I was busy doing modeling for the marketplace here, and then I went on hiatus. Then I heard about Poser5 X Mac being out and bought it and installed it. Being the impulsive type, I ransacked my Poser4 runtime and moved everything to the new digs, i.e. Poser5 runtime, rather than link to the old runtime or duplicate a couple gigs worth of files.

Ok, so here's my question. Is there somebody out there who's nice and clear about the difference between P5 and P4 cr2 and hr2 format? I'm accustomed to editing them manually so I don't scare easily. What I'd like to do is be able to do my hair and clothing creating in P5, so I dont have to reinstall P4 ... but be able to produce P4-compatible cr2 files for sale or giveaway. Can anybody help me here? or point me somewhere? What I need to have I guess, is a list of the file segments I need to delete so the P4 users can load it.

I could learn this myself the hard way, but I hoped somebody in PC land had already been over this ground.

I recommend having Poser 4 installed so you can test the files. I have 4, Pro-Pack, and 5 installed on one of mine for testing before beta-testers. I even have a mac. You could delete allot of the unnecessary stuff from 4 to save space. After testing you can save the Final CR2 files into the library with Poser 4. This way you really know. Poser files start like this: { version { number 5.01 } figureResFile :Runtime:Geometries.... You need to change the number 5.01 to 4 Before opening in Poser 4 make sure there are no element Poser 4 doesn't handle. Like displacement maps, dynamic hair and so on. Hope this helps. I just think if you are going to sell stuff for Poser 4 then test it in Poser 4.

If you open and resave your P5 Cr2 in P4 all the P5 related stuff like node informations etc. is taken out of the file. But I would recommend the same as lynnJonathan, have your P4 installed for testing purposes and just delete all the P4 files you do not need.

there is really no need to delete the p5 stuff as p4 just ignores it, the only thing you really want to do is, change the version number and thats really only to avoid the minor inconveniance of a newer version then expected error which after its clicked really has no effect. as for texture info. you do want to make sure p4 gets its bum files but you can put p5 shader tree info into your files and have the best of both worlds as p5 if it has shader trees ignores p4 textures and p4 ignores shader trees.

I will say however that you should have p4 loaded as has been suggested for testing as p4 seem to have slightly different ways of rounding off numbers which ends up meaning that some morphs loaded in p5 may end up needing to be turned down slightly in p4 and p4 is fussyer about Joint parameters.

Thanks everybody! this is EXACTLY the stuff i needed to know. Thanks especially to wdupre for the tips about file cross-compatibility, that's just the area i was unclear about. And yes, all things considered, having P4 running for test purposes really is the easiest and only safe answer in the long run. I will go ahead with creating in P5 and then testing in P4, because i'd like to be able to offer both a P4 and a P5 version, or a "fat" (features for both apps) version whenever possible, and you've clarified what i need to do for that. Thanks again!