...The reason I say the last bit about the PML exporter and subd morphs is because it produces an obj that reads as having inactive subd levels in mudbox and there's a notification when importing there. I'll have to test further.

Back in the day I wrote myself a program that took a mesh and a template with the same topology and reordered the vertices of the mesh to match the template. That prevented any potential vertex order headaches, but I guess it wouldn't have solved the problem that Poser doesn't export subdivided meshes.

I just ran a couple of quick tests before heading off to work. Oddly enough if you export a whole figure with subdivision active via Poser's file:export:wavefront obj it produces a viable obj, if you export just a body part it produces an empty obj file. Pretty weird. Importing the poser subdivided mesh into mudbox produces this error but you can see the subdivision levels are recorded in the object list of mudbox. Apparently this information is being recorded somewhere in the obj file. I'll have to do some further digging when I get home tonight...

I think the key to exporting subdivided from poser is in the name "unimesh skinning". It doesn't record to obj in just a body part but the entire mesh.

...I'll also have to check, 'subdivide separately from figure' option in actor parameters when I get home and see how that exports...

Interesting! I'll have to try that export from Poser and inspect the .obj to see what feature they use to specify the subdivisions. Maybe smoothing groups?

P12 uses Pixar's OpenSubDiv v3. The subD level is taken from the Preview value i.e. 0 = subD off, 1 = 1 level etc. I don't think it's possible to export body parts with different subD levels, but I've never tried ;)

I should mention that higher-res morphs can fail on occasion, mainly when passing data back and forth to Zbrush to edit the same morph (something fiendish to do with tangents). I've found it very uncommon but something to be aware of.

Another option might be to use the Fitting Room to transfer a shape from one mesh to another, though I also haven't tried that (I think vilters was experimenting with it). Not sure what level of detail/performance trade-off there would be.

Hey thanks for that info Caisson. I've seen vilters method, which is morph projection through the tighten fit brush, basically shrink wrapping an in scene subdivided figure to an externally subdivided and sculpted obj of the same figure. It is kind of a kludge IMHO, and doesn't seem to have the necessary precision for things like fine detailing of the face but vilters does state that it's useful for details that can be realized at 1 level of subdivision, which is probably sufficient for broad shaping of the body or musculature. He says fine details should be displacements or normal/bump which I agree is best. High frequency sculpting is really only useful for concepts meant to be retopologized, or the generation of height maps, at least for all practical purposes we might consider. Models meant for animation. UV mapping. Etc. You already know all this though.

Here's the video where he demonstrates the projection process...

https://youtu.be/zJRs9qQGlEg

I could see where the method above could be really useful if you don't have a utility to maintain vertex order after weld and you're working with an older figure that has its obj broken into body part groups in geometries. You could simply import said figure's obj into poser with weld identical vertices checked, export the welded result, sculpt on that, reimport the sculpted prop figure, and project that sculpt onto an in scene "live version".

And not that it's really relevant to this discussion but I erroneously stated that PML exports and maintains poser subdivision. This isn't correct. I must of been thinking of my method of welding and reimporting clothed and posed figures as props. Which maintains groups, material regions, and UVs if done properly. I usually just dump the groups by processing with UVMapper. I've found that converting figures this way helps a little bit with scene management and overhead. No rigs, no hundreds of body parts. All that adds up, especially with complex scene arrangements.

I was bored so I decided to replace Antonia's eyes. At first I was using some old eyes I had for a creature I made but I quickly realized that trying to shoehorn them into Antonia's head was too difficult to scale and rotate for an exact match. So I took Antonia's existing eyes and made some modifications by cutting, duplicating, and snapping and welding vertices. I knew I wanted a different topology layout for the pupil and iris. I wanted the iris continuous with the sclera as a single mesh, rather than seperate as they are at default. I also wanted a V4 style cornea that's an offset shell completely surrounding the eyeball, rather than being incorporated into the sclera. Overall they turned out pretty well in a more conventional Poser figure eye set up sense. Being that they are a "remix" of Antonia's original eyes they fit as props in her head exactly as her originals do...

Here's the recut and welded surrounding cornea shell...

Here's the new iris and pupil configuration; more detail and a reset pupil allowing for better iris and pupil morphing, the iris is now part of the eyeball proper...

This is the new offset cornea shell in wireframe over the eyeball

Neat!

Subdivided...

I'm going to try and map them with the V4 style mapping. Shouldn't be too difficult. I'm going to maintain her original material set ups though. That is one map 2 materials for the eyeballs... They'll require custom textures though. I'll make some. Because I cut away some polys, welded, and did some mirroring the original UVs are trashed.

It was fun, now I have some nice fitting custom eyes to my specs for her :)

Not that there is anything wrong with Antonia's original eyes. Just a customization to better serve my particular needs. It's also nice that I can share them if I wanted to because of Antonia's permissive license. Really negates alot of customization hurdles. So thanks again for that odf.

No worries! You see, I am an old-fashioned academic type. All we ask is for our work to be cited. :-)

Oh dang, if I'll be playing with Poser again, it's probably time to dig up my old Python code for dealing with meshes and Poser files, upgrading them to Python 3 and Poser 12 and all that. :-/

I know jack about python. There are some python dudes that hang around here still though, that communicate that is. One thing I've noticed about the python guys is they are sort of like wizards in a tower. They will most likely respond in this fashion "Nay, child" lol.

I think the last Python guy that I communicated with that didn't emote like the wizard of oz (hologram version) was philC (retired) who was always very laid back, ironic, and sort of folksy.

“Python guys” :-D

Lol

Going to be moving my character posts over to the Character creator forum so as not to derail this thread further. Makes most sense, plus I have other ongoing character projects with other figures that I've been fiddling with. Be better to have my own space for that stuff. Pop in occasionally odf, to see what I'm doing. I'll probably post sporadically/frequently various things... probably some random beta freebie things also, including Antonia stuff.

Sounds good.

The humble beginnings of me working on that wardrobe situation.

She really can use Superfly SSS shaders. These were rendered with PrincipledBsdf and Physical Surface, hair and clothing converted from V4 with Crossdresser.

Bump is seriously out of control on the second one hborre.

The bump setting is a little too high in the second render, I just didn't bother to readjust the setting but that's easy to fix. Unfortunately, Bagginsbill's VSS doesn't work in Superfly thus an alternative node arrangement must be implemented to get a better, more realistic sken shader.

Vss fan here too. Wouldn't have a clue how to link up real sss into that node football field though. I very much like EZSkin which is based off a far less complex BB concoction. Firefly of course. All old news to you I know. But yes, maybe Antonia can have her own Superfly EZSkin formula set up. Pretty much inevitable.

I wasn't going to comment much more in this thread because I've already rambled on for several pages but good to see you starting to make some stuff for her ODF.

Funny thing about modern clothes designing software: it's highly addictive. :-)

I think you are allowed to mention marvelous designer here lol. Holy crap! 1700 bucks for a year? What the...

If I understand correctly, you can use a personal license if you're a freelancer. That's much cheaper. I'm currently on the 30 day trial and perusing the nice instruction videos.

But that's all I'll say about MD here, seeing as there's a forum for it. ;-)

Fancy. There's CLO too, I see. Cheaper. Same company. Make sure you don't hire any employees... price goes up.

I hear if one hires employees, there's an expectation to pay them, too, which is even more expensive. Weird, I know.

You could start a poser clothes sweat shop ;)

There's a render in there somewhere lol.

In computing, we call that a GPU.

Which reminds me: apparently in early computing a Kilogirl was used as the unit describing the computing capacity of a thousand humans. Because you know, human computers used to be women.

I'm ridiculously happy with this Antonia render in P12 SuperFly, so I figure I spam it all over the site. :-)

Nice render but those toes! The bend is too close to the toe base, it should be further up towards the ball of the feet.

Nice catch! I knew something was bugging me about the way they bent.

Actually, after checking how my own toes bend, I think Antonia's are not that for off. Would have been surprising if I hadn't checked references back then. I think the real problem is the lack of detail. For example, there should be some skin folds appearing with an extreme bend like this, and the toes should curl up to support the weight. Gotta remember that Antonia is really a low-res figure with one level of subd baked in because Poser didn't do subd back then.

Also, I need to teach her how to squat properly, with flat feet and an upright torso. Not sure if her hips and knees can bend far enough, though.

Played with the Poser morph tool to try and give Antonia's face a bit of an update. I realize it's not the best tool for the job, but I figure the morph tool can come in handy for tweaking morphs that have to interact with joint movements or other morphs, so it can't hurt to get a bit of practice.

Another before and after, Antonia's default shape versus the humble beginnings of her new and improved physique, together with the face morph from the previous post, and the breast morphs she comes with.

3d sculpting is a truly foreign concept for an old vertex-pusher like me, but I guess like many things, it just takes a lot of practice.

Update: the abs look much more realistic now, but I won't bore whoever stumbles into this thread with endless update images.

But apparently I've made subdivision morphs without knowing it, and I would like to know what they look like at the base resolution. Is the bake option in the morphing tool what does that?