I want to make morphs for figures in Poser. The modeling app I know and can afford is Blender. I'm getting pretty decent with Blender,  I guess, although as Vilters can tell you I make some pretty stupid mistakes sometimes.

That said, I've tried to make morphs for Poser before and I know that to do that I have to get a copy of the obj. geometry into Blender to work on. I think I'm doing that wrong, to be honest. When I take the exported object in to Blender make a change and try to import the change BACK into Poser as a morph, I keep getting the message that the target geometry has a different number of vertices. Well, I know you can move the vertices around, that's what a morph is, but you can't add or delete any. So what the hell am I doing wrong?

So basically can someone give me step by step instructions for getting a figure out of Poser and into a modeling program, like preferably Blender,, then get it back into Poser as a working morph?

I haven't done it with Blender EClark, but I have done it with Sculptris and with Z-brush. You can receive that error in either of those products as well. It can be caused by a couple of different things that I know of:

1. You have used a brush that does actually add or remove vertices, and that just won't import back into Poser.

2. More commonly, you are importing the wrong part of the body. Let's say we want to make our own lip morph. You export all of V4 to OBJ, import the whole model into Blender, make adjustments, and then export the whole model from Blender. Now you go to V4's head and try to import the morph. You're going to get that error, because it's trying to import V4's whole body into the head. So the number of vertices between her whole body and her head don't match.

What we should have done was export just her head from Blender. The other way I've gotten it to work is to import it into the Body as a FBM. This holds especially true If you are doing a morph that effects multiple body parts - you would have to export each part individually as an OBJ and then import them into that body part in Poser, or just do the whole thing in one go as a FBM.

Links I used when I tried this:

http://www.zbrushcentral.com/showthread.php?53850-Zbrush-Poser-Morphing-Tutorial

Hmm, that's the only I can find right now that I read before. There is this one that I haven't watched though that is specific to Blender:

http://preta3d.com/48/

.. and on top of what EClark describes, once it actually did work for me (meaning the importing it back into Poser bit, after the sculpting in Blender) I always!! get the "exploding mesh" thing. Even with checking to keep vertex order and what not, when exporting the obj from Blender.

My suggestion - Poser's obj export is flaky - don't use it!

Use (make a copy it first) the obj file for the figure - usually from the Geometries folder, or for Rex and Roxie, in the same library folder as the cr2 (if the file is an obz it can be extracted to obj with 7Zip).

If you want to morph a posed figure I'd suggest trying colorcurvature's PML.

I don't have any advice on that one ErickL. I only played around with it a little bit.

I had the particular issue you are describing happen when I turned the morph up past 1 in Poser. So long as I kept them below 1, the morphs seemed to work fine. But it did make me question how people build morphs that you can turn up well past 1, as anything I did immediately started to show noticeable distortion as soon as you went past 1.

Attached Link: Poser Blender import/export options

Kobaltkween was nice enough to answer every question and go indepth about the subject. Even has information regarding Blender's sculpt mode.

Far better to load the original object file and work on that in Blender.

See screengrab for import - export options to check.

REMARK
The import options are to load an original object file to build FBM from.

Load Roxie object file in Blender
Set the import checkboxes as per left screengrab.

Morph using the "edit" or sculpt tools in Blender.
(Do not forget to set symmetry for edit AND for Sculpt tools)

When done, save and check the boxes as per right side iof the screengrab.

How do I get the Roxie figure into Blender, Tony? It's in .obz format.

Quote - How do I get the Roxie figure into Blender, Tony? It's in .obz format.

I know I'm not Tony lol, but open it with a zip utility (something like 7zip) and extract the OBJ.

How about  Stuffit?

Never mind. Found  a way.

OBZ is just a compressed OBJ file. Anything that can unzip a file should work fine EClark.

Quote - How about  Stuffit?

If it has the ability to open a non-standard archive format, then it should work. I've never used Stuffit.

I actually found a way. Poser has an Uncompress Poser files python script included. I ran it and it uncompress the Roxie .obj.

I think her feet morphed well.

Name it Collagen Injection. :P

A quick question: I know that a face morph made for Roxie 1.0 will not work directly on Roxie 1.1, but what about other morphs like my foot arch fix? If I make an injection for Roxie 1.1 will it work on Roxie 1.0?

Never mind. Just discovered that it won't.

Euh, yes, no, yes, no, yes, no, yes, no. LOL.

Hello Earl,
No it will NOT work as a FBM.

But? Roxie1 and Roxie1.1 's  feet are the same.

A single group morph should work for both ; Roxie 1 and 1.1.

"NOT" for the head where the geometry is different.

But for other groups, they are compatible.

So if i inject it as a PBM it should still work?

Nice work!! Glad you figured it out. :D

A rather simple way to unzip obz, crz etc files on the mac is making a copy and changing the file ending to gz. Then just double click the file and the standard unzipping program will unpack the file. After doing that change the file name ending to cr2 or obj etc.

So for example Miki4.obz: change the name to Miki4.gz, doubleclick and the new file is called Miki4 (without a file suffix). Just add ".obj" to the name.

I can't say that I've never had a bad .obj export but it is extremely rare and hasn't happened to me in the last several years.  If you must export from Poser only check "Include existing groups in polygon groups" and, if available, "Preserve existing material names".  You can check "As Morph Target" if you are fooling with a morph.

Folks have recommended different settings but the above always works for me.

If you can, work on the figure's OBJ, not the cr2.  But then again, I've had no trouble in recent years exporting a head.

If something is exploding/imploding or just not doing a damn thing when importing then there's something likely to be wrong on the other end, outside of Poser.  You can't change the vertice count, which includes welding points and all that.  You can't change the winding order of the obj.  You can't change the groups, including adding groups - if the obj is grouped and you are splitting that obj to make morphs that cover multiple body parts.

I've seen Lightwave issues from partners having Lightwave and something strange happens at times on export from it, but that's an external issue outside of Poser.

And yes, Poser has shortcomings and sometimes shit happens but I don't think it's just a "general" case of Poser not handling .obj files properly.

Quote - I actually found a way. Poser has an Uncompress Poser files python script included. I ran it and it uncompress the Roxie .obj.

Also if you have a zip program like winrar, winzip, peazip, etc. you should be able to just drag the .obz (or any z-named poser file) into the zip application and extract that way too.  I think its just standard gzip format.

I use a Mac, which comes with a program to compress files into zips, but not to unzip them.The last program I had that did that was Stuffit, which I may have on my hard drive somewhere, but darn if I know where it is.

Can you morph a figure to be taller? Will that affect the rigging?

It is generally a bad idea to morph along the main axis, past the body part boundaries.  Fat arms or thin arms, no problem.  Morphed long arms, no.  Scaling is what needs to be used.

You can't save scaling can you?

Yes, you can.  It's just a dial value.  You'd work it up just like a Pose file.  Instead of affecting rotation, affects scale.

For example, pose snippet for xScale would be:

        ScaleX xScale
            {
           keys
                {
                k  0  1
                }
             }

The 2nd value after the "k" is the scale.  1 is 100%.  80% would be 0.8, 120% would be 1.2

BTW, sorry for the formatting, I don't know where the CODE tags are anymore...

Would the joints need to be animated, as well?

Nope, not if using scaling.

OTOH, it is possible to do a morph + moving joint centers/endpoints trick to do a resculpt.  Just going to be more involved and moving the centers might trickle down with other issues.

Poser has a python script in the utilites to uncompress it's own compressed files.  It will even clean up and remove dupilcates.

If you want to change a figure's proportions you have basically two options now in Poser:

Simple Scaling and animated joints + scaling morphs.

It really depends on the figure what system to use.

The pic shows a morph for SP3 I'm working on. From right to left: Original SP3, then the scaling, then scaling + body morph.

In this case, (simple-)scaling works pretty well, as the scaling blendzones for SP3 are quite good.

Other figures have not such well made scaling blendzones, or the scaling- blendzones aren't properly created during import like with Genesis 1 and 2.

For those figures, you create a "scaling morph", and then add the matching joint trans values to that morph.

This actually is the more precise solution as the "scaling morph" can be custom made while the deformation created by the "simple - scaling" depends on the quality of the blend zones only.

Both methods have pros and cons. Both methods might need a fix morph for complicated joints.

In the end a custom rigged standalone single figure without any scaling at all will always give the best results.

But then all clothing needs to be modified, too, while Poser can auto-fit both "simple-scaled" and animated joint "scaled" clothing immediately without problems.

If you just need longer or shorter arms, or a wider hip, "simple scaling" will mostly do.

If you want to go from human child to Ogre, you most likely will need animateable joints.

A comparison:

On the left the custom morphed SP3 using simple scaling and on the right a custom morphed Vicky 5 using animated joints for the scaling.

Both had their clothing "auto-scaled" and "auto morphed" by Poser.

SP3's pants scaled and morphed well but the sweater has some problems following SP3's neck scaling.

No problems with Vicky 5, although I had to transfer the new bodymorph a few times before the pants "accepted" it.

Here both are posed:

SP3's pants kept their shape more or less after I transfered SP3's weightmaps but there is some pokethrough. The sweater unfortunately showed massive poke through, even after I used SP3's weightmaps. Both would need some MorphBrush editing to look good.

No problems with Vicky 5. The clothes accepted the custom shape and custom scaling quite well.

So, as I said, scaling based on animated joints is the more precise method. If you want to invest the additional time, you should do that instead of simple scaling.

Okay, I'm having an issue with some props that I'm making. I want to be able to morph them so when I made them I made sure to put in enough verts in the areas I want to change and I exported that to Poser. Then I made the morphed version of the prop. I did NOT add or delete any verts. And I exported it according to the way vilters told me to do. But when I tried to add the morph to the prop, nothing happens OR a dial appears with the name of the morph but when you turn the dial, nothing happens. Anybody have any idea of what I'm doing wrong?

So? If I understand correctly:
You made a prop.
Then made a morph for your prop.
Goto object, load morph target, load you rmorph, the dial is there but not working? And you have no vertex ecplosion. => So the vertex order did not change, that is a good sign.
Tja, you have my e-mail. Send them over, I"ll look at it.

Keep up the good work Earl.

I use a Mac, which comes with a program to compress files into zips, but not to unzip them.The last program I had that did that was Stuffit, which I may have on my hard drive somewhere, but darn if I know where it is.

I don't have a Mac, but there is this free program...

www.izip.com

Okay, I'm having an issue with some props that I'm making. I want to be able to morph them so when I made them I made sure to put in enough verts in the areas I want to change and I exported that to Poser. Then I made the morphed version of the prop. I did NOT add or delete any verts. And I exported it according to the way vilters told me to do. But when I tried to add the morph to the prop, nothing happens OR a dial appears with the name of the morph but when you turn the dial, nothing happens. Anybody have any idea of what I'm doing wrong?

In my experience, this is usually a grouping problem if the morph is accepted when imported when I'm working with a figure. I'm not familiar with Blender, so I took a look at the import/export example. You should be able to simply export the morphed object as a new object (provided it has the same number of verts and such. It doesn't even have to have the same groups, if it's a prop, or more than one group at all - All Poser seems to care about for props is verts.) and that morph target should be accepted for your prop. Your "prop" isn't rigged in any way, is it? Did you use Poser to create any groups in it? Also, are you loading the prop, first, as a Prop (ie: From your Props menu) and then trying to apply the morph to it or are you importing it first, as a .obj, and then trying to apply the morph target to it? (It shouldn't matter, normally. I'm just wondering if there's any Prop specific info that could effect this. Shouldn't be and the prob's likely with your exported morph target from Blender.)

There are two things that I can think of which might be keeping me from making a successful morph. The prop has a solidify modifer   (made in Blender) on it. I don't actually know if that is an issue but one easily remedied. And the fact that the prop really needs to be a figure in order to work because of it's design. Also easily fixable, but I need to identify the problem first.