want to be able to use only one map for a whole figure, or even for games, if one were so inclined. Although she's probably still a little too poly-heavy for a game figure.



lesbentley ( ) posted Sat, 03 October 2009 at 4:03 PM · edited Sat, 03 October 2009 at 4:04 PM

Quote - Did you know you can group them after the fact?

You can make a pz2 file that creates any grouping you want. Just name the parameters where you want them grouped. Even after the parameters already exist in some other organization (or disorganized) this works.

True, but grouping applied by a pz2 is destructive, overwriting the present grouping. You can always include Antonia's default grouping in any new grouping, but that does not help when two third party morph packs both want to write grouping. That's why in "Dial A Nipple" I did the grouping as an separate optional pz2.


MikeJ ( ) posted Sat, 03 October 2009 at 4:08 PM

"Dial A Nipple"
I'm still LMAO over that one. ;-)



lesbentley ( ) posted Sat, 03 October 2009 at 4:35 PM · edited Sat, 03 October 2009 at 4:41 PM

@ bagginsbill,

Quote - Is that statement from experience or a rumor you heard?

On my part, and in respect to P6, it is from experience. Try this pz2 file out. Select any actor of any figure and apply it. The selected actor's existing grouping will be rewritten, note that after applying the pose, you will need to select a different actor, then return to the original actor, in order to refresh the pallet.

{

version
    {
    number 6
    }

actor $CURRENT
    {
    channels
        {
        groups
            {
            groupNode New Group
                {
                parmNode New Node
                }
            }
        }
    }
}

In the absence of existing grouping, Poser will write its own grouping. So there will  be group "Transform" for translations, rotations, and scale, and any un-grouped morphs will be put in a group named "Morph".


Believable3D ( ) posted Sat, 03 October 2009 at 4:39 PM

Quote - > Quote -

I assumed phonemes weren't simply about the lips, but also the tongue.

I dunno. There are people who lip read. Maybe they'd be the best to ask about the differences. :)

I'm sure lip readers would pay more attention to the tongue and might see the difference. Most people who don't read lips won't.

As I think about this, the lips do much more than simply open or close. "P" for example initially looks like an "M," but has to end in a very slight pucker. Usually, "F" is not simply about how open the lips are, but where the jaw lines up so that the bottom teeth can press against the upper lip. Etc.

I suspect though that the tendency with animation is to way overdo the extent of phoneme movement, and thus things would look exaggerated. No subtlety, no realism.

FWIW.

______________

Hardware: AMD Ryzen 9 3900X/MSI MAG570 Tomahawk X570/Zotac Geforce GTX 1650 Super 4GB/32GB OLOy RAM

Software: Windows 10 Professional/Poser Pro 11/Photoshop/Postworkshop 3


bagginsbill ( ) posted Sat, 03 October 2009 at 4:39 PM

Aha.

So with Apollo, where it was all "Morph" anyway, they stayed in the ungrouped group called Morph not becuase my PZ2 was non-destructive, but because it was Apollo.

Gotcha.

Interesting.

Poser behavior is almost always not what I would have designed if I was the system architect.


Renderosity forum reply notifications are wonky. If I read a follow-up in a thread, but I don't myself reply, then notifications no longer happen AT ALL on that thread. So if I seem to be ignoring a question, that's why. (Updated September 23, 2019)


lesbentley ( ) posted Sat, 03 October 2009 at 4:45 PM · edited Sat, 03 October 2009 at 4:52 PM

@ bagginsbill,

Yep. When morphs are not assigned to a group by the last applied grouping pose, Poser will assign them to the group "Morph". Within the Morph group, I think they will be listed alpha-numerically.


MikeJ ( ) posted Sat, 03 October 2009 at 4:50 PM

Quote -

Poser behavior is almost always not what I would have designed if I was the system architect.

Please let me know when it comes down to voting for the next head of the Poser Design Team, because you definitely have my vote. ;-)



Faery_Light ( ) posted Sat, 03 October 2009 at 5:48 PM · edited Sat, 03 October 2009 at 5:49 PM
Online Now!

Just been trying the new UVs.
I tried to convert my Celene texture to the new mapping, it is wayyy tooo much trouble to do that.

So now I am going to start fresh with a new texture for the mapping and see how that goes.

I like the layout, especially the torso.

Could we go with both mappings?


Let me introduce you to my multiple personalities. :)
     BluEcho...Faery_Light...Faery_Souls.


TrekkieGrrrl ( ) posted Sat, 03 October 2009 at 7:25 PM

 I know it's been discussed earlier.. but I don't like the fact that the lips are separated in the UV map. It'll be really really hard to make a non-lipsticked lip blend in properly this way. At least as I see it. Then again, I'm not the most professional texture maker out there.

Another thing... any chance the Eye sockets could get their own material zone so you could apply either eye liner or simply a more glossy material to that "ridge" on the lower eyelid?

FREEBIES! | My Gallery | My Store | My FB | Tumblr |
You just can't put the words "Poserites" and "happy" in the same sentence - didn't you know that? LaurieA
  Using Poser since 2002. Currently at Version 11.1 - Win 10.



MikeJ ( ) posted Sat, 03 October 2009 at 7:50 PM

Quote - Just been trying the new UVs.
I tried to convert my Celene texture to the new mapping, it is wayyy tooo much trouble to do that.
So now I am going to start fresh with a new texture for the mapping and see how that goes.

I like the layout, especially the torso.

Could we go with both mappings?

How could you be trying the new UVs?
The ones I uploaded two weeks ago?
Don't bother with those. They were OK for the time, but that was before Olaf pointed out that the high res and the low res needed to match. What I uploaded earlier was for the high res only, and wouldn't work right for the low res, due to the polygon mis-matching from when it was subdivided.
And now this latest version has that toe cap stuff lined up, plus everything else is different to varying degrees.
But as I wrote in my long post above, Olaf now has the latest version, so he can subdivide it properly with his program he wrote, and as soon as I get the actual OBJ from him, I will create the new UV templates for both the low res and the high res.



MikeJ ( ) posted Sat, 03 October 2009 at 8:00 PM · edited Sat, 03 October 2009 at 8:01 PM

Quote -  I know it's been discussed earlier.. but I don't like the fact that the lips are separated in the UV map. It'll be really really hard to make a non-lipsticked lip blend in properly this way. At least as I see it. Then again, I'm not the most professional texture maker out there.

Another thing... any chance the Eye sockets could get their own material zone so you could apply either eye liner or simply a more glossy material to that "ridge" on the lower eyelid?

Well, I personally would prefer to have the lips as part of the face, but having them separated is better for extreme detailing. Otherwise if you want to get good high detail bump, spec and reflect maps, you'd have to use 4K maps, since the lips would have such a small section of the UV map, if they were attached to the face.

Maybe, maybe not. That's one of those personal preference things I guess. I certainly can stitch them back onto the face, if that's what Olaf and the texture people want.
The way it is now is the way I've been doing it. I've asked several times what people think about that, and get mixed results.
So, I'll wait until Olaf or the texture people tell me to do it otherwise. ;-)

As for the eye sockets, that too would be up to Olaf. It certainly would be easy enough to assign a new material for the finished version, and wouldn't need any new UVs for that. Then again, anybody can do that easily enough in Poser with the grouping tool  too.



Faery_Light ( ) posted Sat, 03 October 2009 at 9:16 PM
Online Now!

MikeJ, I'm just fiddling with the maps you posted two weeks ago.

Not trying to make full textures, just getting a feel for the new layout as these seem pretty much set-up like what you showed for your latest set.
I was able to convert the face set better than I thought I would.

Waiting for the finished UV maps. :)

I like the lip map either way.


Let me introduce you to my multiple personalities. :)
     BluEcho...Faery_Light...Faery_Souls.


odf ( ) posted Sat, 03 October 2009 at 11:46 PM

Quote - > Quote - How many blank morph channels (and corresponding body dials) should I put into Antonia's next CR2?

That's a very hard question to answer. Whilst blank channels don't take up a lot of space, when you have many of them in each actor, it all adds up. Personally I favour a more complex system with different numbers in different actors. Say 10 in the finger joints and toes. 20 in hands and feet. 160 or more in the head. 70 in the collars and hip. 50 in all other parts.

I know this idea would cause some confusion, but I really don't see the point of having 100 channels in rPinkie3. I think that very few people are going to morph the fingers and toes, not many will morph the hands and feet. The head always gets the most attention, followed inevitably by the breasts, and as Antonia has genitals these will probably receive a fair bit of attention too.

Just my 2 cents worth.

P.S. I recommend MikeJ's mouth open morph.

I like that idea a lot, but I'm a bit worried about the confusion it might cause. Also, how would this work with existing tools for generating PBMs and FBMs? See, I don't want to create a new system based on blank morphs. I don't like them much, anyway. I'd rather provide tools to create the channels on the fly, via Python scripts or via tools that rewrite the CR2. So basically, I'd like for morph creators to be able to make injection poses using their preferred tools until I can offer something better.

-- I'm not mad at you, just Westphalian.


odf ( ) posted Sat, 03 October 2009 at 11:53 PM · edited Sat, 03 October 2009 at 11:56 PM

Quote - Question...which UV map are you releasing with the final version?

I want to finish my pz2 and DS sets soon if my hands will permit.

I will release both, but only one will be the "official" or default mapping. Which one that is depends on which will have the most support by texture makers at the time I do that release.

The other one will then either be available via an alternate cr2 with a slightly longer name or, if I can make the necessary geometry switching work, via a dial. The dial solution would have the advantage that the correct dial setting for a given texture could be included in a material pose, invisible to the user. But I've yet to find out how this works out in conjunction with morphs, conforming clothing, etc.

-- I'm not mad at you, just Westphalian.


lesbentley ( ) posted Sun, 04 October 2009 at 12:29 AM

@ odf,

Quote - But I've yet to find out how this works out in conjunction with morphs, conforming clothing, etc.

I don't think there would be any problem in respect to those points. You would not be altering any vertices, so the morphs should still work the same, and as far as I know conforming clothes are unaware of the geometry.


odf ( ) posted Sun, 04 October 2009 at 12:37 AM

Quote - @ odf,

Quote - But I've yet to find out how this works out in conjunction with morphs, conforming clothing, etc.

I don't think there would be any problem in respect to those points. You would not be altering any vertices, so the morphs should still work the same, and as far as I know conforming clothes are unaware of the geometry.

Yes, if it's implemented correctly, there shouldn't be problems. Being a software developer, though, I see an almost infinite potential of messing this kind of thing up. So when I put the geometry switching code into the cr2, I'll definitely do some testing to make sure it all works.

-- I'm not mad at you, just Westphalian.


Starkdog ( ) posted Sun, 04 October 2009 at 12:28 PM

file_440668.jpg

As a break from the UV mapping discussion, I have looked at the newer version (114) of Antonia, and I really like this body shape.  I tried to re-size the breast area of prior clothes items, but I may need to re-sculpt them.  In the meantime, I made this cute and simple strapless partydress for Antonia.  The bodice is a constrained group, and the piping trim is a soft decorated group.  This dress runs through cloth simulator really fast, and Antonia seems really happy, but she cannot do an open smile yet. -Starkdog 


MikeJ ( ) posted Sun, 04 October 2009 at 1:44 PM

Oh well I see Renderosity is finally back online. I don't know how it was for everyone else, but here it was down for at least 8 hours.
Thanks Olaf, for posting the CR2s with the new UVs on the dev site!
I just checked there a little while ago on a whim and found them there.
I will pack the stuff up, along with UV templates and make a download for that. I should have that stuff together before tomorrow morning.



MikeJ ( ) posted Sun, 04 October 2009 at 1:53 PM · edited Sun, 04 October 2009 at 1:54 PM

Quote - MikeJ, I'm just fiddling with the maps you posted two weeks ago.

Not trying to make full textures, just getting a feel for the new layout as these seem pretty much set-up like what you showed for your latest set.
I was able to convert the face set better than I thought I would.

Waiting for the finished UV maps. :)

I like the lip map either way.

Oh, OK, I see, :-)
Well, like I wrote above, I'll have the new UV templates ready by tomorrow morning.
As for the lips, yeah, SaintFox said the same thing too, IIRC, so I'd imagine that's how it's going to stay, since as far as I know, you two are the only ones working on Antonia textures.
Then again, I'm not just gonna be changing things on a whim, either. Can't go around doing that. ;-)
I'm looking forward to seeing what you guys can come up with. :-)



odf ( ) posted Sun, 04 October 2009 at 9:50 PM

Quote - As a break from the UV mapping discussion, I have looked at the newer version (114) of Antonia, and I really like this body shape.  I tried to re-size the breast area of prior clothes items, but I may need to re-sculpt them.  In the meantime, I made this cute and simple strapless partydress for Antonia.  The bodice is a constrained group, and the piping trim is a soft decorated group.  This dress runs through cloth simulator really fast, and Antonia seems really happy, but she cannot do an open smile yet. -Starkdog 

That looks awesome, Starkdog.

I had an idea regarding the conversion of clothes from the old to the new shape, but I haven't gotten around to trying it yet. It should be easy to save out the hip and collars of Antonia-114 as morph targets and then load them as morphs into Antonia-96. One could then spawn a full-body morph and use MorphingClothes or a similar program to transfer that morph onto the clothing item.

-- I'm not mad at you, just Westphalian.


MikeJ ( ) posted Mon, 05 October 2009 at 12:00 AM

Yes, starkdog, that does look really good. 👍


Alright, I got the stuff all together and uploaded it all to the dev site under the category of "Antonia Base Sets". The file is a text file with a link to the Zip file I made, and is titled "AP_AltUVs_10-05-09.txt"
It includes the OBJ and CR2 files that Olaf made from my latest set, which can be found on that same page in a file titled "Antonia-with-MikeJs-UVs.zip".
But you don't need to download that, as the file I uploaded to my own place includes everything.

So, the file also includes all the UV templates for both the lo-res and the hi-res versions of the current Antonia 114. The hi res templates are all 2K, while the lo res are all 1K, and everything is in .png format.

Again, for people who may not be following this and wondering what the heck is going on with all this UV stuff, the earlier versions were not "correct" insofar as Olaf's vision for Antonia. In other words, the earlier versions were only for hi res Antonia and didn't match up with lo res Antonia, due to the way the polygons at the seams changed when subdivided. And of course all that toecap stuff...
Ahh yes, the toe caps.... nothing captures the very essence of the word "fun" quite like UV mapping toecaps. ;-)

So, it's finished now.
That is, unless the texture people want to use them and have legitimate gripes or suggestions about something and would like to see something different. In the event that happens, we'll have to discuss it first. :-)

I don't know who all is working on textures right now. The only ones I'm aware of are BlueEcho and SaintFox, so I'm particularly interested in hearing their comments and/or suggestions.
I don't know how many people have access to the Dev site, as there doesn't seem to be any member list anywhere, so if there are other texture people out there, I'd love to hear from you, too. :-)

Now once again, I'd like to 'splain why I've done this. Simply put, I believe this set I've done is more "developer friendly" than the previous, although there are other reasons too. Other major differences.
One of those, IMO, is a biggie and I'll 'splain that here:
The head in the original is split up into separate UVs, separate materials, which are very different sizes. That is, you have a "scalp", which is part of the Body UVs, and then the Face, which is part of the Head UVs.
Now in mine, the entire head is one material, one set of UVs. This, IMO, makes texturing easier with less distortion, but there's also another very good reason to do it this way:
If you use some other render engine such as Mental Ray or Lightwave to render a figure and want to use SSS on it, materials that are separate will cause very much difficulty in trying to get uniform SSS, because programs that use physically accurate "true" SSS, use real measurement coordinates to determine the SSS distance, penetration, and falloff.
That's not a real big deal when it comes to the body being a separate material than the head, but when you have the back of the head being a separate material from the front of the head, it throws the distance calculations out the window and then it's nothing but guesswork trying to match it up.
Mapping it the way I have eliminates that problem, and might even be better for Poser "SSS" too.

Well, that's just one of several reasons I undertook this project, but there are others as well. Although I consider the above to be very important. It sets it apart from the DAZ-esque style and might make some Mental Ray people happy. :-)

Anyway, enough rambling on about this from me for now.
I'll post a link for the general public...soon. I just wanted to give the texture peeps a few days, a week or so... to look it over and see what they have to say.

The lo res Antonia with all the UVs on one non-overlapping map that momodot requested will be available soon, too.



Faery_Light ( ) posted Mon, 05 October 2009 at 1:19 AM
Online Now!

MikeJ, I finally got my links set up on my new laptop and went to the site.
Now I have the sets and will be working to make some textures using them.

I am hoping that the laptop helps to ease some of the strain in my hands, neck and shoulders when I'm working on textures.

As soon as I get something done i will post some feedback. :)


Let me introduce you to my multiple personalities. :)
     BluEcho...Faery_Light...Faery_Souls.


A_ ( ) posted Mon, 05 October 2009 at 3:28 AM

MikeJ - at the time i started working on a texture for Antonia, but got very little work done. i'd like to try your maps. i just couldn't quite understand where to get them and the newly mapped Antonia. :)


odf ( ) posted Mon, 05 October 2009 at 3:43 AM · edited Mon, 05 October 2009 at 3:46 AM

Quote - MikeJ - at the time i started working on a texture for Antonia, but got very little work done. i'd like to try your maps. i just couldn't quite understand where to get them and the newly mapped Antonia. :)

They are on the ever elusive "Developers Site" that I created for sharing work that is not quite ready for public consumption. Usually, I let people in once they have shown something they made for Antonia. Of course, if you're planning to make something with the new UVs and they are only available from a site you can't access before you make something, that's a bit of a conundrum. :laugh:

I could either make an exception for someone who's been on my favorite artists list for as long as I can remember, or maybe Mike could just message you the direct link for his ZIP file. 😉

-- I'm not mad at you, just Westphalian.


odf ( ) posted Mon, 05 October 2009 at 4:03 AM

While I'm posting, maybe a little progress report is in order. Quite a while ago, I made new shoulder JCMs, but then I got distracted by writing CR2-manipulation software. This weekend, I've imported the new JCMs into the figure files and started to do some cleanups using my new software. Eventually, I'd like the low-poly and high-poly CR2 to be completely identical except for the obj files they include (d'uh!) and the morph deltas (also d'uh!).

Other little things I've changed:

  • translation channels are no longer frozen
  • fixed a small problem with the head twist (although I forgot whether I've fixed it in the low-poly or high-poly version, so I'll have to check and then copy the correct version over).
  • renamed the inverse kinematic chains for the legs so that Poser respects when I turn them off in the file

More things I'd like to do before I put the next version online:

  • turn the handle geometries off by default, or at least make them invisible in renders
  • fix the tiny problem with the breast geometry that lesbentley found
  • address the gimbal lock problem that occurs when the arms point straight forward

There's probably more, but I can't remember right now. I need to make more JCMs, but I think it's time for a new preview fairly soon.

-- I'm not mad at you, just Westphalian.


A_ ( ) posted Mon, 05 October 2009 at 4:45 AM

Attached Link: http://www.renderosity.com/mod/forumpro/showthread.php?thread_id=2753785&page=89#message_3477560

file_440713.jpg

> Quote - > Quote - MikeJ - at the time i started working on a texture for Antonia, but got very little work done. i'd like to try your maps. i just couldn't quite understand where to get them and the newly mapped Antonia. :) > > > They are on the ever elusive "Developers Site" that I created for sharing work that is not quite ready for public consumption. Usually, I let people in once they have shown something they made for Antonia. Of course, if you're planning to make something with the new UVs and they are only available from a site you can't access before you make something, that's a bit of a conundrum. :laugh: > > I could either make an exception for someone who's been on my favorite artists list for as long as I can remember, or maybe Mike could just message you the direct link for his ZIP file. 😉

blushes
that's at your discretion. :)
if that helps, here's a small screenshot of the texture i started back then... and never got around to finish. oh, and i also tried remapping everything to fit into zbrush, but never got it to work (would still love a solution for that, if anybody can think of one).


odf ( ) posted Mon, 05 October 2009 at 4:59 AM

Yep, works for me. Let me know your email address and I'll send you an invite.

-- I'm not mad at you, just Westphalian.


MikeJ ( ) posted Mon, 05 October 2009 at 4:59 AM

Blue Echo,
Sounds good, and I hope the new laptop helps you out some. :-)

A_,
I sent you a site mail with the link to the file.
There's no readme or anything in there, but it's pretty straightforward. Any questions or comments, by all means...  :-)



MikeJ ( ) posted Mon, 05 October 2009 at 5:03 AM · edited Mon, 05 October 2009 at 5:03 AM

Quote -
oh, and i also tried remapping everything to fit into zbrush, but never got it to work (would still love a solution for that, if anybody can think of one).

I'm not sure what you mean.
You might be interested though in the "one map" Antonia I'll be finishing up within the next couple days. Thta will be a version with nothing overlapping in the UVs, specifically with ZBrush in mind. I'll be getting a file up for that some time this week.
Of course in ZBrush you can also append each body part as a subtool, or you can split into groups, but either way still has its problems.



A_ ( ) posted Mon, 05 October 2009 at 5:08 AM

slow slow email! :)

thanks, i got your MP.
and - yes - that's what i meant about the remapping for zbrush. to have it all in "one map", like you said. that way i can do the seams in zbrush and keep all my hair on my head.


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