DAZ Page 1. DAZ3D to Unity (Objects and Clothing)

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Ira Mills
6 years ago
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1 DAZ Page 1 DAZ3D to Unity (Objects and Clothing) Saturday, June 20, :30 PM DAZ is not the easiest to get from objects from DAZ to a game engine and be as optimized as possible. This document will help tremendously. Note: MayaLT must be used for Character Models and any object that has a Skeleton and/or Animations. The process below is similar for MayaLT as well. Scene Setup and Prep-work: Get the object to be exported in the DAZ scene and positioned how you want it to appear in Unity by default. Mesh Reduction: If your mesh is more than 5k even then you may want to try this. Save your scene file as something to come back to. Now open up the Decimator Tab. Decrease in 5 or 10% increments for best results. Keep cranking lower as long as the model is holding up. Once you find where it is breaking down this is where you will want to be in the Real Scene File. Open that back up and do this again to just above the breakdown point. You are now Decimated. Surfaces (Material UVs) DAZ Objects have what is called Surfaces for the Textures and Colors. To optimize a DAZ object mesh it is important to combine like Surfaces into each other then rename them in the Geometry Editor. Note: Some surfaces have no Texture and only use a DAZ Diffuse Color. For this type of object we must tint this in Unity. Make sure to have your Model Naming already done in the appropriate spreadsheet. This is our cataloging method as well so does double duty. Very important! To check Surfaces and use the Geometry Editor: Your Tools Window is sensitive to the type of tool you have selected. It should look like below. You will notice below on this model that there is a Cobble and Wall Surface. This MUST be the same in Unity or the UVs will not should properly. So in Unity we will have 2 materials for this object.so basically 2 draw calls. Anything less than 6 for objects is perfect. If over 5 then we s hould really have a look at working with the UVs to create an atlas of like textures.

DAZ Page 2 Mesh Data and Stats: DAZ artists pay no attention to poly counts.95% of the time. So we need to check what this mesh has to know if we should Decimate it our not.

2 DAZ Page 2 Mesh Data and Stats: DAZ artists pay no attention to poly counts.95% of the time. So we need to check what this mesh has to know if we should Decimate it our not. We can use the Scene Info Tab to take a good look at the mesh data. Level of Detail Rules (for static and ambient objects): Note: Culling is set at 45.0m for LoD 1 and Billboarding Mainly the LoD should be every 5,000 Polys (Triangles) <5k - No LoD 5k-10k - 1 LoD 10k-15k - 2 LoD 15k-20k - 3 LoD 20k+ - 4 LoD

DAZ Page 3 Export Mesh to FBX: First thing we need to do is export the FBX to gather the textures. We will replace the FBX mesh with a cleaner one. The mesh will be OBJ and exported next.

3 DAZ Page 3 Export Mesh to FBX: First thing we need to do is export the FBX to gather the textures. We will replace the FBX mesh with a cleaner one. The mesh will be OBJ and exported next. Some artists define Props as Figures so unless I specifically know that it is not a Prop I leave the top 4 in Export Options selected. You can scroll down the list below to see what will be exported. You only want the Textures of the model you have selected to be exported..saves a lot of confusion.

4 DAZ Page 4 Export Mesh to OBJ: Why you ask? We want very clean meshes to import into Unity. FBX can have lots of crap we do not need in it. OBJs are clean a nd work really well for everything but character models. So we stick with OBJ. Blender and MayaLT work well with this step is the absolute winner when it comes to OBJ. Clean and super easy to manage the Group (DAZ Surface) and Mesh Naming. More on this later. Custom the OBJ Export as shown. I used => Lightwave 1 unit = 1m as the base.

DAZ Page 5 Import the OBJ into Blender (or MayaLT): Now that we have the mesh out of DAZ Studio we need to make a couple adjustments to it then export it back out. Import it int o Blender.

In this case the Cobble and Wall show as Materials within the me sh.which is exactly what we needed. Now you will change the Object Name and Mesh Name to what is in the Spreadsheet. Example shown.

Export the Model from Blender (or MayaLT): Now that we have the naming set we can now export the model and overwrite the one that was exported from DAZ Studio.

5 DAZ Page 5 Import the OBJ into Blender (or MayaLT): Now that we have the mesh out of DAZ Studio we need to make a couple adjustments to it then export it back out. Import it int o Blender. I placed a Base Blender.blend file that is clean and purposed for this. It is on the FTP in the Blender folder. When you Import the OBJ the hierarchy should look like this. In this case the Cobble and Wall show as Materials within the me sh.which is exactly what we needed. Now you will change the Object Name and Mesh Name to what is in the Spreadsheet. Example shown. You can also change the material names if you want to help with linking the Unity Materials to the model. Export the Model from Blender (or MayaLT): Now that we have the naming set we can now export the model and overwrite the one that was exported from DAZ Studio. This is also where you can make any scaling adjustments to make the model the proper size in Unity by default. Note: All of our Unity models must be on a 1uu = 1.000m import base. This makes setting scaling via script a simple % increas e/decrease as well as being able to tell exactly the size of an object. Make sure you are in Object Mode then make sure your object is selected then Export FBX and replace the one exported by DAZ

6 DAZ Page 6 Now drag the FBX model file into Unity 5 and check to see if the materials and mesh is scaled properly. If not make the adjus tments and export again. Edting the Textures: Fire up Photoshop or GIMP v2.8. GIMP is definitely the better choice on scaling images as well as needing this for the making of the Normal Map. Use what you wish for the scaling and exporting to PNG format. Most textures in DAZ Studio are in JPG format. They usually have a Diffuse and Bump at the minimum. Unity 5 use: Diffuse (Albedo) : Used for Coloring and the Detail Map. Also used to make the Normal Map in GIMP. Bump : Used Directly as Ambient Occlusion. Can also be used to make the Normal Map in GIMP This may need to be darkened to be used as AO Map Note: Do not use the Bump and have Unity convert it to a Normal Map. Take the time to make the Normal Map exactly how it needs to be in Unity 5. - Scale the image to 1024, 2048 (Design Default), or 4096 Whatever is the closest scaling. If the image is already at one of these.skip this step. Most images should be Convert the Images to PNG Tip! - You can use XnConvert to batch resize and convert all at the same time very quickly. Change the Diffuse Texture to what is in the spreadsheet. Example: castle_bridge_high_01_cobble.png Change the Bump Texture to Ambient Occlusion: Example: castle_bridge_high_01_cobble_ao.png Now we make the Normal map for each UV Texture in GIMP v2.8: Use the settings shown in the right pic below. For rougher models start with 5.0 or so then tweak from there. For smother models start with a 2.0. Once you get the feel of this you can really close with only 1 or 2 tries. Example: castle_bridge_high_01_cobble_n.png

DAZ Page 7 Note: Photoshop has an nvidia plugin that works but is tedious to use and the results are not as clean. This GIMP filter reme mbers what you just used and makes NMs crazy good and easy.

Example: castle_bridge_high_01_cobble Set the Material to Standard Specular Specular: 15,15,15 (for duller models) or 32,32,32 (for a little shine).adjust from these.

7 DAZ Page 7 Note: Photoshop has an nvidia plugin that works but is tedious to use and the results are not as clean. This GIMP filter reme mbers what you just used and makes NMs crazy good and easy. Now drag your Textures into Unity. Time to make a Unity 5 Material Unity 5: For now drag the textures in the same folder as the mesh/model. Now make a new Material and name it the same as the Texture. Example: castle_bridge_high_01_cobble Set the Material to Standard Specular Specular: 15,15,15 (for duller models) or 32,32,32 (for a little shine).adjust from these. Diffuse to Albedo Diffuse to Detail Albedo x2 (Optional) Normal Map to Normal Map chose Fix Now. If GIMP was done properly 1.0 power will be very close to perfect. You can adjust here. Bump to Occlusion (Optional) Now drag the Materials to their proper slots on the Model and check it out in Scene!

DAZ Page 8 Model is Tested and Looking Right: In each Category we have separate folders for each type of asset. For the Model Set there should be a Folder for it.

8 DAZ Page 8 Model is Tested and Looking Right: In each Category we have separate folders for each type of asset. For the Model Set there should be a Folder for it. Then wit hin that folder there will be three folders. The Prefab will go in the folder directly for use. Components will be in the following folders. Mesh - this is where the FBX Imported Model will be Materials - the Materials for this Model Set Textures - Textures for this Model Set

Mount Points Mount Points is a super simple tool for connecting objects together and managing those relationships.

Mount Points Mount Points is a super simple tool for connecting objects together and managing those relationships. With Mount Points, you can simply drag two objects together and when their mount points