I am a lifelong Poser student who may never create jaw-dropping images, but OHMYGOD Poser 6 rocks amazingly. Haven't had any crashes in over four hours of unsaved tweaking on P4 3.2gHz, 2.5 gb RAM, 200GB SATA HDD, integrated video using Intel 815 chipset - system has no AGP or PCI-E slot :p Image based lighting, ambient occlusion, sub surface scattering and my complete lack of artistic ability STILL creates nice looking images IMHO. New P6 features do not appear to render slower than P5 and image quality is similar to Lightwave radiosity anti-aliased (keep in mind that they've just let me out and I haven't adjusted to my medication). Super-spasmodically and totally worth the $89 upgrade from P5. I believe this new release may somewhat lessen the "hobbyist" scoffing from elitest users of high end packages. I look forward to seeing what wonderous things will happen when the community at large pushes the boundaries the way they have with P5. Special thanks to Mec4D with IBLAO experiments, tips and insights. Message edited for beer induced errors on: 03/24/2005 02:25

Message edited on: 03/24/2005 02:32

I've had an IM from another person who has been going at it for hours and he is rendering simple James walk animations in Poser6 using AO and exporting James walk (identical scene) to one of the other "BigFive" packages and rendering there attempting to compare apples to apples. He is not quite as spasmodic as you but in his own way is floored, absolutely floored, both with quality and render times (Poser6 much faster.) I'll let my friend out his own results, which I'm sure he will do in good time. Oh, and squid69, have some coffee, I don't think you've reached your maximum heart rate yet. ::::: Opera :::::

Opera, not coffee, Red Bull. I've had five today! Heaven forbid the FDA finds something wrong with Red Bull. I've got stock in that company. Per: firefly assembly level, I will still render outdoor scenes in V5I for ecosystems, trees, etc., but I am absolutely impressed with the quality (read: non-clayness) of the IBL - it makes Poser a completly different program. And yes, P6 with the bells and whistles I've used so far is REALLY fast.

Attached Link: http://www.renderosity.com/viewed.ez?galleryid=913941&Start=1&Artist=aeilkema&ByArtist=Yes

I'm very impressed with the Poser 6 rendering improvements and additions too. Fast? That depends on what you're creating. I created the attached picture in Poser 6, no problem at all, until I started to render it. Poser 6 couldn't handle it. The bottom part shows the max I was able to render in P6, every item added to that would result in a render error message. The top picture was rendered in Vue 5 (complete scene imported from P6). I rendered it with Global Illumination with broadcast settings (very good quality) size 1024x768. The picture took just over an hour to render. The attached file shows a Poser 6 render. Used IBL & Ambient Occlusion on the image, size 800x600. It took almost 3hrs to render this picture. In my experience the Poser 6 rendering isn't fast at all. Perhaps with one figure, but not when it comes to multiple figures. Even though I'm very impressed with the new Poser 6 rendering options (especially with IBL & Ambient Occlusion) and I do like it better then the Vue 5 rendering engine, it's unfortunally not an option for me. It can't handle my creations :-( I've got 1Gb Ram in my machine and to do what I want, means adding more to it, but that's the max my motherboard can handle. I would need an upgrade, but I've just upgraded this machine and got Poser 6, so I'm not spending anymore monay for a long time.

Aielkema,
I really like your picture.. However I am amazed that you managed to render that many characters (mucho poly's) in one scene. I thought even the 'big boy' major studios layer there creations when they have more than a few characters.
Don't get me wrong, I am not criticizing I am truly a rank amature and I am most impressed that you are able to do what you do without layering...I would think to render a complex picture like that would a very long time..or choke the heck out Poser..

Attached Link: http://www.renderosity.com/viewed.ez?galleryid=867643&Start=7&Artist=aeilkema&ByArtist=Yes

The top picture cannot be done in poser at all, it indeed chokes the heck out Poser. Vue 5 seems to handle stuff like that fine, I can use up to 30 fully clothed high res poser people in Vue 5 (see attached image) with 1Gb of Physical Ram. I know of people who were able to import up to 70 figures, but they've got lot's more ram and power in their pc. It's very dissapointing that Poser 6 cannot handle it, since I do like the new rendering engine additions and improvements a lot.

aeilkema Very Impressive,I am impressed about Vue 5 being able to do that. I have Vue 5 but I have been dissapointed with the results I have been getting so I have not tried it for a while. Maybe I'll give it another go. I would like to try something simular except with animation. How long did it take to render a scene like those VUE 5 with your 1 Gb machine??

That one was rendered with standard lighting (just one sunlight, GI or GA or Radiosity) and each image took about an hour to render in 800x600 broadcast setting. If you choose final and bring it down in size for animation it should render a lot faster.