Can you separate skeleton/weight mapping from a copyrighted mesh for redistribution?
Squishy
Posts: 460
I have a modification for a copyrighted mesh (I rerigged and did a lot of custom weight mapping) - how can I publish this to other people without including the mesh itself?
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If it's a Daz product, save all your modification within the scene rather than assets, then you can share the scene file (duf). rather than *.dsf files...
Actually you can share dsf files that include 'delta only' data, but what you have done are not only deltas...
contact the owner
Oof, that probably have worked well if I had not already saved the modified figure as support asset so now the scene file refers to the new base file.
e: good suggestion for future work though, thank you I'll keep that in mind
the owner is DAZ and they certainly would not permit me to redistribute their mesh
Looking at the contents of the DSF file, I can see where it defines the geometry - can I instead have this point to and load a separate file e.g. an OBJ export of the copyrighted mesh that I can instruct users to create? That might be OK
e: on second thought I guess that is pretty unlikely as I doubt OBJ would be a safe format to depend on vertex order for things like geograft boundaries and weight maps
Depending on what it is and how it was modified they might be interested in taking it for the store. No harm in asking.
Nah... but..well, it'll be just a little cubersome if you wanna do so... You said asset owner is DAZ, I assume you've modified a Genesis Base Figure, probably...
For the figure, let's say a Genesis 9, all the geometry (vertices), rigging and weight data are stored in data\DAZ 3D\Genesis 9\Base\Genesis9.dsf. You cannot distribute it and its derivatives at all. You've saved a new figure asset with all the modification, so it's a 'derivative'.
In this case, you need to 'recreate' a modified figure with no DSON Support Files (dsf), i.e. a pure 'scene-based' modified figure, then save the scene file.... Let's still use G9 as an example:
1) New scene. Load your modified G9 figure (A) into the scene, Zero it. Load default G9 (B).
2) Transfer Utility - Source: A, Target: B. Distance Tolerance: 0. Only check Weight Maps in General Options ! Uncheck everything in Post Transfer Options. Accept...
3) Memorize Figure Rigging.
4) Delete A. Save the scene file. Now all rigging / weight data are saved within the scene file. Check duf file with Notepad++.
* If you have also rigged attachments (anatomical elements, etc.), as well as weights, replicate the process on them accordingly.
PS: As for morph files if there's any, always import objs with Reverse + Delta Only. Then they could be shared.
Thanks for posting, I'll see if I can do this set of steps.
e: While the resulting file does refer to the original DAZ file in the library ("source" points to the expected DAZ file location) it still includes the geometry (vertices and polylist/face data.
Nah... as long as you don't modify vertex positions (for instance, Update Base Geometry, Mesh Grabber or whatever...) , there'll be no vertices data in Scene file other than the geometry data loaded from its "DSF"
I followed your steps exactly, I'm looking at the file contents and I see vertex/face data ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
4.22.0.1
although at worst, I can just remodel the item I'm working with from scratch and transfer the skeleton/weights with these steps so that's all right
e: Actually I lied a little bit, I had checked "Include face groups" because I'd defined some face groups (for interaction with posing tools) - you're correct, when I followed your steps exactly it didn't include the vertex/face data, thanks again
Oh bummer, the result invokes Autofit
Yeah, no problem ~ Even if you include modified Face Groups, they're just "face group assignment" rather than "vertex positions change". No worry ~
Oh... don't tick Fit to...
it's a geograft item that I'm working with (this is a modification of the anatomical elements), it has to be fitted
Oh... the anatomical elements from Daz Orignals...
The process should be the same...you even don't need to load Genesis figures there if you've just modified the anatomical elements... But if you've made modification on both figure and elements, hmm... just take it easy...
just gonna model it from scratch rather than waste more work on this, thank you anyhow
Is this for Genesis.
I ask because of the mention of autofit kicking in, this is normal if you make content for Genesis in anything other than DS4.5, as there are a lot of systems in newer versions of DS4 that just aren't compatible with G1.
One of these is "compatible base", G1 predates that system so if any of that code is in a conformer/geograft then DS will fire up autofit every time.
The extra [stuff] will have to be removed from the files, basically returning them to DS4.5 spec.
It's for G8 (which internally seems to be G3)
I'm already about 3/4 done with remeshing it anyway, lesson learned
Update: I have decided to stick with the DAZ mesh - it's honestly a really good mesh and the fact that it's already something there's gobs of content out there for (textures in multiple UVs, morphs including my own) that I'd want to accomodate in any mesh I did myself, I guess I will figure out the old RTEncoder method as a couple of people suggested.
Turns out RTEncoder/RTEJava are all defunct, not in a state I could expect random users to be able to use. MADDENING
Is there a modern alternative that doesn't require licenses / shady stuff, the whole point is to avoid doing shady stuff!
e: Found a working, legit link for RTEJava
https://www.geocities.ws/RTEJava/beta/
I would say it's correct that Daz Genesis figures have good mesh but that doesn't prevent you from heavily modifying them. And what is great is that Daz reserves the way of storing all the delta data in a saved duf...so it's very convenient for sharing the scene files.
So, it's up to you loh...
I actually had mesh pretty much done, was doing the UV map and thinking, wow this sucks, also I'm gonna have to redo my morph targets, why am I doing this
so this is actually finished and I need people willing to test this decode method and see if it's reasonable for ordinary folks before I post it
Ah... I'm not familiar with the ways of ciphering in encoding / decoding... but if it's really needed, I'd like to know final test result ~~
You're welcome to try it, sure, there is a text file detailing exactly how to un-encode it and I'll also be here for a while monitoring the forum (I posted a call for volunteers in Commons)
Download: Google Drive
Thanks man! but I'm sorry that I do not own genital elements from Daz Originals but only use the ones from RE sites.