[Released] Sci-Fi Female: Morph Character Pack

Introducing a first of it's kind, the Morph Character Pack, from Morph 3D!

Morph Character Packs have multiple outfits, accessories and (of course) morphs that allow for designing custom characters for your games. In other words, this one pack has hundreds of possible iterations to allow for effortless diversity and personalization.

https://www.assetstore.unity3d.com/en/#!/content/38086

Features Include:
• Custom Character Creation GUI
• 44 Head and Body Morphs
• 3 Fully Setup Prefabs
• 12k, 9k, 7.5k Base Mesh Poly Counts
• 8192 x 8192 Texture Maps
• PBR Materials and Textures
• 4 Swappable Hairs
• 4 Swappable Outfits
• 5 Swappable Weapons
• Fully Rigged and Setup for Mecanim

Learn more at:
http://morph3d.com

A Note From the Devs:
A big thanks to the many who have already downloaded the pack and given us feedback. Thus far, there have been a lot of questions about what exactly this pack is, how to use it but mostly about where we might be going with next with new packs, future updates, and new versions.

So, download the pack, give it a try, make as unique of a character as you can with it and let us know how it went or even how you wished it would have went.

Cheers!

An intro video in case you don't have time to download and play around with the pack:

 

This does look very good, but the workflow for content creation and sale is a major worry. There are great artists and creators within the Unity community. If they can create and sell content for the Morph system, it'll go far and be very popular.

 

This looks awesome !

Can you make your own clothes / armours for it ? Say medieval ?

 

Awesome! Thanks for making a post.. Hopefully you will get a lot more feedback here and avoid answering some of the same questions over and over again.. heheh

Looking forward to seeing how this progresses.

 

First, thank you for the free pack! I'm looking forward to the next pack.

As others have said, I'm curious about how to add my own custom art to the models, and I'm curious about the business model for Morph 3D.

There may be a few bugs with the hair in this pack (v1.02b). Sometimes the Medium hair would render oddly for me (in addition to an alpha problem) under both deferred + linear and forward + gamma (U5.1), and the Bob hair has dark streaks in back under forward + gamma that are not present in deferred + linear.

Also, can you clarify the rights issue on the DAZ art? My assumption is that since you included it in the pack it is fine for us to use in our commercial games.

 

This was a question I presented to them in my first email because I was confused about their response in one of the reviews. I was told these are different from getting models on DAZ and they use the standard Unity Asset Store license. I was confused about the DAZ game license since these appear to be based off of Genesis/Genesis 2 originally. But I was told that the DAZ license doesn't apply with the Morph3D content.

I think a lot of the community is anxious to hear more about the business model, any kind of planned roadmap for future packs, plans for user generated content/support for third party content developers, ability to extend the toolset with custom code (similar to how UMA opened up ability to create tools like UMAzing, UMA Elements, and other implementation/integration tools), and support for MMO type character systems with interchangeable clothing options.

Also, someone who played around with the pack indicated that it doesn't have the level of morphing options that are presently available with UMA. Do you guys plan to extend morphing abilities further than what you have now? If so, any type of timeline?

With UMA we can also apply decals for things like tattoos, scars, dirt and grime, blood, etc. I know a lot of these type of decal packs are available for DAZ. Will they be available to use with Morph3D characters as well?

What about wings, horns, tails, and other non-human type features? I'm thinking things like lycanthorpes (werewolf/werecat/werebear) with tails, animal ears, and fur. Or faeries with wings. Or satyrs with horns. Are these types of things also going to be available?

 

First off - huge high five for offering another modular character creation tool for Unity. These tools/extensions really add value to this community and its a some what different approach than others have taken which is at the very least interesting.

I second Whippets concern regarding content creation.
If this eventually turns into a viable option for modular character creation - this artist hopes there is very little relation to any part of daz in this asset for Unity and no relation to daz regarding adding custom characters to this - as I find most daz content easily identifiable based off its odd 'daz' look.
These models do look nice - and it would be awesome if this was opened up for the community of artists to create additional characters - not using daz software.

 

I second @Shawn67 about multiple skin overlays/decals allowing tattoos, blood, grime, etc; rigged non-human body parts wings, tails, animal ears; and more specific morphs.

Extra bones are a good idea too to allow bone-based jiggle.

 

You bet and thanks for the suggestion to set it up, Shawn!

 

Thanks for fielding that one, Shawn. You are correct, the Morph 3D content falls under the Unity Asset Store License found here.

 

It is fair to ask for clarity on this, because from time to time assets show up in the store that appear to be stolen assets and Unity doesn't necessarily catch them until someone sees it in the store and complains about it.

 

So, half of the reason we decided to release these packs (yes, more are queued for release) is to learn what's working, and what you all are looking for before we get too deep into our "master plan". Or, in other words, there is much more development going on aside from these character packs.

So some specifics:

-Have we thought about decals? Yes, we've got some cool ideas cooking to for our material/texture/shader system.
-What about jiggle, have we considered it? As a matter of fact, yes. Dynamics, to us, seem like one of the best ways to increase the quality of one's characters- rigid hair and outfits, just don't look good. Here's hoping our efforts here are worth sharing someday soon.
-Non-Human features ie wings, horns, tails, etc- any support for that? Certainly. In fact, the DAZ system has a solution for that and we're evaluating whether to emulate theirs or build a different one from scratch.

 

Some good positive answers there - liking the direction for those things that have been answered

 

Yeah, that's our belief too. Just look at DAZ, for that matter, the majority of the content produced for DAZ Studio is created from outside artists from all around the world. We are confident that we'll figure something out with Morph 3D that is as meaningful and successful as things are with the DAZ artist community.

Initially, you'll see a lot of ports from DAZ to Morph but it is so important for so many reasons that we open this up to outside artists. For one, I suspect, that the game dev community will demand different types of content and styles than is currently available at DAZ. We are working on giving ya'll something a bit more substantive in this regard, but please, bare with us.

 

Yeah, for sure, we totally get the concern and apologies for any confusion or worry we may have caused!

 

Looks really great so far!

So we'll have permission to create and sell content for her?

 

How about facial emotes, lip-sync/ mouth shapes, and "dynamics" like blinking?
Also, how do we create more of these morphs, so that we can create other changes to body shape?

 

Really interested in what you've got to say at Unite Europe. Any way you can record it or point us towards a press release with all the goodies you've got to announce?

 

Can I also point to a mesh/UV error on the lower eyelid. There's a large black area as the mesh goes around the eyeball.

 

One problem with adding stuff from outside artists is that all the art must be contained within the same FBX or blend file. This is because Unity3D currently hides the blend shape data (for some unknown reason). This makes it impossible to merge models containing blend shapes together (you lose the blend shape data). The models need to be contained within the same object I believe to share the same animation skeleton. You could merge meshes into an object with blend shapes, and still retain the blend shapes for the original mesh, but all other meshes you merge in would lose their blend shapes (so you couldn't stretch clothing to match the character). This makes it more complex for third party people to add stuff. You'd have to have some familiarity with Maya, Modo or Blender3D in order to merge the outside artist's stuff into the Morph3D model.

 

You want to be able to merge seperate meshes with blend shapes in Unity, then Unity Technology needs to unhide the blend shape data. There has been a feedback post but so they it's been ignored:

http://feedback.unity3d.com/suggestions/expose-blend-shape-vertex-data

 

@Centripetal - I'm not sure to what degree these issues will be addressed, but @Mecanim.Dev has mentioned that they are working on an update to blendshapes. Not sure when it will arrive, as I guess it is done when it's done, but maybe as early as Unity 5.2.

 

yes, a technique for merging/adding/removing sets of clothing from models would be very important. Also finding out from @Mecanim.Dev when we will have access to the blendshape data would be great, another important piece in the jigsaw puzzle.

 

Interestingly, for UMA, each piece of clothing is a separate fbx with the same skeleton. UMA merges these at runtime.

 

UMA uses bone deformation to change the shape of the mesh and not blendshapes. While this works with multiple meshes, it's not as efficient nor as precise as using blendshapes. Bone deformation can double the number of bones involved in bone animation.

 

If you tried to do facial animations with bones, you'd have a crap ton of bones in the face just to emulate what can be more easily done using blend shapes in Maya or shape keys for Blender 3D. And indeed if you look at the UMA model it has a lot of bones in the face.

 

That's great to hear.

 

The pack looks great and I messed around with the demo. However, my main question is can this work in an online environment? I.E. can I have multiple users (in an network environment) run around in a Unity scene with their own unique avatar they have created?

 

I've added multiple copes of the low res prefab and changed the outfit individually on all of them. The only problem I'm getting is that when you change the outfit on one, it hides the skin portions for all the meshes for all prefabs. This means if you put on an outfit for one, another that has different exposed skin would have parts of the skin disappear.

 

I found this is fixed if you go to the "Genesis2Female.Shape_LOD3" object under "Genesis2Female" object, you can change the the "Standard (Specular Setup)" rendering mode from "Cutout" to "Opaque". Note that parts of the skin will show through some of the outfits. Using cutout mode does not improve performance over removing the polygons, but it does keep the skin from poking through.

I suppose if you want to keep using the cutout rending mode, you could duplicate the material per prefab. This way they will not impact each other.

 

Looks very promising and I would really love to see this developing. Of course allowing artists to create custom content for it will be a must have.

Also about features and changeable clothing/accessoires or other parts I think it would be good to include enough different possibilities to allow for details. I think I don't need to name the standards but want to mention some things not always included in such systems but really improving them. Beware I have not yet taken a closer look at it yet so might be I mention something already possible/planned or whatever.

- Girdle
- Cloak
- Horn
- Wing
- Tail
- Amulet
- Earrings
- Rings
- Tattoos / Scars
- Back/Side (imagine Backpack, Quiver or such the like. But why should a quiver for example always go for the back, maybe carried on Side, or a Sword on the back. Of course this can propably be added by everyone later too but maybe it's smart to have some fixed spot for such, being bit above a possible cloak for example)
- Also in question would changeable Bodyparts, Eyes, Legs, arms, hands, feet. Thinking about if someone wants create some pirate hook or cyborg parts. Or use it to show wounded bodyparts.

Also question for me as a non programmer would be how easy it is to integrate. Maybe it's an optiona to see if it can be compatible with Playmaker as well.

Thank you

 

Great to see you guys setup a forum thread for this. I'm greatly enjoying the setup so far and can't wait to see more going on with it. Definitely would like more medieval stuff.

The one thing I do hope you guys keep in mind is performance. All of this is great stuff, but being lean, mean, and easy to use would help you get a leg up on the competition. The base you have here is a good start.

Since you have a forum, I figure I'll show off a couple of screens from my game with your model.





I made a few adjustments to one of the outfits and since the camera is far enough away it works. It also helps that this looks is pretty close to what I want the final to be. Obviously missing gloves, belt, and a vest/chestpiece.

Also, hair needs to be fixed since it clips through the head.

 

Since some folks are calling for medieval clothing, let me counter that by calling for modern (upscale, street, and professional ... like police and hardhat + jumpsuit) and male sci-fi.

 

That didn't really answer my question I am looking for a yes or a no.

 

Yes you can have multiple instances of the character prefab with different visible clothing and hair if you disable cutout rending mode on the material, or change the code to copy the material per prefab instance (I.E. in the start routine).

 

Currently the code cuts out the parts of the skin that are underneath clothing. But it does this at the material level which is shared across instances of the prefab. This cutout method only prevents the skin from showing through the clothing though. This has no impact on performance because it still has the overhead from the polygons underneath the clothing. To improve performance, you'd need to delete or disable the obscured polygons (which does not happen). If you're running on a good machine or device, then it's not a big deal.

 

How did your talk at Unite Europe go? Is the video available? What new things can you tell us now? Have you got answers to some of the questions above?

We're all agog and waiting

 

Have to admit, I'm a bit disappointed in the lack of interaction after the initial couple of days. Hoping it is due to Unite prep and they'll get back to being interactive here.

 

Almost certainly the delay has been preparing for Unite, getting there and setting up, and a couple of days cooldown and debrief. Bound to hear news this week,

 

Spot on Centripetal, and that's one of the main reasons we've yet to "unlock" our base character to artists to so that they can make content for it. We are at a cross roads, we are in the early development of our own blendshape system but knowing that Unity is addressing this issue makes us question whether this is a good use of our team's resources. Currently, we are trying to see if we can gain any insight on Unity's timeline- if it's too far our we'll be forced to use our system, for better or worse.

 

Right you are Shawn, working a booth and presenting at conference's is demanding task for any team and when you throw in a jet lag factor... well, let's just say we are glad to be back to our routine!

 

So, the Unite crew was filming the presentation and I expect it will be online at some point, but we've yet to anything posted. Let us know if you find it? In the meantime, a synopsis looked something like this:

We gave you some back story on who we are and where we come from and showed a WIP of one of the tools that we are building for you all. Additionally, there was a fair amount of discussion on how we intend to build an artist community that is similar to what is seen at DAZ. Finally, we couldn't emphasis enough that we are intentionally introducing ourselves early, so that we can learn from the community the things we are doing right, where we can improve, and how we might move forward. Already, with just this one pack and thanks to everyone's feedback, we've been able to make a course correction or two. So, cheers to you all, keep the feedback coming!

 

At this point with waiting for more information, hopefully a video or more details about what was discussed at Unite, etc.. Feedback is going to be a bit limited.. I think there may have been some questions that remain unanswered and I'm really curious to hear more about the tools you guys are putting together. I understand some of this may be dependent on answers from Unity about the other stuff you just responded about. But hopefully there will be more you can share just so we can start to develop a better feel of what is being worked on.

 

Regarding the cutout method that we are using, we plan to re-release the Sci-Fi Female with that feature greatly optimized. However, for the time being we won't be deleting the "covered" polygons, but we certainly realize how valuable that would be if done successfully.

 

Regarding tools, we'll be swapping out our current "demo" with our latest tool demo (which is much more indicative of where things are going) but our guys want a bit more cleanup time with it. What's a tool demo without a roadmap? Well, we are working on something of that sort that we hope to share with you all around the same time of the next demo. If you haven't gathered already, we are all about incremental revelations, less grand but more frequent.

 

NICE!! Totally impressive that you swapped genres with the character pack- props to you EDarkness and thanks for sharing!

Also, your comments and requests have been duly noted. Cheers.

 

Thanks for all the updates I've tried to glean everything known so far...

We can:-

• Swap clothes during runtime, by turning GameObjects or Renderers on/off
• Access a shop front where content creators can sell their new clothing/accessories
• Create multiple LODs with a "tool" and save the resultant fbx files for each LOD for each model.
  
• Have multiple overlays on the skin, like tattoos, grime, scars, skin-tight clothing
• Have jiggle or "dynamics" on areas that matter (with a switch to turn it on/off as desired)
• Have optional rigged additions like tails, animal ears, horns, wings.

Can we:-

• Have multiple overlays on an item of clothing (ie grime, guild insignia)
• Do facial movements for speaking, emotes, blinking, etc. And make new ones with relative ease.
• Start with base meshes that are a bit higher poly? Even if people aiming for use on todays desktops use the first LOD as their starting point, and people aiming for use on mobile use the third or fourth LOD as their starting point - it makes sense to start with higher poly models (look at SpeedTree with their Hero poly count). We want to be prepared for tomorrows technology from the outset.
  
• Have more morphs, and make new ones with relative ease.
• Have multiple layers of clothing, and be sure of their z-order when worn (ie vest, shirt, jumper, coat)

 

I agree with this.

There is not much information on what this is about at all. Where is this going to be in 6 months to a year? What are the company's goals for this? How much content is going to be available and what kind of content? Can I load the meshes/parts via separate asset bundles and add them at runtime? Is it worth holding out for?

Right now it's like,

"Hey guys, look at this cool thing we did!"
"Yeah, that's cool, I guess." *Back to looking for something practical.*

 

Well, I tried the forums, their Unity "answers", and feedback. Unless you have some inside connection with Unity Technologies, I'm not sure how you'd find out more information on their plans on blendshapes. Best of luck with that. If you find out, please let us know!

 

I imagine Morph 3D can get a more definite answer from Unity by directly asking.

From what I can see, Unity has been working on the Blendshapes API since maybe around the start of the year, and the latest word on it is that it is currently being reviewed. As in:

"There is no ETA at the moment, but the new API is currently reviewed so we are close to add this." - JUNE 25

So maybe it will be in Unity 5.2, which the roadmap pegs as being released on Sept 8.