an0malaus posted at 10:22AM Wed, 21 August 2019 - #4359894

Given that I've explored the DSON .duf & .dsf file formats and have a reasonable python parser script, it occurs to me to question whether FBX format contains sufficient information to transfer inherent characteristics of the source application. E.g. DS uses a different subdivision algorithm to Poser, is the algorithm encoded in FBX?

I would suspect that, given your choice of SubD style (Catmull-Clark, Bilinear, Catmark (the proprietary critter), Loop, etc), you could pick that before export... which IIRC are (or were) standardized. Or, just set resolution to Base and SubD to zero, which removes that from the equation entirely (given the intrinsic rez in a G8 figure, I doubt it's gonna distort by enough to really notice - doubly so since morphs are routinely transferred that way between generations of Genesis anyhow).

As for weight-mapping, you can pick that on its way out... it doesn't have to be DualQ - you can flop the figure to TriAx WM in DS before you export it.

but be aware, that such conversion will not result in the same appearance of bent joints, because the internal algorithms are inherently different and cannot be communicated by simple data transfer.

This would be the big bugaboo, though that would almost be the case with any inter-app conversion... you're gonna be stuck with tweaking the skeleton no matter the source or destination app; unless some enterprising soul spends the time to suss it out and provide a donor skeleton and script to transplant a working skel into it post-transfer (because tweaking the transferred rig params by script and expecting consistency on all computers across the land would be like reaching into Gump's box of chocolates and getting what you expected... you likely won't.) Now would a transplantable and working skeleton rig be kosher (or halal if you prefer) copyright-wise? No frickin' clue on a legal sense, but I'd like to think it would be if it's using different math and has a different end-configuration due to how joints are handled, even if it accomplishes the same goal. But again, it'd still be a derivative product, and I ain't no IP lawyer.

...oh, and we haven't even begun to touch on all the friggin' clothing, shoes/accessories and hair(!) that would have to be transferred with the figure. Oh, and anything geograftable would of course not behave the same way, etc - you'd have to do all that geografting first, export as one great big .obj, make a new mapping for that figure that are compatible w/ what you already got, re-import into DS and make a working rigged figure w/ all relevant morphs, then export again as FBX and pray real hard that your computer doesn't go 'splodey when you try to import the resulting dumpster-fire of a file into Poser... only to realize that autofit and most of the clothing morphs don't/won't work like you expected them to.

Gah - why would you even bother at that point?