Splitting Expressions? (Upper and Lower)

dlm4001

Is there a tool similar to Ultimate Pose Mixer or Pose Splitter, OR a method, for splitting facial expressions onto upper and lower? I want to be able to mix the upper region of one expression with the lower region of another.  Some expression sets include upper and lower and I find that this allows some real creativity in mixing...   like Expression 1 lower 40 %: Expression 2 lower 33%:  Expression 3 Upper 80%.

Any ideas are appreciated.

hansolocambo

Your best option I guess is to follow tutorials about DFormer. Which will enable you to load morphs and partially assign their influence to only parts of the mesh. Idea in a nutshell is to export Genesis 8 as obj with only 1 expression loaded. Then on a base Genesis 8 in DAZ, create a DFormer that will influence only the upper head. Load the export Genesis 8 obj (morph loader pro) with the expression you want, and use the DFormer influence at 1 or -1 to influence upper or lower face (tutorials thereafter so that you understand what that means)

Good tutorials on the subject are ultra rare and focus mostly on how to import head and body separately (FHM, FBM). Meaning that they use the default DFormer already set-up in DAZ for content creators (My DAZ 3D Library>People>Genesis8>Developer Kit>Genesis 8 HeadSplit DFormer). But by making your own DFormer you can for the morphs to apply to any given part of the body.

I'd advise you to follow those tutorials and take notes. It might sound a bit complex at first if you've never dont that. But it's extremely necessary DAZ knowledge to acquire ;) Those expression bundles you talk about have been very probaby made this way. Once you made a DFormer that influence half the head, you can save it and easily re-use it to split upper/lower face the influence of all expressions you want.

1/ First option, good tutorial (except for head/body morphs it doesn't talk about characters taller or smaller than the default G8) :

2/ Second option, in my opinion a more in depth and definitely more advanced tutorial on head/body morphs :

 

Again, both those tutorials are about head/body, but you can make what you need UpperHead / Lower Head, using the same exact technique except you'll have to create your own DFormer (which is pretty simple really).

Good luck !

 

P.S : you could also support a vendor and buy : https://www.daz3d.com/shape-splitter

But the same can be done following tutorials I linked thereabove.

 

Sevrin

hansolocambo said:

Snip

 

It was a question about expressions, not morphs.

There are a few expression packs that allow you to zero out top or bottom expressions.  You could do that with the part you don't want, and then save the result as a preset to dial in as desired. 

This is a pack that comes with separate resets for the top and bottom of the face. PTF Quirky Poses and Expressions for Genesis 8 Female and Bridget 8

 

hansolocambo

Sevrin said:

It was a question about expressions, not morphs

 

Expressions are facial bones movemements, morphs or a mix of both.

Some expressions bundles such as Acting skills by AlFan for example are fully custom made : morphs.

 

Whether it be bones movements and/or facial custom morphs, when an expressions bundle does not have upper-lower expressions dissociated, and even more when those expressions are only morphs, the solution is : doing it by oneself.

It can be done with ZBrush (using layers and the morph brush) or Blender (with shapekeys and masks), but it can also be done easily using only DAZ's D-Former and morph loader pro.

 

P.S : Valery3D also does useful expressions bundles with upper and/or lower face already set up. And his expressions are not morphs. They use the default DAZ sliders. So they can be tweaked more easily in a workflow than pure morphs bundles sur as Acting Skills (although those are really great).

I'm using this one quiet often : V 100 Expressions The Gold Collection for Genesis 8 Female

dlm4001

Thank you both for this information, it was very helpful.

hansolocambo :  I did watch the video trutorials and I was able to complete the seperation of head from body using the provided deformer.  No I need to create my own deformer to spleet the top and bottom of the head.  I will leave this for a weekend project.  the key here will be matching height of the source and destination characters when applying a split morp and then resetting the destination character's height to the desired. I look forward to giving this a try. 

I did buy a couple fo Valery3D's expression packs this morning. I did not buyt the v100 Gold as it was for GF8 and not 8.1 .  I will likely pick it up anyway.

BTW, I am not opposed to supporting venders as it makes the communtiy happen.  Do you know if shape splitter works on GF8.1?  While I would love to try this product, I still want to know how to do it myself. Never know when you need to split and mix a morph.

Sevrin :  Thank you as well.  I actually have a couple of Experession Packs with reset upper and lower face, and never realized it.  This is very helpful as well. There are limitations to the mixing possibilities, but still very useful.  The issue is when I set expression 1, then, zero the top halg of the face and apply expression 2, I get expression 2 on the top half of the faces, and expression 1+2 on the bottom. That has resulted in some cool results but does allow completely independant mising.  Still, a method I will use regularly.  Thank you.  

 

Moogoo

they have this but doubt it works for 8.1 https://www.daz3d.com/genesis-8-female-xprssnmagic

 

this may be usful https://www.daz3d.com/dial-fusion-for-genesis-2-to-81 , apply expression, zero the half you don't want and create a dial, then do the same for the other half, then use both dials to make one full expression.