Ongoing - Sak Yant - Just Finalizing The DAZ Studio Script..

Thanks to the help on the DAZ3D forums I've now got the basics of my 'Apply Tattoo' script working with standard DAZ Studio layered images - and you don't need the MLIE/LIE ([Multi-]Layered Image Editor) for it to work, although the MLIE/LIE is necessary to change the tattoo colour.

I've been having some problems with my computer over the past few days, but I think that's resolved now. So I'll be tidying up the UI for the DAZ Script 2 script (hopefully no new surprises there...), doing some final testing, and then it'll be ready for release.

I've also mapped the tattoos to a few additional free figures not in my original list - Kirwyn's KEZ (original), KEZ-WM, KOZ-WM (for Poser ONLY [i.e. NOT DAZ Studio compatible] available from English Bob's Morphography),and PollyGon (from Adam Thwaites Most Digital Creations), Dawn (still free from hivewire3d.com till 31st October). And since there are still some marvellous Posette-based characters around I've mapped them to Poser 4's Posette and Dork. I've also mapped the tattoo set to fit the FREAK 4 and She Freak 4 morphs for M4/V4, since the standard M4/V4 mappings are too deformed on these figures. For genesis you'll be able to use the M4/V4 mappings with any M4/V4 textures, but I've also done a Genesis Base Figure mapped version of the tattoos, and I might even get round to a Genesis Basic Male/Genesis Basic Female/Genesis 2 Base Female mappings. Anyway, here's how a few of these latest mappings look:

Oh yes, I've got the mappings for all the figures in the original list done as well. If I do the extra Genesis ones I'll redo the Behemoth 2010 and Antonia ones.

For a few of the figures the tattoo crosses two or even three material zones, and for some figures these zones map to different images (e.g. the FREAK 4 tattoo crosses torso/neck/arms, and the arms part of the tattoo needs to be on a separate image). So I need to go through all the figures again and check. That should fit in nicely with the final testing that I'll need to do...

Ongoing - Sak Yant - Scripts

I've got my first set of sak yant mapped to most of the figures in my list (plus a few extra figures). The FREAK 4, P5 Judy and Genesis are the exceptions (the first two aren't installed on my system at the moment, and the last doesn't have a separate OBJ file - no problems, but I just haven't got round to them yet).

I'm currently working on PoserPython and DAZ Script 2 scripts to make it easy to apply tattoos using these masks. I'm starting with a simple script that will use a mask image (selected by the user via a dialogue) to apply a tattoo to the currently selected material zone of the currently selected figure (I've decided not to do the figure auto-detection and application to all required material zones straight away, since I need to do a bit more thinking about the Smart+ datafiles first).

The Poser version is very simple, seems to work fine in Poser 6* and 9, and is more-or-less ready, except for some tidying up and testing. It simply inserts a new Blender node at the Diffuse_Color  (and the Alternate_Diffuse if that's being used) inputs of the Poser_Surface and adds an Image_Map node (using a user-select tattoo mask image) to control the blend(s).

The DAZ Studio version is also very simple and works fine in both DS3 and DS4.5 using my ShaderMixer based material - the preview window shows a totally grey material, but renders fine in both using 3Delight, but not apparently in Luxus/LuxRender. I'm working on LIE support in the script to get round this, and it's now looking promising thanks to Richard and Rob over on the DAZ Developer Discussion forum.

*The preview pane in Poser 6 shows the mask image as the texture but renders fine. The Poser 9 preview pane is correct.

Ongoing - Sak Yant (Nine more figures)

It's progressing well. Nine more figures have received the sacred ink in the traditional manner from the arjan at one of my mythical S.E. Asian wats...

Looking good - maybe Antonia's is too low, and Behemoth 2010's is too small? I may rework those two. But I want to get the main DAZ3D and Poser figures' backs inked before doing any rework.

Ongoing - Sak Yant

The sak yant are progressing nicely now. I've got 16 completed now...

...and that's enough to go on to step two - applying the tattoos to a few figures. I'm starting with a fixed set of tattoos on the back - here's the layout:

I'll be applying these to all the figures in my Smart+ prop list. The procedure's quite easy - I simply need to project that image orthogonally onto the figure's back, and then bake the result onto the figures UV map. (I'm using Blender, and this is just to remind me of the main steps: set up a camera/light directly above the origin looking down; import figure's OBJ; rotate so surface to be tattooed is face up at origin; delete all vertices except the area to be tattooed; F5 material, select correct material, add new texture, orco, Flat, XZZ; load tattoo mask and render; adjust XY offset/size till it's correct; open UV view, create image 2048x2048 or bigger to capture detail; F10 bake, bake textures, save; edit in GIMP to trim off extra bits)

This is my resulting tattoo mask for Apollo...

... and here's how the result looks applied to him in DS4...

I think it's looking rather good now!

Ongoing - Sak Yant

For the past few weeks I've been busy working on some Sak Yant (S.E.Asian tattoos) for my next  freebie. The tattoos are based on genuine designs but are my own versions. The text on the tattoos is written in a Khmer Aksar Mul font and is based on my attempts to decipher the Khom characters on my source images. Note: even if I deciphered the characters correctly, the text is most likely meaningless gobbledigook ! So do NOT take these images to your real-world tattooist ! ;o)

Anyway, here's a few examples of the sort of thing I'm working on...