Frustrating, time-consuming & unintuitive new face controls in 8.1 figures (maddening)

Ulysses Heart

For someone who creates at least 7 figure-based images a week with Daz, and has for years, what the &%$# did Daz developers and interface designers think when changing the face controls in such odd ways? We now confront weird and difficult, time-consuming issues when posing figures. A few really frustrating examples:

1) Lip controls that needed NO fixing in Genesis 8 figures now are mysteriously inseparable from mouth controls. You can no longer, for instance, manipulate the upper lip seprately from the mouth. So you can adjust "Mouth Upper Up," but you cannot adjust Mouth Upper Down, or upper lip down -- so that when a character is smiling slightly, you can no longer hide their teeth with their upper lip. Those sort of capabilities to create subtle epressions is completely lost with 8.1 figures.

2) The oft mentioned inability to simply open a characters mouth in the dang "Mouth" controls (seems odd to even have to type that), continues to irritate me no matter how used to it I become. When I'm working on a character's expressions, and working on the correct mouth expression, why the hell would I want to jump OUT of mouth controls into Jaw controls merely to open a mouth slightly? It's nonsensical in terms of workflow! As someone who works a lot in anatomy, and draws faces a great deal... there really is zero logic that supports this decision. Was it a strictly anatomical decision? No way... no anatomy for artists every refers to the mouth opening as merely a jaw movement. Was it some sort of purest decision based on a structural breakdown of body movements? No way. That's absurd. Find one 3D designer in the industry, anywhere, that refers to mouth movements as jaw movements. If this tool is supposed to be intuitive for artists, please tell me how many artists did Daz developers actually interview before making this decision? Um... if it wasn't zero, it was a few people at Daz. If they had done only the most rudimentary user research with EXTERNAL users, how many of them would have said "I REALLY want to separate opening and closing the characters' mouth into Jaw controls. That really would make my workflow SO MUCH EASIER!"

Um... nope. No one said that. They clearly talked to no external artist-users.

I won't go into a lot of the other changes (like simply closing the character's eyes involves the new "Eye Blink" or "Eye Squint" controls... but no ability to merely lower or raise upper and lower eyelids), the oddball and baly-thought out changes just go on an on. Is there some sort of data or large-scale review of the opinions of users that dictated these changes? I mean, seriously, tese were bad changes that degrade user control and workflow efficiency.

Willy2

You don't have to use Genesis 8.1
But if you want to use version 8.1, you can create morphs or buy Head and Face morphs.
Like you, we have noticed that some morphs have disappeared.
We can't do exactly the same things with Genesis 8.1.
But it is too early to take stock of what has been done.

You say that some subtle expressions can't be done anymore (you should have given an example with an image, so that your remark could be understood)
Personally, I am very satisfied with version 8.1, but I have to admit that I have not done any comparison test between version 8.0 and version 8.1.

nonesuch00

They are FACS based so they follow FACS rules as researched by a bunch of scientists. The old way, while logical, especially to modelers & developers, was not the correct way to set up expressions if the goals was to create realistic FACS based expressions.

Willy2

In the description of this product, it is said that Genesis 3 and 8 already had an underlying armature for using FACS.
https://www.daz3d.com/genesis-3--8-face-controls
Personally, I use Anilip 2 (which I haven't tested yet with version 8.1) but I am not satisfied with the animation of the faces. When the characters speak, the mouth and the lips move in a mechanical way (like in comics).
The integration of FACS in Genesis 8.1 will perhaps allow to have more realistic animations.

 

Ulysses Heart

nonesuch00 said:

They are FACS based so they follow FACS rules as researched by a bunch of scientists. The old way, while logical, especially to modelers & developers, was not the correct way to set up expressions if the goals was to create realistic FACS based expressions.

The Facial Action Coding System (FACS) was developed in 1970. It was created as a scientific way to define and map emotions. It is seriously outdated and – frankly – I know zero animators (including several who worked on Lord of the Rings films, and some who are at PIXAR, Disney and some smaller studios) who take it at all seriously. It is incredibly outmoded for most serious animators and animation modelers, and is considered quasi-Victorian. It just shows Daz taking a really odd step backwards. It seems like they're trying to make Daz seem more applicable to game and animation development, yet strangely showing how little they know about the most serious practiioners while in the very act of doing so. Ever hear of serious Blender, 3DS or Maya animators using FACS? Umm... good luck finding quotes on that after 2014.

PerttiA

G8.1 is the same as G8, the only morphs not working 'out the box' are the G8 base expressions and expressions that use them, but that can be fixed.

Making the G8 base expressions (and any expressions that are using them) work on G8.1 requires removing dummy/placeholder expressions that are installed to G8.1 morph folders - These dummy/placeholder expression files have no other function than to prevent the base G8 expressions from loading. 

The dummy/placeholder files are located in;

...\Data\DAZ 3D\Genesis 8\Female 8_1\Morphs\Daz 3D\Base Pose Head\ (255 files)
...\Data\DAZ 3D\Genesis 8\Female 8_1\Morphs\Daz 3D\Expressions\ (24 files)
...\Data\DAZ 3D\Genesis 8\Male 8_1\Morphs\Daz 3D\Base Pose Head\ (255 files)
...\Data\DAZ 3D\Genesis 8\Male 8_1\Morphs\Daz 3D\Expressions\ (24 files)

Please make sure you are removing the files from G8.1 morph folders and not G8 morph folders.

j cade

Ulysses Heart said:

nonesuch00 said:

They are FACS based so they follow FACS rules as researched by a bunch of scientists. The old way, while logical, especially to modelers & developers, was not the correct way to set up expressions if the goals was to create realistic FACS based expressions.

The Facial Action Coding System (FACS) was developed in 1970. It was created as a scientific way to define and map emotions. It is seriously outdated and – frankly – I know zero animators (including several who worked on Lord of the Rings films, and some who are at PIXAR, Disney and some smaller studios) who take it at all seriously. It is incredibly outmoded for most serious animators and animation modelers, and is considered quasi-Victorian. It just shows Daz taking a really odd step backwards. It seems like they're trying to make Daz seem more applicable to game and animation development, yet strangely showing how little they know about the most serious practiioners while in the very act of doing so. Ever hear of serious Blender, 3DS or Maya animators using FACS? Umm... good luck finding quotes on that after 2014.

found one. it took about 30 seconds https://www.artstation.com/artwork/lxrKoa

 

this guy also uses a FACS like system