Prompted by a few comments in another thread, I thought I'd flog this rotting equine corpse a few more times. First, let me make my own opinions on the subject clear... I don't dig postwork on my images, other than compositing, because my aim is to get Poser to do as much as possible. Plus, I think the results are often better done "in camera" than (for example faking shadows) in Photoshop. Also, I like to learn about Poser and its capabilities, something I'd never do if I reach for Photoshop to iron out the problems I encountered with Poser. I've used Photoshop professionally for around 5 years so I pretty much know my stuff there. Heck, if I wanted a simple solution, I'd break out the boards and brushes and start throwing paint around. I did that for long enough, too. But that ain't where it's at for me. There's something intrinsically fascinating about creating a scene that I can (in my mind's eye, at least) walk around and touch. That seems to be lost when it's painted over and filtered, which is one of the many reasons I don't paint over my renders. That said, if I was working for a client, or to a company deadline, I would use any means at my disposal to get the job done. Mr Customer and Mr Bossman don't give a damn about the means, they only want results. So, for me personally, nay to postwork but back in the real world, yes please. Have at it, guys and gals. Oh and, pretty please, let's keep it friendly, huh?

Have at it, guys and gals. Oh and, pretty please, let's keep it friendly, huh? Well you cn try, but ina forum with so many strong willed, passionate artist types it's not always possible. It's also very easy to misconstrue a comment on here as you can't read expressions, voice and generally body language. Some things come off blunter than they were intended. Right Postwork yes please, for no other reason than I detest the real look that creeps into textures these days. My standpoint being that if I wanted to do a photo manipulation I wouldn't have purchased poser in the first place. I think for me it's that I have a specific look I want to achieve think Boris Valejio and Julie Bell and it's a lot easier to do this with postwork. As this is what I'm asked to supply to my customers it's just a happy turn of chance that thats how I prefer to work. Plus I find that folding clothes and hair to me look a little better when hand painted :)... You will be pleased to know that no one lost any blood or was hurt in the making of this post Pink :)

Whatever gives you the effect/image you're after. It's that simple.

If it's your goal to do everything in Poser, that's cool as long as you're happy with the results you're getting - or if your entire goal is just to test the limits of Poser.

But for me the goal is to realize the image I've got in my brain as completely as possible and everything is just a tool to achieve that end - so whatever it takes, as long it gets you to the point that you're satisfied with the end result. (Note this is just a philosophy for creating art, not everything in life).

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Message edited on: 03/30/2005 18:59

I always postwork pretty much everything, even if it's just to fix elbows and knees or whatever. The reason I do is that I prefer to do it that way. I enjoy digital painting, and I don't particularly care to push Poser to its limits. I prefer to push me to MY limits. :-) I also have to admit, when I do postwork, I feel like I've done something with some of "me" in it, something that nobody else in the Poserverse could have made, because I personally drew parts of the image. Even if I used commonly owned models, pre-made textures, etc., if I put enough of my own energy/time into it via postwork, I feel like it's really "mine". This, of course, is all completely subjective, and I'm not implying anything about people not doing postwork or that if you don't, it's not unique, etc. I'm just expressing purely how I feel about it, and why I'm such a postwork fanatic. ;-) YMMV. bonni

Theres no cut and dried answer. Sometimes it depends on the situation. If your a merchant creating artwork for a product image then NO way, apart from compositing (say a frame or border). Product Honesty is important. For your own artwork, personal or public, then fine. To achive an end result it's accepatable. Poser is like any other tool it has limitations, and sometimes you have work around them. Example - minor poke through. If you have the time to do "pure" renders and do them well then fairplay. SamTherapy - random question for you. Would you consider cropping a photo as postwork ? al

When I'm doing stills, I don't particularly like postwork that consists of drastically "painting over" a render. I prefer to get as much out of the software I'm working with first and foremost. I will, however, do minor things like DOF, color correction, and some other minor fixes after the fact for stills. However, when it comes to my commercial works (particularly as an animator), extensive postwork can become a must. It's not a matter of "pride" when there's money on the line, and clients wanting the BEST you can give. My commercial animations usually consist of compositing 3D elements into 2D scenes, so "postwork" is absolutely unavoidable there. You need to do things like color correction for film and video, somtimes I do motion blur in post, or DOF in post because it's much easier and faster. You can't really paint over things to a great extent or fix joints, etc. when doing animation. Well, you can, but it would be extremely time consuming and not very cost-effective. ;-)

I post for touch-ups...correcting poke thru that I can't get resolved/joints,cracks in skin after posing...sometimes color correction... Bottom line the list is endless...whatever it takes to get the pic the way I want it :)

mr sparky - yes, but there's nothing wrong with it. One of my favourite photographers (Bob Carlos Clarke) relies on "postwork" to get the images he's famous for. As I said, I have nothing against postwork, even though some people may label me as a purist. I just get a real kick when someone says "Wow, you did that with Poser?" but I don't make it my life's work. Going back to the old 8-bit computer days, I used to enjoy creating a graphic that was "impossible" with the available technology. Going further back, I once sat up til the small hours making a picture on my little sister's Etch a Sketch, just so she could go "Oh wow, that's beautiful!"

Boy that's a tough one...kind of like saying what's the best chocolate dessert. Ok, that's not a good analogy I guess I'm just craving sweets. I'm a digital illustrator. Used to be a newspaper photographer and we used to have a similar arguement. "If there's a coke can in the foreground of an image which messes it up...do you photoshop it out?" What it came down to in newspapers was that in a news situation where people count on the truth of reality you don't alter the image. For an illustration, stated as such, on a style cover or food section photoshopping is fair game. In the media, the end product was driven by the client...those paying for the papers. When it comes to the purity of Poser...it also depends on the client. If the desire is to make your Poser art the best of anyone around and present it as such then postwork may not be for you and that's ok. For my situation, when I do illustrations its all about the content and concept of the illustration. All I care about is end result and I'll use whatever it takes to make the best image I can. Unlike some with noses in the air I think Poser is a fantastic tool. I can't spend a month molding a character and such. My work flow is a couple of days to a week. Postwork??? Aye captain! -jay

Nice work. Make that very nice work. Don't you just miss a 16 colour palette? No, me neither. :)

"Yes or No, and why?" Yes. Because a final image is my goal and everything/anything is just a tool to get it to materialize. To put it to an analogy, to NOT use a digital tool would be like an oil painter NOT using certain brushes. Or like telling a water color painter it's wrong (cheating) to use a mask for the whites.

SamTherapy, you stated your case eloquently. It's refreshing to see this eternal question posed and answered in the spirit of "here's what I like and why" instead of "postwork is cheating" or some such provocative assertion. I enjoy postwork, I wish I were better at it. Give me ToxicAngel's skillset now, please, or David Ho's. In recent exercises I've backed off from glow-y, hyper-saturated treatments in favor of simply correcting rendering errors, adjusting bits of hue and value, sharpening small areas when appropriate. I've temporarily disallowed myself the use of plug-in filters, and have tried to make minimal use of Photoshop's defaults, which has forced me to learn more about the default tools. They're quite powerful once you start getting past the beginner level (which I'm only barely graduating from.) I'll return to the fancy effects once I'm convinced I don't need to rely on them like I did as a postwork newbie. I respect the "in camera" approach and do that too sometimes, especially when playing with new figure or texture acquisitions. It's a great exercise in the ways that SamTherapy described. I find it frustrating, for example, when people claim that Poser's lights "suck." They may not be as advanced as in other high-end apps, but even in good old P4, with a little sweat and patience, you can achieve eye-popping or figure-enhancing effects. Just ditch those inadequate light sets that come with Poser. :-) I think the trick with either postwork or no-postwork, if you want to improve, is to experiment as much as possible with the tools at hand, not to rely overmuch on plug-ins, pre-fab poses, other peoples' light sets, etc. Perhaps that's a bit overstated ... I learned a lot by studying Traveler's light sets. :-)

No, in the sense of the word. I do Animation mostly, so Post work is pretty much out of the question other than edits in the Animation Software.

"so Post work is pretty much out of the question other than edits in the Animation Software."

That's not true. You do realize that just about anything you can do to stills inside photoshop, you can also do to video inside of AfterEffects, right? In fact, there's not much you can't do - time permitting - outside of painting over the whole scene by hand. You can even do that too if you really wanted. LOL

Message edited on: 03/30/2005 20:57

As everyone knows, postwork should be illegal. Anyone guilty of the crime of postworking should be hunted down like the dirty dog that they are. And dragged off to the City Pound -- there to await their fate. shudder

"Anyone guilty of the crime of postworking should be hunted down like the dirty dog that they are. And dragged off to the City Pound -- there to await their fate." I'll relay the message to Pixar and Dreamworks. ;-)

I'll relay the message to Pixar and Dreamworks. ;-) Please do. They are some of the worst offenders of all. There oughta be a law...........

Yes.

It is needed to fix joint bends, poke throughs, bad hair days, round things off like shoulders. P5's smoothing helps quite a bit for rounding but look in the gallery and you can tell every image that the artist didn't bother to fix.

I do all my renders in multi layers. I combine them and blend them together. Is that Post work? Yes as far as I know.

I can understand trying to do the most without it. I can usually tell it was done that way. I don't know why anyone would want to limit their creation. I would think if you put a lot of effort into an image, why not go all the way. edited for spelling mistakes, is that not post work?

Message edited on: 03/30/2005 22:45

I kinda like this particular dead horse/different whip..nothing wrong with me...LOL If I am putting together promo images there is no way I will postwork anything apart from maybe hair which is not included in the package. If I were to include hair I would be run out of the MP in a heartbeat LOL ...thank god for 3Dream hair!!! On the other hand I love playing with and postworking an image. So many filters and effects to choose from and each one of them create a whole different atmosphere. For me, it's a way to relax and play without having to think about seams and joints and all those other nasty things that make me pull my hair out on a daily basis.

There can be a real satisfaction to getting it right with just Poser. but sometimes you just need post work. You can do a lot in pure 3D, such as using shadows to mask bad geometry, etc., but sometimes the render just needs more pop. Also, sometimes you must render out in layers because your app chokes on massive geometry and texture files. P6's new texture reduction feature helps a lot in this regard. At the end of the day, to post or not is strictly up to the artist and their taste, or lack thereof. *P

Here is my post-work technique: I render, go to Photoshop and drop the saturation, spike the contrast and print. Then I tape it to the window and trace or copy it by eye... then I paint in gouache. For some digital work I go to Photoshop and play with levels and noise and desat then burn with gradient maps and psedo-depth-of-field blurring for a photo look. I never use straight hyper-real renders except commercial work and I usually try to get the client to go with a digital watercolor, airbrush or oil done over a tracing... sometimes a scanned tracing done from a print.

Depends. Some Poser renders are just awesome out of the box. Why mess with perfection. Sometimes I do compositing (Have to the way I do my comic book covers.) Heck, adding your signature to the image is postwork. Sometimes you want a certain effect or look that Poser cannot do out of the box. So why not. So it depends. I wonder if postwork is to a Poser user as Poser use is to a "We build our own meshes using THESE apps" user?

I want the best possible image I can get. And it's gonna look better with postwork than without, atleast to me. To me, almost every render can benefit from atleast some colour adjustments. So for gallery images, Yes postwork. For promo images for products that's a whole different thing. Then a definate No.

Yes, absolutely.. because no one application can do it all, or at least do it all well, not Poser, not Bryce, etc. I have not seen an image straight out of a particular application that could not benefit from a little postwork, and why limit yourself to one application, when there are so many to work with? Most of my images pass through at least 3 or 4 apps before they look done to me. :)Learning to finesse Photoshop is just as much fun as learning to finesse Poser, and learning to finesse both..well thats just twice the fun.

Usually I end up having to go into PSP and clone in colour where the shadows are pitch black...IE: totally void of colour, and sometimes to clone clothing over parts of the body that I couldn't manage to get covered, and the area was such that it was impossible to make invisible.

"I wonder if postwork is to a Poser user as Poser use is to a "We build our own meshes using THESE apps" user?"

I think about that same irony whenever the topic is raised here. LOL. Good observation. ;-)

In truth, high end artists and studios use a lot of postwork. Perhaps not in the same way that some Poser users do, but it's postwork nonetheless.

Studios pay BIG BUCKS for video post equipment and software. Ever hear of 'Inferno'? For roughly $100,000, you can own one seat of this top-of-the-line video FX "postwork" solution.

Pixar, Dreamworks, ILM, Blur Studios, Animal Logic, Weta Studios, and just about all of the well-respected companies in the 3D/FX industry render their animations or scenes out in "passes"... meaning, different layers for every element in the scene. Then it's all composited together in post, using programs like Shake, Digital Fusion, or Combustion. This allows the postwork crew to do all sorts of things to the render output much faster and better than they would have been able to do straight from the 3D app. It's a matter of production and meeting deadlines. ;-) In fact, Softimage XSI has a video compositor (postwork) suite built right into the application. LOL. Those damned cheaters! hehe. ;-) Message edited on: 03/31/2005 01:42

I not only feel comfortable with post-work, I love doing pre-work. I open my textures and alter those, I mess with my bump files and now IBL images. Then mess with the morfs and faceroom. The "renders" are just as small step along the road. After that it's composite, I can go through layer after layer of mods. All the time fighting not to arrive at an overworked muddy mess. If the look I want requires printing and onto the light table and re-scanning then that's what I use. I even use other peoples skills and equipment like the local camera shop to do my final printing. From idea to item, you can't use Poser to frame or bang the hook in the wall and that's about as post as you get. So I'm a use the best tool for the job type and have fun at every step. All that said I also like to push myself and develop good skills with each tool. Why use two when one will do.

I do post-work in almost all my pics. First, because I use fx that Poser can give me, or the time that I need to spend to do it in Poser is bigger than in Photoshop. Second, because therere corrections that I cant leave in a pic: the joint points in the forced poses, the edges of some 3D props, and ... overalloveralloverall ... the DAMNED shadows that dissapear when two 3D surfaces are very near one to one ... really I would like that Poser The Sixth, as I can see in the pics of the people who already have it, finally avoid my daily shadows retouching ...

"cant give me"

My personal observations: Post working is an artistic skill Ive found the the people who are against it dont come from traditional art backgrounds and Dont have the skills to do it anyway :-) I know a long time poser user who proudly proclaims "P4 NO POST" in every description of his gallery images. and his work is quite Dull Flat & mediocre Like so many other anti-postwork "artists" Ive also noticed the "Anti post" crowd also tends to be recalictrant Poser4 hold outs and even if they use poser 5 they NEVER Use firely, material nodes etc. just the P4 render and perhaps a few Purchased light sets and Background props Alot of them also tend to still run WIndow 98 or Mac OS9 Claiming they dont need "Complicated" systems Like XP or MAC OSX. Just my opinions Good Day

Agree with wolf and a similitude. All the best photographers retouch their photos. Or in the process of revealing or in the process of editing. I think if a photographer put under all his photos the tag "ONLY CAMERA - NO POSTWORK", it was a lilbit ridiculous ... I have used two or three times the POSER5 FIREFLY RENDER - NO POSTWORK, but more as a curiosity than as a commandment of the Pure Poser Cult ... ROFL

No, I don't fancy carrying those big bags, some people have nasty dogs, and some of those letterboxes have really sharp edges. Errr.. I'll get my coat..... Anyway, I don't do postwork, but mainly because when I've tried I always think the as rendered picture look 'cleaner' and less smudged, probably I should practice with Paintshop some more.

Aren't people who edited their messages "guilty" of postworking (grin)?

Postwork?.......I prefer Foreplay.

I tried that when I caught the wife bending over the freezer. But now we're both banned from the Supermarket :-(

Sometimes I feel I am the only person in the Poser universe still using Poser for imaging figures for traditional media. I never see work by people doing this and there is a decide lack of interest in any I show. Only my seemingly non-postworked pinups garner any coment. I come to this as a painter, my work isn't about making renders, it is about making art using renders, but I do understand the true artistry of pushing a technology to its limits. When I was in school it was neccessary to show the film edges in a print to demonstrate the abscence of cropping... I myself ascribed to this aesthetic, it called for artistic discipline and good practice. Esentially arbitrary restriction in practice itself can lead to hights of artistry, the pietas, formal verse, etc. I saw reproduced a show of Modern Iraqi art... artist had been restricted to only liknesses of Sadam in all thier work... positive ones at that, there were some truly beautiful works. I love looking at and I apreciate tremendously the talent and artistry of those doing "pure" renders. I do wish I saw more work by people using Poser to simulate Photography and any by people using it for the foundation for extreme post-work or traditional media.

Sometimes I feel I am the only person in the Poser universe still using Poser for imaging figures for traditional media. I never see work by people doing this and there is a decide lack of interest in any I show. Only my seemingly non-postworked pinups garner any coment. I come to this as a painter, my work isn't about making renders, it is about making art using renders, but I do understand the true artistry of pushing a technology to its limits. When I was in school it was neccessary to show the film edges in a print to demonstrate the abscence of cropping... I myself ascribed to this aesthetic, it called for artistic discipline and good practice. Esentially arbitrary restriction in practice itself can lead to hights of artistry, the pietas, formal verse, etc. I saw reproduced a show of Modern Iraqi art... artist had been restricted to only liknesses of Sadam in all thier work... positive ones at that, there were some truly beautiful works. I love looking at and I apreciate tremendously the talent and artistry of those doing "pure" renders. I do wish I saw more work by people using Poser to simulate Photography and any by people using it for the foundation for extreme post-work or traditional media.