Is that the correct procedure for the editor? The files I was trying to merge both work. I would like for them to work together instead of separately. 

When I try to use the editor, I get an error message.  I don’t know whether I’m using the editor wrong, or if I’ve made some other mistake.  What I did: First I went to Open, and opened one of the files I wanted to merge. Opening a second one seemed to be switching it out instead of adding it, so I went to Merge and then chose the one I wanted to merge it with. And then a window pops up that says:

“Exception in Tkinter callback

Traceback (most recent call last):

  File "C:Program Files (x86)Smith MicroPoser 10RuntimePythonliblib-tkTkinter.py", line 1410, in call

    return self.func(*args)

  File "C:UsersLisa_2Documentspython scriptsTDMT_Match_VMF_Editor2b.py", line 118, in mergefile

    gz = check_gzip(fname)

  File "C:UsersLisa_2Documentspython scriptsTDMT_Match_VMF_Editor2b.py", line 145, in check_gzip

    f = open(dataPath,"rb")

IOError: [Errno 2] No such file or directory: u'{' “

Yes, well, it worked.

Satyress was the second one I did. I think it’s good for a second attempt; I’m proud of the ears. Look how nicely they morph! They can morph even more than that and still look good. The first one I did, I am also happy with.  It’s this guy, the Open Source Centaur, who lives here: http://www.wa1gsf.net/subpage.html   He’s a simple lo-res kind of guy, but I’m fond of him. (I’m drawn to certain types.) I think the morphs look beautiful on him.

The first one is the V4 horse head morph available on the same page. The second is the M4 character Jarryd. The third is the Bushman ethnic morph. Then the Freak. Second row is Maldegar from Philosopher’s Egg, then with the expression “confusion,”  Orc from Creature Creator, “Flirting C right wink,” and something from the set “You Choose 2.” (I have also been refitting hairs and accessories to him.)

Now I’m working on Renithra; that’s the one that’s giving me so much trouble.

And the answer is: Yes, if you copy the same morphs to the eyelash figure as you copied to the head, and it is set to follow morphs when conforming, then the eyelashes will move with the eyes. :)

I re-ran the match and now it's copying morphs again (although it still fails on a higher percentage of them than my first my first two projects, but it was doing that all along, even though it was my best job yet of lining them up.) I still don't know what messed it up, wish I knew so I could prevent it from happening again.

As for the eyelashes: The figure I am working on now has figure eyelashes (they are a separate figure from the character, they load with him but if you delete him from the scene they remain hovering there like the Cheshire Cat's smile) and that's why I can't combine the files. How would you handle such a case? They move with his built-in eye morphs so should I just copy all the same morphs to the eyelashes and assume they will keep following the eyes if they have the morphs?

Well, it worked the first time. It's the same scene and I still have them both loaded with the same morphs. I added a few more that I thought of that I wanted, but I don't see how that would mess it up, I've done that before with no problems. Maybe it has somehow gotten confused by the times I had the wrong actor selected when I tried to copy stuff? Maybe I should just run the match over again? I was wondering: once the match has been made, I don't have to have them lined up anymore, right? They just have to be in the scene and have the morphs? I'm not at my computer right now. 

Thanks, it just frustrates me that things make so little sense sometimes. It sometimes works. That means it is able to work. Therefore there must be some factor that determines when it works and when it doesn't, but I have no idea what it is.

Also, similarly: I stupidly already deleted the eye morphs that I copied because I was going to try them again with the new settings.  Didn’t work. “Morph Creation  Failed.” So I tried to just copy them again with the old file, the one that successfully created them in the first place, and again I got “Morph Creation Failed.”  On every single one. But it made them before, and they were fine except that the eyelashes didn’t move with them, and I mistakenly assumed that the fact that I copied some eye morphs between these figures meant that I am able to copy eye morphs between these two figures.  The same figures, the same vmf file, the same morphs. Again, there logically has to be a determining factor. I'm frustrated; sorry for the rant. It was seeming so promising for a while.

Because they tend to mess up in the same places, across all the morphs. With the Satyress it was the base of the horns, the bottom of the neck, and behind the ears, so I made a single exclusion group of those areas, and ran the script on all the morphs that needed it, and then they were nice-looking morphs. I liked it a lot. But alas, it died. :(

The first time I used it, it worked. Then it immediately stopped working, in the same scene, on the exact same group. When I was working on the Satyress is was working consistently so I started thinking of it as an available resource that I could use if I needed it. Now all it ever does anymore is create something that ends in "EXChead," even though I have the grouping tool open with my group selected. So what I'm wondering is, what is the factor that determines whether it recognizes the group or not?

Windows User Access Control is hiding them; they should be somewhere under /AppData/Local/VirtualStore (AppData is a hidden folder) which is in your user folder under C:/Users...

Yes, that's where they were. Thanks. Still playing around with it. Slightly off-topic but related: The Ockham script I was using to clean up the morphs after I copied them was MTexcGroup. When it works it is very useful. But, when it ignores the grouped section and excludes the entire head, why does it do that? I can't think of a single thing I'm doing different, it seems random. Is there a way to control it, so that it actually makes a morph excluding the grouped section, whenever I want it to? And I was just starting to think that my luck was turning around with Poser stuff...

Just tried it. Of course it doesn't work, they're different figures.

Thanks for the response, I love your script! I am using Poser 10. So, in restore detail, I zero the figure, and then run the script on the morph. Then, do I use the dial it makes along with the morph, or in place of it?

There is also the mystery of where my computer is keeping the vmf files. TDMT is pulling them from a certain folder, but when I look in that folder they don't exist (except for the sample ones that came with the script), and when I search for them by name on my computer it doesn't find them. (I have Windows 7.) Makes it hard to manage them, if I can't find them.

The material screening is tricky, I'm still trying to figure out the best way to do it, I suspect that it involves the use of the editor? I haven't used the editor yet. Is the purpose of it to combine matches of different parts to make a full-body morph? And I just load them all into it and hit "merge"? Or is it more complicated than that? Can I also use it to merge different parts of the head? I'm currently working on a figure who has figure eyelashes. On the last match I did (Satyress, above) I regretted not screening the eyelashes because they warp on morphs that open and close the eyes, so this time I didn't match the eyelashes, and now they don't move with the eyes. I was thinking maybe if I matched them just to the "eyelashes" material area of the other figure, and then merged the files? Would that work?

So, raycasting is for if the original geometry is similar, and not just if I morphed one of them beyond recognition to fit the other one?

Tips and questions.

First, tips, that I learned the hard way, for anyone else attempting this.

1.    1.    DO NOT inject every morph package you have and then use the “copy all morphs” option. If you have morph packages injected (which you will, because you need the morphs to make the heads fit together), you will have to pick through the list manually, because it will make extra copies of the entire set of base expression morphs for every character in every morph package. This means, for example, if you have ethnic morphs loaded, you will get the full set for Norwegian, the full set for Ethiopian, etc., and none of these copies work as well as the original base copies (the ones that don’t have a bunch of letters before them) so to make it more manageable, you will have to spend an hour deleting them all.

2.   2.    Screen material areas, and use “exclusive” mode.  Screen out things like eyelashes, teeth, etc. In this character, the base of the horns is part of the head, and I wish I had screened them, because morphs that affect the top of the head cause the horns to warp. I had to clean it up in the copied morphs with the grouping tool and an Ockham script.

3.    3.   When copying morphs, make sure the figure and body part that you are copying to is selected as the current actor, even though the script lets you select anything in the scene, which might lead you to believe that what you’re copying to and from only have to be in the scene. If the wrong thing is selected, things start to get very weird. Figures start mixing up their parameter windows, forever, in that  scene, and you have to revert. Be careful. Save frequently.

Questions for anyone who actually knows how to use this: There are settings, but I don’t know what they do. “Distance cutoff,” “number of influences,”  “test normals,” “test using base geom,” “ray-casting.” I left them all on the default, because I was afraid to interfere with them.  

Is there anyone out there who uses this tool frequently, who is good at it?

There is a Restore Detail script that comes with it, but I couldn’t get that to work. It is supposed to clean up the messy morphs, but for me it either makes dials that don’t do anything, or it makes spikes shoot out of their faces. What am I doing wrong?

Satyress, located here:  http://poser-outerzone.com/freebie/freebie.html

...with Daz gen4 morphs, transferred with TDMT. Thought someone might recognize the morphs...the last one is Hiro, with one of his characteristic zany expressions. It IS fun! The Satyress is adorable, but she needed more morphs, and now she has plenty! (I will share the vmf file when I figure out how to fix the problems with it; I had to clean up some of the morphs after copying them, but the flaws are still in the original file.)

(Oops, accidentally posted the picture twice.)