DAZ Studio
Detail from "Night of the Fireflies" by Giovanino (DAZ Gallery).
For much of our work combining 3D and 2D graphics, we'll use DAZ Studio 3.0. This is a free posing, rendering, and animation tool from Digital Art Zone (DAZ), a company that maintains a store and virtual community for digital artists and illustrators.
DAZ has been producing software for 3D art since the late 1990s. They are best known for their photorealistic human figures, Michael, Victoria, and others, which are the most widely supported high-resolution models available at reasonable prices.
Though DAZ makes its money selling add-on resources for users of Poser, Vue, Maya, and other 3D programs, no purchases are required for our work. DAZ Studio 3.0 is available for download at no charge. Studio comes with pre-installed content, including a base version of the female figure Victoria 4.2. Other assets, including the base Michael 4 male figure, are also available free.
DAZ Michael 4 figure.
Note: I am accessing the DAZ site as a member. DAZ may require you to set up an account in order to download. There is no charge for membership. You will be required to give an e-mail address. If you are concerned about spam mailings (and in my experience, DAZ is not a spam threat), feel free to use a secondary or expendable account.
Also note that DAZ offers a second version, DAZ Studio 3.0 Avanced, which is a professional-level tool with additional features. This program costs money. We'll stick with the free version.
DAZ Studio is not a modeling tool. It simply allows you to place and arrange prefabricated 3D models, adding props and textures. You can control lighting and camera position, and render high-resolution graphics in a number of formats, using various lighting and rendering techniques. The program includes an animation timeline, and so can be used for CGI video as well as still images.
"Home Again" by Tugpsx (DAZ Gallery).
As you'll see when you visit the DAZ site, most Studio users seem interested in photorealistic renderings of female subjects -- what were once called pinups, and more lately digital babes. This is regrettable, since 3D art can be used for many other purposes besides glamour shots (see the image at right).
DAZ Studio provides a powerful, convenient, cost-free learning tool for this class. We'll use it to investigate UVW textures, then a bit later on, to generate scenes for art renderings and storyboards. If you're into digital babes (or guys), okay; but nobody has to be. While DAZ clearly makes its money serving men (and maybe some women) who like to look at young, minimally clothed women, no one should feel forced or encouraged to define their work in that way.
Finally, a note about the position in the 3D tool space occupied by DAZ Studio, Poser, and similar programs. They are not full-featured 3D packages, like 3ds Max, Maya, or Cinema 4D. They do not support modeling (though DAZ offers a separate modeler called Carrara). They are much less complex, and vastly less expensive, than industry-standard tools. Essentially, DAZ Studio is to 3ds Max what a Ford Focus is to an F-16. Technically, you could use either one to learn how to drive a motor vehicle, assuming all you did with the jet was taxi around. However, it would be quite difficult to teach parallel parking in the F-16. Simple tasks require simple tools.
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