A question arose about products with the same name. I edited that post because what I wanted to say was general, and not specific to those merchants. I posted a new message. That post was deleted by the PTB due to accurate, but offensive, wording, so this is a revised post, which, hopefully, will be allowed to remain. In an over-crowded marketplace, with everybody copying each other, merchants are going to have to do something original and creative in order to get my money. My points are valid ones. Merchants spend a lot of time working on a product... they might get more sales if they spend some time thinking about it. *********************************** I will make a point that NEITHER of these products look like a fairy, and neither of them will go into my cart. At least the one has pointed ears. :sigh: But no non-human face morphs. I could put on plastic ears (available on eBay and at costume shops all over the place) and a paint-job and look more magical and other-worldly than these ladies. Rhinestones under the eye or a rose painted on the breast doesn't equal magic nor does it make a pin-up doll into a denizen of faerie. May I suggest in general that if merchants want to make non-humans that you change the bone structure under the skin before you paint or tattoo the surface? That you think about eyebrows/antennae? That you consider feathers or fur in lieu of hair? Or if a butterfly/dragonfly-winged fae that you work some iridescent scales into the main texture? If you are going to be inspired by a magical or exotic name, create something different. Something. ANYTHING. And, sheesh, be original!!!!! If you just want to do gothic paintjobs, sexually-provocative-in-a-cheap-and-obvious-way lips, or colorful tattoos, why don't you give your characters punk/contemporary names and leave the fairy folk alone. Carolly the VERY Opinionated (I'm assuming that "sexually provocative" isn't too offensive...)

hi hauksdottir, unfortantly these days it's hard to be orginal because usually someone thought it up first. :| People do work very hard on their products some don't just want make a quick buck and to be quite frank I first saw this post i was bit ticked, but it's correct too, with feelings aside the has to be some other areas that has not be filled by the marketplace. Which I am trying to do, with my project Kaimira. I'v been working on her almost a year now and the prospect non orginal products came to mind. ok wtf maybe i should keep my ideas to myself in fear that some taffer is gonna snagg them? That's a chance we all take unfortantly. :( I saw a few other figures out there of course and i thought what can i do improve it and put in my own ideas of course i assume people would do the same thing to me. When i created MLS system for my poser figure it changes the bases for future product devoplment and addons for figures so at least i am trying to open the market to new ideas and things. I hope that accounts for something in ur minds eye. Cheers Seraphira

So what you want is a heavily morphed v3 character with antena's coming off the eyebrows and dragon fly wings and an irridecent skin texture? ;) With fur for hair?

I could prob do most of that but the skin shader would have to be poser 5 only :)

Message edited on: 02/15/2005 01:24

/me nods her head with death of life LOL ;)

Attached Link: http://www.magictrade.dk/images/kort/portal/Merfolk%20of%20the%20Pearl%20Trident.JPG

Laugh at odeathoflife. A figure doesn't have to have everything and the kitchen sink... but SOMETHING. Example: dryads. Years ago I was doing heads for a chat room site called WorldsAway. I gave my dryad leaves in lieu of hair. Someone else might think of weeping willow branches or wisteria with purple flowers and purple eyes to match. What about building/finding a beret and texturing it like an acorn cap? If you don't want to do leafy bits, perhaps morph the face so that it looks carved. Or texture the entire face as though it were a single blossom petal (look at one close up). Don't just stick a rose tattoo over the eye of a fully-made-up modern woman and call it a dryad. It isn't and I won't buy it. Another example: mermaids. I remembered being especially pleased with this Magic card, so found a link to it. Most of the mermaid packs out today have the bright colors stop at the level of hip-huggers, with nary a scale elsewhere... unless they are covering the breasts like a bra. :roll eyes: Why leave the navel bare? Should merfolk HAVE navels? Maybe in which to store a pearl, or maybe for bad punsters to comment upon... but, maybe not. Why don't the patterns and colors continue up the rest of the body? Why is the merlady wearing lipstick and eyeshadow? A few scales would be a lot more "fishy" and wondrous. I was starting to scan some abalone, but I'll need more samples to get enough to texture an entire body... but those are exquisite patterns inside the shells! Or how about pearlescence over the entire body? Maybe that is P5 only... but most Poser users now have P5. If an artist runs out of fish patterns, there are always sea shell interiors, and then there are the anenomes and starfish and jellyfish. So far, the folks at RDNA are the only ones to be creative with their merfolk. I bought their packages. I've got Dacort's naga and merfolk, too, and those are a joy. :) I understand the limits on webbing fingers... but that is no excuse for not making an ear morph or running the texture up over the body or something else magical. Example: fairies. If your fairy doesn't have wings, what does s/he have? A goblin might have knobby fingers, pot-belly, long nose... or might have stubby fingers and a button nose... but shouldn't look like the neighbor's kid with a "kobald blue" paint job. Most insects have antennae, so an insect-winged fae could have them in lieu of eyebrows. Maybe your wasp queen has a mouth shaped like mandibles. Spiders have, what, eight eyes? Instead of sticking a spiderweb tattoo on the tummy, how about adding 6 tiny eyes in an arc on the forehead? The pointed "elf" ears are originally from animals (as wild creatures), so making a face more foxlike or nudging the eyes further out to the sides or flattening the nose or SOMETHING helps with the illusion that this isn't a human. Troll babies (the ones that get exchanged for humans in the cradle) often have black eyes and a cowlick which is untamable. Um... I've never seen a cowlick and I've seen a lot of hair. Bad monsters get all the trimmings (most orc or werewolf packages seem pretty creative), but even the nice monsters need something extra. Not everything, but SOMETHING. Example: centaurs. Is there any logical reason why a centaur should have shiny neat street-ready hair like Kozaburo's? That makes as much sense as a french pompadour or shirley temple curls! It would either be braided to keep it out of the way when galloping and out of the eyes when grazing, or it would be a mane which goes all the way down the back to the withers, or it would be very, very messy. Something. And why should the horse coat abruptly |stop| at the human part? Humans are hairy, too. If the idea of fur on the face is disturbing, blend it over some distance, gradually thinning it. Think about all the horse colors and the underlying skin!!! If your white horse texture has a grey muzzle from the black skin... then a centaur wearing that coat pattern ought to have black skin on his upper part, too. Maybe there are some ideas here. Seraphira's figure will have layers over the cheeks to aid in adding makeup as I understand it... but those same layers could be utilized to add scales or a hint of lizard skin or treebark. Natalia3 has webby feet... think about frog women with those dangerous, if not out-right poisonous, frog textures and a glisten to the skin. Maybe bigger eyes, too. ;^) Several of the models have a morph for forked tongues... but how many snake creatures actually utilize it? And it doesn't have to be ugly! If anybody else has read "The Face in the Abyss", think about the snake mother with her delicate heart-shaped face. So... if you are selling something magical, something extraordinary, something alien... don't try to sell me a fashion model from Chicago or a goth from Seattle with the label "fairy". It is false advertising and I know better. You don't have to give me 5 laboriously painted tattoos when tilting the cheekbones or morphing the eyebrows or lengthening the fingers will do a more convincing job of selling me on your creature. Carolly the Voluminously Opinionated http://www.magictrade.dk/images/kort/portal/Merfolk%20of%20the%20Pearl%20Trident.JPG

That is a great wealth of information and worthy of a sticky post if I ever saw one. I for one ( if I ever do another mermaid or fantasy character ) will take that to heart.

Thank you, but there are lots of sources for ideas. :) And even if a person can't make morphs or use magnets, there are always bump maps and displacement maps to feed the illusion of surface detail. In the X-Men movie, there was a lithe woman with blue skin, odd eyes, and a pattern of scales. Instead of scales, one could use some of the jigsaw bark of a Jeffrey pine tree and a different skin color with a hint of wood-grain. Still an attractive woman, but unique. With all the fantasy and science fiction movies, one doesn't have to copy the characters, but use imaginative features as jumping-off places. Fairytales are full of good fairies and evil monsters, but there are also the "helpers" along the way, and these side people are often interesting enough in their own right. Imagine an old wrinkled woman with mushrooms in lieu of warts? Or suppose you have a grinning old man with a Cheshire Cat smile? "Spirited Away" was heavily influenced by the tales of Baba Yaga and Vasilisa the Brave and other girls who helped and were helped in return... so many wonderful characters! Another good one is the Lady of Copper Mountain... sometimes she is a golden lizard and sometimes a princess with skin of malachite.... surrounded by blossoms of stone. Have you seen malachite? In Scandinavia, there is a legend that a dancing arctic fox is a sorceress in disguise. I used this in one of my RPG campaigns: Melrakka's almost human form had white hair to the floor and little sharp teeth, and she watched people the same way a cat does. Three parties of adventurers were doomed. :)= There are undoubtedly merchants who will be offended (criticism is controversial, and I'm not being gentle), but if even a half dozen out of the thousand plus merchants gets inspired to do something different and truly magical, we all have something better to play with. Carolly

quite frankly...I like your original post...you left nothing to the imagination to how you REALLY felt... but in this day of PC, what can you expect but to delete the whole thread. It had character...may it R.I.P.

taking notes :o) am not very good at this but will have a play and see what happens Chris :o)

me being a first time merchant - taking notes and will see what my imagination comes up with however i keep far from fantasy types if i can since i dont have the means of creating wings and what not.

Artemis- I have the means but no imagination wanna team up?

very quick play long ways to go and as i don't know how to model i could do textures for some existing wings etc this is just a texture i had on hand posted once but not showing hope am not repeating myself lol

Chrislenn pointed me here, and I told her I was going to bed but got thinking so going to say my piece and hit the hay. I started in poser as a morpher and changed to textures because lack of interest on everybody elses part. If the time to come out of the woodwork is now I'm game. A full custom head morph for a mil. cr is about 1.5 -2 mb so figure one or two textures less in average pack. I have two projects to finish then i'll be open for suggestions. yarddog aka dannyboy

hauksdottir; for Centaurs there is a nice pack in the MP called Fantasy Mane that I thought was a fantastic start to a mane but the creator abandoned the product and never even made a male version :( It would be nice if it were longer and flowing like a horses mane and if she kept up the product for male characters (an all too often negleted thought to most products). For mermaid ears, I know I saw one morph target somewhere but can't remember which character it was. It was a nice 'fin-like' morph that I wish woulda continued on for the other characters that are so often used to make mermaids. And there was once a really nice Sharkmermaid once but I didn't get a chance to grab her before she vanished into the abbys... :( Yes, faeries need to be more creative, just look at Froud faeries at www.sideshowtoys.com , of course they can't be copied but it should spark some creativity and check out his cool pixies too. It's hard to create a totally new concept, that's true but there is so much out there that can be drawn upon and used as a guide to at least add details to what is made. And I'd love to see some gargoyle type feet made and if not webbed hands at least some nice gnarly clawed hands!

For wings, there are Thorne's universal wings (available free at DAZ and FaerieWylde and Anton's fantasy wings (which everybody who was a member of the PC Club at DAZ probably purchased since they've been used a lot)... so even if a person can't model wings those are both good bases for texturing and transmapping with a reasoable expectation that customers can lay their hands on the obj. Example: an acorn fairy. Let's start with Chrislenn's very pretty face in #6 and make the chin pointier and bring the jawbones in to shape the face just a little more. The nose is already small enough. Find a cap like the one which comes with StudioMaya's dreadlocks (I think there are other free caps out there like this), and make a new texture with displacement map to look like an acorn cap. OR make a cap with a squashed sphere and a little cylinder stem. Scan some nice oak leaves and make textures for the u-wings. I don't have any of the body suits, but I think it might be possible to use one of thip's quicksuits and some more leaves to add coverage in lieu of clothing. (This way one could make a more sprite-like body without worrying about clothes-fitting.) Make a skin texture in a nut-brown shade with a hint of woodgrain (going length-wise on the maps to minimize edge-blending problems). Green eyes with a bit of mischief? (after all, it is a nut!) This sort of thing is within the bounds of someone who isn't a modeler, the base parts are free, and yet is more imaginative than most of what is in the market. I've got Traveler's old "Monster Parts" pack, and ought to pull it out and see what else those legs can fit. He has replacement satyr legs and other neat stuff in it. There is room in the Marketplace for something modern, if a modeler wanted to tackle it. Fantasy Mane? Don't you mean the Fantasy Spike Conforming Hair? That has been on my private wishlist for a while as having possibilities. Except for Catarina, we don't have any sphinxes. With the hair in P5 (to make a furry body), lion-faced female morphs, and possibly some wings an imaginative artist could come up with some nice unique interpretations of this creature. There are even some Greek clothes for the male characters if one wanted to put wanderers to the riddle test! Harpies? PhilC has an old dragon-winged harpie but I haven't seen a Russian-styled one with feather wings and tidy crown (don't want it to fall off when flying!) There lots of flying bird-women variations possible given all of the cultures: Arabian Nights and Assyrian would be more vividly-colored than the Russian, Greek, and Egyptian.... I can suggest playing with a couple of layers of skull-cap or short hair with ostriche feather transmaps in lieu of flowing hair and carrying that feathery texture down into the body. Using a bodysuit or quick suit, one could get layers of feathers for a more realistic look (like a couple of people are doing with body hair). Find a feather wing that is free of commonly used and make a matching texture. For facial morphs, what about something like an owl-face with beaky hooked nose and huge luminous golden eyes? Yesterday I binged with friends and watched the entire expanded LOTR trilogy. 13 hours with food breaks between the disks. We were worse than hobbits! Anyway, most of the non-humans have pointed ears: riverfolk, hobbits, elves, orcs... but they are all DIFFERENT pointed ears. The orcs are especially variable. Lots of potential with a couple of magnets and an unwilling victim (the orcs were elves once). But these creatures are mose than just the pointy ears. Furry feet, button noses, slender or stumpy body types, facial hair, all go into the package to make each creature believable. igohigh, I believe that you were the one asking about a braided beard for a pirate: that is also useful for dwarves, Vikings, Celts! However, the character shouldn't stop there. Wild or exuberant eyebrows are part of this sort of image. (Guys who don't shave are probably not going to have manicured eyebrows either.) Fins for ears fulfills our human need to have something where the ears ought to be, yet still look fishy. Wasn't there a superhero character, Namor the sub-mariner, with this look? [hmmm... I just googled and could only find pointy-ears, but I remember fins... maybe from another sea-dwelling comic character] If someone is going to build smartprops to replace the ears, they should also make a morph to remove the current ones. Another thing about ears: many characters have dials for raising/lowering or turning/twisting the ears... but how many fairy-type creatures take advantage of this? If the ears are high and pointed and horse-like, it would help unicorn-type faes. Lower with maybe a flop at the tip would work with deer antlers or satyr horns. Just litle things to think about and which might help the illusion come together. Poser 6 is reported to have some sort of new subsurface scattering whatzit (was it secret #4?)... I could see new skin shaders possibly coming down the road which could help with glow... and also maps which have veins to give a trunslucent look. If old people have thinner skin... an 800-year old fairy ought to be quite translucent! Old skin loses elasticity and becomes a bit more papery even if it isn't wrinkled like a prune. How many witches/hags/ogresses have you seen with dry old skin? Creatures which live outdoors all year round (satyrs and centaurs) might have rougher tanned skin, too. (Although, by this reasoning, mermaids ought to be wrinkled on top of wrinkles, there is a limit to reality.) Lizards and other reptiles often have colorful skin, and the texture of the skin cells can form rosette patterns. Some scientists believe that dinosaurs were brightly colored since they have found skin impressions in the fossil beds showing these same rosettes. There are some saurian/human models, but I could see an evil fae with a reptilian skin where the pattern was more than just color, but also displacement or bump mapped. Noses... Small and flattened? (lizard) Wet like a dog's? (werewolf) Flaring like a horse (centaur) Maybe colored in a furry face? (I'm thinking of baboons and lemurs and other cousins of ours) Hmm... yeti with white furry face and body and a blue nose because it is cold! ;^) OK, enough typing for now... but I will add that Brian Froud is my favority fairy artist and even he has barely scratched the surface of what is possible. Carolly the Optimist

"Fantasy Mane? Don't you mean the Fantasy Spike Conforming Hair? That has been on my private wishlist for a while as having possibilities." That's the one, it's great and I've been able to transfer to it all but Freak with the various utilities out, it's kinda troublesome with M2 however. Don't wait too long, I begged the creator to continue and make it compatable with the males but she seems to have abandoned the whole project so who knows how much longer it will even be available... :? it was such a great start to centaur's mane, too bad she has no more intrest is progressing it's design in that direction like so many have craved in the past in the wish list forums...sign

OK, I'll nab it. If enough of us vote with our wallets, and pester her for more, maybe she'll be persuaded to do the males, too. :) When I saw it, it seemed like a good start for a zebra-type-centaur mane, but might need to be doubled-up so that it would brush out a bit. I don't yet own the zebra, which was the chief reason for not getting it.

Could this be something along the lines we are looking for? She was wip by Chrislenn and I when this string began. You pushed me to do some new morphing. ty Suggestions? Poser4 no postwork.

Message edited on: 02/25/2005 01:46

Attached Link: news.nationalgeographic.com/.../ 08/batspit.html

Ears are one of the defining characteristics for bats... as much so as their wings. They are usually large and upright and break the silhouette of the head. Even Japanese masks and origami (where things get simplified) show these ears. there is a lot of variation in ear types but this image is decent: news.nationalgeographic.com/.../ 08/batspit.html This Priest #9 from Ironclaw gallery shows stylized ears: http://greywolf.critter.net/gallery/ironclawgallery-standups-01.htm Also for wings, look at this one of a chocolate wattled bat: http://www.geocities.com/cradleoffilthtr/ResimLer/bat.jpg This is looking good. The clawed fingers are nicely predatory. Making her nose into more of a snout would just make her uglier (but suitable for a male perhaps), so I'd leaving the nose as is, or maybe tipping it up just slightly. I'd suggest rounder eyes, and black all over. Glinting beadily. If you know how Thorne got his pookling eyes, a similar sort of texture would help give her a sense of "other". If you had a red ambient, that would fit the tradition, but might also be too much. Bats hear more than they see, so giving her large foxlike ears, lifting them higher on the head, and at least hinting at the ribbed texture would really make this huntress distinctive. Morphng or modeling those ribs would be too much work, when a texture and bump map yields the same look. Many artists make vampires look a bit hollow in the cheek. A SUCCESSFUL well-fed stalker-of-the-night wouldn't be. In fact a plump self-satified look might be more unsettling! For the wings, check out a couple of images (this will help with texture, too). The little thumb claw is important to real bats since it allows them to hang on when climbing or feeding. It isn't as essential to a creature with arms, but is perhaps still useful. (Hey, if *I* was crawling upside down, I'd want all the little hooks available!) So, in summary, I'd recommend that you 1) lift and shape the ears so that they are obvious (yes, I know this will make choosing hair trickier, but mesh is somewhat forgiving). 2) make the eyes blacker and rounder. 3) work on the wings a bit more, although much of that look is in the texture. I like the neck tattoo: it gives her an elegant look (sort of like the vampires with lace cravats). (I usually don't like tattoos, so this one must be good!) If possible, make this so that anybody who has the free Vicky can use her without buying all the other morph packages... that way, you have the largest market base, without a bunch of requirements. It is a great start, and I hope that you guys get her into the market. Carolly

Thanks for the input:) Stasis will be a morphing V3Cr from a beauty to vamp this is mid stage with beauty and vamp morphs.As far as wings I rendered with Fallen Angel Wings here with new texture they have wing hooks but are out of the image right now. Thinking .....If this cr had custom morps all the way thru and her own morphing wings how much would you being willing to spend? Tim