Discussion about content

[Chris]

Not exactly, people investing a lot of money in their hobby figures , they will not want to change their favorite figure for any other and start from zero, many of them are collectors buying stuff not even once using it. Now for a new figure to have a star status it need to be at last more attractive from what they have already to be even bother with. You see my fav figures was Gen2 and 3, did not bother much after and a lot of my professional customer still request custom work for the older figures and not for the last one.

Dawn 2 need to shine, and technically better will not really sell her as many users don't care about the technical side as long it pose well and looks good in a picture and is easy to use. We living right now in a world where the good look matters first and the illustrators looking for the wow factor of their audience on social medias. It is like with the design bag , look everyone what I have , just for show off . So if someone make a render of a figure that don't even look dissent to the standards of today, it not gonna get attention and become abandoned quickly. It become another misfit. Not because it was technically well made, because it did not had the wow factor to be loved outside the community where it was created.

The 3D Artists skills of today are brilliant , that are 1000 times beyond Daz3D and others, just visit Zbrush Central , it is not like 25 years ago where the group was so little with zero resources and minimal tools, the level and skills of people today are beyond everything we share in our community. And it getting harder and harder to shine on the big platform.

All we need is more support from 3D artists that will create amazing content for Dawn2 to be taken seriously by people that use already better looking characters and content. This means Dawn2 need to be a serious competitor in this game and nobody else but us going to be responsible for her success. But somehow I have a very good feelings this time .. finger crossed

I will add here that Jenn at Rendo mentioned to me 4 days ago that she is "SO ANXIOUS to see Dawn and Dusk 2! We’ll do a big launch for them here for you!"

Paul is making progress on the facial rigging of Dawn 2, and "soon" she'll be ready for beta so artists will have more to work with for our new girl.

 

[Ken1171]

Dawn 2 is building improvements over the current generation, but on facial rigging, that will be a first for HW. I have played with LF and SMS Pauline trying to make facial expressions, but with little success. More recently, other people have shared a similar experience, and I am glad it wasn't just me "not getting it". I would probably need more knowledge of what facial muscles make a smile look like a smile. I don't think this is supposed to be easy, making facial expressions with body handles. It's like 5 handles just on the upper lip. I know what I want, but what handles do that? Do I translate or rotate them? In LF we can do both, and even scale it. Sounds easy to get overwhelmed.

Even though I have actively participated on the mesh part of Dawn2, I have no idea what her facial rig will be like. Even though LF has blown me away with the tech on her rig, I still couldn't get good facial expressions out of it. What went wrong? Is there a lesson to be learned from that?

 

[Hornet3d]

Dawn 2 is building improvements over the current generation, but on facial rigging, that will be a first for HW. I have played with LF and SMS Pauline trying to make facial expressions, but with little success. More recently, other people have shared a similar experience, and I am glad it wasn't just me "not getting it". I would probably need more knowledge of what facial muscles make a smile look like a smile. I don't think this is supposed to be easy, making facial expressions with body handles. It's like 5 handles just on the upper lip. I know what I want, but what handles do that? Do I translate or rotate them? In LF we can do both, and even scale it. Sounds easy to get overwhelmed.

Even though I have actively participated on the mesh part of Dawn2, I have no idea what her facial rig will be like. Even though LF has blown me away with the tech on her rig, I still couldn't get good facial expressions out of it. What went wrong? Is there a lesson to be learned from that?

Now that is scaring me, on of the main reasons for my move from V4WM to Dawn SE was the fact that it was easier to create reasonable expressions with Dawn. Sadly I made life a little more difficult when a came up with the dial spun character as the end result did not play well with the commercial expressions that were available. They do give a good starting point though and I can get a range of expressions now with little work.

If expressions become even more difficult it would limit my use a fair bit.

 

[Chris]

Ken, Paul has a video he shared recently on the Dawn 2 thread showing his facial rigging work in progress. Don't recall if you've had a chance to see that yet.

I have created a wide variety of facial expression morphs for Dawn 2. If it were me, I would use those first and perhaps us the facial rigging for nuancing and tweaking for refinement. Morphs first, and rigging second. But that's just me. I think the rigging is very cool but has it's limits.

I can't imagine any figure for Poser or Studio not having facial morphs as a foundation. Perhaps I'm old school.

 

[Miss B]

You may be "old school" Chris, but I happen to agree with you. Whenever I want to pose a character, I choose one that's close, and then tweak the heck out of it until I get what I want . . . especially hands. I can't imagine setting up a facial expression in the same manner not being the best way to go about it.

I'm really looking forward to seeing all the goodies you and Paul have given our girl.

 

[theschell]

When I'd created my Anime Girl Kristin several years back, I'd managed to figure out how to successfully rig not only the lower jaw but the eye-lids and eye-brows as well... I'd added a number of facial morphs to back up the rigged features and it worked well for opening up a better range of facial expressions...

Morphs alone can do a lot, but when you pair them with functionally rigged joints as well it gives a much better range of expression and movement...

 

[KageRyu]

Imagine the "chip" concept applied to selected other key muscles and/or body features... oh the possibilities.

 

[AnimaGemini]

Even though I have actively participated on the mesh part of Dawn2, I have no idea what her facial rig will be like. Even though LF has blown me away with the tech on her rig, I still couldn't get good facial expressions out of it. What went wrong? Is there a lesson to be learned from that?

I was trying hard too. Buy me reference packs for expressions, buy me books about the anatomie of human and the distribution of muscles for 3D artists ,etc..study them study the face chips on her till my eyes get blurry and still I could not get any decent smile out of LF. I think it is the topology on her face.

 

[Rae134]

Ken, Paul has a video he shared recently on the Dawn 2 thread showing his facial rigging work in progress. Don't recall if you've had a chance to see that yet.

I have created a wide variety of facial expression morphs for Dawn 2. If it were me, I would use those first and perhaps us the facial rigging for nuancing and tweaking for refinement. Morphs first, and rigging second. But that's just me. I think the rigging is very cool but has it's limits.

I can't imagine any figure for Poser or Studio not having facial morphs as a foundation. Perhaps I'm old school.

I actually thought this was the way it was supposed to work (its the most logical way to me).

I must admit I haven't played too much with LF (not at all with G8.1) and I haven't played at all with the Chips (even if I think they are a GREAT idea), just haven't need it because I think I've done like maybe 10 renders in total and just used morphs because it was all I needed at the time. I do appreciate them having the tech tho so when I do do a close up, portrait type render they are there to utilise. I think I missed the video Paul shared, I'll have to go find it. Dawn 2's going to be awesome!

 

[AnimaGemini]

I will add here that Jenn at Rendo mentioned to me 4 days ago that she is "SO ANXIOUS to see Dawn and Dusk 2! We’ll do a big launch for them here for you!"

Paul is making progress on the facial rigging of Dawn 2, and "soon" she'll be ready for beta so artists will have more to work with for our new girl.

This is great to hear. But she will need as many content as possible for her first day. Hair, outfit, character , poses. Vendors have to jump in as soon as possible , otherwise users will claim that she has nothing to play with it.
DAZ releases always their new Gen or even in the past V4 with big content. People could jump in right away and use her .

 

[Rae134]

Dawn def needs more hair (I hate having to try and get other hair made to fit one character to fit another character)

 

[AnimaGemini]

Dawn def needs more hair (I hate having to try and get other hair made to fit one character to fit another character)

Bisquits hair have all Dawn Morphs and they look really great. But you are right. She need more hair and also shoes . She has almost no shoes.
I really liked Sora character from Dawn. But she was even less supported.
Hope this will change. But I am very positive .
I would like to create for Dawn, Anime/Manga style outfits, Fantasy and Sci-Fiction. My fav themes and I already put many ideas together.
Have some concept ideas , which I still sketch out , but i am definitely close.

 

[Hornet3d]

Dawn SE has a fair choice of shoes so hopefully that will bode well for Dawn 2. Hair wise, Afrodite-Ohki has some lovely hair for Dawn so I hope that will continue into Dawn 2 and, as already stated, Biscuits hair has a Dawn option as does the massive Manakhoo range.

Outfit wise I hope Hunter3D will add some Dawn 2 outfits as the outfits always have a range of materials and options that can give the choice of six or more outfits with a single purchase. My personal hope is that Ken1171 Designs - Volpe Box will rework the fabulous CKV-01 for Dawn 2 if it is indeed needed.

Of course the other issue may be that, for those that choose not to, or cannot afford, to move to Dawn 2 may see no further content developed for the earlier Dawn. To be truthful that would not affect me much as I have a vast selection of outfits, hair and shoes that will keep me going even without some kit bashing but then I have been buying for a while. Much of the content I have is now not available as the marketplaces have closed and vendors moved away from making content al together.

​

 

[Hornet3d]

One thing I would like to see with new content both for Dawn 2 and otherwise is a better description of the materials used. A lot of the content I have purchased in the last few years have been advertised as having materials that work in Superfly. While this is useful it is only part of the story as there is a vast difference between materials that work in Superfly and those that use the advantages of Superfly. Well over fifty percent of my time is changing materials that have been said to work in Superfly for those that take advantage of what superfly has to offer.

At the start I could understand this and vendors needed time to learn about superfly but it has been around for sometime now and the situation has not changed much.

 

[Miss B]

Dawn def needs more hair (I hate having to try and get other hair made to fit one character to fit another character)

There are hair creators who add "fits" for more than one character. Biscuits over at Renderosity is one I know who does that. She usually has at least 4 or 5 other fits, and Dawn is usually included if the base fit is for LF. Also check out Ali/Mankahoo at Renderosity because she/he usually includes Dawn and LF, especially with newer hair styles.

Also, which you may not be aware of, Blackhearted has a freebie head/skull morph for LF that allows you to use V4 hair, which I find very useful, as I have tons of V4 hair from back when V4 was my female go-to character. It's called La Femme V4 Hair Fit, which you can find with the link to his Freebies in his store.

 

[Ken1171]

Ken, Paul has a video he shared recently on the Dawn 2 thread showing his facial rigging work in progress. Don't recall if you've had a chance to see that yet.

I have created a wide variety of facial expression morphs for Dawn 2. If it were me, I would use those first and perhaps us the facial rigging for nuancing and tweaking for refinement. Morphs first, and rigging second. But that's just me. I think the rigging is very cool but has it's limits.

I can't imagine any figure for Poser or Studio not having facial morphs as a foundation. Perhaps I'm old school.

I agree, it makes more sense to first use expression morphs, and then add nuances with the handles. This takes away the burden of having to reconstruct an entire expression with just the chips. Looking back to my previous attempts with other figures, that seems a more practical way to go about it.

I seem to have missed the video about Dawn2 facial rigging. Sometimes the post notifications fail for some reason. I have to see that ASAP! ^____^

This is great to hear. But she will need as many content as possible for her first day. Hair, outfit, character , poses. Vendors have to jump in as soon as possible , otherwise users will claim that she has nothing to play with it.
DAZ releases always their new Gen or even in the past V4 with big content. People could jump in right away and use her .

I believe that's the plan. As soon as a usable version is available, vendors should have a copy to work with.

I really liked Sora character from Dawn. But she was even less supported.

I have created a character for Sora, but it didn't sell. Perhaps it would had been different if she was at Rendo at that time. That particular style didn't find its public here.

My personal hope is that Ken1171 Designs - Volpe Box will rework the fabulous CKV-01 for Dawn 2 if it is indeed needed.

Volpe and I put a lot of time designing and building that complex sci-fi outfit for Dawn, but surprise, surprise - it didn't sell well. I don't know what we did wrong, but Volpe has lost interest and left ever since. I can't blame him, I would probably had left as well if I were him. I told him it would be da-bomb if we made something like that, and it didn't come true. I currently can't even bring CKV-01 to Rendo, since Volpe is not replying. Maybe he is out in vacation? I will have to wait and see, but I don't think he would be back for more after this. If THAT didn't sell, I don't know what would. The Scatter Tool and the universal heads outsold everything else. This world is full of surprises.

 

[Ken1171]

A lot of the content I have purchased in the last few years have been advertised as having materials that work in Superfly. While this is useful it is only part of the story as there is a vast difference between materials that work in Superfly and those that use the advantages of Superfly. Well over fifty percent of my time is changing materials that have been said to work in Superfly for those that take advantage of what superfly has to offer.

I have an issue with that as well. Many character materials for Dawn were created before Poser 11 and Superfly existed, to include DawnSE's default materials. If you saw my WIP video on the upcoming SkinEdit script for Poser 12, it can fix these old materials with a single mouse click - not just on Dawn, but also on V4, M4, LF and LH. I have countless character shaders for V4 that look horribly wrong in SF, but now I can fix it with a button click. This should make life easier.

 

[MEC4D]

Ken, Paul has a video he shared recently on the Dawn 2 thread showing his facial rigging work in progress. Don't recall if you've had a chance to see that yet.

I have created a wide variety of facial expression morphs for Dawn 2. If it were me, I would use those first and perhaps us the facial rigging for nuancing and tweaking for refinement. Morphs first, and rigging second. But that's just me. I think the rigging is very cool but has it's limits.

I can't imagine any figure for Poser or Studio not having facial morphs as a foundation. Perhaps I'm old school.

What good about facial rigging is that it will works with all characters, no matter pretty face or mouse face , base expressions morphs will not always works with custom face morphs where facial rigging would. Making it more versatile , what is only good. Now people would have a chance to do more with it no matter what they choice, make facial morphs or not so all good.
Morphs are like gloves they fit best the hands they are made for.

 

[MEC4D]

Dawn 2 is building improvements over the current generation, but on facial rigging, that will be a first for HW. I have played with LF and SMS Pauline trying to make facial expressions, but with little success. More recently, other people have shared a similar experience, and I am glad it wasn't just me "not getting it". I would probably need more knowledge of what facial muscles make a smile look like a smile. I don't think this is supposed to be easy, making facial expressions with body handles. It's like 5 handles just on the upper lip. I know what I want, but what handles do that? Do I translate or rotate them? In LF we can do both, and even scale it. Sounds easy to get overwhelmed.

Even though I have actively participated on the mesh part of Dawn2, I have no idea what her facial rig will be like. Even though LF has blown me away with the tech on her rig, I still couldn't get good facial expressions out of it. What went wrong? Is there a lesson to be learned from that?

Facial rigging use Pose for expressions , you can do it with individual sliders or use Pose presets , same as you pose your whole figure and save it as a pose . You can create much quicker the expressions you want without the need of sculpting skills, morphs and all the extra hustle , the facial rigging should have already set up base presets expressions with sliders for each bone and groups, Genesis have it for so long and nobody even noticed the transition , everything still looks the same for the end user. Upper lip up, upper lip down lol I don't think I want to use 20 handles to make one expression , it is more for the new creators of custom expressions . Facial rigging is a must have to go forward and not stay behind everything else what the market offer or it would be over soon, and you gonna wondering again why nobody want to buy your creations , it is not the issue with your creations, if the people don't want to buy the base model they will not buy your creations, it is simple mat, no matter what you do and how good you do, your future success depends on the base model popularity.

 

[Ken1171]

Facial rigging use Pose for expressions , you can do it with individual sliders or use Pose presets , same as you pose your whole figure and save it as a pose . You can create much quicker the expressions you want without the need of sculpting skills, morphs and all the extra hustle , the facial rigging should have already set up base presets expressions with sliders for each bone and groups, Genesis have it for so long and nobody even noticed the transition , everything still looks the same for the end user. Upper lip up, upper lip down lol I don't think I want to use 20 handles to make one expression , it is more for the new creators of custom expressions . Facial rigging is a must have to go forward and not stay behind everything else what the market offer or it would be over soon, and you gonna wondering again why nobody want to buy your creations , it is not the issue with your creations, if the people don't want to buy the base model they will not buy your creations, it is simple mat, no matter what you do and how good you do, your future success depends on the base model popularity.

That's fair enough. A facial rig seems to have become a must these days. I have first seen it in BioWare game models about 20 years ago, and it looked like a good idea, comparing to asking modelers to create new expressions for every specific scene. Dawn 2 will be HW's very first figure to have it, so it's one of these things not being built over previous Dawn experience.

I have just watched Paul's recent video, and I find it useful that eye closing is now done with a bone. How many character morphs had to include eye closing adjustment morphs? That shouldn't be such an issue with bones, assuming the upper and lower eye lids shape still match when closed. That's a thing that occurred to be when I was watching the video.

As for people rejecting Dawn as a figure, there were no lack of discussions about it. But of course, one thing leads to the other. I saw people denying Dawn while waiting like over a year for PE to come out, like it was better to have no figure than to give her a try. It was not that people didn't like Dawn, but instead that they refused to even try. Like discussed elsewhere in this forum, the Poser community has historically tended to be divisive and hostile against new figures. They ask for new figures, and then shoot them down when they get them. They have given up on both Pauline and PE, and shot down Dawn in the way, ending up with nothing. That's a crowd hard to please.