Before we begin mastering DAZ Studio, we have to understand the other side of the Poserverse: Poser itself. DAZ Studio is developed as an entry, or gateway product, into the wonderful world of 3D Art. Poser was originally designed to help artists draw in traditional media.
Poser costs anywhere between $100 dollars (being sold through DAZ 3D of all places) to $250 dollars (sold through Smith Micro). Poser bills itself as a "high end" program. Not at all good for hobbyists. DAZ Studio was produced for the Hobbyist in mind.
But both DAZ Studio and Poser can load poser content. But because there are subtle differences in the way that DAZ Studio can handle Poser Content, not all Poser Content will work with DAZ Studio. This problem is compounded by the fact that most sites that sell for Poser will not SELL for DAZ Studio. Most items you see at Renderosity, Runtime DNA, and other sites have wonderful items that will work -- but they don't come prepackaged with DAZ Studio shaders. People who work with DAZ Studio will have to realize that they are often treated as "the guys down the street your mother warned you about" by vendors at other sites other than DAZ 3D.
However, some stuff from Runtime DNA and Renderosity will work with DAZ. You just have to work with DAZ shaders to get them right (often times that takes man hours on your part). If you don't want to deal with it, you often have to buy stuff at DAZ 3D. Although, Aery Soul and Danie and Malforno both sell items at DAZ 3D, and will often give support to DAZ Studio after a fashion.
There is one thing about DAZ Studio that makes it stand out from Poser. It's like having your own indoor Photography Studio. The 3D models cost less than a real model these days. And Computer Graphics technology has progressed to the point where the difference between real and CGI is blurred for the layman.
The Master Series will use Theatrical terms such as "blocking" to help you form your scenes. This is mostly because of my theatre background, also it fits DAZ Studio's intended purpose.
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The main items designed for Poser that just don't work in DAZ Studio are Dynamic Clothing and Dynamic Hair, but these two categories make up a tiny proportion of the available content. Dynamic Clothing is, apparently, coming "soon" to DAZ Studio, and it's going to use a different system to Poser when it comes - it'll be better, by all accounts.
When it comes to materials and textures, I find that they do sometimes need a little tweaking in DAZ Studio, but often only if you're trying to get an accurate match between the two apps. Some Poser content come with alternate textures stored in Poser-specific .mc6 Material Room files. DAZ Studio doesn't support those, but they're easy to convert into DAZ-friendy .pz2 files which you can load from your Pose folder.
Here's how:
Make a copy of the mc6 file and its png thumbnail. Open the copy of the mc6 file in a text editor. Change "mtlCollection" to "figure" (if the pose is going to apply to a figure, which will usually be the case) or "prop Prop" (if it's for a prop, or for hair from the hair library). This is usually the 7th or 8th line. Save (don't use File>Save as... or you may change the extension to .txt, which you don't want).
Change the extension of the file from .mc6 to .pz2. Move the file and the png thumbnail to a folder in the Pose library.
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