Swidhelm’s Skywyrm Copyright Darrin Smith (Swidhelm) 2008 Table of Contents 1. About Dragons, a Brief Summary 2. The Name Explained 3. Package Contents 4. Instalation 5. Wings: A Detailed Explanation and Tips 6. Known Issues 7. File List Requirements: Poser 6 (Not tested in 7, and Daz Studio lacks the cloth simulation, though the poses and props may still work.) All of this product's content was created by Swidhelm (Darrin Smith) 1. About Dragons, a Brief Summary Greetings fellow dragon enthusiasts! Some of you have been watching for this release, while others of you may have just discovered it. Either way the fact that you purchased such a beast says to me you are indeed a dragon lover. That is good tidings. First I’d like to define just what a dragon is. Some in these modern days seem to be hung up on TSR rules. Cast them aside, as they mean nothing. Look deeper into human culture and you will find varying dragon folklore from all over the world, including the Inuit, despite them never having seen a reptile. There are varying theories as to why dragons are so prominent in human culture, one citing that the mythology can trace its origins back to primitive discoveries of dinosaur fossils. Either way, their mythology is vast and varied. Dragons can be depicted in almost any manner you like. Probably the most common depiction is that of a six limbed creature—two wings, and four legs of which to walk on. But there are others such as four limed serpents with two wings and only two legs much like a bird or bat, and of coarse there are those that are much more serpent like displaying no limbs whatsoever. Some breathe fire, though that I think was largely a Judaic idea taken from the scriptures of the bible that describe Leviathan. Dragons from India hunted elephants, but used their tails to entangle, not their breath. Some were said to be venomous with hot breath and use the cool blood of the elephant to cool themselves. Either way the myths are broad and many. My favorite depictions however are like you see in a few modern films, mainly Paramount’s Dragon Slayer and Touchstone’s Reign of Fire directed by Rob Bowman—two wings, two legs, and a whole lot of attitude. 2. The Name Explained Skywyrm. That’s right, I named my great dragon Skywyrm. Sky for obvious reasons, reflecting its ability to fly, and wyrm from the old English or old Norse word for serpent. My dragon is thus named for its vast wings and its reptilian heritage. I went through a few different wing designs as well before eventually settling on the more or less borrowed design from Reign of Fire, and as a result I felt he deserved a name that reflected his likely ability to dominate the air. As Christain Bale so eloquently put it, “That’s their territory!” 3. Package Contents Now to the meat of the Readme—what does this package contain that will allow you to make use of said Skywyrm? Well, I will delight in explaining them to you. 1: Dragon figure, fully rigged with IK chains in his legs. 2: Two types of membrane props, both dynamic and static. Two types of dynamic as well, for more controll 3: A series of poses to get you started quickly 4: Some props for the head to add spineties and quills. (yes I said spineties!) 5: Two Material Collections, Dark and Zebra 6: A Tutorial in pdf format onw the use of the dynamic membranes 7: Readme and License files **I found even with my duo core system with a gig of ram I can’t simulate the higher res membranes so I did not include them except in prop form. Within the pose folder there are a number of dynamic poses as well as resting poses. Note that I made use of Ajax’s Easypose, and that does not save in the library when saving a pose, so tail and neck will have to be adjusted unless I adjusted them manually in said pose. Materials The Material Collections folder contains all the material collections for the two mats included with the dragon. There is the dark and the zebra textures, with collections for both the body and head, and the wings, for both sets of dynamic props. Also because the pre-simulated props use the same material zones as the dynamic props, they will respond two the material collection settings as well. Note that this is for Poser 6 use, which does not use .bum files. Morphs The figure itself has a number of morphs, both for the body and the head. Not as dramatic as some figures but still certainly worth having. Body: Side Thorns, Mid Thorns Upper, Mid Thorns Lower, Small Eyes, Bony Fingers Head: Sunken Cheeks, Brow Narrow 2, Brow Narrow 1, Brow Flat, Nose Ridge 1, Head Top Lumpy, Nose Synched Eyes: Eyes Blink, Eyes Wide, Eyes Wince, f-eyes small (Full Body Morph reference) Mouth: Mouth Closed Fix, Snarl Upper, Snarl Bottom, Membranes Drawn, Mouth Membranes Closed Eyes: r-eye-slit, l-eye-slit, f-eyes small (Full Body Morph reference) Jaw: Thorns Small IK Chains There are IK chains within the hierarchy, at least for the legs. I tried for the wings, but I think the extra elbow joint cased issues. They are still there, but none of the IK chains are enabled. You can enable them simply by going into the hierarchy editor, scrolling down to the bottom and checking the boxes. They are useful for animations on the ground. 4. INSTALLATION: Installing the dragon is easy enough. The zip contains all the folders in their correct location. Extract the files witihin your Poser directory. It will tell you that the Runtime folder already exists and asks if you wish to overwrite it. Answer yes to this, and all the files should be placed in the correct folders. If not the file list and location is below. Just copy the files to their corresponding folder. 5. Wings Okay this is the part that may surprise some. I looked a great detail the way the many wings were done for poser, everything from a pteradon, to a bat. Part of what bothers me about many membranes for poser is caused by poser’s inability to have children bones next to children bones—do that and you get tears in the mesh. You’ll note that most membranes for any figures out there with wings end just below the arm pit, or right near the shoulder of the wing itself. This I find silly. Study a bat’s wing and you’ll quickly note that the membrane follows its body all the way to its legs and in some species between its legs to attach to a tail. I wanted to figure out how to accomplish this in poser and spent a long time working with different rigs and experimenting. It wasn’t until I was watching the behind the scenes footage of Reign of Fire and they showed clips of the dragon flying un-rendered that I noticed the membranes reacted to the air in the environment. The proverbial light bulb came on in my bulbous noggin! I had an epiphany! The cloth lab!! Well even that wasn’t as simple as one might think. It took much experimentation to find a simulation setting and a base pose that worked—which incidentally is why I have two sets of dynamic membranes. One set is the whole membrane to simulate all at once which is useful for quick pics, depending on the pose. The other is broken up into two parts, finger membrane, and from finger to chest. This allows for more dynamic control over what each section is doing, and is much better suited to detailed flight animations. What this all let me do was pose the wings in ways that no other figure for poser is able to. I have free run of space and can arc fingers bend them back, curve them forward, control over where each section of the wing goes, from wrist to hand, with three additional appendages coming off the arm too. The wing design I chose too was one that does not fold up, but is used to walk on. Those poses I have found are the only poses that can cause issues when simulating. Just depends on where the elbow appendage is. But with experimentation, and examining the poses I have made available you will see what I mean in no time and easily adapt. It is not a big deal, just limitations of both physics, and the wing design itself. I did not see those issues before hand. To sum up: Dynamic Membrane Full: Quicker to simulate, great for quick images. Dynamic Membrane two part: Better for more dynamic control over said sections lending more realism in animations. Static membranes: Props included that fit the poses included for those that are unfamiliar with the cloth lab, or just want to throw together a quick image. Low res and hi res props are included. Note, they are parented to the hip, so if you are going to move the dragon around make sure you select the hip to do so. Also, make sure to select the pose for the dragon before loading the prop or it ends up coming in at funny angles. Cloth Room Wing Parameters I came up with these settings after much experimentation. However they are just a guide. Feel free to experiment as you see fit. I’m sure someone may come up with better settings. I encourage posting the settings you use with your image as well, that may help others. Would be very useful and would benefit the community. Membranes Whole Fold Resistance 300 Shear 50 Stretch resistance 0.00 stretch damping 1.0000 cloth density 0.0001 cloth self friction 0.0000 static friction 0.5 dynamic friction 0.1 Air Damping 0.0001 Membranes Part Fingers Fold Resistance 300 Shear 50 Stretch resistance 0.00 stretch damping 0.0100 cloth density 0.0100 cloth self friction 0.0000 static friction 0.5 dynamic friction 0.1 Air Damping 0.1000 Base Fold Resistance 300 Shear 50 Stretch resistance 0.00 stretch damping 0.0100 cloth density 0.0003 cloth self friction 0.0000 static friction 0.5 dynamic friction 0.1 Air Damping 0.0200 Important Note: I’ve found that once a large simulation file is created and saved for an animation, the effects of the .dyn file can corrupt use of the dragon in Poser later on. I found it made use of the material room impossible and doing new simulations impossible. It essentially broke the dragon. I panicked the first time this happened, but discovered if I delete the .dyn file associated with that save file then all problems are corrected. So if making extensive animations I’d suggest working on each section of footage one at a time, exporting the animation if you can, then deleting the .dyn file before working on the next segment. This was on my old PC and my new PC, but it may not occur on every PC. But best to give a warning and a solution just incase it happens to anyone else. But again it is only large .dyn files that seem to do it. Small ones never cause a problem. Only when I have about 100 frames or more. I also find that sometimes because the membranes aren’t as high res as I would like, I get a noticeable poly shape where the membranes arch. Normally this doesn’t bother me, and was actually done to keep simulation times reasonable. However, what I will do sometimes, and I encourage this, is once a simulated wing is finished, at least for still images, export the membrane from the frame you wish to use it in, and import it into your favorite modeler. (provided you actually model.) I use Wings3D. That’s right! I used Wings3D to model this bad boy. But you can use other 3D apps that have a subdivide feature. Once imported, I select the entire object, but then deselect the underside polys that are “holes” and then smooth the whole thing. Export to wherever, and import your much smoother already simulated membranes into poser for your scene. Can’t really do that for animations, however if you are hardcore 3D and do model, and plan on using the dragon in good high quality animations, I’d suggest exporting the base membrane meshes, subdividing them, and re-importing them to use in simulations. I just found my system crawled when they were much higher. Simulating When simulating the wings there are a few things you need to know. That is which joint’s to collide against, and which options are required in the simulation setup. I will give all the info you need here, but see the tutorial for a more drawn out explanation. Add Remove > Ignore the mid and in, as they are just the small fingers\toes and do not need to be selected. This goes for Thumb as well. The list isn’t in proper order, but it does give you everything you need to have selected. Might be easier to select the whole body, and then deselect the bones you don’t need. The list is large either way. But I find if I have the entire figure selected it slows down the process considerably. Note: You will want to have “Start Draping from Zero Pose” deselected. The dragon was modeled one way, but the membranes rely on a tighter pose to reduce folding. That is the “default” pose. It is the pose you will want to start with when draping or simulating un-simulated wings. Chest, Abdomen, Hip, Right Collar, Right Shoulder, Right Elbow, Right Elbow 1, Right Elbow 2, Right Elbow 3, Right Forearm, Right Wrist, Right Extender, Right Hand, Right Index 1, Right Index 2, Right Index3, Right Middle 1, Right Middle 2, Right Middle 3, Right ring 1, Right Ring 2, Right Ring 3, Right Guide 1, Right Guide 2, Left Collar, Left Shoulder, Left Elbow, Left Elbow 1, Left Elbow 2, Left Elbow 3, Left Forearm, Left Wrist, Left Extender, Left Hand, Left Index1, Left Index 2, Left Index3, Left Middle 1, Left Middle 2, Left Middle 3, Left Ring 1, Left Ring 2, Left Ring 3, Left Guide 1, Left Guide 2 Tail 1, Tail 2, Tail 3, Tail 4, Tail 5, Tail 6, Tail 7, Right Thigh Left Thigh I select the thigh incase you get any sagging. You don’t want the membrane to clip with the thigh. There are two materials to make use of in the dynamic grouping as well. There is a constrained material, which is the areas of the membranes that adhere to the fingers and arms, and then there is the dynamic material which is meant to react to environment—fold, billow, etc. When grouping, make sure your dynamic settings match the dynamic groups as well. And save, save, save: best to save as often as possible. 6. Known Issues The model is not 100% symmetrical, and therefore won’t pose 100% symmetrical when using the symmetry options in the figure menu. IK chains react strange in the arms\wings, so best not to use them at present. I’ve found when simulating large animations and saving the file (which saves a .dyn file) can cause the dragon to stop working properly, and the cloth room to not work when the dragon is loaded. The material room also fails. However when you delete the .dyn file everything is fine. So if working on large animations, just keep that in mind. 7. File List The folder layout is fairly simple. Runtime > libraries > Character > Swidhelm’s Skywyrm Skywyrm.cr2 Skywyrm.obj Skywyrm.png Runtime > libraries > Props > Swidhelm’s Skywyrm Air Attack-hi.png Air Attack-hi.pp2 Air Attack-low.png Air Attack-low.pp2 Crawl-hi.png Crawl-hi.pp2 Crawl-low.png Crawl-low.pp2 Glide-hi.png Glide-hi.pp2 Glide-low.png Glide-low.pp2 Membranes-Fingers.png Membranes-Fingers.pp2 Membranes-Full.png Membranes-Full.pp2 Membranes-Shoulders.png Membranes-Shoulders.pp2 Rear-hi.png Rear-hi.pp2 Rear-low.png Rear-low.pp2 Reign-hi.png Reign-hi.pp2 Reign-low.png Reign-low.pp2 Spines.png Spines.pp2 Swoop-hi.png Swoop-hi.pp2 Swoop-low.png Swoop-low.pp2 Runtime > libraries > pose > Swidhelm’s Skywyrm Air Attack.png Air Attack.pz2 Crawl.png Crawl.pz2 Default.png Default.pz2 Glide.png Glide.pz2 Rear.png Rear.pz2 Reign.png Reign.pz2 Swoop.png Swoop.pz2 Runtime > textures > Swidhelm’s Skywyrm body-bump.jpg body-colour-dark.jpg body-zebra.jpg eye-blue.jpg eye-bronze.jpg eye-red.jpg head-bump.jpg head-dark.jpg head-zebra.jpg spines-bump.jpg spines-dark.jpg spines-zebra.jpg wing-bump.jpg wings-dark.jpg wings-zebra.jpg wings-trans no holes.jpg Runtime > libraries > materials > Swidhelm’s Skywyrm Hide Dark.mc6 Hide Dark.png Hide Zebra.mc6 Hide Zebra.png Spines Dark.mc6 Spines Dark.png Spines Zebra.mc6 Spines Zebra.png Wings Dark.mc6 Wings Dark.png Wings Zebra.mc6 Wings Zebra.png The figure mesh is in the Character > Swidhelm’s Skywyrm folder. Within the Props Folder there are spines for the head, and of coarse pre-simulated wings to go with the poses for quick images or for those who do not like the cloth lab, or have trouble using the cloth lab. There are both hi-res and low-res versions, the hi res being higher than the membranes available to simulate. The low res props however are there simply to conserve memory. Thank you again for your interest in my Skywyrm. I hope the information in this readme has been useful to you. I know it is a lot of info, but the beastie is a bit complicated. Good art, I always say, is not done in a day—tedious to work with at times, but worth it. Cheers Swidhelm