Ken1171_Designs posted at 4:47 PM Thu, 30 March 2023 - #4460106

RHaseltine posted at 3:46 PM Thu, 30 March 2023 - #4460085

Giving Poser the ability to import .duf content would not require copying the content, so I don't see how it would entail copyright concerns. Poser now has many of the required features, Dual Quaternions being an obvious exception, but of course that says nothing to its practicality or desirability, and of course an imported figure would not have built-in support for soem Poser antive featrues such as Walk Designer.

I have 3 plugins for Poser 12+ in my store that already read and import DUF format straight into Poser, and that indeed does not infringe any copyright law. That is not the issue. The issue is that Genesis is not a "figure", it's a "platform". Every feature it can perform depends on DS4 to function, meaning they remade DAZ Studio to support it. In other words, Genesis will not work in DS 1, 2 or 3. It only works in 4, where the "platform" was created specifically for it. It's this "Genesis Platform" that is copyrighted, to include all of its functionality.   

I know it's funny to put DAZ and copyright on the same sentence, since they had no shame when they stole Poser rigging to use in DAZ Studio. They gave it a fancy name (TriAx), but it's the exact same Poser rigging used in legacy figures. If not, legacy figures wouldn't work in their software. For those who don't believe me, I have talked to one of their figure riggers, and he confirmed that it's the exact same rigging stolen from Poser. If it weren't the same, it wouldn't work seamlessly in both programs. I never understood why Poser didn't sue them, but I suspect it had something to do with Poser being sold from one company to the next so many times in a row. These companies (probably) didn't want to get into legal disputes with a larger corporation. Who knows?  

I agree that it was a good thing that DAZ decided to drop the proprietary file formats, and adopt an open standard like JSON. That was a long standing request from the vendors, so it was a good move.   

About Dual Quats, Poser supports it too. It was used in the Kinect MOCAP support added in Poser 11, and even the Python API has access to Dual Quaternion math off the bat. I have used it in my "Scatter Tool" plugin for Poser 11 and 12, so it's not something new. The rigging in Genesis 3/8 is the classic "Simple Bone" used in game engines for ages. Dual Quats is the math used to calculate the rotations, which is also commonly used in game engines. Poser uses Euler rotations, but it could be quickly replaced with Dual Quats without changing anything in the existing rigging. It's just the math used to calculate rotations, not the rigging itself.   

2 major advantages of DQ over Euler rotations are the elimination of "gimbal locks", and also the faster calculation speed. I think some parts of the Poser interface use DQs, but the rigging is still Euler rotations. 

Hi Ken

I am curious as to the "platform" comment you made.

As I understand, perhaps erroneously, as far as the use of figures for posing and rendering is concerned, Poser ans DS can be characterised as performing as a model of some universe: its laws, its objects and its geometry. The laws in question are mostly the interaction of light with objects (essentially their shaders), some interaction of wind with objects, the behaviour of some objects such as cloth, strands (hairs), perhaps soft body or solid physics, liquids, the possibility of ubiquity or not (instancing), etc.. The objects are just that, props, figures (with heir caracteritics, such as bending etc.), the global setting. The geometry include positions (of the lights, props, etc.), morphs…

The laws of the universe emulated and specific behaviours (such as bending) of one software, however, are just concepts, and can be replicated in anyd other software, provided the software has the code (or the api) for such. While some properties may not be immediately transferable (it is unclear, for me at least, if instancing is possible within Poser; c.f. https://www.renderosity.com/forums/threads/2944252), some which are not possible by use of the software per se, can be, to some extent, provided by the use of extensions, be they plugins or some other form of such, as you know well. As concepts, these are afforded no protection under any set of law I have heard of (IANAL!).

Specific likelinesses, on the other hand, can be protected: you could not reasonably create a clone of one vendor's leading figure made for one software, and sell it for use in another software, without the authorisation of the figure's creator. But still, one may translate a description of an object prepared in a format for one software into an equivalent description in a format for another software, if only for the personal use of the translator (fair use). This, of course, is only possible if the description is actually accessible: as I recall, in early versions of Poser, some figures (the manikin?) were embedded in the software's code. As the translation of most objects in one software, say DS, is possible into a description for another software (by means of "bridges"), evidently at least part the descriptions is accessible, be it through another software and a bridge. It may be, of course, that the format used for the description for use in the original format is not documented.

So, after this far-too-long-winded introduction, what, in your opinion, are the elements which would render the translation of the object mentioned by OP impossible, impractical, or illegal?