Steve Shanks
September 1, 2000
In this tutorial we will make morph targets for Poser 4 figures using two free programs, Anim8or by R. Steven Glanville and UVmapper by Steve Cox (click on the names to go to the websites). First thing to do is get a body part to create the morph from so open poser and load a figure. I'm using the Poser 4 nude woman but any figure will do. Now go File>Export>Wavefront OBJ and when the next box opens make sure you have single frame selected and hit OK. The next window is important as we only want the head exported so click on the universe box shown in the image below to deselect everything.
Then move down and put a cross in "Head" then click OK then save the OBJ in the standard windows box. Then the final window appears which must be set up like this because morphing is our only concern.
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Now if we imported this straight into Anim8or we would get an error so we must fix the OBJ by opening it in UVmapper then saving it out again. Don't make any changes to it in UVmapper or when exporting, it fixes it just by importing and exporting. Note: If you ever have trouble with Wavefront OBJ's always try running them through UVmapper, it fixes a multitude of problems. Now start Anim8or and go Object/ Import then change your files of type drop down box to Wavefront OBJ and locate and open your head. You can't see it so we need to zoom in by clicking on the eye icon followed by the zoom to fit icon (both highlighted below).
Now we can see our head but we are going to move points around so lets go to wire frame mode by going view/wire (Ctrl+W) while we are in the view menu take note of the bottom list of views (All, side, top etc.) We will need to flick through these as we are going to get the best view possible. So now go into side view and you should have a screen like this.
Now we need to go into point editing mode so click on the Object/Point button pictured below.
You'll now see your head in black wire frame with the points shown as black squares. We now need to start moving points, to do this we'll use the tools highlighted below.
So use the drag select over the tip of the nose then select the move tool to make the nose a little longer.
Then grab a bit of chin and drag those out too, in fact lets go wild and pull some points all over just to show how much we can change the head. Here is mine destined for an outer space image I think.
Once your done changing the shape go Object/ Export then choose Wavefront OBJ and then close down Anim8or and start Poser. Now if you created a Morph for the Poser 4 nude woman it will only work with her so load her up and double click on her head, this box will pop up.
Click on the "Add morph target" button then in the next box click on the "Locate" button and find the head we exported from Anim8or.
Once that's loaded type in a name for the morph in the label box and click OK then OK again. You should now have a dial named the same as you just typed in, if you turn the dial up or down you will see your morph change the head. Warning, change the dial to minus figures or past 1.000 may produce horrible results. Here is a picture of the finished morph.
Copyright 2000, Steve Shanks, All Rights Reserved