The Complete Guide to DAZ Studio 4
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Posing the lower part of the body

Once the torso is positioned correctly, it's time to tackle the toughest part of the task: the lower limbs.

Positioning the legs

To start with, we need to bend the thighs quite a bit. Let's start with the left thigh. We select it directly in the 3D Viewport, and then rotate it by acting on the Bend parameter. Next, we need to click on the Left Shin part and act on the Bend parameter as well. We repeat the operation for the right leg. At this point, it's best to not spend too much time trying to match the original pose perfectly; we just need to get an approximation of the pose. Let's check where we are at this point.

We are getting closer, but the surfboard is now in the wrong position. Let's click on it and use the Universal tool to move it under the figure's feet. Moving the camera around can help to verify that the position is correct.

Positioning the legs with Inverse Kinematics

The reason why we didn't spend too much time in positioning the legs is because there's a very effective way of doing that, and it's called Inverse Kinematics (IK).

IK is a technique that moves a series of joints based on the movement of the element at the end of the limb. For example, if we move the foot while IK is activated, the shin and thigh will automatically move to follow the position of the foot. IK is generally active when we load Genesis, but it can be turned off for those situations where it could potentially interfere with fine adjustments of the feet. We can verify that IK is turned on by navigating to Edit | Figure | Inverse Kinematics.

With IK enabled, we can now drag the left foot into position so that it touches the surfboard. The leg will follow. To do this, it's best to click on the left foot and then use the Camera: Frame tool. This action will zoom the camera close to the foot, a bit too close for what we need to do, so we need to use the mouse wheel (or trackpad) to zoom out a little bit, just enough that the leg is visible. Now we need to click on the foot, hold the click, and then drag the foot to get in the right position, in contact with the surfboard. The leg will automatically follow and adapt to have a very natural pose. The Bend angle of the foot might need to be adjusted a bit. For that operation, the easiest approach is to use the Parameters tab.

Once the left leg is done, we can proceed to the right one noting that the foot needs to be positioned further down, toward the tail of the board. The procedure is the same though and the adjustment should be done in a few minutes. Using the board as an alignment plane, we can position the feet at the right height and incline it, so that they seem to touch and rest on the board. If we try to move a foot further below the surface of the board, we can see that there is no problem in penetrating the object. Unlike objects in real life, 3D objects have no law of physics that prevents them from intersecting each other. For this reason, it's important that we work very carefully and make the feet rest on the surface of the board, but not much below. As we work with bare feet, in this case, we need to convey the illusion of them being slightly flattened by the weight of the figure. To do this operation, we need to push the feet just barely below the surface of the board. Not enough to suggest the intersection, but also careful that the figure doesn't seem to be hovering above the surface of the board.