Daz 3D Human History
Scott Livingston has an excellent thread on the History of Daz 3D Figures on the Daz 3D Forums:
Daz 3D Human Figures - A History
His history article goes into great detail on when things occurred and what works with what as far as Daz Studio/Poser are concerned. There's a lot of very useful information there!
Thanks Scott!
Victoria - The Shape of Things to Come
The Millennium Woman, who later became "Victoria - The Millennium Woman" took the Poser world by storm!
With shaping morphs and texture sets, along with conforming clothing and hair... she was a real breakthrough for the hobbyist 3D artist!
A wealth of official support items of clothing, props and hair, poses, character packs and textures, as well as those from third party vendors and freebie content creators flooded the marketplaces for this amazing figure.
When I first started in all of this, I didn't know the good from the bad, and internet was a Lot slower then, so I was constantly downloading free stuff to experiment with!
To me, she was a Vast improvement to the P5 Woman model.
I still believe that all generations of Daz 3D figures are some of the finest to work with anywhere. I stuck with V4 until very recently. In fact, I don't think that any other single 3D human has had nearly as much support by way of additional content to purchase or obtain freely.
I have a write-up on her here: Victoria 4
I see people still using generations 1, 2 and generation 3 and they are also quite immense in capability and availability of additional content and support. Especially when it comes to Aiko and Hiro, Freak and The Girl. The Generation 4 Kids have had a Lot of support as well.
Each generation of Daz 3D figure has brought with it an incredible upgrade in the latest technology toward articulate human 3D figures of their time.
Generation two was an upgrade to the first, which paved way for generation 3, Daz 3D's first "Unimesh" design - where all figures are derived from the same base mesh.
Generation 4 revolutionized 3D figures. They were the first 3D characters of their time with high polycount, high-resolution modern UV maps, and abilities for infinite morphs, along with a unique morph-following feature for conforming items.
Does anyone remember the early-on "Magnetize" pose files? :)
A fun introduction to Daz Studio video made before Daz Studio 4.xx and Genesis
I love using Carrara, that much is clear. But I'm also incredibly impressed with how far Daz Studio has come since... well, since before it even existed!
Generation 4 had perhaps the longest run to date before a new generation came along - Genesis.
With Genesis came a whole new software version to support this amazing technology - Daz Studio 4.0
Genesis' androgynous figure base added the unique ability to share clothing between genders, and Genesis was among the first platforms to offer morph projection, which allowed clothing to conform to figure’s body morphs.
It also introduced Sub-D Cage technology to the world of Daz 3D Human Figures. Daz 3D and their Premier Artists went Wild making all manner of shapes of all different sizes - creatures, animals, monsters, giants, fairies, adults, toddlers... there is an absolutely Enormous availability of shapes and textures for this fifth generation, and most of them use their own custom UV mapping!
My early Demonstration of Genesis 1 in Carrara 8.5 Pro Beta from 2012
One of my newer Demonstrations of Genesis 1 in Carrara 8.5 Pro in 2020
The unisex nature of Genesis was an amazing feat of genius, but proved a bit problematic for clothing artists, so Genesis 2 brings on the sixth generation with separate Male and Female versions once again.
Genesis 2 also, among other technological improvements introduced HD Morph technology, allowing artists to utilize high density modeling from Zbrush and the like into the Sub-D morphing capabilities of Genesis, allowing for an unprecedented new level of detail and realism.
Generation 7 - Genesis 3 started paving the way towards higher definition and photo-realism. Genesis 3 brought incredible detail, compatibility across the platform, and unique facial expressions with improved eye reflection and twice as many points of articulation for life-like movement.
Although it wasn't out very long before the next generation comes along, there is a lot of content available, perhaps even still being made for this incredible generation.
...and that brings us to today. Generation 8 took on the name of its generation to help keep from customers getting confused. If some folks say V4, most of the people of my Daz 3D generation would think they're talking about Victoria 4 of the fourth generation, for example. So instead of being called Genesis 4, Daz 3D made the wise move to simply call them Genesis 8.
The Genesis 8 figure platform is extremely versatile and the most realistic figure platform ever achieved. Through automatically flexing muscles, improved expressions, and default poses for new content, Genesis 8 made other advancements like backward-compatibility with all previous generations of Genesis.
Genesis 8 has been out for quite some time now and has some of the finest looking support content I've ever seen. With Daz Studio now also having d-Force soft body physics, it's even getting better and even more realistic than ever!
I understand that generation 9 is in development now and I have no doubts that it, too shall blow me away with the genius of the brilliant minds at Daz 3D!
Here's a fun little Generations video made by Daz 3D for Halloween 2015
...and another multi-generation video by Daz 3D from 2014
Once again, Scott Livingston has an excellent thread on the History of Daz 3D Figures on the Daz 3D Forums:
Daz 3D Human Figures - A History
His history article goes into great detail on when things occurred and what works with what as far as Daz Studio/Poser are concerned. There's a lot of very useful information there!
Thanks Scott!
...Under Construction
Have a Question? Just Ask!
I love to help others as best I can. This is a rather broad topic: CG Filmmaking, so my articles on any particular topic may not answer your specific question.
Most of the questions directed to me are regarding Carrara or How did I do this?
For these sorts of things, post your question at the Carrara Discussion Forum (or another appropriate category) at Daz 3D.com forums, and if I don't see it right away, someone else might. They are such a friendly and helpful bunch! I've learned so much from that forum over the years!
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