The best DAZ Studio freebies, ShareCG edition

Ah ShareCG, how I love thee. This is one of the largest repositories of free models, textures, clothes and props for DAZ Studio, Poser and other 3d apps, and it’s also one of the most regularly updated. It ranks right up there as being one of the site I check every single day, and can be assured that there’ll be at least one new thing each day that’s worth adding to my runtime folder.

But at the same time, it’s among the most frustrating sites on the internet because it’s set up to only allow one download at a time (which is fair enough), but it also completely locks your access to the site while you’re downloading. This means you can’t set a download going then carry on looking through the site. You’re stuck there, waiting… and waiting… and waiting. It’s like surfing in 1986, only worse. Why they’ve set it up like that I don’t know.

But anyhow. Once you know about that limit, it’s easy to work around by looking through the pages first, opening the items you like in separate tabs on your browser and downloading each in turn as they complete.

This time around I’m going to show you the pick of the crop from the Poser section of ShareCG, the must-have freebies from this vast site which merit space on your hard drive and you’re use time and again as you explore the wonderful world of 3d rendering.

Moonfire, by Colleen
When you’ve reached a point where you you’ve had enough of that purple rash and want a higher-resolution texture than the sample-res Natural skin, this is the one to get. I’ve raved about this texture and morph for Victoria 4 before – it’s a beautiful pale skin texture which is easily commercial quality, and just right for rendering ethereal elves, Irish lassies and your typical Gothette. It takes lighting very well indeed, and (with a little tweaking) works well on Michael 4 too!

No, I don’t know either.

What’s more, the headmorph works with the Victoria 4.2 EZ figure provided with DAZ Studio, so you don’t even need the morph pack to use it. Which is nice.

Gelf and Babs, by michy
Don’t be fooled by the identical pictures in the promo shots – these are two different texture-and-morph sets which turn Michael 4 into an elf or futuristic alien. Like Colleen above, the morphs (even the body morph) work with the Base figure so you don’t need M4’s morph pack to use ’em. The textures look good right out the box, though as usual I recommend changing the skin’s Render Style to Matt in the Surfaces tab.

Despite the savage attack from Gelf, Babs still managed to balance the tree on his nose.

The headmorphs work with Victoria 4 too, so use Gelf and apply the Colleen skin texture and just a touch of Photoshop magic, and……..

Fable and Red Guard update, by Dyald
As a relatively new model, Michael 4 is sadly lacking when it comes to freebie clothes, so it’s well worth grabbing anything that’s available. Thankfully, Fable is a terrific set which has been very well fan-supported with tonnes of additional free textures and addons.

The set comes with two different tunics, two sets of sleeves for either tunic, two sets of pants, gloves, boots, sword, scabbard, shield and banner – in other words, more than enough to provide M4 in fantasy-themed outfits for months! And that’s where Fable stands out – in it’s sheer re-usability. I’ve used the boots and gloves for superhero renders more times than I can count, and the whole set for everything from fantasy to sci-fi and beyond.

M4 Base + Gloves + Boots + Shirt Front + Fast Metal Shaders = done!

Anything by Shukky
Certain names are uttered in hushed reverential tones among the 3d rendering community. If it’s sci-fi or urban scenes you need, it’s Stonemason. If it’s gritty fantasy, it’s Danie and Marforno. And if it’s manga/anime, it’s Shukky.

I’m going to be looking at how to create manga/anime style images in the future, but for now, just know that if it says Shukky on the label, you want it.

M4 Pose Pack, by magneto1969
If there’s one thing you need it’s poses for your figures, and here’s a stonkin’ collection for Michael 4 along with a pile for M4 & V4 together too. It’s not perfect, and there’s a handful of NSFW poses in there that really don’t belong, but if you want action poses for Michael this collection deverves space in your runtime folder.

That’ll do for now. As is typical I’ve bared scratched the surface, and doubtless forgotten some items which I use on a daily basis, but ShareCG has one ace up it’s sleeve – a search facility which actually works. You can search for only hair, clothing, characters, etc, and look for just Poser (and, by association, DAZ Studio) content – though don’t forget the ever useful .obj format files too. DAZ Studio loads those in just fine (File->Import is your friend), and there’s a wealth of great spaceships and buildings out there in .obj format.

If you find any great freebies on ShareCG, why not leave a link in the comments for others to find too?

Till next time!