It’s been an interesting Christmas season. I didn’t get to do my usual Christmas artwork – the day snuck up on me – so here’s a preview of the next page. I hope you’re having a wonderful season.
And also, just like that: Daz has necessitated another style change. They’re phasing out 3Delight, the important render engine that creates all the toon things I do. Hey, I’d only spent years developing the technique and style. That’s all!
3Delight was pretty much one of the few things that had me hanging on. With it gone and being forced to go to iray or their goddawful ugly toon system, which does create nice stuff after I stick the stuff through filters, I think it’s time to move on. I’d been feeling it for a long while now.
I mean I was making a little bit of money creating things for DAZ, but I couldn’t keep up. So that soon went out the window. So which program to migrate (slowly) to?
Blender is out. Period. That program is a cluster fuck of nope. I can use it a little, but the instructions online are either out of date, confusing, or both. They try to stick too much into one box. I’d migrated to DAZ from Poser, matter of fact, because way back when it was DAZ3 the interface was easier to grok. If I must migrate, let me do it to something else.
IClone looks promising. Unlike the other system, they actually have an entire toon creation section. They love people like me. It may also solve some problems regarding the more anthropomorphic characters that haven’t had a chance to show up yet. Maybe. I’m hoping. It also has some features that DAZ never, just would never ever, put into their system. Cartooning is supposed to be easier with them as well.
The drawback is that it’s expensive. I’m still trying to raise the money for shaman classes (which only happen once a year, and I’ve only a couple of weeks left to get it together) for crying outloud. But I’m going to look at it anyway. Seeing that they have an entire system dedicated to creating toon hair and* it has spring dynamics raised both eyebrows, and one of them doesn’t move so well.
I mean, if the style must change anyway because of 3Delight’s loss then let me make the most of it. The attached image is what I was able to eeek out, but I’m not married to the look yet for all I like it.