Trying to pick up again, how to make figures for Poser.  I learned a lot from this forum but this time, for nerves sake, I want to try a different approach.  A more stable one.  ;-) Started with Cinema - Got model separated into groups Imported/Exported from Zbrush to get the MTL file PHI edit for the heirarchy so I could just open that in Poser 6 and fix the joints.  I wanted to stear clear of doing much of anything in Poser.  STILL, once I get there, things happen of coarse. My tail on this T-rex keeps re-ordering itself wrong.  The original groups in Cinema are tail01, tail02, tail03 up until tail12. Now I've messed around with naming these parts all day.  Finally I think I have it when all goes well except tail2 and tail 8 are completely swapped, their parents are tail 1 and tail 7 but the places have switched within the tail????????

I must have missed this when it was posted, sorry... If you're making your hierarchy by importing a PHI file, always open the newly created CR2 in Poser and save it again straight afterwards. Don't use the joint editor on a newly imported PHI. Strange Things Will Happen. :scared:

No problem on not seeing and thanks for the tip.  I did do what you said.  It still did the weird switcheroo dealy.  So it was not the Cr2 but the object.  
Cinema 4D had them listed in a certain order which I didn't think mattered since I was using PHI just after.  But it did matter. 

import obj, check hierarchy, export checked obj, then use the exported obj as ref for new cr2 file?

What I'm not clear on is whether the groups have got mixed up in your mesh, or whether the hierarchy is mixed up in the CR2. Do you have some independent way of checking the mesh grouping? I'd use UVMapper Pro, and select by group to see what actually appeared, but there must be many ways of accomplishing that test. The hierarchy can be checked by looking at the CR2 in an editor (text editor, or dedicated Poser file editor). Something else I missed the first time - I'm not sure why you need a MTL file?

I set the groups up in Cinema 4d, I did a heirarchy there but it didn't carry over.  So I pulled all the group parts in one long list.  As it would happen Tail 2 and Tail 8 were out of order from top to bottom, and this somehow carried over into PHI builder.  The parts actually switched names because tail2 was tail 8 but the hierarchy still applied, rotating tail 7 would rotate tail 8 which was down where tail 2 was.
The tut I found was for rigging mostly outside poser which I liked the sound of.  In order for his Mapper program to work it needed an mtl.  In and out of Poser was the suggestion.  Not sure why but he said to do it.

This tutorial? I haven't followed it through fully, but it seems that his OBJ mesh has material zones defined, not groups, and he's using LithUnwrap to convert one to the other. You're defining your groups in Cinema, which I don't use, but I think you'll find that its OBJ export is unreliable. Get Spanki's Riptide plug-in from here if you don't already have it. The background section on that page should tell you all you need to know about why not to trust Cinema's OBJ export. Cinema's hierarchy will be ignored whatever you do, since that information isn't carried by the OBJ file. Once we're sure you have a meaningful OBJ mesh, with the right groups called the right thing, we can take it from there. If PHI Builder is mixing up the group order, then it's just a case of dragging them back into the right positions when you assemble the hierarchy. That's all I can think of for now - over to you...

That IS the one!! Good job!!  Material zones and groups, I thought of them as the same.  I have so much to learn!

But if the Cinema export heirarchy has no bearing on how the object appears, how could it change the object right after switching them?  The Poser filtered object was opened in Cinema and Tail 2 and Tail 8 were put in order in the list, that fixed it.

Riptide has been tried but always crashes my Cinema for some reason.  I can see if the object has reversed normals because the needles when the polygon is selected will face out if it's normal and face in if reversed.

So the problem is actually solved now.  I fixed it by switching the order in Cinema.

Quote - Riptide has been tried but always crashes my Cinema for some reason.

 

Which version of C4D?

PC or Mac?

Do you have the most recent version of Riptide?

...I don't currently know of any conditions where the current versions of Riptide causes a crash, so I'm very interested to hear more about this.

Thanks.

Quote - But if the Cinema export heirarchy has no bearing on how the object appears, how could it change the object right after switching them?

C4D uses the group lines to hold the hierarchy.
To Poser this looks like multiple groups names.
When exporting for Poser, you need to lose the hierarchy so that each mesh ends up in only one group.

In Cinema 4D: So if I had a head with inner mouth as one group, I highlighted those polygons and split them from the group and named that innermouth, and went back to original group and deleted those same polygons for innermouth, Poser might have a problem with this?  Even though the groups are touching but completely separate?

If we can figure out how to get Riptide working for you (see my post above), all your grouping issues are easily solved.

Without Riptide, the only thing that defines a 'group' is separate mesh objects.  If it is all in one mesh, you get just one group (whether the polygons are welded to each other or not).  If you have more than one mesh object, you will get more than one 'group' (and obviously, the polygons can not be welded between to separate mesh objects.

With Riptide, you set up your groups using Selection Tags and a Riptide 'Group Tag' to track them.  Then it doesn't matter if they are in separate meshes are all in one mesh, welded together, or not - you have complete control over the group boundries.

Material zones are a separate entity from 'groups'.  Groups are only used in Poser for figures (like you are doing here), to define which polygons belong to which bones.

While Riptide is not Poser 'specific' (it's more Wavefront .Obj file format specific), the reason I wrote Riptide in the first place was to ease the process of creating Poser content (it's what I use C4D for), without losing all the material zone and group info that C4D's built-in import/export does.

I appreciate it Spanki.  I tried this a year ago with version 8.1 and not sure which Riptide I downloaded.  I'm still using 8.1.  You were equally concerned then as you are now and I thank you for it.
That's very impressive to me that you made this software and equally commendable that you give it away free with care, concern, and technical support.

Doesn't Poser, once the obj is filtered, (in and out) make it it's own anyways.  I notice how the numbers change drastically within the obj after a Poser filtering?

A year ago, there might well have been some crash bugs :).  If you're willing to try it again, and you are using 8.1, then you'd need to use the R7.3+ version.

Anytime you enter/exit the Setup Room (or use the Group Editor) in Poser and then save a .cr2 file, Poser writes out a new .obj file (look for it in the same folder as your .cr2 file).  If you haven't used the Group Editor, then what I normally do is delete that new .obj file and edit the .cr2 file to point back to the original mesh (over in the Geometries folder, where it belongs).  If you did use the Group Editor, and changed some grouping or material settings, then you'll need to use the new .obj file.

As for other numbers changing drastically, if you Export a .obj file from Poser, it will add Vertex Normals (which may not have been in the original file).  It might also change the vertex location values, depending on what options you use when exporting.  Other differences are likely due to the method used to write floating point values to a file and a few other file-formatting differences, but functionality is the same.

The problem above stemmed, like you say, from Cinema, as soon as I save out, names are changed and I would need to edit the obj before anything else.  The orders were completely messed up in an order I couldn't figure out  like neck05 would be neck01.  For some reason it takes the zero out.  So I tried Riptide again, no matter what I do it says DOH! No Base Material, then crashes when I click OK.   These were my settings but I tried all different ones.  I have a material assigned to all the groups too. This was the version you told me to get 7.3+  I placed the riptide folder inside this folder cinema4dsdk inside the plugins folder. Any ideas?  Is it installed properly?

Sorry, I just saw this... I'll have to go look around to see what the crash bug might be, but in the meantime, here's a few notes on the settings you're using...

Scale Factor - I use 1000 on import and 1000 on export for Poser figures.  I typically load some Poser figure in (at 1000 scale factor) to use as a reference inside C4D, then make my models relative to that figure/scale.  Then when you export your model, leave the Scale Factor set to 1000.

Reverse Faces - You should have this enabled when exporting for Poser (or for C4D, for that matter).

Mesh Names/As Groups - If you set up selection tags for your groups and then added a Riptide 'Group Tag' to track them, you should not use the 'Mesh Names' option.  It will just add confusion to the naming.  The group names will be the same as you used for your Selection Tags.... which is what the 'Group Tag Names' option does (if you have a Group Tag set up on the mesh(es), it looks in there to get the names).

Let me see if I can figure out the crash and get back to you.

Can you try duplicating exactly what I have here and saving that out?

Also... try importing this file: "grouped_capsule.zip" (at 1000 scale factor) and use the "Don't Split" option... you should get one mesh object, with several groups set up, along with several materials.

Once it's imported, try exporting it.  If that works, then it should be a good example of how to set up your mesh.  You can double-click on the Group Tag to see that the group selection tags are over in the right-hand side and the ones in the left-hand side are material selection tags (so they don't go over to the Selected side).

Also note that the materials are given the same name as the selection tags for each material (that shouldn't be required, but it's easier to keep track of things that way).  Also, if you click on each material over in the Object Manager to see it's properties, they are all restricted to the selection tags that were set up for them.

The last thing to check is to be sure to NOT use any of the special 'Shaders' in your materials (like Danel, Cheen, Fog, Mabel, etc).  Those are not portable and not handled by Riptide.

Attached Link: http://www.maxon.net/pages/download/c4dr82_e.html

...you might also consider downloading the R8.2 update (see link).

Here's a fuzzy screen shot :).

This thread should move to the Cinema forum.  ;-)

I'm not sure how to get that triangle tag in there.  ;-)  I noticed you have different colors applied to one geometry.  I need to learn that little trick.  I'm trying to connect the inner mouth to the top and bottom jaw and have it be another material so I can at least select "material" in the texture mapper.  When I connect something like teeth to an upper head or something it only allows one material. ;-(

I did export my object so far from Cinema all reversed, meaning all the needles when selected are facing inward since poser always reverses them.
Also, for naming, When I had tail01, tail02, tail03, etc, it would save completely messed up, tail03 may become tail1, and it always removed 0s but still didn't have any logic to it's order.  So now I have been saving out tailA, tailB, tailC, and opening wordpad to correct replacing each letter with the correct #.  The letters in the name actually kept the correct part association too.  . .shrugs.

Attached Link: Thread Continuation in C4D forum

see link... :).