Daz Studio...just too damn slow. Progress bar goes BACKWARDS, and 20 minutes(!) to save!

I've been working with Daz Studio on and off mostly for kicks for a couple of years, since version 1.whatever. Now I'm using v2.3.3.146 and actually trying to produce something, namely my Commander Series webcomic, and it's really not working out too well.

People, this applications is SLOW. Slow to do everything, including opening, saving and just working in it. It's a real pain in the ass and it makes me actually put off working on my comic because it's so painful to work in the program.

On some level, I always felt that I really couldn't complain because it's free, and what did I expect from a free app. Well, I expect a hell of a lot more than this.

For one thing, I expect that it does not take 20 minutes to open and save a file. That's 20(!) minutes each way, meaning that 40 MINUTES (at least!) is added onto your project time.

You know what it's like - you're working, and you really should be saving your work as you go along, but you know that if you hit save right now you have over 20 MINUTES to wait before you can keep working on your project. Sometimes the render is quicker than that...

I know, I know...as of this writing, Daz Studio 3 is out. I wish I could say the bugs were fixed in this version, but I can't since it keeps crashing every time I start to use it. Back to 2.3 I go.

I mentioned before that the progress bar goes backwards. BACKWARDS! Come on, man...WTF? That's just shoddy. Nothing says "we don't give a damn about this program" more than a progress bar that goes BACKWARDS!! Arrrgh.

Really, the problem apparently lies with some of the more popular and free figures, namely Victoria 4 and Michael 4. There are known issues with saving and with loading these characters. Of course, I'm using BOTH of these models in my project, so I'm doubly screwed.

In this link, one of the forum team notes that this is a known problem. That post was made in January 2009. It hasn't been fixed since then. At least I think it hasn't, since I can't try version 3.0 since it keeps crashing. Bah!

To think I was going to try to be an affiliate for this software. No way. I can't in good conscience recommend this to anyone interested in 3D, because it will rob them of their valuable time.

Here's another thing. They tease you with all these stunning renders in the promotional material that I'm just not sure are possible using Daz Studio. From reading the forums a lot of users have questions about this. Are the promotional renders actually done using Daz or some other program? Is the Daz 3Delight renderer really hobbled as some claim? Or is it just that the users can't figure out how to get those renders. I really don't think it's all user error.

Obviously, Daz 3D is a business looking to make money. The free program is supposed to be your gateway drug on your way to the harder stuff like Poser and Carrera. On the way, they'll sell you all the new models and props that you'll need to make your art. I was fine with that. I'm actually a member of the Platinum Club, I've bought plenty of props trying to make this webcomic, but the program itself is forcing me to quit using it.

Not only is the saving and loading horribly long, but working in the program is like working underwater. You know, when you click on something to move it and the program is constantly 1 second or more behind you until you are thoroughly out of sync with your own thought processes.

Frankly, I think the program is sloppily coded. I hate to say that, not being someone who can code an application, but the evidence is right in front of me. The GUI of this program takes a lot of resources. Sometimes my processor is pegged to 100% for no damn reason that I can see.

Other times, after a 20 minute loading progress bar, the app is still locked up for another 2-3 minutes and my processor at 100%. But the progress bar is gone. What's the point of the progress bar if it does not truly indicate progress? Did I mention that sometimes it goes BACKWARDS??

You will get to the point where you are afraid to do anything, load any pose, prop or model, because you may add who knows how many minutes to your scene saving time.

Just to test, I timed saving times with and without the troublesome M4 and V4 models:

WITH M4 & V4: 25 minutes!!

WITHOUT M4 & V4: 30 seconds! Wow!

Also in both scenes were the Droid model and The Commander scene props. It's disgraceful, man. Really quite shameful.

Now, I have a lot of time invested in this project, so hopefully I can get this finished in a week or so and after that I'm deleting this app. Never again. Far too much of my time has been wasted. I'll do it in another app or just draw the damn thing completely. I don't even really need to do it in 3D, but I thought it would be a fun experiment. Wrong.

As usual, I'm forced to compare Daz Studio to my favorite 3D app: Blender. The two are both free, but aside from that, they couldn't be more different.

Blender is Open Source, and probably has legions of coders around the world submitting their bugfixes and changes, while Daz is free, but proprietary and most likely has a small team of coders working on the project, which I'm sure is the lowest priority project since it does not directly earn revenue for the company.

Many people complain about the Blender interface, but I'll tell you this: It's NO different than learning any new program, you just read up on it and repeat until you learn it.

I'll tell you another thing, Blender is LIGHTNING quick. That's one of the first things I notice. Opening, saving and working in Blender is pretty much a joy. Save as much as you want, it won't break your workflow.

Not to mention that I get much better renders out of Blender than out of Daz. Sure I could agonize and bust my ass to learn all the tricks of Daz, but the renders look much better without much more work coming straight out of Blender. When I put work into it the renders are absolutely phenomenal.

Here's one more thing: Turning on Ray-Tracing in Daz leads to ASTRONOMICAL render times. And that's just with one light! Turning on Ray-tracing in Blender does add significantly to the render, but nowhere near the degree that happens with Daz. And that's even with multiple Ray-Traced lights in Blender.

Plus, I can create my own content in Blender without having to rely on or pay for other people's models. Yeah it's some work to learn how to do these things, but we can't be afraid to learn things if we want to express our art to the ultimate vision we have for it.

There's even a few shortcuts to make figures. I just installed the free Make Human script. You set up your parameters and it outputs a .obj file or collada file that you can then import into Blender. You have to rig it yourself, but I have a couple of books and numerous tutorials all across the web that explain rigging in great detail. My goal is to not even use the script, I'll just make my models from scratch in Blender, pose them and animate them in Blender, too.

So you can see here that Blender does a whole lot more than Daz, plus it performs far better. Daz might want to consider going open source on Daz Studio, maybe they can get some of those bugs fixed.

In the interest of fairness, I'm running on an old G4 Mac Mini with 1.25ghz PowerPC chip and 1ghz ram. It falls within their system requirements...not their recommended requirements, but still it's in there. Daz is sluggish and piggish on my system.

In contrast, Blender, a far more powerful program, runs smooth as silk on my machine. Great job Blender Foundation.

I'll end this rant now because I have to save one of my Daz Studio files, so my computer will be locked up for the next half-hour.

Did I mention the progress bar goes BACKWARDS?

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