We all hate having to go and turn off IK whenever we need to REALLY pose a figure the way we want. Is there a way to store IK states in a POSE? I've tried simply making the changes to IK and then saving a Pose, but the IK settings are not saved with that method. What would be nice is if a pose could be made to turn on and turn off all IKs. Is there a way to do this? Can the Pose files be changed with a text-editor?

Yes, it can, I bought soething that came with an IK off pose, no idea how though...

Yep. At least, I've never tried it, but there's no reason why not. Here's the inky channel from a posette (with IK switched off). inkyChain rightLegg { off name Right Leg addLink rThigh:1 addLink rShin:1 goal rFoot:1 linkWeight 0 1 linkWeight 1 0.05 } As far as I can see, all you need to do is make a Pose (or SET, as I call them) file which changes the 'on' line to 'off'. You'd need 4 channels, 2 for the arms and 2 for the legs. In case you're wondering, the channel name 'rightLegg' is a trick I use to force IK to switch off permanantly. 'rightLeg' becomes 'rightLegg' and poser can't switch IK on. So here's what the SET would look like. { version { number 4.01 } figure { inkyChain rightArm { off name Right Arm addLink rShldr:1 addLink rForeArm:1 goal rHand:1 linkWeight 0 1 linkWeight 1 0.05 } inkyChain leftArm { off name Left Arm addLink lShldr:1 addLink lForeArm:1 goal lHand:1 linkWeight 0 1 linkWeight 1 0.05 } inkyChain rightLeg { off name Right Leg addLink rThigh:1 addLink rShin:1 goal rFoot:1 linkWeight 0 1 linkWeight 1 0.05 } inkyChain leftLeg { off name Left Leg addLink lThigh:1 addLink lShin:1 goal lFoot:1 linkWeight 0 1 linkWeight 1 0.05 } } } You can try copying and pasting this. Save it as a .pz2 and try it. I don't guarantee anything, but I think it's OK. This will switch IK off for any P4 fem figure. If you want to switch it on, change all 4 'off' lines to 'on'. mac

I just tried it myself, and it works fine. mac

Try this too. It's a slimmed-down version. Should work. mac { version { number 4.01 } figure { inkyChain rightArm { off } inkyChain leftArm { off } inkyChain rightLeg { off } inkyChain leftLeg { off } } }

Just change the wording and case from Mac's version, as V3 uses "hands" instead of "arms". { version { number 4.01 } figure { inkyChain RightHand { off } inkyChain LeftHand { off } inkyChain RightLeg { off } inkyChain LeftLeg { off } } } ---- What an excellent timesaver, this is my favourite discovery this week!

Hate to be a wet blanket, but why is this so useful? I mean the menu option is just a click away. If you have a pose to do it you have to first navigate to the folder that has the pose inside...or else copy it to every folder. And IK is useful for some things, so you should also have a pose file that turns 'em on if you want to use pose files.

Well I find it useful... :p :p :p LOL Seriously, I find navigating by menus quite hard for some reason. I'd always rather double click. Perhaps it's just because the libraries are on the right of the screen, and the menu over to the left, and I'm right-handed. Perhaps it's that the palettes are larger icons than a menu, and I'm cack-handed... Who knows? ;-)

"and I'm cack-handed... " Translation for non-Brits... Cack-handed = clumsy, unco-ordinated, "unfortunate". Sorry, karen, no offense meant. :) I think a pose to turn of IK is a great idea because one double click does the lot, rather than having to go back up to the menu and select the other leg, etc.

None taken ;-) Not only cack-handed tonight, but dumb with it - just hit Render before saving my file so far and it looks like Poser has crapped out on me once more : RATS!!

I'm with tedbragg and karen1573, I hate having to turn IK off all the time! Life is too short for that.

"looks like Poser has crapped out on me once more : RATS!!" I wave a hammer at my computer when it starts acting up. It works wonders. Sometimes.

Hey..no problem if you'd rather click a pose file. MY problem would be finding the folder the file is in. LOL Quicker for me to hit the menu. :)

'I hate having to turn IK off all the time! Life is too short for that' Exactly. That's why all the figures I use frequently have had their channels renamed to 'inkyChain rightLegg'. That stops poser from using IK at all. Of course, if you do want to use it (which I never do), you have to re-hack the cr2. 'so you should also have a pose file that turns 'em on' Yep. That's why I said "If you want to switch it on, change all 4 'off' lines to 'on'" Karen, I'm pretty unkeen on menus myself, so I do everything with the keyboard. As soon as you press ALT, the menu shortcut letter will be underlined. It doesn't take long to learn them. For example... alt-f-e-i = export image alt-f-i-w = import obj file alt-f-i-b = import background pic and so on... I use the kb over the mouse every chance I get. mac

The easiest way must be to just edit the cr2 for the figure in question: The IK settings are close to the end in the cr2 file (do a text search for "inkyChain"). Replace "On" with "Off" for the legs and save the cr2. After that, IK will be off every time you load the figure.

AFAIK Poser automatically sets the IKChain for leftLeg and rightLeg to "on" whenever a figure is loaded, and you have to RENAME the IK chains (for me calling 'em "left_Leg" and "right_Leg" did the trick)...

Yep. Changing it in the cr2 won't help, since poser switches IK on anyway. To repeat what I said above, 'That's why all the figures I use frequently have had their channels renamed to 'inkyChain rightLegg'. That stops poser from using IK at all' In other words, renaming 'rightLeg' to 'runtLog' or anything else, will prevent poser from using IK on it. mac

Bummer... Another "feature" in Poser that I wouldn't mind if they got rid of. Why not let the users decide if they want IK on as default or not!

Larry was told that many advanced users do not use IK - or seldom use it and would like the option to keep it off. That we hate the present situation. This, when P5 was still in beta, but the answer was negative about doing it. I am still frustrated that I could not convey just how much of an annoyance the present setup is. A PZ3 will open a figure with IK off, if it is saved that way.

Yeah, it should be off by default, but don't even think of getting rid of it. I've found it very useful for starting certain types of poses. Put a figure's hands on a wall, for example, turn IK on for the arms so the hands stay stuck, then do your fiddling with the body. Or stand a figure in front of chair, turn IK on for the legs. Grab the hip and pull down. Turn it off again for refining. I think if it were off by default, and easier to click off and on, folks wouldn't gripe so much, turn it off, then forget it exists.

Poser IK definitely has flaws, but I've always found it useful to do animation poses. I can't imagine why it would be useful or necessary to hack a CR2 to disable it (though maybe this is a P5 problem...?). All of my character CR2s have IK off by default so when they're loaded IK is off (I use P4 Pro Pack).

I have pose files in a prominent pose folder which will turn on or off various combinations of hands, feet, or head. So I turn on the IKs when I start the development of the animated pose. Then with IK still on I go to the animation pallette and delete all the keyframes for body parts from the hip (not inclusive) to the IK targets (e.g., hands). This smooths out the body part movements. Then I turn IK off (quickly and easily using my pose files). It's sometimes necessary to turn it back on for, say, the feet to make sure the feet stay firmly planted in the final animated pose, but the end results are almost always quite good.

All my figures, starting with Supermodel Vickie up to Ingenue Vickie have had the renaming bit done, and IK is off by default. You can still turn it on and resave the CR2 to make it stick, if you want, having a choice is nice, I though. ;-)