Attached Link: http://www.renderosity.com/messages.ez?Form.ShowMessage=1676929

I've started a couple of threads called Notes for a Newbie to help a friend of mine get started. (I've been asked to make them into real tutorials so that they don't get buried, but that means reformatting and rewriting, and I haven't gotten around to it.) Since we have so many real experts here, I'm filling in the outside around the corner stuff, such as asset management. For basics on how to find your way around the interface and use the tools, search for "geep". Dr Geep's primers are major time-savers and he uses lots of pictures and humor to make the information clear and fun to learn. For specific questions, don't just put "helllllp, pleeeeese" in the thread title. Mention *what* you need help with so that the right experts see it: "how do I inject morphs?" "how do you get shadows to render on the ground?" "Her hair vanished... what happened?" are the type of thread subjects which get answered appropriately by the people who understand morphs, lighting, joints, and IK. Get Poser 5 and play with it for a while. Look at the galleries to see what can be done. Browze over the free-stuff areas and the stores to see what extra materials are available for when you want them. THEN determine what sort of pictures you want to make and start accumulating the figures, clothes, and props for that imagery. Example: if you are going for the manga look you'd want all the anime characters and the toon-shading tuorials, but would ignore the exactly-scaled structures and photorealistic textures. If you are doing pinups, then you'd want the textures and all the lingerie you can find. If you are recreating civil war scenes, you'd want period buildings and props and clothes, and anime dollies are of no use. Don't spend money on stuff you will never use and don't waste bandwidth for those freestuff providers. However, if it *does* look like something you will want, then it is usually a good idea to get it, because sites do go under and people do leave the community. Being under deadline is no time to go hunting for a prop you thought you saw 3 years ago! Carolly