but you look so stiff, my dear. You pose like a rock
daveso
Posts: 7,004
I see a ton of very good images here in the gallery, on forum pages, and different sites, but one of the things that pops out to me is that the characters look so stiff, unrealistic in the images. They don't sink into a mattress, their legs are not relaxed, everything appears tight. No bulging, spreading, sinking, no relaxation.
How are we to make the poses realistic looking. I think a lot of it is just small movement of the fingers, a slight different angle of an ankle, stuff like that, but some of it cannot be accomplished without some sort of add on that can create bulge, spread, and sinking on solids, dents, etc. Like a head on a pillow doesn;t just sit up there like on concrete, and even on concrete a head will exhibit certain movement of flesh or the hair gets spread, dented, and so forth.
What are some products or even techniques that can accomplish realistic appearance for poses in a scene?
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I agree with you - I notice and cringe when I see oddly stiff posed characters or "loose gripped" items like swords and guns. I just found this and it is in my cart right now, but it could help.
https://www.daz3d.com/ghost-dynamics
yup - gravity is definitely something that tends to be forgotten, lol!! i usually try to find photos online similar to my poses and then compare and adjust in Daz accordingly making sure to add a sense of 'heavy' to the character - nothing beats the Mark I eyeball for that!! you are absolutely right, it always finally comes down to the small movements and placements - the slight slump of the shoulders, the small twist of the ankle, the gentle curl of the finger, etc. it adds time, but it's totally worth it :D
Meant to add Mesh Grabber to my last post.
https://www.daz3d.com/mesh-grabber-win
Another trick that goes a long way with cars or vehicles with rubber tires, adjust Y axis downard to put it just ever so slightly down into the road, or surface it is sitting on and this makes it look like it has weight. SO EASY! Works with people sitting on soft furniture too.
I'm really bad at this because I get frustrated quickly with my posing and give up too early. I found the following thread very helpful for adding extra interaction with the environment: https://www.daz3d.com/forums/discussion/208141/how-to-use-dforce-creating-a-blanket-draping-clothes-on-furniture-and-much-more-commercial/p1
There are some PDFs that are linked that actually cover a head on pillow case you mentioned and using dforce for moving a cushion into the body vs pushing the body down into the cushion. I think I need to just practice more and get used to the tools available. The new user contests also have an advanced contest with lots of Push Modifiers/Deformers examples. I found this video very helpful: https://youtu.be/TwKcEGdIXLI?si=huaLOB2hadvCpBU7
As for products, there is Mesh Grabber Bundle (Win) seems to help for modifying the environment or clothing in a scene. I haven't tried Ghost Dynamics mentioned above, but it looks kind of cool. Natural Movements Pack for Genesis 9 is also pretty neat to adding extra morphs for the body. There is a sit morph included that flattens the bottom area and legs as if your model were sitting down on a chair. I'm not sure how well it works since I've only used it once and the person was wearing clothing so I didn't notice too much of a difference.
Anyway, not sure if these are helpful, but thought I'd share and also check out other people's suggestions since I'm always trying to improve my work and this is a think I'm pretty bad at and want to improve. =)
A starting point with a few objects like chairs or pillows is to edit the object's geometry, add a smoothing modifier, and make your character the collision object. In many cases, it will automatically deform to your character's shape.
Try some stretches, that might help.
Honestly, my big advice for posing is "More is moving than you think". If you raise your arm, your collarbone moves, your torso muscles have to tension, your legs have to shift their balance. If a pose doesn't seem to be working, then something "upstream" of the bones you're trying to pose is probably wrong (this is commonly the case if you think you need to turn limits off).
Agreed, Limits should always remain ON. accurate poses move groups of body parts, not just the single joint to an un-natural extreme.
There is likely another way to do it (that I don't know
) but to fine tune the deformation of a pillow, I can use an invisible clone of the character.
I initially did it like that because the character's hand was messing with the smoothing modifier of her clothes: the impacted clothes ended smoothed against the invisible clone and I moved just the hand of that clone, so I had an invisible clone available to interact with the pillow.
...whether natural or not depends on poses, muscles shape, how clothing & hair drape or follow the poses, figure's interaction with objects no matter they're with softbody or hard surface, as well as the quality of assets you use, yada yada...
As Elor said, I think the best way is to finetune them in proper ways, with the tools that you're familiar with... (dForce, MG, sculpting software....)... as long as you're willing to spend time on it... as well as observe the pose reference pictures of human beings. Usually we have no way to make them 100% perfect and look 100% natural 'cause it's a 3D world but we've been just trying to make them better and better.
And eyeline and facial expression are critical. Even AI hasn't mastered that. The ones I've seen are either deadpan or screaming or grinning like a Cheshire Cat in heat.
...that spilled my coffee this morning, thank you!