I thought I posted a  new thread, but can't seem to find it, so here it goes.
I am confused with the program, and the PDF doesn't help me anything.
1. Load a scene. and highlight everything in the Scene.
2. Run Decimator, and I set it to 10%  (so it's ugly...  but wanted to test it)
3. Save a LOD (What am I suppose to do with that?) it seems like it's saving nothing or a small file(?) somewhere.
4. Export to FDX .

Ends up that the original FDX was 1 Gb  and the new one 3 Gb.
Do it didn't do me any good.
I tried all over the place to get some more info, but all I find on Youtube is how to lower the polygons, and that's it.
Either I am missing something really important,  or the program just doesn't work for it.

Thank you so much..

Please explain in more detail what you are doing, and what software you are using. iClone, Character Creator and 3DXchange do not have a decimator module.

Gerry

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System: Win 10 Pro (21H2), Asus X99-E WS, CPU i7-5930K -3,5 GHz, 32 GB DDR4 2666-16 RAM, NVidia GTX 1080 Ti GPU - 11 GB VRAM(Driver Studio-536.99), Samsung 850 Pro 512 GB SSD, 6 TB HD storage.

I want to import scenes from Daz to Iclone.
When I did that in the past, I ended up with 1.5 - 4 Gb files.   
3DXchange doesn't like that size.. So I used the 4gb patch since it's still 32bit, but that didn't fix it either.
From my understanding is that you need to use 3DXchange first before you can use it in Iclone.

So I am trying to make the file smaller smaller, since the polygons are very high.  Someone recommended using Decimator for Daz.
I loaded the scene, ran Decimator and set the quality to 10%. (just wanted to see what the filesize would look like)
Saved a LOD (no clue what it's for)  and I exported the FDX file again. 
This time it tripled the filesize..   So I am clue less on what to do. (besides returning the program to Daz)
I must be missing something, but idk what.

You are experiencing the difference between high quality created objects and something generated with auto cad or simular methods that looks good, but has many problems decimating.

The ugly result is due to how your selected objects were created. Poly reduction tools (decimator) uses and algorithim that reduces polygons "Pefectly"
if each object is created with "All Quads."

As we all know, 3dxchange converts all objects to "Triangles." That does not mean objects cannot decimate correctly.
It means that your "Trinagles" must form quads, otherwise the algorithm has to guess.

On thing that really mess up poly reduction are (NGons)... 5 sided polygons
Does you scene objects contain any NGons??

Also:
Never attempt to decimate an entire scene. Decimate each object seperately.

Each object would be fine, but then I still don't know what to do next.
what do I do with that LOD file?
can I just export to FDX ?

or am I missing steps?
the PDF doesn't tell me anything that came with it.

Before worrying about the LOD, you may want to fix the mesh to decimate correctly.
Use a program like Blender to form "all quads" then your LOD will not be ugly.

I made it ugly on purpose to see the outcome of the file size.
If I set it to 50 or 80% then it's fine.
I need to know the steps after that. without using Blender.

You should be able to do everything in DAZ. Need an expert to explain it better, but LOD means level of detail, which is a reduced poly version of the same item for use in the background. I'm speculating here, but I believe all LOD versions are saved together, so what you have is the original and any LOD versions in one file. That's the reason for the increased file size.

I have to run now, but I played a bit with it and instead of Create LOD you select DON and save the reduced figure as a new scene file. You can then also export as FBX at that point. More later (but experts may have chimed in already).

EDIT: Clothing was a mess because I don't know what I'm doing but I had a reduced G3 figure that came in at 120k polys in 3DXchange. I used a 30% reduction. It's recognized as a DAZ figure.

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Hm,  I didn't know you could save it as DON.
I will try again when I get home.
I just save LOD, and export as FDX.  
Maybe I need to save the scene first and load it again.  Maybe that's what I am missing.
spent $$$$'s on items, and now bought the whole Iclone package, so I don't want to get it all to waste.
Mostly I buy Props and Scenes etc.
Put them together in Daz, and then export.
But since some of them are Massive FDX files, I can't load them back in.
even when I cut pieces of of the scenes, probably because of the polygon/sizes from the buildings etc.

Not trying to be rude,  love Iclone and trying to learn the steps here.
So I apologize in advance in case it happens

Typo: I meant "Done", not "DON", which just means that you are finished with your decimating. The changes in are in character in your scene (or whatever you decimated), so by saving that you will have a decimated version. 

BTW, don't worry asking questions; we all learn from that, including those who answer. 

I believe you can control which parts are decimated and which are not. For a character that's essential. My 30% version has blocky eyes, which spoils it.

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