By Eric (RL) - 9 Years Ago
|
Hi everyone, here is a quick walk-through of quickly creating morph sliders using the new dialogue box from Character Creator v1.4
One of the new powerful feature introduced in Character Creator v1.4 is the ability to turn your creation into a "Morph Slider", in which you can either blend with other characters, or improve on it by tweaking the body parts to quick create a FAMILY worth of character content.
You can import Character Creator compatible meshes in either:
- OBJ format
- iAvatar format
- Using current character project already loaded in Character Creator

The process is fairly simple. I'm going to bring the old guy from above (also known as Winston) into Character Creator and turn it into a morph slider.
Go top the top menu, under Create, select Morph Slider

A dialogue box should appear: There are a number of selections and input boxes, and I'm going to go through them one by one.

1. Set Category:
This is the place where you can select which category your newly created Morph Slider will fall under in the Modify window. There are four choices: Body, Head, Eyes Teeth. I'm going to select Body since this is a full body character.

2. Set Slider Path:
You can input the "Group" that your morph slider belongs to. For example, if I selected Body in the previous option and input Tokomotion under Slider Path, then the newly created slider will be in the Tokomotion Group

3. Morph Name:
Simply type in the name of your new Morph that will appear in the Modify window.

4. The Min and Max Morph Value:
This sets the minimum and maximum ends of your new morph slider. 0 being the Source Morph, while 100 being the Target Morph (More on this later). Caution when setting a negative number for the Minimum value, as it may result in some really funky looking characters when you play around with the slider later! For simplicity's sake, I'm going to leave this in default. (0 and 100 respectively)

5. Thumbnail, select a thumbnail for your new Morph Slider.(Still in Testing)
You can load a 55 x 64 to 64 x 64 thumbnail pic here so that it will display along side the morph slider you have created.
We have included two template files which you can freely use. Find them under:
\Reallusion\iClone Character Creator 1\Image\Thumbnail_Template_Blank.png
\Reallusion\iClone Character Creator 1\Image\Thumbnail_Template_Male.png
6. Source Morph:
The Character Mesh that your morph slider will CHANGE FROM. You are essentially assigning the shape of the character that will appear as when the you set the Morph Slider value to 0.
There are three options: A. Default Morph (the one that loads to when you press the reset key in the Modify window) B. Current Morph (the shape of the current character as appeared in Character Creator C. File: The OBJ or iAvatar File
For this test, since I'm working with a default morph, I'm going to select default morph
7. Target Morph:
The Character Mesh that your morph slider will CHANGE TO. You are assigning the shape of the character that will appear as when the you set the Morph Slider value to 100.
There are two options: A. Current Morph (the shape of the current character as appeared in Character Creator B. File: The OBJ or iAvatar File
Since I want my character to morph from default character into Winston, and I happens to have a iAvatar file for this character, I'm going to select File and point to the right location.
This is what my final dialogue box looks like:

Other Settings:
8. OBJ settings:
If you are importing from an OBJ file, you can set the Axis of your character depending on which 3D modeling application you used for further modification. If you are using an Character obj file that is exported from Character Creator, make sure you also load the accompanied checksum file (in .ObjKey format).
Auto Apply to Current Character:
This will automatically change your character's shape into the Target Morph which you have previously set.
This is the end result:

One of the coolest thing you can do is to mix and blend with other characters.
If I load another character and turn it into a morph slider (In this case, Max, the strong dude), I can create new and exciting characters by simply adjusting sliders.

|
By hj - 9 Years Ago
|
CC 1.4 does work only with OBJ and with chksum fille.

The "chksum file" you get only with the export from CC 1.4 i can not import a Obj from another 3D-Programm into CC 1.4 :blush::blush::blush:
hj
|
By duchess110 - 9 Years Ago
|
When you export your mesh from C.Creator as and obj file it generates also an obj.key file it is saved where you saved your export mesh. When you start to load as a custom morph slider it needs this obj.key to activate it.

|
By hj - 9 Years Ago
|
The Head-Morph-slider changed the hole Body not only the head.
A head-slider should only morphed the head !!!

hj
|
By hj - 9 Years Ago
|
When you start to load as a custom morph slider it needs this obj.key to activate it.
yes i know this. But only CC create this file not other 3D-Programm. First you have always to export the Actor as OBJ by CC to get the obj.key.
hj
|
By GreedyPeopleSuck - 9 Years Ago
|
hj (2/2/2016)
When you start to load as a custom morph slider it needs this obj.key to activate it.
yes i know this. But only CC create this file not other 3D-Programm. First you have always to export the Actor as OBJ by CC to get the obj.key.
hj
Bump. It would be nice to have an explanation on this. There is no documentation outside of this post about this cuckery.
Why is a key file needed?
Why do you need a morph slider when you could just sculpt a model in ZBrush?
Why do you have to go through Character Creator to have a Crazy Talk 8 model?
Why does Character Creator not import normal FBX?
Is iClone 7 going to avoid these seemingly needless steps?
What is the release date for iClone7?
Is there going to be documentation written for these updates or are we going to have to ask endless questions until some kind soul makes a tutorial?
|
By R Ham - 9 Years Ago
|
Thanks Eric. Your instructions were straightforward. If only it had worked. It saved a cartoonish bodybuilder morph that was not even in use, along with the head morphs I wanted. I tried it twice with identical results.- How to save only the desired morphs?
Thanks. I look forward to your reply. ......................................................
OK, I think I get it. Is saves ALL the morphs, both head and body, including any that were present in the base figure you used - not just the ones in the category you selected. To save ONLY morphs for the head, it is necessary to RESET the entire figure before adding and saving head morphs. Always start from zero. Ha!
|
By vidi - 9 Years Ago
|
It would be nice to have an explanation on this. There is no documentation outside of this post about this cuckery.Why is a key file needed?
"Click the Export button to export two files, *.obj and *.ObjKey. The later one includes the DRM data for the *.obj file. DO KEEP these two files because you will need it when you load the modified OBJ Avatar back to iClone Character Creator as target morphing character."
http://manual.reallusion.com/Character_Creator/ENU/1/17_Export/Exporting_Obj_Avatars.htm
Why do you need a morph slider when you could just sculpt a model in ZBrush?
That would break the vertexorder. Like I say before it works only with CC Character Mesh as Morph nothing else
"DO NOT change the total number and structure of the vertex in the OBJ avatar by means of any features such as sub-division, slice, add/delete vertices... and so on."
|
By GreedyPeopleSuck - 9 Years Ago
|
Why do you need a morph slider when you could just sculpt a model in ZBrush?
That would break the vertexorder. Like I say before it works only with CC Character Mesh as Morph nothing else
"DO NOT change the total number and structure of the vertex in the OBJ avatar by means of any features such as sub-division, slice, add/delete vertices... and so on." [/quote]
That doesn't make much sense though, FBX is an interchange format. Why do you need to use Character Creator to use CrazyTalk, when you don't need it to use iClone? This seems to be a design flaw the software, not anything born out of logic. People who create for production are not going to use the character creator for much besides mockups.
Who wants to resculpt things? It takes a few weeks to model some characters, this is not a fast process, and you need to be able to edit topology.
|
By vidi - 9 Years Ago
|
Why do you have to use Character Creator to use CrazyTalk if you do not need it to use iClone? In this case, CC is the obj. Importer for the Morph target The 3D CrazyTalk Head is nothing more than the RL CC Character Mesh. You can only reshape the base CC mesh, as a morph target, similar DAZ Studio Genesis works. A uniform Mesh deform to many Shapes.
|
By GreedyPeopleSuck - 9 Years Ago
|
.
|
By GreedyPeopleSuck - 9 Years Ago
|
vidi (12/11/2016)
Why do you have to use Character Creator to use CrazyTalk if you do not need it to use iClone? In this case, CC is the obj. Importer for the Morph target The 3D CrazyTalk Head is nothing more than the RL CC Character Mesh. You can only reshape the base CC mesh, as a morph target, similar DAZ Studio Genesis works. A uniform Mesh deform to many Shapes.
I've only used ZBrush, Blender, and Max when it comes to 3D. I get blendshapes and morphing, what I don't get is this process. What's the point of the very nimble animation workflow if you can't import art properly?
iClone 6 has a nice UI, but the rendering is early 2000s for now, and I mostly want to quickly do facial animations in Crazy Talk. It can't be possible that nobody thought of using a life like model in Crazy Talk before, no?
You cannot subdivide, it's madness. 
|
By Delerna - 9 Years Ago
|
Here is how i see it Character creater is a tool that enables users to easily manipulate the shapes of many of a characters body parts with sliders. It is quite Similar to Daz.. Using these sliders you can make all kinds of characters for use in iClone
These sliders move specific vertices of the character around to change the shape of that part of the character. For these sliders to work then the characters mesh structure must always remain the same. You can export the character from CC and change its shape by moving the vertices around. But if you want to be able to bring that character back into CC you cannot add or remove vertices edges or faces. CC wont let you bring the character back into CC if you do that because the morph sliders will no longer work. DAz is exactly the same.
If you want to bring a character that has the mesh modified back into iClone then you need to load it into 3dXchange as a non standard character. You will be able to animate it in iclone but you will not be able to bring it into CC. Again, CC is a tool to make character modifications easy for users. But it only works with the base characters that it comes with. All those characters have the same mesh and bone structure and you cannot change that structure if you want the character to work in CC
|
By GreedyPeopleSuck - 9 Years Ago
|
Delerna (12/11/2016) Here is how i see it Character creater is a tool that enables users to easily manipulate the shapes of many of a characters body parts with sliders. It is quite Similar to Daz.. Using these sliders you can make all kinds of characters for use in iClone
These sliders move specific vertices of the character around to change the shape of that part of the character. For these sliders to work then the characters mesh structure must always remain the same. You can export the character from CC and change its shape by moving the vertices around. But if you want to be able to bring that character back into CC you cannot add or remove vertices edges or faces. CC wont let you bring the character back into CC if you do that because the morph sliders will no longer work. DAz is exactly the same.
If you want to bring a character that has the mesh modified back into iClone then you need to load it into 3dXchange as a non standard character. You will be able to animate it in iclone but you will not be able to bring it into CC. Again, CC is a tool to make character modifications easy for users. But it only works with the base characters that it comes with. All those characters have the same mesh and bone structure and you cannot change that structure if you want the character to work in CC
Yes, I already can do that. I have zero need for Character Creator as a ZBrusher. It's useful for mockups and dev art only. It's shouldn't be needed, but for importing to Crazy Talk 8 it is. Crazy Talk has very good results for what I want. I want to animate the face of a higher poly model since it exports in 4k. The Character Creator is crippled to 14,000 polys. You cannot import a subdivided model.
I would gladly work in 2D with a workflow to CTA3, but again CTA3 is crippled and you cannot work with raster g3 characters in 360. The wonderful g2.5 has a very awful vector workflow that makes doing it 3D faster if you want to animate multiple angles. Sigh, CTA3 could be good.
It looks like the key for OBJ import is only for DRM to protect models in the nearly pointless asset store. The program is intentionally cucked for this reason. :-( All this DRM and it seems like the program suite is pirated by most users. DRM will not stop people from stealing, in this case it looks like the opposite.
This tutorial and this thread has helped reconcile the uniformly poor documentation. Whomever designed the UI for the RA suite is a genius. Whomever is doing the graphic design well...let;s play a game. Which program is which? 
|
By Delerna - 9 Years Ago
|
Iclone, 3dXchange,CTA,CC,CT8
I was mainly saying why you cant change the meshes in CC I dont use CT8 to animate so i wasnt aware that you had to use CC to import 3D heads into CT8. Cant say anything about CT8 because i dont use it but sounds like it mightnt have been a good thing to make CC the only way to import into CT8
|
By Delerna - 9 Years Ago
|
Actually, i though Crazy talk 8 was a 2D head animation software? I know you can load a 2D head photo into it and use the photo to make a 3D head which can then be animated. I knew you can export that 3D head for use in iClone through CC
But can you import a 3D head into CT8?
|
By vidi - 9 Years Ago
|
I think your problem is still at the moment, understanding of all the tools, techniques and workarounds. it End here in a Turning in the circle I have no need for Character Creator as ZBrusher. It is useful for mockups and dev art only. Actually I use zbrush to create all of my moprh for the CC character.
Maybe with more knoweledge in the future you will understand what we here try to explain .
Good luck to finding your pipeline
|
By GreedyPeopleSuck - 9 Years Ago
|
vidi (12/12/2016)
I think your problem is still at the moment, understanding of all the tools, techniques and workarounds. it End here in a Turning in the circle I have no need for Character Creator as ZBrusher. It is useful for mockups and dev art only. Actually I use zbrush to create all of my moprh for the CC character.
Maybe with more knoweledge in the future you will understand what we here try to explain .
Good luck to finding your pipeline
I shouldn't have to find any pipeline, it should be clear in the documentation.
I don't know how I missed, but I found this: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BFWnWDUk2lM&index=1&list=PLNV5zSFadPdl8bX7wzxg2MGbhRjUvSt5J
The guy with the Asian accent is finally what I was looking for. Now it makes sense why Character Creator exists. Well almost everything makes sense. It's also very clear I was wrong about a few things, but my instinct is very correct. There are major issues with the scope of the software.
The asset store is a waste of time, and it's not a justification for DRM. It may have sounded clever on paper to monetize, but this software is best focused on the animation part, and pipeline to video games. The UI is amazing for doing projects on a small team or individual. If you have a large team, of course there are infinitely more complex ways you can do things. Nowhere in any of this do people have an interest in buying low quality assets.
I'm not happy about having to resculpt for Crazy Talk, I hope this will be addressed, and I sent a support ticket to figure out how I can import a subdivided model back into CC. It errors.
|
By vidi - 9 Years Ago
|
] The guy with the Asian accent is finally what I was looking for
Conforming Mesh or import a own character are 2 different things.
You can only bind an additional Mesh to a CC character . I do not think that is what you are looking for. It would waste of time to keep on that idea
I think, You want to import your own 3D sculptured and subdivided character, but that is not the goal of CC or CT8. You can only import FBX as Nonstandard Character to iClone via 3D xchange.
... and pipeline to video games I can get a subdivided model back in CC
I guess you are a beginner in game development? because Subdivision a model is not the best idea to make video games
Low poly number does not mean low quality but more power in real-time render engines
|
By animagic - 9 Years Ago
|
@nadiak: I think you confuse your own opinion with universal truth. iClone and associated products are not just a pipeline for video games. Doing some research would easily make that clear. You may not like the asset store, but I have found it very useful as a time saver when I make my films. There is really not just one way to look at things, as vidi already aptly explained to you.
Occasionally someone new comes barging in, telling us that RL got it all wrong and that the end of the world is near if they don't change their ways. It's between amusing and irritating, and it usually blows over. In the meantime RL is still in business, I believe for about 15 years now.
|
By urbanlamb - 9 Years Ago
|
Yes throwing mesh at a character is not the right thing to do even in old fashioned cgi less is more.
Game engines have strict poly counts for asset ... go look up the specifications for say unity the poly count is actually pretty low. The CC characters in my opinion are actually pretty high poly for game engines and if I were going to use em in a game would export and optimize them externally and not import directly to unity or unreal if i were making an actual game. Although the concept is nice with layers this concept lends itself better to making movies and such in unity.
You bring out detail with textures always always. The less polygons you can get away with the better. I like the CC characters for movie making, but in all honestly I would not use em in a game situation ever without 'fixing em'.
|
By GreedyPeopleSuck - 9 Years Ago
|
urbanlamb (12/12/2016) Yes throwing mesh at a character is not the right thing to do even in old fashioned cgi less is more.
Game engines have strict poly counts for asset ... go look up the specifications for say unity the poly count is actually pretty low. The CC characters in my opinion are actually pretty high poly for game engines and if I were going to use em in a game would export and optimize them externally and not import directly to unity or unreal if i were making an actual game. Although the concept is nice with layers this concept lends itself better to making movies and such in unity.
You bring out detail with textures always always. The less polygons you can get away with the better. I like the CC characters for movie making, but in all honestly I would not use em in a game situation ever without 'fixing em'.
Interesting assessment. I am still trying to figure out how to subdivide and reimport. It throws errors, but allegedly it is possible. Any ideas?
I find the polys a bit light for 4k export in CT8. I am doing more or less life like textures for the characters. It's much more noticeable the lost detail especially with very recognizable faces.
I agree on the games as well, especially if you are inevitably porting for mobile. 15k is way too many for most things. Fuse (Mixamo now Adobe) character creator has more controls over polys, but unfortunately they are not compatible with CT8 because of DRM. Adobe has kind of let development die a bit, which is why I'm so happy with what will be possible with RA software. I think Adobe just bought Mixamo to kill competition, and take the bits they wanted for other projects more than to develop it to what it can be.
For low poly I would use my own topology that is character specific. A couple more days more for much better results.
|
By Anna Mironova - 8 Years Ago
|
Could you please help me to understand what am i doing wrong
the problem is feet size for kids after using a slider seems like it stay in adult size and doesnt change at all (all other parts of sliders works just fine)
Slider was made from obj (figure on left) sourse morph - default _________________________________________________________ PS: remaid this slider using iavatar, now feets looks OK but still dont understand whats wrong with obj version...

|
By urbanlamb - 8 Years Ago
|
nadiak (12/27/2016)
urbanlamb (12/12/2016) Yes throwing mesh at a character is not the right thing to do even in old fashioned cgi less is more.
Game engines have strict poly counts for asset ... go look up the specifications for say unity the poly count is actually pretty low. The CC characters in my opinion are actually pretty high poly for game engines and if I were going to use em in a game would export and optimize them externally and not import directly to unity or unreal if i were making an actual game. Although the concept is nice with layers this concept lends itself better to making movies and such in unity.
You bring out detail with textures always always. The less polygons you can get away with the better. I like the CC characters for movie making, but in all honestly I would not use em in a game situation ever without 'fixing em'.
Interesting assessment. I am still trying to figure out how to subdivide and reimport. It throws errors, but allegedly it is possible. Any ideas? I find the polys a bit light for 4k export in CT8. I am doing more or less life like textures for the characters. It's much more noticeable the lost detail especially with very recognizable faces. I agree on the games as well, especially if you are inevitably porting for mobile. 15k is way too many for most things. Fuse (Mixamo now Adobe) character creator has more controls over polys, but unfortunately they are not compatible with CT8 because of DRM. Adobe has kind of let development die a bit, which is why I'm so happy with what will be possible with RA software. I think Adobe just bought Mixamo to kill competition, and take the bits they wanted for other projects more than to develop it to what it can be. For low poly I would use my own topology that is character specific. A couple more days more for much better results.
You cannot subdivide and re-miport into the CC. So unless your going to convert to a nonstandard character in the 3dexchange and have no intention of adding it back to the CC you can't do it. Subdivision changes vertex info. You can only sculpt the original mesh and move the vertexes around, but you cannot change the vertex order or add anymore or take any away. This was explained above and is in the tutorials dont subdivide or change vertex order.
If you decide to add mesh or take it away you will be needing to re-rig the thing and use it as a non-standard character via 3dexchange
|
By AasmundSchei - 8 Years Ago
|
Is it possible to create a morph for universal scaling of a character? (Like in the whole character)
|
By Snarp Farkle - 8 Years Ago
|
annamironova2007 (1/29/2017)
Could you please help me to understand what am i doing wrong the problem is feet size for kids after using a slider seems like it stay in adult size and doesnt change at all (all other parts of sliders works just fine) Slider was made from obj (figure on left) sourse morph - default _________________________________________________________ PS: remaid this slider using iavatar, now feets looks OK but still dont understand whats wrong with obj version... 
I ran into this a couple times also, not completely sure but I think it had something to do with using an avatar sent to CC from iClone and exported in CC as an obj, if I remember right it didn't happen when using an avatar created and exported directly from CC. It's been a while but I'll see if I can dig up the files that gave me problems and test it again.
|
By eternityblue - 8 Years Ago
|
I'm trying to create morph sliders for teeth, they import fine, and I can use the slider in the current session, but as soon as I load a new character in, the teeth morph disappears. What am I doing wrong?
|
By paulg625 - 8 Years Ago
|
Thanks for the info!
|