what's the best program to use to create 3D content for Daz?
torque3656
Posts: 18
Like clothing and whatever else. Generally what is the most commonly used and best program to use to get the job done to create stuff to use in Daz? what do many professionals use?
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Depends on what you take to.
I use Blender.
It might seem like a flipant answer, but any 3D package can be used; it is about preferences and workflow, and sometimes about what one can afford.
I'm a fan of Blender too, but use Hexagon for morphs.
Modo, Silo, Hexagon, ZBrush, Maya
there is no "one" there are dozens more. Find one you like and use it.
I won't deny Blender is hard wrap your head around but the fact it's free does not mean it's not capable of making real 3D work, IMHO it blows the doors off the first 4 titles I suggested and none of them are free. It's a modeler at it's core and it's a professional one at that but it's far from being a one trick pony, as a result the interface can be a bit daunting and it's probably impossible to learn without tutorials (which are abundant on youtube and vemo and dozens of other sites that are a web search away if you are interested), but the capabilities of Blender speak for themselves.
Tutorials and cheat sheets...Blender has those in abundance. There is a large, helpful community surrounding Blender that provides a massive amount of instruction...much of it at the same 'cost' as the program itself (one of the 'costs' is the expectation to pass on the knowledge and help newcomers learn). Yes, there are some of the same things around the others, too...but it is really all about the 'fit'.
The only modeler I currently have is Strata Design 3D (the "lighter CX" version) on OS X. A week ago I tried Blender and I found the UI awful. I also must have had incredibly bad luck as about 3 if not 4 links I tried for tutorials all resulted in 404 errors. At that point, I gave up.
I also want to give Hexagon a try soon.
Hexagon has not had update in 5 years and is essentially a time bomb for many users on any OS made after Windows XP or Leopard 10.5.
Thanks for the heads up. Yea, just saw some of the notes on the product page (e.g. "Hexagon 2.5 is not universal binary and may have some stability issues on the Intel Mac.").
I saw a post from someone official, stating that something will happen with Hexagon, so don't write it off. Personally, even if it gets no more development, it's ease of making quick(ish) morphs is worth a small amount; I picked it up cheap a while back.
Good point, and for the current extremely low price of Hexagon, I could see picking it up.
I'm doing some experiments now with Strata 3D. You can do some neat stuff in the updated 8.0 version (I have 7.5). e.g. you can render a 3D scene using a spherical camera, export that as an HDRI image. Then turn around and render another scene using that HDRI. There's an add-on HDRI creator application too which will let you build HDRI images from a whole slew of studio lighting options. The 8.0 update will cost me USD 200 and if I also get the lighting studio companion, that goes up to USD 450.
So if I go in that direction, I'll just upgrade my Strata. Also seeing what happens when bringing in Daz3D scenes into Strata to perfom renders there.
that "official" statement has been hovering around this forum for years and nothing has happened since that time other than more "official" statements.
Being an owner of Hex I'd love to see it updated but given that years have come and gone and nothing has changed I'm not putting too much confidence in it.
Carrara is a pretty good all-round modeller, and generally around $65 with PC+ discount. (that's just 2 Stonemasons!) Not only can it build just about any prop or model with its vertex, spline, metaball, terrain, ocean, tree etc. modellers, but it directly supports Poser and DUF content -- including Genesis 1 and 2 (plus Daz have officially stated they're working on Genesis 3 support, although there's no suggestion of a date), and no worries about running it on modern Macs. It also works directly with smart content installed through DIM.
Brand new to 3d modeling I settled on Hexagon 2.5 on a Mac with an iCore7 about nine months ago. Indeed it does mysteriously exit at intervals and the user interface has one "feature" that makes me a bit crazy when I go back into DAZ and find myself holding down a modifier key and scratching the mouse about to try to rotate the DAZ screen until the voice in my head says "use the cube silly." But it has been a great learning tool and it can work for hours without deciding to just take a break and dumping you back to the desktop. And it always exits politely without seeming to break anything so I do not worry about it.
I might try Carrara but it strangely says something about not being good for above 10.8?? And the word "Beta" is a bit of a put off. I just upgraded my older Mac to 10.9 from 10.6 as support for that is a thing of the past. And 10.8 will be soon in the same "unspported" class I fear.
The install of Hexagon BTW was quick and easy and once you figure out the size conversions moving OBJ files back and forth is not too tricky. I have learned a lot with it. But it was kind of a close your eyes and point helped with the fact it was at least Mac friendly. So many things demand Windows. At this point Hexagon works for me as a learning tool and I would like to move up but given how much time and effort is involved in learning the new moves on a new user interface I really want something worth changing to (and less than $1200 for a license).
Thanks everyone for your input on this question.
Likewise, and if it was upgraded, would I buy? Not so sure, considering the derth of support over the years - I own it too. I'm even making an effort to figure out how to transfer to and from blender - never have been able to get the hang of that.
Blender is Mac friendly - very Mac friendly. New releases of blender, always include Windows, Linux, and Mac.