Is it worth migrating assets from DAZ to Blender just for rendering?

tcassat

I tested Blender for the first time and the render times I got with Cycles seemed much faster than iray, but I don't know if it's because of the assets I used.

The question is the title of the topic. If my intention is just to use exactly the same functions as I have in DAZ Studio, i.e. to pose characters in 3D environments obtained from the DAZ Store and render them, is there a significant advantage in doing this in Blender rather than DAZ Studio?

Thanks!

 

wolf359

For stills & portraits?

No advantage

Padone

Blender has a simplify tool that is similar to the scene optimizer in daz studio. Cycles has a better denoiser and supports AMD and Intel cards, plus it provides motion blur. For animations eevee is much better than filament. Apart this, if you have a nvidia card and use the scene optimizer in daz studio, then there's no significant advantage to render still pictures.

hardwire666

Blender will allow you to optimize your scene in ways Daz just can not do. This translates into faster render times. However as with any rendering program. If you don't now how to optimize it doesn't matter. I can render larger and more complex scenes faster in Cycles than I can in Iray/Daz.

nonesuch00

If you have to do lightweight one off modeling for the scene direct in Blender or have to do a lot of scene jiggering and test renders of your scene before you get to something you like then exporting to Blender is worth it. Also, if you want to use Eevee to create effects not possible in iRay, then it's worth it.

TheMysteryIsThePoint

But do not discount the phenomenon where you thought you just wanted to render in Blender, but once you're actually in Blender you realize that now you've got your content in an extremely powerful environment, it liberates your creativity and you think of all sorts of things you want to do now that you didn't even think of before. Houdini is the same way.

Valiska

That probably depends on what you're doing. It won't be for everybody. It's worth it to me. Once I took the time to learn Blender well enough to model, I also prefer to set up and render in it.

1. Daz Studio moves around large landscapes so slowly it's painful. It becomes very time-consuming to set up scenes if you're using such. I use large landscapes often.
2. I can easily increase the size of Blender interface text to the point where I can read without eyestrain on any monitor.
3. Nevertheless I have more screenspace available for the scene, instead of the interface, since I had to learn keyboard shortcuts to model efficiently in Blender. I don't need sidepanels open most of the time, and I can open and close them with a keystroke.
4. Daz used to have terrific previews for 3Delight renders, but that's been working less well for a long time, with the switch mainly to Iray. What's up with old card hair? I now frequently see old hair pieces that looked fine in textured preview in 2013, now half transparent/disappearing, in a fashion that would have me fixing flipped normals if I saw it in Blender. The hair still renders in Daz Studio, but it's harder to tell what it's going to look like. And I'm finding it hard to look at a shiny Genesis model (different from generation to generation) and guess what the Iray render will look like. I can now look at a quick Eevee preview and make better guesses about the intended Cycles render.

So I've installed Diffeomorphic and I've been exporting my entire Daz library for use in Blender. For the old 3Delight items, I run RSSY's 3DL to Iray converter before export, so I'm starting out with PBR shaders for everything. I then can meddle with the materials further in Blender for individual scenes.

Hurdy3D

Lighting is in Blender much better than in Daz.

Dissendior

I tend to do so more and more because - what mentioned earlier - I HATE navigating large scenes in DazStudio. It's really awful. And I am already much better in doing the adjustments in Blender, for example some clothing that is not lying correctly and dForce in Daz may not work - I can use Blender's scultping to do the necessary changes. Also I can use props and scenes from elsewhere (cgtrader, turbosquid etc.) more easily. I always felt like importing 3rd party objects into daz is much more complicated as you need to adjust all the shaders all the time, even with PBR materials. Another advantage is animation if you want to go that way. I am not very experienced but what I've seen so far animation in daz also is a pain where as Blender is much more handy for that.

For getting scenes, characters and poses into Blender I use diffeomorphic. Most of the time it#s working very well

csaa

TheMysteryIsThePoint said:

But do not discount the phenomenon where you thought you just wanted to render in Blender, but once you're actually in Blender you realize that now you've got your content in an extremely powerful environment, it liberates your creativity and you think of all sorts of things you want to do now that you didn't even think of before. Houdini is the same way.

TheMysteryIsThePoint,

When switching from one toolset to another, it helps to be aware of the paradigms we carry over and, when necessary, to be nimble in adapting the old to the new. Coming from Daz, I took to Blender looking for the same features and workflows. To some degree this helped, as Daz and Blender share commonalities. But in other aspects sticking with the Daz way of doing things only hindered me.

dForce is one example that tripped me up. I thought the solution to clothing peek-throughs in Blender was to simulate the scene -- figure, clothing pose and all -- to get the clothes settled well on the figure. Just as in Daz. This turned out to be more trouble than I had bargained for! In the end, I turned to Blender's sculpting tools. For generating still images, I've found this to be the easiest way around the problem.

As to Houdini, I've dipped my toes into it from time to time. All these new concepts -- SOPs, VOPs, etc. -- with little in terms of paradigms carried over from Daz and Blender. My intiution tells me that the key lies in approaching Houdini as a programmer; that is, to view those network nodes in terms of data flow graphs that transform geometry and vectors, whatever the later represents.

So many intersting things to learn ... so little waking hours to dabble in them. Alas, such is life.

Cheers!

Singular3D

I use a lot of different software for creating images. Daz is mainly used for characters and assets of other software is combined in Blender for the final image. I also tend to improve Daz assets in Blender. For complex scenes, I have many more options in Blender than in Daz even for stills. There is a certain learning curve, but Blender is constantly improving and gets better. Diffeo is a grest tool to get the Daz content over. I really hoped that G9 would be useable in Blender as good as in Daz. At least Daz is a content provider.

TheMysteryIsThePoint

csaa said:

TheMysteryIsThePoint said:

But do not discount the phenomenon where you thought you just wanted to render in Blender, but once you're actually in Blender you realize that now you've got your content in an extremely powerful environment, it liberates your creativity and you think of all sorts of things you want to do now that you didn't even think of before. Houdini is the same way.

TheMysteryIsThePoint,

When switching from one toolset to another, it helps to be aware of the paradigms we carry over and, when necessary, to be nimble in adapting the old to the new. Coming from Daz, I took to Blender looking for the same features and workflows. To some degree this helped, as Daz and Blender share commonalities. But in other aspects sticking with the Daz way of doing things only hindered me.

dForce is one example that tripped me up. I thought the solution to clothing peek-throughs in Blender was to simulate the scene -- figure, clothing pose and all -- to get the clothes settled well on the figure. Just as in Daz. This turned out to be more trouble than I had bargained for! In the end, I turned to Blender's sculpting tools. For generating still images, I've found this to be the easiest way around the problem.

As to Houdini, I've dipped my toes into it from time to time. All these new concepts -- SOPs, VOPs, etc. -- with little in terms of paradigms carried over from Daz and Blender. My intiution tells me that the key lies in approaching Houdini as a programmer; that is, to view those network nodes in terms of data flow graphs that transform geometry and vectors, whatever the later represents.

So many intersting things to learn ... so little waking hours to dabble in them. Alas, such is life.

Cheers!

Very well said, @csaa