Daz3d- 30+ days in Top 5 Tips & Tricks
I’ve been using Daz3d daily for the past 30+ days and still very much consider myself a beginner. Here are the top things that I’ve learned and/or found extremely useful. In no real particular order of importance:
Sales- There’s always another sale
Daz is really good about putting out some discount sales so I’m finding if I want something that is either not on sale or is slightly discounted-just wait. I don’t know if they do some weird statistic voodoo but pretty much every time I’ve said I’ll just wait the item I wanted ended up on sale the next day or so. Wonderful but still kind of creepy- in a good way I guess. Bonus note- wait for gift card discounts and get a membership card to extend those savings!
Shop Smarter- Buy Sets!
If you are new to Daz then trying to build a collection of usable items can quickly become expensive. One way to help make your money go further is to first really think about what you want to create and think about what items you will need to pull it off. Go a little further to think about other use cases for those items. Daz has a looooooot of items for sell and if you can- try to find the sets that will have multiple uses. For example I had in mind a campfire scene and another water scene that I wanted to do. I found a campsite set that was around $5 USD and there were lots of water scenes around $15 and up. There was also a big set on sale for $11 that had a fire, water, and other nature props that I could use for another idea I had. So that one bundle I bought had a lot of various uses. Think the same way with clothes. Why buy a $11 pair of heels not on sale if you can spend $3 for an entire outfit or if you really, really like those shoes wait for a sale or the discount coupon members get at the start of each month.
Opacity Cutouts
On the panel with surfaces and info near the bottom of an item there will be an opacity cutout that allows you to ‘delete’ portions of an item. For example I got a cute summer halter top that had straps that didn’t look right-like they were floating no matter how I tried to fix them. I selected just the straps and turned the opacity cutout to 0 and they no longer appeared on the model. This works for anything (as far as I know) that has the option available.
YouTube Learning
Daz3d has some really quick and informative videos over on YouTube about the software. The videos are several years old but still very relevant. So if you haven’t definitely, definitely give them a look.
Daz3D & Photoshop
Did you know that PS has a 3D mode?! I feel like this might be one of those features that gets overlooked unless you do 3D on the regular or it could just be I’ve been the only one missing out. PS has limited 3D functions but definitely enough to use your simple Daz figures (haven’t tried complex scenes yet!) for reference.
Bonus- You can PAUSE your renders as well as set priority!
My computer would basically through everything it had at Daz and Daz would make everything else come to a crawl as it rendered happily away. Thankfully going to Task Manager and giving Daz a lower priority and access to fewer cores made multi-tasking something I could still do in a limited capacity.
Ok so those are my 5 tips/tricks at the moment. A bit busy trying to get the next Skillshare Class up and running but hope to be back soon with some exciting news!
