Posted in 3D Utilities, Carrara, Lighting, Special Offers and Discounts, Spotted in the News
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Are you a DAZ Carrara user, but jealous of the DAZ Studio and Poser plugins for the free advanced LuxRender 3D renderer? Well, now there’s a new Luxrender plugin for Carrara! It’s called Luxus for Carrara and has just been released, at an introductory price of 30% off. There are 32-bit and 64-bit versions, and it works on Windows or Mac.
Freebies and an extra manual for Carrara Luxus can be had over at the Carrara Cafe website.
[Hat-tip: Jose Rendero]
This survey is a short follow-up to my ‘everyday’ goth girls survey. Goth boys are much harder to find for DAZ Studio and Poser, but I managed to find some quality 3D content in the same vein as my previous survey. Nothing here is too medieval fantasy, or s&m vampire, or camp 1970s disco-leathers. Just a more contemporary darkwave / goth boy look:
Duncan is an excellent M4 custom-made figure. Requires the Michael 4 Morphs++.
Dark Thorn for M4 and its Graver addon gives you a standard set of goth boy clothes for M4…
If you use Daz Studio 4.x and Genesis then have a look at Onyx for Genesis Male and its Nightwatcher and Darkwave textures addon…
Onxy also includes boots, belt, choker, bracers and piercings. More piercings in Goth Top & Peircing for M4. Update: This appears to be one of the items which vanished with the demise of the RuntimeDNA store.
Also for Genesis is a high-quality standard Main St. style black hoodie, Tre. It’s more skater than goth, but might look good combined with other more outre goth gear or for use with a wannabee-goth junior sidekick…
The textures look unconvincing, but Amazing Coat for M4 might be the black fanboy trenchcoat you’re looking for…
More boots needed? Have a look at Full Metal Stompers for M4…
Hair? Pure Hair: Punk can be easily turned from ginger to black with its wide range of MAT options…
Makeup? There’s hardly anything for goth boys, but Guy Liner M4 might be worth a look… Update: This appears to be one of the items which vanished with the demise of the RuntimeDNA store.
Toons? Again, there’s hardly anything for Daz and Poser goth boys, but Night Slayers: Mesh Tank for Chip looks like high quality texturing. It seems to be standalone, requiring only the Chip boy character.
That’s it!
Two beautiful new building interiors from quality content developer Jack Tomalin, suitable for a national library or a big museum interior: Aslan Court 1 and Aslan Court 2, both of which are currently on big discounts. They work with DAZ Studio or Poser, and there are light sets for DAZ 3 and 4.x. There are also OBJ versions, which is handy.
These interiors might work well with exhibitions stands and rope barriers from the Roman Museum Hall, and… perhaps a Cthulhu statue in the centre of the dome? 😉
A really super new semi-toon kittee at Runtime DNA, Sassafras. Update: This appears to be one of the items which vanished with the demise of the RuntimeDNA store.
An original figure for DAZ Studio or Poser, which can accept most standard poses.
Excellent new Yeti (Abominable Snowman) for Genesis Freak 5, complete with integrated Look At My Hair plugin presets for the hair. There’s also a Bigfoot version. For DAZ Studio 4.x only.
And just arrived, with a similarly Ice Age feel to it, is the cute Woolly Rhino — also with Look At My Hair plugin presets for the hair…
This is my survey of DAZ Studio or Poser content assets for Doctor Who, the famous British science-fiction TV series…
The Doctor himself:
So far as I can find, there are no M3 or M4 morph + clothing sets specifically for The Doctor himself, that are worth having. There’s a really rather ugly “Tom Baker” set for M3, and one “David Tennant” for M4 that looks nothing like Tennant, and frankly neither is worth having. [Update, May 2017: I found a fairly good Tennant face for M3]. You’d probably do better by trying to make your own, either with M4 for Poser or Genesis 2 for DAZ Studio.
However, there are some Wild West outfits that could be fairly easily adapted to be suitable clothing. Such as Wanted Dead or Alive for M4…
DAZ Studio 4 users should also take a look at adapting the Morphing Business Suit expansion for the Genesis Morphing Business Suit, and its Just Posh expansion…
There are of course a vast number of choices for clothing for young companions, but Dresscoat Italia for V3 has the right amount of “1970s” in it for a retro Pertwee or Baker-era Doctor Who render…
Enemies:
Your first stop for a new Dalek Empire should be Mechmaster who has a range of superb Daleks for Poser…
SamTherapy’s free Exterminate 2012 collection is… “A truly massive update to my Dalek builds. All canon Daleks rebuilt, 5 new canon Daleks, 4 new non canon Daleks. All models have ERC. Should work in any version of Poser from 6 upwards. Not tested in DAZ Studio.”
There’s also Dystopia Productions which has some nicely modelled P4 and P5 daleks…
Xantor created a free Davos for Poser.
More old enemies, for recreating lost episodes from the 1960s and 70s, are available from Orange Cow who has some cool old monsters for Poser, including some vintage Cybermen, an Ice Warrior, and a Yeti.
I’ve seen one good DAZ/Poser render of a Sontaran, but can’t find any links to the model online.
The TARDIS:
A TARDIS for Poser…
The Sonic Screwdriver:
A sonic screwdriver for DAZ Carrara. Also take a look at the free Retro Sci-Fi Multitool for Poser which could also be retextured as a sonic screwdriver.
Suitable sci-fi sets:
Stonemason’s ultra high-quality Planet Alpine and Planet Lava have a Whovian feel about them. Neither set is dependent on you having the other in your runtime…
There are also vast numbers of generic sci-fi corridors available as 3D models, including some nice ones from Stonemason, but I didn’t see anything that especially said “Doctor Who” to me.
Of course there’s also the free Doctor Who items on Google 3D Warehouse, although not as many as you might expect. The modelling there is often rough, the textures almost always awful, and you’ll have to export from Sketchup to OBJ and from there to DAZ or Poser. But there are a few quality models there such as nice Tardis Monitor screen 2010, and some rare TARDIS interiors if you really need one from a particular era.
That’s it!
Cute free Toon Dragon for Poser. Standalone, for non-commercial use only.
There’s to be a free Poser 2014 webinar with Steve Cooper, Senior Product Manager at Smith Micro Software. The one-hour live webinar will walk you though the new features in Poser 10 and Poser Pro 2014, on 23rd May 2013.
Here’s a survey of contemporary modern goth girls for DAZ Studio or Poser. No medieval armour, fantasy vampires, s&m lingerie, or Victorian-era frumpery — just a focus on a more contemporary look…
Characters for V4:
Emily Gothic expansion for Emily. Update: This appears to be one of the items which vanished with the demise of the RuntimeDNA store.
FW Helena for V4… Update: This appears to be one of the items which vanished with the demise of the RuntimeDNA store.
Lilah for V4 and A4…
Clothing:
Vast amounts to choose from, but here’s a core starter pack.
Goth Chick for Genesis (DAZ Studio 4.5) is flexible dance-club style goth outfit…
For a scene in colder climes, or perhaps a visit to a chilly crypt in search of cultists, try Bunny Fashion (requires Victoria 4.2 Morphs++). There are now a variety of texture addons for this…
Gothic Lilipop outfit for V4 and A4 is a little more cosplay…
As is the Delerium outfit for V4 and A4…
Lots of fine textures and details in the new Gothic Texture Expansion for Ooh La La…
Dark Rose for V4 and A4 is a bit quirky and has a variety of texture expansions…
Hoodlum for V4 and A4 is purrfect for exploring the catacombs…
Set two in the Urban Fae pack is goth…
The denim is too rockist and needs to be replaced with something in black satin, but Wicked Confessions is useful for a more ‘Main street’ / mall-girl goth look…
Hair:
Chilli Hair is a convincing contemporary street goth look.
Piercings:
Dead World Piercings for Genesis (DAZ Studio 4.5)
Boots:
Overknee Lace-up Boots and the Hot Boots expansion…
Teodora and Saraid Boots for V4 A4 are more your standard shoe-shop style goth boots…
That’s it!
FoRender is starting a series of complete Victoria 4 characters for DAZ Studio and Poser who look like famous actresses. The first is Restless for V4. I don’t recognise her, but apparently she is modelled after a Hollywood actress who many will know. You can suggest/vote for further V4 “famous” characters to be created in 3D by FoRender, here.
Posted in Comics, Companion software, DAZ Studio, Natural media emulation, Poser, Spotted in the News
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Smith Micro have just officially announced Poser Pro 2014, and they’ve even priced and dated it: 21st May 2013!
Here are the new features, with my comments on each:
* There’s a new Pro-version only “Fitting Room”… “to convert your existing clothing and props to fit any figure”. Useful, although third-party software such as CrossDresser (my review) already does that quite well and also works seamlessly for DAZ Studio too. Plus a related… “Morph Brush now supports Sag, Tighten and Loosen so clothing works better”. Poke-through, begone! Maybe.
* “Pixar Subdivision Surfaces for fast and efficient scene building” This means you can change the density of the surfaces on your model, by making the mesh looser or tighter. Looks like an on-the-fly polygon-reduction system, and one you can apply to any bit of a 3D model. Nice. Not sure how many times I’d use it. If I ever had a scene that heavy then I’d break it into background, foreground, character, and then composite their multiple renders together in Photoshop.
* “Bullet Physics for Soft Body Dynamics, Rigid Body and Hair.” Nice, for the small handful of serious Poser animators.
* A new “Comic Book Preview Mode” for color and B&W cartoon illustration and animation. A bit more on this one: “This feature will enable you to create comic art with fantastic line control and color, or clean black and white outlines with persistent shading even when rotating or animating your point of view.” Plus some new semi-toon characters which will ship with the software.
Sounds cool, especially if we can tweak it and can make share-able presets. The existing sketch mode in Poser can be made to produce rather nice effects. But I’ve yet to see a useful straight comic-book filter from any software, and I’ll be surprised if Poser 2014 manages to finally get it right.
* “Interactive Raytrace Preview.” Grainy real-time preview in a tiny window, but it looks really useful in terms of seeing what your render is actually going to look like, and as such could save a lot of time. Reducing the amount of wasted “fiddle-about-with-it time” can only be good, since that’s a real drawback in using DAZ Studio or Poser compared to iClone.
* “OpenGL Speed Optimization.” Nice. It was a bit sticky and slow, for me, so improvements are welcome. Not sure it’ll be as lovely-looking and responsive as DAZ Studio 3’s implementation of real-time Open GL, but we can hope.
And of course, the ever-present promise of faster rendering…
* “The Firefly render engine has been optimized for faster performance when Raytracing.”
So for me, the new version boils down to: it may render a bit faster, it has a useful real-time preview, and the comic-book filter might be cool. The real-time preview window looks like the must-have “killer feature”.
Anyway, judge for yourself. Here’s the official video for the new features of Poser Pro 2014…
New free robo character over at FoRender, for Poser and Daz…
Keep in mind that this is based off a famous Japanese cartoon character owned by Disney/Toei Animation Co., so can’t be used commercially unless you want Disney lawyers knocking on your door.
The slick new DAZ Studio 4.5 hair-growth plugin Look At My Hair now has a new free player that integrates right into DAZ 4.5…
“integrated in the DAZ Studio interface, the Look at my Hair Player allows you to load most pre-made Look at my Hair presets or .duf scenes, modify color and shader properties, hair count, thickness and render!”
