Yesterday, a professional NYC 3d designer told me that poser is not really considered a "professional" tool. She said that in the industry she and it uses 3dmax exvlusively. Her resume is pretty impressive so she has some credibility. But why is this? Is it because of proprietary issues vis a vis poser geometries? Is it some other technical limitation that poser has? It astounds me to think it might be primarily an ego trip because only a fool would deny the fact that the poser models look better than most designer created from scratch models. Is it output protocols that limit Poser? Incompatibilities? Wassup?

I am not sure what she meant, I think it is amazing...Sharen Guess you have to go with your gut feelings here and what you see and use.

I think, she didn't mean to insult us Poser-users not even the artists among us ;-) She probably meant Poser is not used much (if at all) in the professional market, because it lacks some features they need, for example, batch rendering with a render farm, compositing tools and the like. It is a very fine tool for me and you for hobby purposes and it comes with an acceptable price tag. The professional tools cost a lot more and are more integrated. Remember the hoopla because CL hasn't yet finished a MAC-version or the interfaces for Lightwave or C4D? It has nothing to do with the quality of stills you can make very conveniently with Poser, IMHO. Willy

There are two reasons why they don't consider Poser a professional 3d Application. #1 You don't have to go to school to learn to use it. #2 It doesnt cost enough! ;D

Exactly sirkrite.Well said.

In my opinion, a true "professional" will use whatever tools are necessary to satisfactorily complete the job. Sometimes a simple or less expensive tool is the right choice. If possible, use whatever works best for you.

well, since people use poser (propack and 5 anyway) to make figures posable for use in poser, and then sell the figures, that would make it the tool of a professional :)

A professional tool is a tool that is used by professionals. Professionals use Poser to make money for them. Therefore Poser is a professional tool. QED

you know as an avid 3d art enthusiast...i hear/read ALOT of people knocking poser which leads me to wonder...have they even TRIED using poser?...first off it's not the tools that make the art...it essentialy is the artist...would the world look down upon say rembrant if he created the EXACT SAME art in another medium say....human excrement?...no....at the VERY LEAST poser is an exellent learning and/or set up tool...people can knock poser all they want...yet oddly enough i see p4 figures turning up on many many commercials these days (weight loss products, etc.) so returning to what i said before it is the artist NOT the tool =) reverend judas

Further thoughts - I think Poser's ease of use works against it sometimes. I've seen advertising work which used the default Poser figures, plastic hair and all - no effort put into it at all, just straight out of the box. Anybody seeing that could be forgiven for thinking that was all Poser could do. If anybody remembers the "Letraset" dry transfer clip art series, those were all over the small ads some years back, to the point where you began to recognise the same clips cropping up time after time. You couldn't do anything with 3DS Max or Maya without a considerable amount of learning, but anybody can install Poser, pick a clothed character from the library and apply a stock pose to them in under an hour. So perhaps we should campaign for Poser to be made really hard to use? The we Poser experts could lord it over the rest of the world. :-)

PLEEZE dont make it any harder!! I can do autocad in my sleep so know that i understand 3d but sometimes - well, let's just say with Poser 5, poser is hard enough!

I think poser is one of the best professional tools a programmer (duh, only talent i have after 20+ years is programming) can have and for our artists here - i can only hope to see work as good as yours on ads, in films or in art galleries!

Keep up the good work and figure that teacher probably never tried using the software before looking down her nose - a lot of us do that in life; unfortunately and good luck with your class!

Professional programs cost in the $10K range, so obviously Poser does not qualify! Do you think there is anyone in the world who makes a living producing Poser art? Don't get me wrong... I am GLAD it is not in the $10K range, since I am not a professional and I (or my non-existent employer) cannot afford that!

I have created illustrations with Poser that I used in technical manuals and in marketing brochures. I also used CorelDraw, CorelPaint, Adobe FrameMaker, and many other tools. That was 3 years ago and I was making $30/hour at the time. Cost doesn't determine whether it is professional. If professionals use it is what determines if it is professional. It doesn't matter what it costs, if it can do what you need. IMHO.

"it's not the tools that make the art...it essentialy is the artist..." I agree for the most part, but do you really think Michaelangelo could have done as a nice a job with the Sistine Chapel if he had to use a paint roller instead of an army of brushes? From my perspective, there are two major reasons why Poser is not considered a professional-level program. And yes, I have used it. 1. The Poser render engine -- even the new FireFly engine -- is poor. Honestly, the only programs I've ever worked with that had less-powerful renderers have been free ones. 2. Poser is not a self-contained application unless all you want to do is use stock clothing, stock figures and stock morphs. If you want new props, you need to create them in another program. If you want clothing, you have to create it in another program. If you want new morphs... well, you get the idea. The only advantage is that Poser comes with already-modeled figures, but companies that deal with 3D a great buy dozens of CDs of content, including human figures, to use it programs like 3D Studio Max and Lightwave, programs where you can do everything you need to RIGHT THERE. Poser is TOO specialized to make it a truly useful tool for most professionals -- it has a very narrow purpose and very limited options in terms of expanding it's useage.

Poser is not considered a Pro app because: 1. There are only stock figures available, you cannot create your own within Poser. 2. The animation system in Poser is crap!...compared to other animation packages. 3. Render output is VERY restrictive. No multi-pass options etc, etc. 4. Considering the above, you need a second package to do the modelling, animation and rendering, so you might as well buy Lightwave, Maya, Softimage or Cinema to do the job ;o) Cheers