I'm considering iClone for animation of DAZ characters, in order to drastically (I hope) speed up render times.
All the YouTube videos and online sources I can find say to use the FBX format to export characters from DAZ for use in iClone. But is that really the only way?
I'm a fan of the DAZ Minotaur 6 HD character, which is constructed from a Genesis 2 human base mesh with "geograft" parts to replace the legs with hooves, add a tail, etc. I have tried exporting this character for use in Blender, and so far it seems the mesh exports perfectly to a Wavefront OBJ format, but other formats aren't very good at all; geografts don't blend with the body mesh. For example, when I import an FBX into Blender, it looks like the character is wearing flesh-colored thigh boots, because the area where the bull-like lower leg meets the thigh has a very visible top rim and seam. None of the geografts line up right, and I worry that this is a misfeature of the FBX exporter rather than a problem with Blender.
I want to learn a bit about iClone before starting my 30-day trial, so at the moment I cannot test whether an FBX format works perfectly with geografts or whether OBJ would work better--or if using OBJ is even an option.
I imagine FBX was chosen in order to include lip-sync animations. Would it be possible to import the character as FBX and then replace the mesh with the better one from the OBJ?
Can any one offer expertise about how or if one can use OBJ format to transfer nonstandard avatars to iClone?