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By michael7 - 8 Years Ago
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I'm 3/4 the way through a project and at the moment I'm stuck. I have a character I've created in Daz, and need to finish the animation in iclone. This character has a beard, anyone familiar with Daz might know Garabaldi hair, which I made it from. But basically that's irrelevant because you can't import Garabaldi hair into iclone. So I converted the hair to an object. I then parented the object beard to the characters jaw. I also made a head of hair, converted to an object and parented that to the head. When I export this and bring it into 3DXchange, it's all there, and the head of hair stays parented to the head when I move it around, but the beard doesn't stay attached to the jaw when I test the jaw movements, it just stays in one place. The jaw moves through it. Also, now the character is coming in with really thick eye lashes like it's wearing mascara whereas it wasn't doing this before. So I am wondering if the object hair is somehow interfering with something because as an object each hair strand is an object. But my main question is, how do I properly parent something to the jaw? Can I bring the beard in as a seperate object once in iclone and parent it to the jaw then? Will that work on a Genesis 2 Daz character?
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By planetstardragon - 8 Years Ago
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it sounds like part of the problem is that you are parenting the prop to a bone, and when you do a morph - the jaw bone doesn't necessarily have to move - which sounds like that case here.
You can attach it in iclone, but iclone will do the same thing, ie - if you attach the beard to the rig / jaw - and use a morph to use the lips - where the jaw "bone" doesn't move, but the face morph does move.
in this particular case you need the beard to be part of the mesh, not just attached, so the deformations follow along. - especially if you plan to use morphs for facial animations. - right now you could probably animate the beard separately by following along with the jaw bone, if you do not require the beard to bend with the lips.
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By Cricky - 8 Years Ago
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Confucius Say:
The video above demonstrates that the Beard is a JAWBone and moves with the Bone of the lower jaw. It was designed this way because of the bone and morph relations that have to be taken into account when preparing Facial Morphs in 3dXchange. You can use a combination of Morphs and Bone animations in the 3dXchange Expressions editor that allow use of both Upper and Lower Jawbones to move the beard during speech. Not all Phonemes will move the lower jaw in the same amount (e.g. "A" moves less than "O"), so you take that into account when doing the expressions.
If the UV's are setup properly, the Beard can be made into soft cloth (as shown above in the demo) which allows more motion when walking or moving. It is held outside the body with Rigid Body "Collision Shapes" so it will not pierce the chest or neck if the character looks down or left. The original Toon Character this was based upon from Reallusion (Left side Model) would not allow this because of the structure, so I re-created him and made the necessary modifications to bone structure and UV mapping that allowed the Beard to flow as Soft Cloth while being "Pinned" to the chin using the PhysX Weight Mapping. The beard has multiple adjustable bones in it also, for the times when collision detection of the cloth using PhysX is not interpreted properly.
michael7 (6/9/2016)
I'm 3/4 the way through a project and at the moment I'm stuck. I have a character I've created in Daz, and need to finish the animation in iclone. This character has a beard, anyone familiar with Daz might know Garabaldi hair, which I made it from. But basically that's irrelevant because you can't import Garabaldi hair into iclone. So I converted the hair to an object. I then parented the object beard to the characters jaw. I also made a head of hair, converted to an object and parented that to the head. When I export this and bring it into 3DXchange, it's all there, and the head of hair stays parented to the head when I move it around, but the beard doesn't stay attached to the jaw when I test the jaw movements, it just stays in one place. The jaw moves through it. Also, now the character is coming in with really thick eye lashes like it's wearing mascara whereas it wasn't doing this before. So I am wondering if the object hair is somehow interfering with something because as an object each hair strand is an object. But my main question is, how do I properly parent something to the jaw? Can I bring the beard in as a seperate object once in iclone and parent it to the jaw then? Will that work on a Genesis 2 Daz character?
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By Rampa - 8 Years Ago
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PSD hit the nail on the head. The jawbone that your Genesis 2 figure has is not used in the facial animation in iClone, and so your beard will not move.
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By michael7 - 8 Years Ago
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Thanks all for the replys!  I figured out yesterday I would probably have to paint the beard onto the face and use a bump and displacement map. At least it is just stubble so I might be able to get away with the illusion. I suppose the other thing I could do if I needed a fuller beard is use an iclone character with a beard and make the character invisible and overlay the Daz character. Apply the same motion plus file to both characters.
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By michael7 - 8 Years Ago
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Sw00000p I'll take a look at that video again but I'm not sure I can get away with that with a Genesis2 character.
Cricky I'll watch that and see if I can apply it. Thanks.
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By Rampa - 8 Years Ago
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A displacement map is a good solution. Do it in iClone, as maps are easily loaded, and you have a lot of control over the displacement level and tessellation.
Towards the future, there will be an explosion of new CC clothing shortly after CC 1.5 is released. You'll also be able to make your own, of course. I've got a sense that we'll be able to make facial hair the same way we make clothing. So, you may be able to work entirely "in-house" soon.
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By michael7 - 8 Years Ago
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That's good news!
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By michael7 - 8 Years Ago
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Sw00000p, just to keep you updated, you might know this already but I went in and after I applied the Genesis2 male iclone face key to the character and looked at the key frames they do have the jaw bone move up and down with the morph, unfortunately it just doesn't come in that way into 3DXchange. I'm trying everything else first before I settle on painting the beard so looking at Cricky's advice now and trying that.
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By michael7 - 8 Years Ago
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Sw00000p thanks I appreciate all the advice I can get. Already did a fair bit with the phoneme / viseme, that's one of the primary reason I decided to get iclone, the Daz lip sync feature is horrible. I literally spent over a week in Daz tweeking the lip sinc for less than a minutes worth of animation till I had enough. Since over 3/4 of the animation work is already done with the main character in Daz I had hoped I could bring the iclone lip sync back into Daz and apply it to the character. Unfortunately either iclone or Daz, one of the two, was nearsighted in that regard and it can't be done. So now I'm bringing that character into iclone and will finish it there. So that's what all this is about. But I will be doing most future work in iclone. I will also be getting into the mocap very soon, another reason why I bought icone.
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By Cricky - 8 Years Ago
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Rampa, no offense, but you missed the Nail Head. You can use the Jawbone of the Genesis 2 models in iClone Facial Animation.
Both the Jawbone and the Facial Morphs can be used in combination when setting up the expressions, including the Genesis 2 models. it simply has to be setup in 3dXchange once imported. The Beard (depending on source attachment, parenting and/or linking) can be weight mapped to follow the Lower Jawbone movement. Using a combination of Bone and Facial Expression Morphs does allow the Beard to move with the jawbone.
Test then apply response. Analogy is: Measure Twice, Cut Once.
rampa (6/9/2016)
PSD hit the nail on the head. The jawbone that your Genesis 2 figure has is not used in the facial animation in iClone, and so your beard will not move.
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By animagic - 8 Years Ago
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@michael7: My advice: listen to Cricky... He has given plenty of valuable advice regarding iClone over the years. The importance is to get things done, and many have shown in their work that quality can be achieved in iClone.
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By michael7 - 8 Years Ago
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Thanks animagic. I'm pretty impressed with iclone overall so far. I wasn't so much so when I first saw some of the renders that are used to promote the product in some videos but I am now.
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By michael7 - 8 Years Ago
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Cricky I have my character in 3DX and I am in the expressions editor menu. The only reference to jaw in the sliders menu on the right hand side is Genesis2MaleCtrlJaw Side to Side. When I drop the jaw wide open the slider that moves is the HeadPhmMouthOpenWide. I assume that is just a face morph? There are no other jaw sliders. I see the scene tree on the left and I see the lower jaw bone in there but selecting that doesn't do anything. When I go to convert to non standard and I select the lower jaw there are options I can map it to. The default seems to be map to jaw. I can change it to map to face, is this what I should be doing? I tried doing that before and tried parenting a sphere to the lower jaw in iclone but the sphere doesn't move when I run a viseme animation, or open the mouth in any other way. I also tried maping the jaw to the extend bone instead of the face in 3Dx and went back into iclone and that didn't work either. I haven't tried the weight mapping yet. But where do I start first in 3DX? I want to thank you for all your help and I understand people have busy schedules. If this is to complex to get into can you refer me to a source where I can read about it?
Thanks again,
Mike.
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By michael7 - 8 Years Ago
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Sw00000p I can appreciate what you are suggesting, I really do. But that would involve me building the character right from the beginning and at the moment I just don't have the time for that. The Daz character/s has a bone hierarchy and Daz allows you to change all of that and alter the mesh as well, so I could probably fix some things but that would be for the future as it would probably involve a couple of weeks learning ( I assume ). Thanks for the advice.
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By Rampa - 8 Years Ago
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I think you best off using a displacement map. There is the downside that it is stretching the UV's, but some clever texturing might take care of that pretty well.
Here's a quick example. I would then need to add some new texturing to the existing face texture.
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By michael7 - 8 Years Ago
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Thanks rampa. This is the method I am going to use. It's just beard stubble so this will be the easiest method. Just want to learn the rest for future use to.
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By Snarp Farkle - 8 Years Ago
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rampa (6/11/2016)
I think you best off using a displacement map. There is the downside that it is stretching the UV's, but some clever texturing might take care of that pretty well. Here's a quick example. I would then need to add some new texturing to the existing face texture.
I'm confused rampa, you did this with a displacement map? I started a thread about a month ago on facial hair issues, see (HERE) and my conclusion in that thread was to attempt a displacement map but this isn't what I imagined at all, something like this would have real potential!
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By Rampa - 8 Years Ago
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Load this grayscale texture into the displacement channel for the head of a CC.
scroll down to the tessalation section.
Set the "grayscale base value" to zero, the "tessalation level" to 10, and the "multiplier to about 2.
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By michael7 - 8 Years Ago
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Well the displacement map didn't work for what I needed to happen. Two things happened with it in iclone, it separated the diffuse map from the body slightly making it look like the character had a skin peel, but as for the beard the mesh isn't fine enough to handle fine looking face stubble coming from it so it ended up looking like the character had a bad skin problem. I went back into Daz to see what would happen there and it's not as bad but it still looks like a bad skin condition instead of whiskers so this method is in the trash. I also realized ( took me long enough ) that I would never be able to do what I want to do with this anyway. I don't know if any of you are familiar with the Garibaldi hair plug in in Daz but it lets you make almost any kind of hair and they act like real world hairs that catch the light and alter in appearance with the light, plus they conform to the movements of the skin, so if you suck in a characters cheeks the hairs move with it. I hope/ I wish iclone picks up a feature like this in the future but it is more memory intensive. So initially, since the hair won't come into iclone I thought I'd turn the hair into objects, which Garibaldi lets you do. I didn't stop to think though that in the case of the beard it would be a static object. If I could pose the character with different mouth expressions and make the hair turn into objects conformed to each one, I might be able to then take those into the timeline and place them at the various characters mouth expressions but alas it only turns the hair into an object from the initial paint and not from a body morph. Turning the hair into an object works just fine for head hair, but not for whiskers that have to follow skin movements. So I'm left with just having the whiskers painted on the skin. Which is too bad because it really added a lot of depth to the character the way I had it. Really, this goes back to hoping one of the two companies will make it so that face animations can be imported back into Daz. Here is a screen shot of the character I mentioned and you can see the whiskers I am talking about.
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By michael7 - 8 Years Ago
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I wonder if I can turn the beard into a soft cloth. Anyone know? Maybe I can turn it into a soft cloth and pin it to various places of the face.
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By planetstardragon - 8 Years Ago
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there are several ways to do it -
1 - prop
2 - prop with soft cloth
3 - prop with springs
4 - simple texture map
5 - texture map with bump / displacement
6 - model with beard,
7 - model with beard and displacement / normal map
8 - model with beard, displacement map and rigged with bones for spring effect.
9 - mocha tracking in a video editor.
10 - get a friend with a beard and green screen him into your scene - i know someone who could pull off that clown look for the right price lol
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By Rampa - 8 Years Ago
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michael7 (6/11/2016)
I wonder if I can turn the beard into a soft cloth. Anyone know? Maybe I can turn it into a soft cloth and pin it to various places of the face.
Soon. 
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By Bellatrix - 8 Years Ago
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michael7 (6/11/2016)
I wonder if I can turn the beard into a soft cloth. Anyone know? Maybe I can turn it into a soft cloth and pin it to various places of the face.
YES you can.
Cricky obviously knows - and even told you in detail a few posts ago!
You need to slow down and read?
There is an even simpler path to get your Garibaldi beard on Genesis2 into iClone which will move when talking
no soft physics or complicated whatevers
which I was about to mention, but then I saw...
apparently you also want to export lip sync back to Daz!
that, is a very complicated pipeline - unless you're very experienced DS user
I can only say
go back to step 1: know your chosen character rig inside out
know Daz Studio clothing prop rigging tools
then more you know Genesis WITHIN Daz Studio
the more you know which iCloners have the right Daz-to-iClone solutions for Daz migrants
and how to filter noise from signal
cheers
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By Bellatrix - 8 Years Ago
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Nice video for Motion Builder users.
sw00000p (6/11/2016)
Bellatrix (6/11/2016)
[..but then I saw...
apparently you also want to export lip sync back to Daz!
that, is a very complicated pipeline - unless you're very experienced DS userIt's not complicated.. it goes like this: Just as you map Daz bones to use RL bones to animate in iClone.... You merely map iClone bones to "transfer" animation to the Correct Daz Bone.
Those who know their Genesis technology will know
No need to map Daz bones to RL bones
It's not news on this forum!
really give the OP some breathing room
one step at a time
to the experience Daz-iCloners it's clear where OP is skill/ info wise
hence I recommend
start with knowing the rig/weight difference between Genesis 1/2/3
then clothing process
then export from Daz process
then import to iClone process
the export to 3DX process
the export to Daz process
that's a lot to cover
before deciding if the workflow is worth it to the INDIVIDUAL
everyone has different budget for time
different learning energy
I can't and won't decide for him if lip sync i/o is worth it
not at this stage
too much info and noise can cloud judgement
I will stop now
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By Rampa - 8 Years Ago
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What are using for the lipsync in DAZ? I just downloaded the 32 bit version that has the Lipsync plugin with it. It is more accurate than the iClone lipsync, IMHO. Make sure your timeline is playing at 30 FPS.
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By michael7 - 8 Years Ago
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Rampa: IMO the 32 bit Daz lip sync is terrible as far as trying to perfect the lip sync. The audio in Daz lags greatly behind the character, or it zooms past it when scrubbing on the time line. It's not my computer I'm running I-7 32 Gb with a GTX 970 video card. Iclone has it perfectly synced all the time. And I like the phoneme pairing it does.
Bellatrix: Your right Cricky did mention it, and I read it. You said this: There is an even simpler path to get your Garibaldi beard on Genesis2 into iClone which will move when talking
no soft physics or complicated whatevers
which I was about to mention,
Please don't hold back this would be a perfect fix. How do I do it?
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By michael7 - 8 Years Ago
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I want to repeat this, just so it's clear what I need to do. The beard doesn't hang from the face. It's beard stubble, it needs to conform to the morphs of the face. I can only see three options. Being able to get the Garibaldi stubble into iclone ( IDEAL ). Getting the iclone face motion back into Daz ( IDEAL ). Settling on painting the beard onto the face ( satisfactory ).
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By michael7 - 8 Years Ago
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Sw00000p, please no offense to you, as I said before I appreciate help, but what you are offering does not match the situation. This isn't an issue of bone mapping. It's not possible to bring lip sync information as a bvh file back into Daz studio. Daz studio won't even recognize lip sync files brought in as bvh files that were initially saved within Daz itself.
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By Bellatrix - 8 Years Ago
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@Swoop - the "magic" solutions is called 3DXchange auto-retargeting.
existed for Genesis1/2 since 3dxc5
existed for Genesis3 courtesy of 2016 DaziCloners (Catlady/Cricky/possibly others)
(I would suggest for you to play with Daz Studio so DaziCloners can benefit from more quality guidance
but then I recall "indie chitty" Daz Studio is beneath you so I won't )
michael7 (6/12/2016)
I want to repeat this, just so it's clear what I need to do. The beard doesn't hang from the face. It's beard stubble, it needs to conform to the morphs of the face. I can only see three options. Being able to get the Garibaldi stubble into iclone ( IDEAL ). Getting the iclone face motion back into Daz ( IDEAL ). Settling on painting the beard onto the face ( satisfactory ).
Straight answers first
Garibaldi stubble to iClone, no.
Beard obj to iClone, yes.
Lip sync Genesis 2 back to Daz, no. Jaw yes.
Genesis 2 beard obj face moving with beard, in Daz, no (therefore in iClone, also no)
Genesis 3 beard obj face moving with beard, in Daz, yes (therefore in iClone, also yes)
Lip sync Genesis 3 back to Daz. Yes, but Daz import buggy not feasible.
*lip data and face muscle/morph data = different things
Now onto the bigger picture
Sound likes, your primary intent = use iClone to extract lipsync data for use on your preferred Genesis
If so, you never needed to import a fully-accessorized/ beardy Genesis in the first place!
(which also means all beard related matters = secondary issue)
Now onto the primary issue:
Indeed, Lip Sync - even the free 32 bit one - in Daz Studio has far better output than iClone on any Genesis.
Paid version of Daz Mimic has fine-tuning options. Not the greatest but does the job.
Lip sync in iClone is great - for CC character only. The rest suffer from little fine-tuning.
But don't take my words for it
If you still wish to use iClone to produce lip sync data for Genesis, see the BVH route.
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By michael7 - 8 Years Ago
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Bellatrix (6/12/2016)
@Swoop - the "magic" solutions is called 3DXchange auto-retargeting. existed for Genesis1/2 since 3dxc5 existed for Genesis3 courtesy of 2016 DaziCloners (Catlady/Cricky/possibly others) (I would suggest for you to play with Daz Studio so DaziCloners can benefit from more quality guidance but then I recall "indie chitty" Daz Studio is beneath you so I won't ) michael7 (6/12/2016)
I want to repeat this, just so it's clear what I need to do. The beard doesn't hang from the face. It's beard stubble, it needs to conform to the morphs of the face. I can only see three options. Being able to get the Garibaldi stubble into iclone ( IDEAL ). Getting the iclone face motion back into Daz ( IDEAL ). Settling on painting the beard onto the face ( satisfactory ).
Straight answers first Garibaldi stubble to iClone, no. Beard obj to iClone, yes. Lip sync Genesis 2 back to Daz, no. Jaw yes. Genesis 2 beard obj face moving with beard, in Daz, no (therefore in iClone, also no) Genesis 3 beard obj face moving with beard, in Daz, yes (therefore in iClone, also yes) Lip sync Genesis 3 back to Daz. Yes, but Daz import buggy not feasible. *lip data and face muscle/morph data = different things Now onto the bigger picture Sound likes, your primary intent = use iClone to extract lipsync data for use on your preferred Genesis If so, you never needed to import a fully-accessorized/ beardy Genesis in the first place!
(which also means all beard related matters = secondary issue)Now onto the primary issue: Indeed, Lip Sync - even the free 32 bit one - in Daz Studio has far better output than iClone on any Genesis. Paid version of Daz Mimic has fine-tuning options. Not the greatest but does the job. Lip sync in iClone is great - for CC character only. The rest suffer from little fine-tuning. But don't take my words for it If you still wish to use iClone to produce lip sync data for Genesis, see the BVH route.
I knew about converting Garibaldi to an object. I mentioned that and made the head hair that way, I thought it was in this thread but it could be somewhere else.
I just want to be clear, here's my primary intent. My drive is in making good animations. Really good executions of comedy scripts. 3/4 of just one script have been done in Daz. I'm tired, very tired of the poor lip sync features in Daz. I agree with you that Daz does a decent enough job of getting an initial lip sync moderately close to matching the voice to the audio. But it is still very far removed from how good I need it to be. I've already mentioned what the issues are but I'll state them again. It it HORRIBLE when it comes to scrubbing on the time line. It can't keep the visual up with the audio when scrubbing, even when in wire frame mode. It is either too slow, or it zooms past where I need it to be. It is a low grade time consuming way of working. Iclone on the other hand, doesn't do the job as well as Daz does with the initial lip sync, but it excels over Daz because it doesn't have any lag when it comes to scrubbing and fine tuning. Not any that's important anyhow. This saves SO MUCH TIME, and makes it enjoyable to work with. I NEED to be able to listen to the voice and watch the facial mouth movements to get the right expression at the right place.
I also like the fact that iclone renders significantly faster than Daz. And it's easier to animate characters. I intend to use iclone for most of my work that I need to finish because of all of this.
You can no longer buy the paid version of Mimic for Daz. I tried a month and a half ago, it's gone. Daz has no answers for when or if it will be brought back.
You mentioned about going the BVH route if I wanted to use iclone to bring lip sync into Daz. I did mention this but maybe you didn't see it. Daz will not recognize BVH lip sync information, not even BVH files with lip sync information saved within Daz itself.
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By michael7 - 8 Years Ago
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Sw00000p wrote:
" michael7, please no offense to you, but if Daz doesn't support importing bvh.... "Why ask how to...."
Obviously because I just figured that out. And let me be clear, it supports BVH, when it comes to body animation. But not facial morphing animation.
Sw00000p I have a specific need for a specific character. I don't have the time frame to build a character from scratch. Please quit parroting the same thing over and over. I've settled on a solution, this should be the end of this thread. I am not going to build a mesh with a massive amount of facial hair coming from it. I hope this is clear.
I don't think it's that hard for this forum to be treated as it was built for, helpful adults helping adults who have specific needs. Not people who want to get into pissing contests with each other over who knows more etc. etc.
It's not that hard, if you are a helpful adult, to write a clear and concise instruction set on how to fully perform any given operation, instead of little teasing tidbits here and there.
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