Morphing Armatures

In DAZ Studio it is possible to create morphs that change both the character mesh and armature, so called ERC (Enhanced Remote Control) morphs. This corresponds to morphs that change the rest pose of an armature, which is not supported by Blender. The DAZ Importer adds some support for morphing armatures. For more information see the blog posts on Morphing Armatures and Morphing Armatures and Rendering.

To make the armature morphable, enable the global setting ERC Morphs when the morph is loaded.

• Morph Armature: Update the morphable armature.
• Auto Morph Armature: Automatically update morphable armatures on frame change.

Morph Armature

Here is a monster morph at 0%, 50% and 100%.

And here the same morph after Morph Armature has been pressed.

Auto Morph Armature

Automatically update morphing armatures on frame change. There are some caveats to be aware of.

• Morphing armatures do not work if the DAZ Importer is disabled, e.g. on a render farm. To make auto-morphing work even when the DAZ Importer is disabled, we must load the file morph_armature.py into the text editor and register it. See the post on Morphing Armatures for details.
• Morphing armatures are not updated during render. To render an animation with morphing armatures, use the Render Frames utility.

Render Frames

Render a range of frames as still images, to overcome problems with morphing armatures and rendering. This button is located in the Utilities panel.

• Open GL: Open GL rendering
• All Armatures: Auto morph all visible armatures instead of just the visible ones

ERCs vs IK. note by Alessandro.

ERC morphs are morphing the figure armature other than the geometry. Most morphs under “Actor“ are ERC, most morphs under “Pose Controls“ aren't, at least DAZ originals while PAs tend to do some confusion. Blender doesn’t support morphed armatures but Thomas uses some tricks to make it happen.

The thing is, ERC morphs are incompatible with IK, same as body morphs, so they are not intended for MHX or rigify. If we want ERC morphs then we have to use the daz rig. The intended workflow is to bake Actor morphs into dbz, not to import them in blender, though this is possible via ERCs.