Virt-A-Mate Hub

Thanks for taking the time to post. Yes, you got your guesses right with the teacher and Cat. My skills are fairly limited so I tend to think of my models more as inspired by than being actual lookalikes really. Companions come from a certain British show about a doctor who flies through time and space.
Vecterror made a quite nice 1950s Marilyn M along with Ms. Bundy from Married with... and a few movie actresses from the 80s and 90s. I would guess he has the most interest. I think he is fairly skilled as well.
I have some earlier attempts at the 80s TV stuff in my folders. Let me see if I can get them up to a decent level and post them. Maybe there will be something in there. I don't do commissions as I don't have the skills that the 'pros' have with DAZ and Poser and all the things they do. You might also try Sirap who did a nice classic Audrey H.

Gotcha on the companions! Makes sense now. Is the number in the name a reference to the season? ...or simply the sequence they became cast members?

Not to mention names, but I've been watching a bunch of designers with accounts on Patreon. I agree, many seem to be DAZ wizards, and the quality of their output is growing very quickly. I asked a few about commissions, and what I'm sensing is that many just want to make a quick buck (who doesn't, lol) by copy/pasting a hi-res face photo onto a generic body, moving a few sliders, and calling it done. If there is no hi-res photo (as with older celebrities) available after a quick search online, it involves more work, and suddenly they're no longer interested.

I agree that Vecterror and Sirap have some good material coming out... been really impressed by both. Vecterror did a little work on a look of Coebe Phates, and I was hoping to eventually see one of "Retsy Bussell," amazing equestrian and co-star in a movie with Coebe. ...and would really love to see any scream queens from B-movies in that time period.

My goodness... Pumpkin! I think Al would be mortified to see your very accurate portrayal of his daughter... err, well, he'd probably be turned on before he figured out who it was. I think you undersell your skills.

Honestly, I've wondered about getting a little into designing some on my own, but good grief I have no idea what to do to get started. Any chance you could briefly sum up what you do to generate a look?

Just sequential order on the classic companions so the grand daughter is one, the school teacher is two, the Victorian lady is six, etc.. I have more I need to touch up.

Yeah, I'm not surprised on trying to get a good commission done on older actors. As you say they want a quick turn around. I always hope that Vec or Sirap will do more classic looks! I must admit I've dreamed of the ladies who went to that private school. I'll take a look and see what I can find. So much depends on source material. I've messed a bit with scream queens but really had trouble getting a decent image. Glad for the input it does make me think of ladies I haven't thought of in quite a while.

I get lucky once in a while. The leading Friend lady for instance is pretty good I think but my attempt at one of her sidekicks is pretty rough. A lot of it is luck getting an initial image out of facegen. speaking of which I'll try to explain the process in my next post after I go get the laundry.

Yeah... bubblegum came out really good! I never liked smelly cat girl anyway, LOL.

One I keep daydreaming about is the fitness girl from the '80s... she kept hollering at me from the TV to get fit, but I never could stop staring from my couch. Anise Daustin... I had one Patreon guy try to get her look right, and it turned out fairly well. ...so many beauties with big hair from back in those days!

Here is a quick and dirty list I made up about how I tend to work. I hope it is somewhat clear. Feel free to ask questions.

The main thing you need to buy is Facegen which can export DAZ 2 files.

Find straight on headshots with little to no smile. If possible find profile shots.

Import the headshots into Facegen and make models. Adjust any obvious flaws in the morphs and adjust skin color. Often facegen makes the noses too long for instance.

Try to do a headshot plus a profile shot if you can. Even if the skin isn’t great, the morph can be useful.

Transfer the textures and the morphs to VAM.

Kick up the basic scene, clear all morphs, hair, skin. Add in the textures as the skin materials. Find the morphs and start messing with them. Try to look in turn closely at the eyes, the nose and the chin and start adjusting. I also like to uncross the eyes. Also get the eye color close if you can.

I like having say half a dozen textures and morphs and mess around to see what I can get.

Look for flaws in the skins and use a photo editor to get rid of things like bits of teeth showing, reflections on the lips and nose, eyelashes showing on the eyebrows, shadows under the nose and lips, etc…

Tinker with sliders to see if they help. Save a lot through all this as sometimes you make it worse.

Try to find a hair style that improves the look. I’m trying to improve in this area. Often you have a base and then bangs. The hair color corrector mod is very useful to match hairstyles.

Wow... that's a great chunk for a start!

I keep telling myself: Man, I should really start working on my own looks... just as soon as I organize all the files I've downloaded so far. I guess you can imagine how far that gets me.

Curious, do you expect the list you just gave me to become pretty much irrelevant once VAM2 takes over?