Hey, check out this game. Has anyone tried it yet? The makers of poser and Daz could learn a lot. The icons make it easy to shape faces while not getting lost in a million dials. Daz what have you done? Your own Demise? 3d apps need to learn from games on how easy it can be unless 3d apps have some other hidden motivation.

Nah. This is actually a pretty common feeling, but it's not based on the right perspective. The two realms exist separately. Without the 3D apps that exist, the games couldn't exist. In turn, the games spur more development in the 3D Apps. The reason I say this is that a game, in particular, a game like the sims, is actually created first in a 3D app. All those little icons essentially point to a routine that is a set and fixed point already predetermined for you in a 3D app. Your choices are, ultimately, limited. With 3D apps you are not limited -- assuming you know how to use the program. In poser alone there are two powerful modifers (wave and magnet) that actually allow you to completely reshape a figure to your whims. DAZ studio, I believe, has now or is planned to have similar modfiers. These modifiers, and more advanced one in the actual modelling applications (poser is not a modelling tool) are what allow an artist to create the options you use in a game. The game itself does not make any changes, it merely takes what has already been made and displays it. Poser and D|S, on the other hand, are a sort of middle ground. Poser is a figure design and animation tool -- it's a step beyond a game (and therefore will be somewhat more difficult) and a middle ground between a game and a modelling/rendering suite. Often, you will read debates here about how Poser should have this advanced feature or that advanced feature. The difficulty with adding them is that they push Poser into a different realm -- one where expensive high end applications reside -- rather than that special middle ground. To the other extreme, there are calls to "simplify poser", which reduce it to the level of a game-like environment. Again, this pushes Poser into a realm where a game like version would be more applicable -- which reduces the rich feature set it already has. The cause of this is often based in user ability. More advanced users want more advanced features. Less intense users want greater simplicity and ease of use -- and don't need all that fancy stuff. That push and pull is actually proof that Poser is where it needs to be, but walking that line between the two is difficult. As it is now, it is an outstanding artists tool - and, from private discussions, had some influence on the development of Sims2. So it's not so much a "hidden motivation" as it is a different purpose. The Sims is made to entertain you. Poser is for creating things that entertain you. It's a fine distinction, but an important one -- even if the majority of users rarely move beyond making a nude female they can ogle...

Nicely said.

I agree in general but I don't think the choice is quite so binary -- power or ease of use. To use Poser'd magnet tool as an example. Yes, you can do a lot with it but it is hardly intuitive or easy for many people to use. ZBrush and Amorphium take the same task and use a sculpting metaphor that is easier to grasp. Some variation on the grouping tool where you could color the areas of the mesh to be affected, using different colors to define the strength and perhaps something other than the clumsy (IMO) three piece magnet would make things much easier. Too often, the problem with software isn't a lack of power but rather a lot of power locked behind an inscrutable interface. The Macintosh was a hit, not so much because it could do anything that other machines of the day couldn't but because it made doing it easier for many people.

Been playing the Sims 2 way too much I've lost the weekend to it.LOL! I was thnking there should be more dials.But I do like its easy to figure out what the dials do in an icon. Can end users put in there own morph dials? I really need to take a break from playing and take a look under the hood of it.

It's not binary. There's always 5 POV's -- I just used the two most opposed to illustrate the point more accurately. The inscrutability of the interface is a variable but nevertheless falls into the realm of ease of use when reduction is applied. Interface is an area where folks have too much invested to go into with any depth -- what works for some will fail miserably for others. Furthermore, comparing Poser to other applications outside it's purview is a losing proposition -- but one that will exist indefintely, again because it occupies a middle ground. While all applications can indefinitely use improvement (I have yet to find one that meets every need of all it's users -- but then, if it did, it would do everything, lol), it's still a matter of learning to use the tool as it is. But that's off topic. And thanks for the kind words :)

Interfaces for 3D apps do seem to be about as idiosyncratic as you can get. Everyone seems to have a slightly different way of accomplishing the same thing. As long as you can settle on one, choice is always a good thing. It's true what one person grasps easily seems muddled to another. I do wonder though, how much these companies invest in the type of usability testing that others do. Some of them have faces that only their original creator could consider intuitive IMO. I wasn't trying to compare Poser to other applications, just a specific function in Poser that other applications also have but implement differently. I agree that Poser should stay Poser and not try to become Maya or Max. A smooth pipeline to Shade and Vue is a much better strategy. I suspect that Daz should've concentrated on making better models as well but it's their money. If Daz, CL, the Vue folks and the Shade folks could all cooperate in a joint manner, they might be the AMD of 3D.

Personally, I think they should make Poser 6 more like Silent Hill! muhahaha

lmckenzie; How true that would be. Poser and VueVuePro is a wonderous thing for those who want to learn animation. Shade still has a long way to go for acceptability, but since Vue already supports native shd. import, that makes it a good choice for new modellers. DAZ is going to have to figure it out for themselves.

Someone in one of the early Shade threads linked to a render on the Shade site that is stunning. I like photorealism in 3D and previously, I thought Cinema4D produced the best results I'd seen. I have to say, Shade's results look just as good and possibly better. They will have to work to break into the market here but with Poser integration, decent modeling tools and a low price, they can be a valuable part of the package. I hope that (the whole package) is the way they're looking at it. People have already used Poser to do relatively simple stuff for TV. I don't see why "the package" wouldn't be a compelling alternative to Maya, etc. for low budget film and TV work. Maybe they will discard FireFly and integrate the Shade renderer with Poser for a start. who knows. Unfortunately, Poser's wayward history doesn't seem to bode well for great decision making though.

ynsaen you have to think out of the box. The ease of consumer camcorders with the quality of professional cameras gave way to the mini dv camcorders combining the ease and professionalism. The prosumer market. Here the ease of games with the complexity of 3d programs is giving way to better software that combines the best of both worlds as each learns from the other. Maybe you are too old to understand or closed minded but the future will lend a hand. Poser and vue are terrible for animations and need to be redesigned. Salesmen everywhere....

It's possible I'm too old to understand, and equally possible I'm close minded, though I'm inclined to believe otherwise ;) On the other hand, it's possible that not understanding the market forces that created the "prosumer" market may give rise to not understanding the manner in which the apples to oranges comparison provided arises. Let me ask two questions to help clarify the discussion. The ease of use in games comes from what? Combining it with the capability of what sort of 3D program? 3D programs come in a lot of different designs, functions, and with different strentghs and weaknesses. And that's exclusive of rendering engines -- engines which are buit entirely differently today for 3D programs than they are for games. incidentally, "prosumer" is a market sub category into which Poser fits.

I'm trying to understand both POVs here--and probably failing, of course. The description of games as a relatively "dumb" consumer of 3D content is true to a large extent. The same can be said of poser at least in a way. Poser is a relatively speaking, dumb consumer of meshes made in Lightwave and other far more capable modeling applications that Poser itself couldn't begin to create. Ynsaen seems to be saying that the relationship between games and 3D apps can only influencing 3D by driving the (3D app makers) to create more powerful applications to create 3D content. That is probably accurate at this point. I would argue that this being the case, 3D apps are perhaps behind the curve. Games have had a tremendous impact on the way we use computers. Sound, graphics, video, avatars , voice commands, these are all things which have been popularized in the gaming world and now appear in "real" applications. Microsoft's upcoming Avalon interface makes heave use of 3D graphics. One new web monitoring tool uses the game-like metaphor of avatars moving through rooms to represent users navigating a website. Software companies aren't adding these features because they look cute but because they empower users with a familiar interface and yes, they're also "fun." Now you could say that it's all interface and not the meat of the application, but to the user, the interface is the application. It defines what you can accomplish and how easily you can accomplish it as well as how many errors you make in the process. Now modeling is hard (I can't do it, so it must be), but I think the 3D apps are one of the last bastions of software that is harder than it needs to be. They're missing the boat. Publishing used to be hard when the only thing that existed were things like SGML and FrameMaker. Now, anyone can produce results that were impossible for a non-trained person a few years ago. The same goes for photo and video editing. Now Joe Blow isn't going to produce the NY Times or Star Wars but that's not the intent. What percentage of Poser users, a smart and relatively 3D savvy group model? How many can edit a home movie or produce a newsletter? Probably most of the ones that have a desire to do so. How many use pre-made light sets because Poser's lighting is hard to grasp? How many couldn't use a magnet to make a simple adjustment to hide Vicky's nipples? It's not a lack of desire, a lack of smarts, or a lack of power in the applications it's the difficulty and frustration in using tools that aren't doing the job they should be. Sure, a lot of people have a lot of time, money and ego invested in the skills needed to use these tools effectively and perhaps that leads to a worldview which says that this is just the way things are. I spent a lot of time learning to code in C, the old fashioned way. Would I rather code a drop down menu by hand now rather than using VB's menu builder?, No way! I want that time to concentrate on the real meat of my skills, the logic of creating a program. We all use Poser, some model. We know how much fun it is, how compelling it is. I'm truly convinced that there is a whole world of people out there who would feel that if the toolmakers respond by creating the same kind of applications that have driven the popularity of home digital video, photography and publishing. Poser is a good start but it has a ways to go for sure. Most of the other 3D applications haven't even started. Does it have to be hard to be powerful? Do you have to endure a daunting rite of passage before you can get down to realizing your vision? I agree with Arthur C. Clarke. "Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic."

No, it doesn't have to be hard. But to change Poser from what it is now into something else is in error. An ideal would be a new application geared more accurately towards the needs of the users who do not wish that full functionality.

Well, at one time I did suggest 'Poser for Kids,' which was indeed a stripped down version. What I maying here is that adding a new magnet manipulation tool is not reducing functionality, quite the contraty, its opening up the underlying functionality to a larger group of users. Even if we go to the extreme and add a gamelike 3D glove controller which allows the user to "reach into" the scene and pose a figure, we're not changing Poser's core functionality or focus a bit. If you compare Poser 5 to Poser 4, CL have done more to try to change Poser into something else than anything I've advocated. Whether that was a good thing I don't know. It was what people wanted. Today, it makes more sense to me to have Shade do the lighting, rendering etc. Being an isolated product, Poser of necessity became Lighter, Renderer, etc. It doesn't necessarily have to do that anymore. Let it return to it's roots as a posing, design and pre-visuaization tool. Concentrate on better posing. Bury the hatchet with Daz and let them concentrate on building better figures. Let the folks in Japan who've been pushing, lighting and rendering polygons for years do what they do best and to hell with Maya.