Hi, I have been using Poser 4 a bit for the past year and feel like I need to go further. I have heard that DAZ's products are good, but don't know much about them. I am into animation and use Poser in conjunction with After Effects and Flash. If I wanted to get started with DAZ stuff, what would I start with? What would be a good, basic starter kit? (I would like to start out with one male model and one female model) Thanks.

If you're doing animation, you might want to check out the Lo-Res versions of Vicki and Michael. They'll tax your systems a lot less than fully loaded version 2's, let alone the version 3's which can get quite big. (Vicki 3 is already out and Mike 3 will be out soon - probably this week, I hope!) That said, if you do the morph injection system properly - inject just what you need then spawn morphs based on all the minor morphs you used in creating the character, you might find V3 usable for animation. Lo-Res Vic and Mike can wear the clothes for the fully loaded Vic 1(2) and Mike 1(2). They can't wear the version 3 clothing without a decent amount of work - possibly a lot of work for animation. I do stills, not animation, but we do have some very knowledgeable animators here who can give much more detailed advise. Hope this helps, Cres

Attached Link: http://daz3d.com

If you have the money, get the Michael 2.0 & Victoria 2.0 CD's. You get two wonderful models, hair and clothing. Victora 3 is out and Michael 3 is just around the corner, but they use a somewhat mind-boggling system for morphs (called morph injections) that can be a bit daunting at first. As well as fill your computer with lots of files.

I'm sure someone else will be around soon with more pointers, tips and links to good stuff.

Michael 2.0 CD

Victora 2.0 CD

Oops. cross-posted :)

Check the deal you get with the Michael and Victoria CDs at DAZ. Also, everything Michael is on sale at DAZ this weekend.

Another posting of the cross. ;^P

Thanks. What about Mimic 2 and Mimic 2 Pro? Any good? Is Pro worth the extra money?

Mimics pro is a good investment if you want to customize facial expressions during the speech. laurent

Quick tip: If you are going to jump in and buy both mike & vicky, along with other Daz items, you will want platnium club membership first. Do the math before you buy, tally up all that you plan to buy in the next couple of weeks both with the club and without. You'll find you save money with the club.