Dunno if that title helped at all, but here's the situation.  I've been experimenting with a modeling program, using it to make some ear morphs, fairly simple.  However, I've been in contact with someone doing pretty much the same thing and we decided to collaborate on a project, but not sure what the next step is.

Here's the problem, we want to make some foot/leg morphs.  I know that in order to make a morph target work, you export each body part, edit it, then re-import it as a morph target, fairly simple, but that's also where we're confused.

Since you have to export each body part separately, how do you go about changing the entire leg when it's in pieces and still be able to use each piece as a morph target?  We're both using Blender, basically because if we decide that this doesn't work, we didn't blow hundreds of dollars on a program we won't ever use again.

Why aren't you just working on the whole figure? I'm just curious...

Laurie

That would be feasible, Laurie, except I tried that concept very recently as an experiment and the program crashed when the whole body morph target was introduced. 

Well, you could work on the whole figure in your modeler and then export each group and then apply each body part as a morph still, couldn't you?

Laurie

Yup, as Laurie said. Work on the figure as a whole and then export the individual body parts as morph targets.

missy woot!

I am just starting to learn this on a whole figure basis. Doing a individual part is easy you just export modify and import as a morph target. Some of the golden rules are:

• Don't alter the mesh in any way other than to move the verts - you can't add or delete verts
• Be mindful of where body parts meet if you are altering an individual body part - in other words if you do a head morph don't make the neck larger where it leaves the head because the verts won't meet where the neck connects to the body
• be mindful of scale. Poser scale is typically much smaller than most scales
• don't change the vertex order. this happens in certain programs when importing and exporting.
• Full body morphs are tedious and/or complex to create. Not the actual 3d sculpting but the process of going from app to app.

In order to do a FBM (full body morph) I welded the seems and sculpted the mesh and broke the model apart again. This is where I get really fuzzy. I am not too practiced at this and keep hitting roadblocks in any attempt to speed up this process. I found a plugin for my modeling app that will break my mesh by materials and name them so breaking the mesh apart was easy - but it reordered the verts. I found an app to conform one mesh to another so I didn't need to break the mesh, but it reordered the verts. I found a script that would fix the vert order but it crashes my 3d app. So I am stuck breaking it all up manually and renaming the parts - not too bad it you aren't including the fingers in your FBM.

Then the process of creating the FBM using all this broken and named geometry - this is where I am now trying to figure all that out :)

Good luck and keep us posted.

you can also make a copy of the cr2 file and edit it to point to the new obj that you create, which will be the morphed and welded full figure. Then export each body part from there and import them into the original figure as a morph target. Then delete the working copy.

I've never done it this way but I'm told that it will work.

I wish I understood that :)

Me too...lol ;o)

Laurie

sorry not much sleep, drove down to jacksonville fla from Kentucky last night.

lol, wow, lots of info to read.  Didn't realize I could just use the whole figure for editing, I thought I had to export each bod part simply because that's the only way you can use the modded mesh.  And yeah, I know I can only move verts and not add or remove any :D

So, let me see if I got this right. 

Step 1 - Export entire figure instead of just the body parts

Step 2 - Edit said figure as needed

Step 3 - re-import edited figure OBJ file and export each new body part as a morph target

Step 4 - Replace each body part of a new figure with new morph target body parts

Am I close or did I miss something? :P

If you are going to work on the full figure I suggest that you work on the figure's OBJ file rather than export a copy out from Poser. Exporting will work, but working on the base OBJ file will work every time.

**If your modeler requires that the object be one unified group or if your modeler messes up the group names:-
**Open the base obj file in UVMapper and export out the UV's. Select to include groups, you can also include materials although that is not essential. If your modeler requires that the object be one unified group use UVMapper to assign everything to a single group at this time. DO NOT use the weld function! Save with a new name.

Load the object into your modeler. If you need to change scale be sure that you can rescale back again without changing the model's world location/orientation.

Create your morph.

Save the morphed OBJ file.

If you need to reinatate the grouping or group names:-
Open the morphed OBJ in UVMapper and import the previously saved UV's. This will reinstate the original grouping (and materials). Save the OBJ file.

Edit the original figure's CR2 file to point to the morphed OBJ file.

Load edited figure into Poser.

Export out each body part as required and use as morph target to the original figure.

**Why this works, (and why some other work flows don't).
**
Grouped OBJ files can have either welded or unwelded seams. Welded groups share the vertices at the seam boundary, unwelded groups duplicate the vertices at seam boundaries. Poser can work with both BUT when Poser loads a figure it effectively converts everything to an unwelded type, duplicating the vertices at the seams.

(To see a script that very effectively illustrates this go to http://www.philc.net/forum/viewtopic.php?t=3021 )

By making the morphed object into a Poser figure then exporting out each body part you ensure that Poser is always comparing apples with apples.

The Poser Tool Box has  tools that help automate this process. See "Load Morphs from OBJ"

thanks Phil, that was part of what I was attempting to say, but road lag is like a hang over for me.

Don't forget that, with Poser 7 and higher, the Morphing tool allows moving vertices directly in Poser.  I haven't gotten around to using it yet, but have seen some fairly impressive results achieved by others.

and to think, we just wanted some foot morphs :P

well, this is going to be experimenting at its finest, I've done some minor editing to the ears of my figures for some nifty WoW inspired ears. 

As for Poser 7's morph tool... to be honest, it's really a gimmick than anything.  I will say it helps to be able to smooth out rough meshes, but can only do so on each body part, not the figure as a whole.  If they want Poser to be able to edit meshes, then it needs to be a program that can do EVERYTHING to edit a mesh. 

Yeah, I wish the morph tool were better at going across body parts, but even so, I can do some pretty cool stuff with it, as well as others :o). It's definitely not a be-all, end-all thing tho.

Laurie

In Poser 8 you can now use the morphing tool across groups. If I needed to do that in Poser 7 I would work on the OBJ file and glean the MT's as per above work flow.

I found it worked best when I dialed down its default settings. It then became one of my most used tools.

one of these days I'll get P8 :P

Quote - In Poser 8 you can now use the morphing tool across groups. If I needed to do that in Poser 7 I would work on the OBJ file and glean the MT's as per above work flow.

I found it worked best when I dialed down its default settings. It then became one of my most used tools.

It does in Poser 8???!! Oh goodie! Cause I'm downloading Poser 8 now (um, or at least I'm trying to...lol). And even in Poser 7 the default settings were way too high. I turn them almost down to nothing and I'm good to go ;o).

Here's hoping I don't have all the problems with P8 that everyone else seems to ;o).

Laurie

aww, lucky you pouts I just spent $600 on new monitors for my computer so I could still see what I was working on :P

Quote - aww, lucky you pouts I just spent $600 on new monitors for my computer so I could still see what I was working on :P

Well, this is one of the few things that I can thank the IRS for...lol.

Now that I've said that, I can go back to hating them again ;oP

Laurie

Thank them hell, it just means you paid in too much and they got an interest free loan for 15 months. Best thing you can do is owe them just enough that you don't have to pay a penalty, That way you are earning interest on thier money for that long. You have to pay it eventually but I like to hold it as long as possible, touch it, feel it, send it letters after it's gone. LOL

KY still hung over from the road.