- This topic has 6 replies, 5 voices, and was last updated 9 months ago by
.
-
Posts
-
Hi Zone members,
3DDC here and I wanted to bring a serious problem to everyone's attention. A problem you might not even catch at first unless you are paying close attention to very specific details. And that problem is what I am calling "Corrupt file shares". These are files shared from members here on the Zone or any other place on the web, that when installed will corrupt your Daz runtime character data in various ways until manually found and removed.
To illustrate with two examples:
the first one goes back to a G9 character shared here back in October. This was shared by someone else and I immediately caught an issue with the Daz official IM-xxx.zip, where after installing the share, every single G9 figure was loading with a crushed skull. The issue was fixed, mods alerted, and a proper DIM installer was made available to all. I have found similar corrupt morphs issues since but have been so busy I typically just uninstall, move on and never touch that character again. My sincere apologies for not posting about this sooner as it can only benefit everyone here.This time I want to nip the issue in the bud once and for all by showing everyone what to look for, how to find it, and most importantly, how to fix it.
Earlier this week, a file share named "M3D Luciano HD for Genesis 9" was shared here which corrupts all G9 characters in a relatively unassuming but major way, it changes a number of proportion morphs on your base model by default with no way to quickly reset them.
Seen here:
https://new.imagehostx.com/upload/2024/04/20/ex01_1713638685.jpgI only noticed this because the model I was working with at the time I had created a few days prior. Since I always use measure metrics to create my models to be as realistic as possible, I noticed the character was quite a few cm taller than they I had originally created them to be. This prompted the investigation leading to loading a fresh scene and character to identify if any morphs were auto-loading, causing the instant change in proportions.
Resetting an existing or brand new G9 to default leaves those morphs in the previous screenshot active. Alt-clicking on an individual morph also DOES NOTHING! (it should reset it to 0) And as you can see in the pic, hidden morphs are showing and nothing extra is dialed up that would cause this issue either.
What this means is that SOMETHING is secretly controlling these morphs as a master Morph Controller but is also wrongly set to default to a number greater than 0%, which is why it does not show up in the "currently used" list. Daz considers the master morph "unused"! If that doesn't make sense it will soon, keep reading.
To start off, I went through my DIM (Daz Install Manager) installed product history. In particular, I am looking for any character/morph products that were installed this week as one of those is the most likely culprit. Recall that I did not have this issue when I created my newest character on Monday.
Now to find the culprit install. Start with the most recent character or morph file in the installed list and pick one word that stands out that will most likely show up in the morph search list
https://new.imagehostx.com/upload/2024/04/20/ex02_1713639707.jpg
In this case we will type "Luciano" into the morph search field in Daz Studio with our default G9 selected:
https://new.imagehostx.com/upload/2024/04/20/ex03_1713640127.jpg
Notice anything abnormal? The "M3D Luciano Proportions" morph is set to 100%. But rather than being lit up bright white as a changed morph should, it it dull grey because 100% is set to be the default position for this morph. This means that every character we make will be loading with this bad Luciano Proportions morph active at 100%, but hidden because it is wrongly set to default, and all the proportion morphs active with no easy way to fix them.
By manually dragging it to 0 we can see that all the proportion morphs get zeroed out as well, and disappear if we click off the currently used tab and then back.
https://new.imagehostx.com/upload/2024/04/20/ex04_1713640386.jpg
Notice the proportion morphs are greyed out now, but Luciano Proportions at 0% is bright white. We want it to be greyed out also so that not only disappears from our currently used list, but also stops loading with every new or old G9 character we load in.
To do this we change the Default field from 100% to 0%. Click the "..." icon to the right of the "File Path" field and leave that window open. Pay attention to the "Path" field as well. We need those both in a minute.
https://new.imagehostx.com/upload/2024/04/20/ex05_1713641282.jpgNow we save out the fixed morph asset. Go to File > Save As > Support Asset > Morph Asset(s). We can find the morph by following the "Path" field that we looked at before. It should look like this:
https://new.imagehostx.com/upload/2024/04/20/ex06_1713641987.jpgPay attention to the Vendor Name and Product Name! They must be typed EXACTLY as found in the windows explorer folder we opened earlier; capital letters and spaces do matter. (case sensitive and whitespace) Failure to type both of these exactly will not change the existing morph, but rather make a second duplicate morph and cause further error!
Now we click save, then create a new scene and reload G9 to verify that our fixed morph is working properly. If not, then something most likely was mistyped during the naming process of the save and we can trace our steps backward to figure it out.
This was a pretty long and involved post but I don't see any other way to explain all the pertinent info and give every user the power to fix it themselves, rather than being reliant on myself or someone else to fix it.
*****
This is important because of why this corrupt morph issue has been showing up more and more lately.Now, I have no way of actually knowing why, but I see a few possibilities:
1) Daz is becoming VERY lazy with their QA process and tons of garbage is slipping through. This is probably partially true, simply by judging the quality of some of the work Daz is accepting nowadays. It's not even Renderhub tier, it's Renderosity tier, some almost shareCG tier. (aka poor quality) While most of the Daz PA work is still top notch, S tier quality, some garbage is being allowed for some reason now. If they are throwing everything at the wall to see what sticks now, it's not surprising their QA team no longer cares to do their job.
2) Here's the big one: ITS INTENTIONAL!!!
That's right, seeing as Daz has not implemented a known tracking system like Renderhub/Renderotica, I have suspected for some time now that they are going the more clever route. "Poison the well" so to speak, with deliberate corrupt files, easily catching those who are stupid enough to ask about an error on their own forums, discourage sharers from using their products going forward as they randomly corrupt runtimes, but also potentially catch aspiring creators in act when they submit products to them that accidentally have additional hidden morphs in the ERC lists due to the corrupt morphs being snuck in.Moral of the story, BE CAREFUL!!!
And hopefully this empowers everyone to take the diagnosis, fixes and creation process into their own hands!Be well, stay safe, and keep on making art!!
-3DDCDaz QA process is almost absent wrt ensuring product quality. But the bigger problem I see here is that not all upstream product updates propagate here. May be there are a few samaritans that occasionally post an update here, but for the vast majority the original post remains as the sole copy. Even the official product readme sections at Daz aren't updated often announcing fixes or updates. So unless someone actually own the product there is no reliable way to know if the fixes are even released upstream.
They have separate repositories for DIM and Connect channels even for the metadata, which also adds another layer of complexity to their release management process. Sometimes the updates would be available on one channel but miss the other channel entirely.
I wouldn't be so sure that those issues being deliberate, since the same packages are distributed to paid customers, and Daz wouldn't risk infuriating them deliberately. Its another thing that given Daz's marketing strategy of selling stuff in bulk, that most issues remain unreported due to lack of usage of those products, even after they are bought.
That's a really good point. I hadn't realized the DIM and Connect channels were split. That's super inefficient.
Still, with the number of day1 releases we have seen here from Request fills lately, it's entirely possible some of could be deliberate pre-distribution releases with corrupt files. This mitigates the customer support issues.
It might seem crazy but it's how I would handle it were I in their shoes. Hell, it could even be PA's acting on their own. No way to rule it out one way or the other.
Regardless, everyone now has the info needed to propagate fixes. My hope is that we can crowdsource ongoing fixes this way rather than relying on a few ppl with the howto knowledge
It's a good point source for newbies 😉
It doesn't surprise me that you caught this and have developed a way to fix it. We have some terrific talent here.
I can't see Daz doing this on purpose as it seems like a convoluted way to catch pirates. They should know that someone would catch on quickly. I'm betting that it's nothing more insidious than Daz's complete lack of QA. I'll be watching for someone to complain in their forums and see what Daz's response is.
- You must be logged in to reply to this topic.
