how do i manually install .obj and .mtl files in daz 4.6?

j_stnk

got a lot of neat stuff from 3d artists that freely share their fantastic content. some are straight forward runtime folders easily installed but some come with .obj and .mtl files. do i have to put these in a new folder with some kind of name relating to the content so the content manager can retrieve them? or just toss the loose files in the right hole? they come in zip files. is it possible to somehow put the zips in the download manager so it can place them? i've noticed that most obj and mtls are located in the geometries folder in a named folder. any help, advice or tutorials would be grateful.

Chohole

I usually put obj models (Those which are purely an OBJ and associated MTL) into a separate folder on my drive so I know where they are. They will need to be imported into DS (and other programs as well), not installed to the program.

The good thing about an OBJ is that it can be used in many different programs. Te downside is that they will be static props, whichever program they are used in, not fully rigged models.

JimmyC_2009

Just to add to what chohole has said

they come in zip files. is it possible to somehow put the zips in the download manager so it can place them? i’ve noticed that most obj and mtls are located in the geometries folder in a named folder. any help, advice or tutorials would be grateful.

The DAZ Install Manager (DIM) only uses ZIP files that are downloaded from the store here, and not zips from anywhere else. To load a OBJ file in DAZ Studio, you need to use the File > Import option, they will not appear in the Content Library even if installed there.

Also, if OBJ files are inside a Runtime > Geometries folder, then it looks like they may be part of a CR2 or PP2 file which Poser uses (and DAZ Studio can load as well). In that case, they wouldn't have a MTL file associated with them.

If there are any in particular that you are having problems with, post a link here to the item, and I'm sure we can advise you further.

j_stnk

excellent! i would also import the associated mtl as well? are there any in-depth interactive tutorials for daz 4.6 available? thanks

JimmyC_2009

j_stnk said:

excellent! i would also import the associated mtl as well? are there any in-depth interactive tutorials for daz 4.6 available? thanks

DAZ Studio does not seem to load the MTL file information for you. You may need to find the maps yourself, and load them into the Diffuse channel to get them to work.

I don't know of any interactive tutorials on using OBJs, it is relatively simple. Just use File > Import > Wavefront OBJ, but you may need to try some scales if you don't know what scale the object was saved at. Poser is a pretty good bet for most things, but you may need to try others. Once you have loaded your model, to the correct size, and textured it, you can save it as a Scene or Scene Subset from the File > Save As menu option.

There are interactive tutoruials that come with DAZ Studio, and yet more available for free from the store. You can find most of them here :
http://www.daz3d.com/catalogsearch/result/?q=interactive&x=0&y=0

Inside DS, go to Help > Home, and you should find some there, plus other useful links.

Chohole

I find that most, if not all, MTL files simply give you the info as to what materials were used on the OBJ, and I then have to go find them, which is simple if they are stored in the same folder as the OBJ.

Bunyip02

Hope this is of help. Only a basic import run-through.

Step 1 - Import Model

Bunyip02

Step 2

Choose Settings
Adjust scale
Adjust XYZ locations if required

Bunyip02

Step 3

After import, select item, then click on the Surfaces Tab
Locate textures if required.
If you look down the Surfaces Tab list there are a number of things you can adjust, including the Bump maps and others.
Tiling option is worth exploring for bringing in additional textures.
(Remember to save your work when you are happy with what you have done)

pciccone

OBJ files support only the simplest of material definition and there is no consistency in the information that you find online.
The best that you can hope for is to have the textures set; beyond that you need to adjust the materials in the Surfaces tab manually.

If you are not familiar with the terminology there, Diffuse, Specular, Bump map and so on, do a search online. Those terms are general to the whole 3D field, they are not specific of Studio, and so you can find a lot of good sources to explain the concepts.

The rest is experimentation and time :)

Cheers.

Bejaymac

The MTL that the following chunk of code is from has a sub folder next to it called maps, and all of the textures are in it.

newmtl Plastic_Crate
 Ns 14.999999
 Ni 1.500000
 Ka 0.000000 0.000000 0.000000
 Kd 0.964706 0.964706 0.964706
 Ks 0.8 0.8 0.8
 Ke 0.000000 0.000000 0.000000
 map_Ka maps\plastic_crate(grey).jpg
 map_Kd maps\plastic_crate(grey).jpg

Using "File > Import" means DS will never find that texture, as it has no idea where to start looking on your hard drive for the maps folder, even though it's right next to the MTL.

By creating a new content directory, and then adding it to the "Other Import Formats" setup changes things, with the OBJ, MTL and maps folder in the new content directory it means the OBJ now shows up in the Content Library, and can be loaded into the scene with a double click. Doing this means it's all inside a registered content directory, which means DS now knows it only has to look in that directory to find the textures, as a result most textures will load this way.

Actually Paolo the OBJ doesn't hold any material definitions, that's the job of the MTL, and it's quite capable of handling everything our own default surface shader can, the problem as always is down to how good the coders are that create the import/export plugins for the various programs.

pciccone

I was keeping things simple by referring the OBJ. Of course the OBJ refers the MTL and the MTL has the definition of the material but the complexity of properties that the MTL has is nowhere close to what we use today.

Cheers.

j_stnk

thanks all! it works for some things as for the mtl files they won't show up in the import window? maybe i'm blind lol. also is it possible to convert mc6 files. i found a tut. using some kind of word conversion technique but now they're saying daz 4.6 might be tricky. when you convert in crimson converter the version change is 4.6? and the materials line after version is changed to "figure" and you save as .pz2 right? thanks for the tutorial link!

SpottedKitty

j_stnk said:

thanks all! it works for some things as for the mtl files they won't show up in the import window?

The .mtl settings should be loaded automatically when you import the .obj file. Remember to tick on the "use MTL settings" box in the import dialog.

Note that there are things that can go a bit wrong with this. The .mtl filename is usually defined near the top of the .obj file (they're both just plain text files, you can open them in any text program like Notepad or Wordpad), which means that if anyone changes the file names, the .mtl file definition must be changed too, or else it won't be picked up at all. This can lead to materials on the .obj ending up with either random colours, or all glossy grey. The texture paths in the .mtl file can sometimes be set up with absolute folder paths, as they exist on the computer belonging to the object creator. This will have to be fixed by manually editing the file definition lines, since needless to say, it will not work on any other computer on Earth. Apart from that, there should be no major problems.