>>2106974
Honestly, it was mostly trial and error trying to figure this thing out. Experiencing it in VR is what really convinced me to learn how this thing works. I upgraded from an old WMR headset to an Index + Trackers mostly because of this thing, and I don't regret it at all. There's a wiki that goes over what the UI does (https://hub.virtamate.com/wiki/), but admittedly there isn't a lot of good documentation on how to get started due to the scope of the program and people likely just trying everything. I'll try to sum up the essentials at least.
-You need a Creator level key applied to do anything worthwhile in the program, like adding new characters or animating. It's up to you on how you want to acquire it.
-All of the characters and other assets you download (.VAR files) are placed in the AddonPackages folder. You'll have quick access to them from the "Everyone" tab at VaM's top menu. You can use the "Teaser" menu from the main menu to download from the Hub directly, including all required depedencies if they're avaliable.
-Make sure you're in Edit mode to make any changes to the scene itself. If the main UI isn't available, click the "Toggle UI" button or press U. Edit Mode adds additional icons on the right side of the main UI and needs the Creator key to work.
-.VAR files can be opened with something like 7-Zip to extract their contents. I'd actually recommend extracting any plugins you download and placing them in the Custom/Scripts folder. It'll be easier to find them later on when you mess around with those.
- https://hub.virtamate.com/resources/cuamanager.547/ -This is a "Session" plugin (which is persistant throughout the entire scene) to load and attach external assets to a character. Many VaM characters use this to load objects imported into Unity using an AssetBundle.
It has instructions on how to use it, but it assumes you know how to add a plugin. While in a scene you'll need to click on the 3 Lines icon on the Main UI, then choose Session Plugins > Add Plugin > Select File...
By default VAM will go to the Custom/Scripts folder (more on that later), but for now click on VAM 1.20 from the directory list and choose the AddonPackages folder. Choose the var file and go thru the folders until you see an "ADD_ME.cs" file and select that. From here I would recommend going back to the side menu and choose Session Plugins Presets > Change User Defaults > Set Current As User Defaults. This will load up any Session plugin automatically in every scene.
https://hub.virtamate.com/resources/timeline.94/ -This is a "Scene" plugin
(only effects the character it's attached to) that allows characters to use traditional Keyframe animation as opposed to something that was procedural generated with forces. You apply this to a character while in Edit mode and go to their Plugins menu. You go through the same process as adding a Session plugin.
-"Atom" refers to characters and other assets created within VaM. You're gonna be seeing that word a lot.
-If you want to add a character to the scene, click on the blue Person icon and then choose "Add Atom". This icon automatically highlights Person from the Add Atom menu (the + icon). There's also a Unity icon to import objects from Unity Asset Bundles (or a CUA as they call it) and a flag for "SubScenes" which is a whole nother can-of-worms.
-You can click and drag on to any body part to move around and pose it. If you want to choose a specific body part, click on the Arrow icon on the Main UI. Choose your character's name on the left list, and then a body part on the right list.
-The "Root" of the character is usually between their feet. This will allow you to move the entire character around the scene and bring up the preferences menu in Edit mode. You can also the click the green icon with two people to bring up this menu or press the N key.
This is where you'll be doing most of the adjustments to a character, such as adding clothing, changing their morphs, or swapping models. The screenshot I included shows what this looks like.
https://hub.virtamate.com/wiki/person_atom_complete_contents/
-You can use "Save Look" button on this menu to save the appearance of the character as is, then use "Load Look" to apply it to any other character. Note that this doesn't work on custom objects, which will need the the CUAManager plugin to Save/Load. I'd highly recommened going thru VAR packages and start saving looks so you can add characters elsewhere.
-VaM loads up female characters by default. But you can load up a Male by choosing "Skin Select" near the bottom of the side menu, and then choosing a Male skin a few pages over.
-Morphs are separated by Male and Female. VaM comes with built-in ones, but many of your morphs will come from other VAR files. Use the sliders to apply the morph, and you can adjust the range by pressing the +Range button under each slider. Grey Boxes are built in morphs, Red Boxes are morphs from other VAR files, and Blue Boxes are morphs located in Custom/Atom/Person/Morphs in either the female or male folders. All morphs are based on Genesis 2 from DaZ Studio, so VaM can accept files from that program. This also applies to texture files.
-If you load up a character's look, you'll have the option to use their morphs on other characters as long as you're loading over the same models. You can figure out what morphs a character is currently using by going to Female/Male Morphs and clicking on the "Only Active" checkbox. You can use the search box to find the name of each morph if you want to add it elsewhere.
-In addition to saving looks, you can also save the current textures, morphs, clothing sets, etc of a character. On the side menu, there will be several "Presets" buttons you can use. If you want to save a new set, simply type in any name you want in the "Preset Name" box and click on Create New Preset. You can click on "Select Existing" to load up a list of presets you've made, or you can type in the name you saved and choose "Load" to apply to any character in the scene. Skin Presets saves the current textures, Morph presets saves the current morphs, etc.
-Once you've got some character looks saved, I'd recommened going to other scenes and mess around with those, such as loading character looks
There's an ungodly amount of stuff in this program so I'd recommened playing around for a while. As far as porting, there's a few guides as far as adding Unity objects or making your own morphs using Blender/DaZ Studio. I can't provide too much help on this aspect of VaM though.
Adding Unity Objects:
https://hub.virtamate.com/resources/unity-assetbundles-for-vam-1-xx.167/
https://hub.virtamate.com/resources/the-definitive-asset-creation-tutorial-for-vam.16753/
Export to Blender/DaZ:
https://hub.virtamate.com/resources/vam-to-blender-to-vam.3759/
|
