The new animation export feature with the D2B Bridge
benniewoodell
Posts: 1,969
So I downloaded the new update for the D2B plug-in last night to try out the new exporting animation feature. I had just forty frames and it was at two hours of exporting and only got to frame 17. Then I wanted to just bring a character over to see the updates on the Blender side and it started to go through the timeline again and I realized you have to set the timeline to one frame if you just want the character. I'm wondering if anyone else is finding it's taking forever to export, or is it just on my system? It looks like I was able to get the shape keys to show up in the export box for the Face Motion plug-in I use, so I really wanted to see if those would in fact transfer over as the animation on my timeline to continue animating in Blender, but I also didn't want to wait another two hours or so for the other twenty frames to export as I sometimes have shots that are 300 frames and there's no way I could wait that long for shots to export to animate in Blender if I ever want to finish this film, so I didn't continue with the test.
More than anything though, I wanted to see if the feature was the same in the update to the Maya plug-in where you can animate in Maya and bring the animation back into Daz to utilize dForce and render it. I got the free trial of Maya and it totally worked, and sure Maya Indie is only like 285 a year or something and to be able to animate a character without feet and arms moving when they shouldn't is worth every penny, I was like if this is a feature that's coming to the Blender plug-in, I won't bother with Maya and stick with Blender as I love that program. So if anyone who works at Daz with this plug-in knows if that's in the works, I don't need a date or anything, I just need a hey, give us some time as we're working on it, then I will save that 285 on Maya and gladly use that to buy stuff on the Daz site instead.
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Comments
Hmmm, okay so I found out it depends on how many expressions you have. I tried a G8F yesterday and I have more expression packs than I know what to do with, and so that held everything up as I have like maybe 10 packs for G8M, I just tried 119 frames just now for the animation I'm working on and it took like ten minutes tops to go through the timeline. So yay for figuring that out, must uninstall expression packs for the women if I want them to go quicker.
I'll have to play around and see what's going on now though as I don't see anything coming into Blender animation wise, or textures to my character. One step at a time!
We didn't even think about that! Thanks for the heads up. We will add an option to disable animation if you do not want to export it out!
But keep an eye on our GitHub that will always be the best place to grab the newest version of the bridge. You can also post feature requests and problems there as well! Thanks for the feedback @benniewoodell
@ DAZ_sam :
Swing and a miss...
Disabling animation export is not what benniewoodell was implying is needed, but it is a good idea to add as option for users who wish not to have animation automatically exported when not wanted.
However, it might be a good idea to add an expression collection box (like the one for general morphs that are not auto-exported [which is still hit-or-miss in some use cases]) to filter exporting only desired expressions over to Blender to speed up the export (as with benniewoodell's case of an enormous amount of expressions available to him, slowing down the export).
Then, on the Blender side, add a way to import any further desired expressions one at a time, or by collection selection for those needing to add more after the import.
But, what do I know... It's not like I have been working on a Daz Studio/Blender bridge for over a year or anything... Thanks for the shout-out... wait... no, nevermind... I've got to get back to coding -- Trying to code the auto-ERC for the auto-Adjust Rigging To Shape against the highly cryptic SDK is still kicking my ass, but at least I am still making progress. Hell, it only took me a little over two months just to get the code working properly for Presentation Color presets...
Now, the real question is; Did DAZ fire the master coder, Rob W. in lieu of cheaper labor, or did they hire extra coders to work solely on the bridging efforts. As I appreciate seeing you here, and hope you will actually be a liaison for us, I am rather fond of Rob and have been following him for decades since he first showed me the way to hack Poser CR2 files (not directly, of course), and I pray he is still gainfully employed at Daz3D...
Ah haha thanks for catching that for me. @benniewoodell sorry for the misunderstanding! So are you saying that instead of automatically exporting all the Expressions like it's doing right now, give the option to choose from the expressions? We do have it as a plan to fix up the Dazscript on DaztoBlender but, as the team over at Daz is small for the bridges @DAZ_vish and I will be the only ones working on it internally. I definitely want to make the morph exporter much better so, I am always happy to hear suggestions.
Sorry for missing you on my list! Just got you added. Also, let me know if there is anything I can help with.
Because Rob W. is not gone and I am thankful for that idk what we do without him as a resource. @DAZ_vish understands the Daz SDK more than me but if neither one of us can help we can bring it up with Rob when he has more free time.
You hit right on the nose our focus is on the bridges and learning how to make them better on our side but, we know how much work is already here in the community. So, my goal is to make sure you can get help with issues as well. Question on the SDK is just one idea.
I don't think Rob W. isn't going anywhere!
100% check box list for expressions would be great. Another HUGE option that Diffeomorphic has that would step things up is the ability to swap out a lower poly maniquine for animation and swap back to the high poly model for rendering. I have a robust system and still the high poly count of the Daz models and their subsurface modifiers great slows down any scene especially with 2 or more Daz character in it.
Absolutely, don't automatically export expressions if at all possible when you get a chance would be the best option, let us choose what, if any, we want. Quite honestly, I'm doing everything with Face Motion, which transfers with this bridge now, so I don't need any expressions, and if I need one, I'll tweak it myself in Blender. This way it could work both ways, for the folks that want to export expressions and take the time to do so, and for those of us who don't, we can get it exported much quicker. Thanks so much!