Using Poser Materials in Deep Paint 3D - The Set Up

Often times, modelers will create objects with several materials. However, if you import all the materials in Deep Paint 3D, they will end up as different texture maps. Combining and assembling all the materials back together, although not impossible, is a royal pain.(See Method III for more details.) With the help of the great tech support people at Deep Paint 3D, I was able to work out methods (mostly their ideas) to have my cake and paint it, too.

This tutorial assumes that you know what the basic buttons are in Deep Paint 3D and are willing to click on them.

Are you ready? Sure? If you say so ...

Deciding how to separate out your materials.

I'm using Sharkey's Dominatrix outfit. Why? It illustrates why someone might use only some materials from an object, and, let's face it, sexy outfits get attention.

  1. Open up Deep Paint 3D. (Duh.)

  2. Open up your .obj file. Accept all the defaults. DO NOT MERGE THE MATERIALS. (Yes, most tutorials tell you to merge the materials. Trust me. I got you this far ...)

  3. Go to the Elements Tab in the Control Panel, then click on Layers. Select a material, and click the C button. (See red squares below.)

    Select a loud color.

  4. Choose the next material, select a different, loud color, etc. Your outfit should look like a psycho clown suit when you're done.

    Now you can see exactly which materials affect which parts of the suit.

  5. Note down which parts you want to color separate from the rest of the outfit. I decided I wanted the wire rim, and wire lacing to be one color, the rings that the wiring goes through to be a separate color (you can't see them in this picture, but I promise that they exist), and the rest of the body suit to be one item. In this case, I ended up with the following list:

    Group 1 - RimBreast, Wire
    Group 2 - Ring
    Group 3 - LeatherPants, LeatherBra ... everything else.

  6. Close the file without saving. Really. It's okay.

Now comes the hard part - choosing which method to create your multi-material texture map.

Method I - Using Photoshop to Assemble the Pieces. (Easy but time consuming, especially if you have a lot of materials.)

Method II - Using the Selection Tool on the 2D Texture Map. (Works best if the materials are in well-defined, separate areas of the texture map.)

Method III - Using Lots of Masks. (Takes more work, but works with complex texture maps.) Coming soon.

The only thing that helps me maintain my slender grip on reality is the friendship I share with my singing potatos.' Holly - Red Dwarf.

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