DAZ and DAO

As finally convinced me to try to portrait Alistair from DAO using my humble DAZ skills, I decided to upload some WIPs that may document the process (or the pain?) I'm going through.


I had a similar "project" about a year and a half ago, when I was passing the Parlor Passage and found out that publishing some intermediate steps of work really helps me to keep on track. It's not supposed to a tutorial. It's an invitation to peer over my virtual shoulder and even to give me advices, if I'm doing something really stupid.

So - what have we here?
  
Say "Hello" to Michael. As far as I know, Michael is the most used, default male model for DAZ. He's just something like a 3-dimensional paper doll. You can move him, dress him, give him another haircut, even another face. The last one is, what I'm going to do next, because Michael doesn't really look like Alistair, does he?
In DAZ you really can bear a hand and morph almost every part of Michael's body manually. Or - if you're lazy bones like me - you decide to "pull" a whole, completey morphed character "over" your Michael. This is, what I did in the second pic: I loaded a character named Zeno. I love Zeno! Really. The skin-texture is great and the face morph is right up my street. No wonder that even Torias is "built" on Zeno.
You might ask me now: Hells, where's the hair gone?!
Well - to be honest: Michael never had "real virtual" hair. His hair was some kind of "fake hair", just like a body tattoo only painted on his skull (by the way - his boxer shorts are fake, too ). I'm going to give Zeno-Alistair-to-be some "real virtual" hair in the following step.

It's has been quite difficult to find a good looking short hair-model. I finally ended up with the Preppy Hair from Neftis. It's the one that in my eyes is nearest to Alistair - although I'm really missing those stubborn front strands ...

On this screenshot you see the DAZ working space as well as a smaller window showing a first quick render preview. There are no big differences between the two views by now, but this certainly will change, once I start working with lights .. in step fivehundred or so ...

So far so good. Let's have a tea break and have a look, just to drive me nuts.

As you see, it's still a long way to get those boys looking like twins. Seems that I have to age poor Zeno a few years, to re-shape nose and mouth and to work on his eyes. It's a weekend-mission. So let's meet again next week, OK?

Well - I actually wanted to continue working on Al's face. But then I decided, to do him a favor. And to do me a favor, too, because it's quite irritating to work with naked men, who miss their "best parts".

As far as I know, the male models in DAZ originally are G-rated (looks quite funny, doesn't it?). Yet you always can add (and shape ) all the parts a man really needs. Call it a whim, but I use to dress my models at least a bit, before I seriously start working with them. It's a matter of respect ... somehow.


Can you see the changes I made? I worked on the nose and the lips. It really took me hours: morph it, do a quick render and compare the result with the screenshot - and abandom the step to start all over again: .

Update

As you might have noticed I got stuck in the middle of the work somehow. I had no idea, how to go on - that's why I asked my friends and random visitors for help. Well ... the poll's result  shoughad.deviantart.com/journa… seems to be quite clear. Most of you want me to come up with something hopelessly romantic ...
Folks, don't you know that I'm a real deadbeat in such things?!!!!
To make things worse, I decided to take part in the 's actual challenge "Three Important Words".

I have no clue. What important words?
"Good luck, Alistair!" ... "See you later."..."Crows eat cookies." ... "Roses have thorns." ... "Sten likes stew."... "Where are we?" ... "What about me?"