Attached Link: http://secure.daz3d.com/shop.php?op=itemdetails&item=1352

Just wanted to be the first to mention it here: Mimic 2.0 and 2.0 Pro, plus upgrades for both, are available at DAZ!

Has anyone had a chance to use the new versions yet? It looks like the price is great, especially for the upgrade (seems there's no additional discount for Platinum Club members, though :( ), but as I'm on borrowed PCs with very limited Internet access for the summer, I can't start playing with it on my Mac yet. Unless I were to have it burned to a CD and shipped....

That little blurb is on all DOC items. AFAIK, it just means that you can't use the vouchers in conjunction with the PC discount.

Attached Link: http://www.3-AXIS.com

Trust me on this one. BUY IT! B-U-Y I-T ! It ROCKS OUT LOUD! Joe www.3-AXIS.com

Attached Link: http://www.daz3d.com

Just FYI, the Platinum Club discount does apply to these products. Again, with the new store checkout procedure (which is being improved, have no fear), the discounts do not show up until the screen after you enter your payment information. Just in case you were wondering, greenbd. ;) Hope everyone likes it as much as you, LawnDartLawnDart. It is quite a bit "different" than the older Mimic, eh? Steve Kondris DAZ Productions, Inc.

I get a lovely little DNS Error trying to get to daz. grrrrr of all the luck. update update update. haha. open open open. sigh least it's not going to go out of stock, I'll have to check later. thanks for the heads up though.

Steve, If you already have Mimic and want Mimic 2 Pro do you have to buy the upgrade to Mimic 2 AND Mimic 2 Pro? The Mimic 2 Pro page indicates that Mimic 2 is required. Just wondered if it should say that Mimic 1 or 2 is required. Thanks, Phillip

For some reason I get an error as well trying to get to the daz3d.com addy but if I follow the link in the first post here I can get in to the store.. strange..

I think they will love it Steve. You guys and gals at DAZ have turned a little pseudo-plugin (that worked ok) into a full blown rippin application. It's really good. Joe www.3-AXIS.com

Okay I'm seriously confused by the new site. I'm a PClub member. If I buy Mimic 2, and the Mimic Pro upgrade it's $111, much cheaper than JUST buying mimic pro. but when I login and add to my shopping cart I don't see any discounts applying. I can't see PCLUB discounts applying anywhere anymore on other items also. I'm not ready to buy, just trying to figure out money to set as side. this used to be so much easyer in the old version of the site. anybody have a clue?

MachineClaw, our current checkout process doesn't display any discounts until the final checkout screen (right after you enter payment information, right before your card is charged). So, you won't see the discounts until you are just about to charge your card. As for the site, we were having problems with our dns for some reason, but I'm told it has been fixed now. Phillip, as for the upgrade, you can upgrade straight from Mimic 1 to Mimic 2 Pro. But, yes, that should be more explicit on the product page, I'll have that fixed now, thanks. Hope you all enjoy it! Steve

Oh, cool. They even added the timeline editor and hardware-accelerated 3D preview window I wanted.

Victoria 1 Reduced Resolution included

Interesting. I think I'll wait until tomorrow to buy mine.

Steve, thanks. Not diggin the new site procedures, but I guess I'll get used to it. thanks for the info.

Looks nice, but how about some idea about system requirements? Is the Mac version 9.x compatable, or is it OSX?

I don't want to be the stick in the mud, but is there any particular reason why the total plus discount can't be shown before checkout. It was rather convenient to know what the total was without a calculator (or entering my credit card info for that matter). I don't suppose there's any plans to put some form of total cost with discounts back onto the shopping cart, is there? ~DM

OK I admit it I'm a Daz junky. I'll be buying the Pro upgrade of Mimic later today. I'm a little surprised that since its purpose is to make making animations easier that I can't find any example animations showing what it can do to demonstrate just how good it is. Cheers Mark

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Well, I gotta tell ya, I did a quick little test run on it as soon as I got it installed (I bought my copy of Mimic 1.0 from lipsync way back when) and I'm much happier with the new version. Can't wait until I have a bit more time to play with it fully. Kate

As for Pricing and discounts, I was able to purchase my copy of the Mimic 2 Pro version for less than 79 dollars. Discount 1 was the introductory price. Discount 2 was my ownership of Mimic 1. Discount 3 (Platinum Club) was tagged just before the download function. What a hoot! I paid twice this amount for the original edition when Curious Labs could sell it. I'll let you know my feelings when I install and try it this weekend. Take care! Sincerely, Bill

Tempt the Hand of Fate and it'll give you the "finger"!

I was one of the beta testers for Mimic 2. It is sooooo faaarrrr advanced from Mimic 1, you won't even recognize it as the same program. Of the two progs, I would definitely get Pro - you won't believe the feature set! -scara

Great news :) Does this mean that DAZ|Studio beta is near ? If memory serves, Mimic 2.0 and DAZ|Studio beta release were side by side on DAZ|Studio release timetable, but I just checked and there is no such connection anymore... Jon

I was thinking the same thing. Alas, more recently I read that Mimic would be released in May (which it did) and the core render engine for DAZ Studio would appear sometime in mid summer. That gives us a potentially two month wait still ahead. But that's okay. I'd rather have a more stable program even if it means waiting a little longer. Just remember, gang, this will be a public "beta." That means someone WILL find bugs. The good part is that we will NOT be PAYING for the privilage to test it. It should be an interesting summer! Sincerely, Bill

Tempt the Hand of Fate and it'll give you the "finger"!

I've got to figure a way to get more cash. I want Mimic 2 Pro in the worst way. And I'm hoping Mike 3 will be out sometime this summer too. Anyone want to buy a slightly used domestic partner? OK, maybe more than slightly, but he's got lots of miles left on him... Steve, any estimate on Mike 3?

This is a great product! It is so far advanced from version 1 this should carry a version number of 4! I just wish you would have waited to sell it. I am so far behind in my other projects that having this to play with won't help ;)

Attached Link: http://arcana.daz3d.com/category_index.php?cat=9

for anyone who hasn't decided yet I had the privilege of an early look and have written a few tutorials which have been featured on Daz arcana. they should give you a better idea of Mimic 2's capabilities.

Jim, did you try selling him on eBay? :)

Darn you Daz! You are gonna get me divorced!

BTW when they say define Phenomes and emotions, does that mean that it can merely edit existing morphs or add new ones. So for instance if I wanna add more phenomes to vicky 2 since I don't have V3 yet etc... Does that make sense? Probably not. Hehe wish this had come out last christmas during the customer appreciation sale. :D

Jim, "slightly used domestic partner" hmm... how are you at repairing and maintaining computers? Can you cook? :speculating grin: Carolly

Attached Link: http://www.daz3d.com

The checkout process and discount listing is being changed, however, it will be a couple of weeks before you see the changes implemented I'm afraid. But it will be better, so please be patient with us in the meantime. As for the system requirements, the MAC version is OSX 10.2 and higher, from what I understand. I'll make sure someone puts that up more clearly on the product page if it's not already. Steve PS: Michael 3 is off the chalk board and in the production room now. No release date yet, however.

Berserga if you can make the morph on your figure you can add it to Mimic 2 pro. there are a specific number of phonemes you can't change that, but you can change the morphs associated with them and for any other facial morphs you can use Expressions and Gestures

Carolly, I can repair and maintain PC's great! Program them too. No Macs though... I'm a really good cook too (or so I've been told). Anything from Down home southern to some fairly exotic stuff. My favorite though is game hens stuffed with wild rice, apples, walnuts, and raisens with a honey mustard and rosmary glaze. I sever them with fresh steamed green beans tossed with lemon juice, summer savory, and a little olive oil. Dessert is Triple Chocholate Cake with homemade rasberry filling. Steve, thanks for the info on Mike 3! I can hardly wait!

wdupre: Nice tutorials. These will be a huge help to many people out there. Awsome! Joe www.3-AXIS.com

pdxjims, But do you know what and where a laundry hamper is, and can you load a dishwasher? >^_~

Loking good, MIMIC 2 Pro downloaded and installed AOK. Initial tests sugegst that DAZ's "minimum spec" (E.G. Pentium 700MHz) might be a touch optimistic - but as I'll be using a Pentium 4 2.4GHz except when I'm away I'm not THAT bothered . Quick note - in the Windows startup menu (Start...Program Files...DAZ Programs...Mimic 2) you might have to edit the "Mimic HTML Help" link - when I installed it put "Mimic 2" in the shortcut twice, so couldn't find the help file. cut one of these out and it works great. Cheers, Cliff "No more darned CD required" Bowman

Serious question: Is Mimic any use to non animators?

MomCat, I guess in the strictest sense, no, it wouldn't, not if you only do still shots. But if you want to create a quick kiosk type greeting for a web site, then its use of WAV files to create the animated facial poses is a blessing. But this tools is geared towards animators. Sincerely, Bill

Tempt the Hand of Fate and it'll give you the "finger"!

Not sure...
I have CD's Mimic, bought at lipsinc.com (many months ago... Before Daz3d realease it), and I would like to know if I will buy the upgrade 'Mimic 2 Pro (Upgrade from version 1 or 2) Code: ps_ap043' will it work with my CD (I mean with the version I currently have)?
Thanks in advance for the help.

yes it does - I bought from Lipsync and the MIMIC PRo upgrade installed very easily (bar the installer quirk mentioned above, which is a minor glitch).

Phoul; Unless I am badly mistaken, what DAZ did was purchase Mimic, and then make it available. I don't =think= there was any additional work done to it... Okay. The version of Lipsinc I purchased from DAZ is version 1.0 and still has the lipsinc logo. In any event, Mimic 2.0 installs into a seperate folder altogether; it only looks to see if you have a valid copy of Mimic 1. So it should 'upgrade' just fine. And you -do- want this program. Just the options to add and adjust the facial morph behavior is priceless. And you will still have Mimic 1 if you ever need it (visions of cutting the laughter out of Carlin's 'Incomplete list of Dirty Words monologue on the In Campus tape have just gotten much stonger).

Thanks friends for the infos. Let's go to the shop now :-)

So, if I have the original Mimic 1.0, will I still have to use the old Mimic CD to run Mimic2Pro? Can I uninstall Mimic 1.0 after 2 is installed?

Intel Core I7 3090K 4.5 GhZ (overclocked) 12-meg cache CPU, 32 Gig DDR3 memory, GeoForce GTX680 2gig 256 Bit PCI Express 3.0 graphic card, 3 Western Difgital 7200 rpm 1 Tb SATA Hard Drives

You don't need the CD, but I haven't been using it long enough to try uninstalling MIMIC1 yet (SHOULD be just fine - DAZ installers only check for old versions of stuff on installing, not every time the program is used). Hmmm... I note that it's not quite as good as Poser at finding textures... looks like I might have to correct some references (and the MilDragon doesn't work quite as well with MimiC 2 as I'd have liked - but such is life).

The V3 promo picture has a wonderful looking smile. What morph packs/dial settings were used? I've fiddled around at times to try for decent smiles, and I haven't come up with anything that nice. Thanks!

Does Mimic work with other languages than English?

Getting a Dragon to talk to ya is hard, usually they just want to eat you or fry you on the spot. sorry, couldn't resist :P

to MarianneR, i think so. If you read DAZ's intro to mimic 2, it will say "regardless of language" or something like that. by the way, i'm getting mimic, and i'm glad the lady at daz told me the system requirements were MAC os X, now i have to backup and reinstall jaguar.

to tebop: Thank you! Now I found it.

To MachineClaw: First thing I ever did with the MilDragon IIRC is record my voice saying "Hello James", rendering up in Poser and playing it to my young son - who was transfixed at this "ROOOOAAAAR" (what he calls monsters and carnivorous animals) speaking with Daddy's voice. Sigh - he'll be 2 years old in a couple of months (James, not the Mil Dragon). So yeah - it's important for Dragons to be able to do more than Bar-B-Q the neighbors

I'm with you there who3d! My and son and two daughters love to here the "scary animals" (or heck, ANY of the animals or characters) talk in one of Daddy's many voices. That is just about my favorite use of Poser ... entertaining the kids! Downloading Mimic 2 Pro Now ... MUST ... MAINTAIN ... COMPOSURE. HELLLP! ;) -Tim

All I have to say is ... WOW!!!!!!!!!!!!! Okay, maybe a little more than wow: These folks weren't kidding when they said it is quite impressive. Amazing really ... a completely new program, feature rich, fast, and very accurate right "out of the box"! NICE WORK DAZ !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! I just tried a little singing ... which is notoriously hard for a lipsync program, and it was near flawless. Always can use tweaking, but pretty good. If you're an animator or just like making things talk (for your kids, spouse, yourself, whatever) you MUST get this program. The real-time preview is WONDERFUL. I'm going to try the side-by-side video next ... can't wait! Thanks Daz! -Tim

I'm really impressed too. Pro version makes it very easy to change expressions. Makes you wonder what surprises Daz Studio will have. Great work Daz! Tim

For those that have looked yet, here's the system req Windows 98, 2000, ME or XP Or Macintosh OS X + Most current version o Microsoft Media Player (Windows) Most current version of Quicktime (Mac) DAZ|Studio 1.0 or Curious Labs Poser v3 or above (Optional) 700MHz Pentium class or compatible <-- which class Mac does this translate to? G3?, G4? and what speed? 128MB System RAM (256MB recommended) 24-bit color display 1024x 768 resolution 25MB free hard disk space Sound card, speakers and microphone Video card supporting Open GL

Why shouldn't speech be free? Very little of it is worth anything.

I wish this product worked with lightwave.

Okay so serious question. I've read the hype on the product pages, I've read the posts claiming it's fab. If one has never used mimic, or done many animations, mimic 2 or mimic 2 pro? I'm not sure I understand the extras of the Pro version other than a larger price tag. could someone experienced in mimic/animation give someone that is interested in these products a really laymens term summary? Pro lets you do more isn't enough ahahaa! thanks. Also agree, something like this for Lightwave would be to die for but I can live with poser and splicing lightwave and poser vids together.

it is definately worth the price for the pro version. mimic 2 basic: load figure, sound file, text file, and premade config file you can adjust the Phoneme timeline and view your lip sync pose. and export. Mimic 2 Pro: in adition to above you can add custom expressions on two additional tracks, as well as a gesture track for blinking, head movement, eybrow raise. that sort of thing all easily adjustable and viewable in real time. you can prerecord a live actor doing the same stuff and sync up your figure's movements frame by frame with the live actor. you can also create custom config file with your own versions of phonemes expressions and gestures. thats basicly the difference. but you can get a better idea by viewing my tutorials at arcana as far as what pro can do.

oh also in pro you can change the phonemes in the timeline completely, simply by dropping new ones in from the library.

I'll take a crack at it for you: From the DAZ Website 1-Generate Your Own Configuration Files. 2-Characters (CR2s) Imported with Surface Materials and Textures Applied. 3-Timeline Display Includes: Phonemes, Audio, Text, Dual Expressions Tracks, and Gestures. 4-Open GL Video Preview For Side-By-Side Comparison. 5-Analyze Sound Track from Video Source. 6-Expressions Palette. 7-Definable and Editable Phonemes. 8-Definable and Editable Expressions. Okay, in order (anyone feel free to correct any inaccuracies or missing info): 1 - Configuration files are new in Mimic 2.0. Basically, they let you create a set or themes of gestures, expressions, phonemes and then save that set of characteristics for application to other Mimic-made animations. So you could create a "happy set", and "angry set" and apply them to any number of Mimic sequences. 2- Pretty self-explan., but basically you can see the character you are animating with speech in REAL-TIME (*this is new to Mimic!) and the Pro version let's you see them with all texture-maps and materials. So you're basically seeing what your animation looks like. *BTW, all those wondering why we animators gripe about Poser 5 not implementing OpenGL HARDWARE support ... THIS is one beautiful example! But that is another rant. :) 3- Again, pretty SE ... the timeline is stacked to show you all of those things, so you can adjust (time, lengthen, strength, etc.) all on one screen for each property. 4- This allows you to view video of yourself or someone else saying the lines and "acting" out the part. Professional character animators do this ALL the time. (to be continued ...)

(continued ...) 5- No explanation required ... I think. 6- A pre-defined collection of expression (anger, fear, happiness) etc. that you can drag and drop to the timeline to change the facial expression of the character. You can mix/match and control strength of expression, etc. 7- Allows you to change/create the way phonemes appear on the character. 8- Allows you to have expressions (i.e angry, scared, sad) that you can drag onto the timeline, mix/match, and even create your own! Hope that helps. To me Mimic 2.0, is almost like a "dream version" of Poser (i.e. the way Poser should be) concentrating solely on lipsync and facial expression/head movement. I kind of think of it as the long lost "Face Animation Room" for Poser. Amazing. -Tim

Plus what those good folks said above, of course! :)

nods okie dokie. I'm gunna need pro then because of the creation of expressions. I'll go read the arcana tutorials before I flood with more questions haha. thanks for the explanations, that helped.

Jim, umm... game hens... :) oohhh... chocolate!!! :) Pity about the lack of Mac experience, though. I need to replace the hard drive in my beastie and have been putting it off for weeks. A migrained out dyslexic really ought not be rewiring a brain, no matter how simple it looks when I open the machine. Meanwhile, glad that you are back. I'd like Mimic2 as well (having seen a very impressive sneak peek at the GDC), but it will wait. Carolly

Okay, this is probably an incredibly stupid question on my part, but is it possible to not purchase poser, but purchase Mimic2Pro, then purchase a Poser character here at Renderosity, then import the CR2 for the character into Mimic using the Real-time preview feature, then run Mimic and see my character speak in real-time inside of Mimic?

Attached Link: http://www.daz3d.com

YES! It's absolutely possible. In fact, Mimic comes with a default reduced resolution version of Victoria which you can use as your character if you wish. (Mimic 2 Pro has textures as well). Steve Kondris DAZ Productions, Inc.

... and it's AWESOME (!!!) I might add. Not only is it incredibly useful, it's a lot of fun too. My kids like making the Wolf talk all the time. Mimic 2.0 -- invaluable animation tool and entertainment software all in one. Heh-heh. -Tim

Thanks for the replies! That's awesome that you can do that with textures and all! I did have one question though (again from my lack of knowledge); when I purchase a character here they do not actually include the .cr2 files; so how do I get/create them if I dont have poser?

Attached Link: http://www.daz3d.com

The majority of the time when you purchase a character another product (the base figure that the character is created off of) is required to get the final desired output. For example, a large portion of the female characters for sale require a version of the "Victoria" figure. Victoria, Michael, Stephanie, Millennium Girls/Boys, are all available at www.daz3d.com. Hope that helps, Steve

Thanks.. I actually knew that - what I was really asking is; after I buy V3 from DAZ and a charactor set here at Renderosity - how do I combine them to create the .cr2 files to use for Mimic (in the real-time preview)?

Ah, sorry, I see what you're asking. I'm not the most tech-savvy person around here, but once you have V3 and the character pak you like, simply load V3 into poser, apply your character presets that you've purchased (the MAT/MOR pose files, etc.) and then open your "Figures" tab from within the poser library, and then click on the "+" sign down at the bottom of the library, this will allow you to save out a new cr2 (which should contain the information for your character as well now). Then, from within mimic's quick start menu, just browse for that new cr2 file. Again, I'm not an expert tech guy, but that should work for you. Steve

Great... thanks. That's pretty much what I thought - so I will actually have to own Poser just to merge V3 and my charactor.... Hmmm, I wonder if anyone here could merge the two for me (when I send them the files) then send me the .cr2 files - that way I would't have to spend $140.00 on poser just to make the .cr2 files.