Amen Anton!

Wow that red/blue comparison is revealing. I sure hope Rendo had DAZ's consent to create a clone of their figure. Other than the obvious flaws already pointed out in this thread, there is no indication anywhere of who was involved in building this model. DAZ has a reputation for quality. Anton has a reputation for quality. "RPublishing" has no reputation at all (while R'osity has a reputation for selling any old crap), so why should anyone spend so much money on a figure when there's no way to be confident of quality?

Anton has the correct perspective. 3D Human figure creation (in any app) is not a trivial task to say the least. It really requires knowledge of human anatomy, kinematics, external physiology, musculature, 3D rigging/modelling/deformations, and a whole slew of other concerns. It is not something for amateurs and definitely not for the feint of heart. Alternatively, if you are going to do it for commercial purposes, you'd better do it right! That might sound like an accusation. And it is. I'll purchase some off figures because I like to support the 'little guy' (e.g.: Misaki, Himeko). Any resultant effort is a good effort. But these are still 'little guys'; individuals without corporate backing. Should I continue? Daz3D's release of V3 was not flawless, but one has to admit that it was a step above in many areas. Out of the box, it wasn't a disaster, just flawed. Renda, in my honest opinion, is a disaster out of the box. And for the pricetag and feature set, not a well-conceived idea. So, for the effort, I'll give them a B. But there is no try, only do or do not. This does not.

Well, its from the same folks who gave us the wonderfull and exiting opportunity to PAY them for MAYBE being published in the "Digital Art for the 21st Century" book, so what would you expect ? RLOFL. stahlratte

Just a comment on the texture size issue - Poser (like nearly all graphics packages) - unpacks any texture loaded from the file format into an unpacked full size texture. What coulds for Poser memory use is the pixel size of the texture, so a 4000x4000 texture has 16 million pixels, while the 1500x1500 texture only has just over 2 million. In that texture comparison, Renda's fifth 4000x4000 texture needs 48meg, while V3's 1500, 600 and 1300 textures need a total of just over 12meg. Big textures take big memory, regardless of the file size

"It really requires knowledge of human anatomy, kinematics, external physiology, musculature, 3D rigging/modelling/deformations, and a whole slew of other concerns. It is not something for amateurs and definitely not for the feint of heart." I couldnt agree more if it comes to creating an ORIGINAL meshes, but if you look at odeathoflifes pics it is beyond doubt that Renda is just a bad copy of Vicky3 even if the polygons are placed differently. Sorry, but "painting by numbers" doesnt qualify in my book for creating an ORIGINAL mesh. As Neftis has proven, you can make a completely original mesh that is as atractive (even more so) as Vicky without copying a single vertce of her. So sorry, no "B" for effort, but rather an "F" for cheating. stahlratte

Ouch! That is to be seen (though the current evidence is rather condemning). If Renda is a somewhat altered plagarization of V3, that would not be good for all concerned. As a merchant, I promptly downloaded the file. But I see no reason to support this figure. It is not very original and definitely not something unique. What were they (you, Rendarosity) thinking?

I see some Aufrey Hephburn in there Neftis! Lol you are a starlet buff aren't you?

Bookmark

I see some Aufrey Hephburn in there Neftis! Lol you are a starlet buff aren't you?

I see some Aufrey Hephburn in there Neftis! Lol you are a starlet buff aren't you?

Anton you got me ;) LOL I admit it:D nothing like watching an old movie after a hard day at work!

Figured I'd go ahead and speak up, now. I got Renda yesterday and busily set about working on a morph package for her, since, er, to be honest, she's got a LOT of things to fix. I'm not talking about things that are just a different build than I may want. I'm talking things that no human can or should have. Renda has been built in such a way that it makes it almost impossible for me to work with her in my morphing program, unless I want to spend over a month on each individual bodypart. I intended to smooth out her breasts, since they have, much like Ruffles potato chips, ridges in them. I couldn't. Every time I tried to smooth a section out, a new section had issues, some going so far as to slice into the existing 'breast tissue' when I tried to fix them. And it's not a matter of me using bad software or not knowing how to use it. I've used this software since early 2003 and the ONLY OBJs I've had issues with have been those of a non-professional standard. (Those having triangular polys, for example seem to cause minor issues.) She's low poly where she should be high and high poly where she should be low. Who really needs 90 poly nipples? Especially when the breasts themselves are almost disturbingly squared off at certain angles. I know the unimesh figure has similarly high polys in that area, but considering the relative lack in the rest of the mesh, it seems SILLY. Maybe it's because I already own several quality female figures (V3, S3, Solondra III, Animlisa, Aiko...) and I've been spoiled... But even MAYADOLL, which is a FREE figure, is better quality. Renda strikes me as a cheap attempt to knock off V3. She's like Victoria's deformed, evil twin. She even fits in V3's clothes with a minimum of break through. (Mostly because Renda has a lot of ass. She puts JLo to shame.) Have you noticed how the promo images of Renda have her legs bent in only ONE shot, and it's from BEHIND? (And there's STILL deformation, specifically in her buttocks!) Her UV maps are also badly set up. Renda's lips are in a seperate section, which makes it harder for texturists to blend the lip/skin area realistically. I know what I'd be feeling if I'd purchased this mesh, right now. Fury at being tricked and swindled. I'm sad to say, the best I've been able to get poor Renda's breasts to look, so far, is when I accidentally turned them into saggy boobs, or when I inflated them to the point that even Wyrmmaster's women look like gymnasts.

Neftis, that's a very lovely girl you're working on. Will she be getting a male counterpart at a later date?

Attached Link: http://www.renderosity.com/messages.ez?ForumID=12355&Form.ShowMessage=2306225

He looks like he's off to a good start, Neftis. I wouldn't mind a few more guys to round off my runtime! (Right now, there's a distinct imbalance. Lots more females than males!)

Yup this is true!!less males than female.Although AMax comes and put a little balance to this:) I still haven't got him yet but intend to. Dispite the competition, I am glad that the artists around are finally creating different figures.All those years with the same old same old and now there seem to be a better choice for the people.I like that.

She's like Victoria's deformed, evil twin. ROTFLMAO!!!!! Oh, man, I'm glad I didn't have a mouthful of water (or some other drink) when I read that. bonni

Sean ! drools (a different way to say "bookmark", I forgot to do it when posting earlier)

Wow! Neftis, I'm really loving the look of your new model. Just learned that I'm in line for a little back pay - its going directly into a kitty for her. Anton's right and I love the classic holywood look.

Attached Link: http://www.urbaczewski.com/humor/softdevcycle.htm

Attached Link: The Great Poser Bending Test

The new, better bending female figure is here now, finished, with some clothing available already (much more to follow), and to top it all off, she is only five bucks!

She takes textures from an existing figure, ditto for head morphs (not having to do head morphs kept my time investment down, I only have about 300 hours in her), she has a full set of JCM, setup the best as I know how to do. She has lots of new ideas, like two versions of feet, one for flats and one for heels.

While some may say is too thin, please compare her proportions with Gabriels's excellent work in message 98, above. She isn't intended as a general-purpose figure like V3, anyway.

She bends better than any female figure I've tested har against. See the link for more details.

I'd like to see some 3rd party compare her bending with Apollo's, or any other figure that claims to have good bending.

Message edited on: 06/23/2005 08:19

Jim, I like her, though I must say, her head and neck seem a little large in comparison to her shoulders. Sadly, while she's only 5$, she's NOT a stand alone figure, right? She requires Jesse. Having just sprung for Apollo Maximus, I cannot afford another 130$ for an upgrade to Poser, at the moment. :( Still, she looks very nice. Rather Comicbookish, in a good way.

I'am working (or I should say reworking) two new men! :^)

pitklad

She looks great, Jim. So does Neftis' new figures.

I couldnt agree more if it comes to creating an ORIGINAL meshes, but if you look at odeathoflifes pics it is beyond doubt that Renda is just a bad copy of Vicky3 even if the polygons are placed differently. this is interesting. just looking i would say that she's enough like V3 for Daz to take a look and perhaps cry "derivitave". She's more of a knock off than the Alexa model that got pulled was.

Poppi, Alexa actually had V3 verts, from what I understand, which was why she's pulled. Though I'm inclined to agree. Renda is suspiciously close to Vicki 3. Like I said before, she fits into V3's clothes with only some minor tweaking. Proving my theory that she's V3's deformed evil twin once and for all.

well, from what i read on the daz eula....even if i were to heavily morph v3, render her out, spline draw over the render from side, front....and create my own figure from that it would still be considered a "derivative". does anyone know if that is correct? because the face in particular is almost exact vicki...but well, you're right evil vicki. who modelled her, btw? anyone know.

Attached Link: http://poserpros.daz3d.com/forums/viewtopic.php?t=41930

Poppi, If you start with V3, then it's derivative. Is it provable? Depends... Do verts line up in key places? Does your .cr2 file contain identical information as the source? Can someone make a good case that you did start with another figure? Then you could be in trouble. There are tests that can be run to compare programatically two meshes for verts and shape. It takes time and effort though, and sometimes it just doesn't pay to do it. Renda does look awfully close to V3 though. The places I'd be doing an eyeball look would be the fingers, feet and toes, face, and hip. The closer these match between the two figures, the more likely there's a problem of this sort.

"'RPublishing' has no reputation at all" Well they do now.

Thanks guys! Her head is only bigger because it is scaled up by default, most all of the Poser figures look like pin-heads to me, especailly if you go by the classical 8 or 7 1/2 "heads high" proportions. You can always scale it back, I even include a pose that does that... As to derivative, it isn't for me to say if she (Renda) is or not, and bearing in mind IANAL, let me say from the standpoint of sombody who has created both derivate (Low-res Lori) and non-derivate figures: If you shrink-wrap mesh over any part of V3's figure, you have a derivative figure, even though the polygons are different, you have just stolen the shape. Ditto if you just bought it into the modeling program as a template or other modeling aid. It might be possable to get around this part if you first modeled from scratch, got the figure up to finished, or near finished status, and then modifed it to match V3's shape. I'd think you better be able to prove this, though. From a legal standpoint, it might be best to offer both a "standard" and a "V3-like" version of the figure, as I think Dcort has done on some of his.

Oh well I guess she will stay in my wishlist until I see if any fixes come out for her. 8) And I have to add that Anton's Apollo Max is so superior to Renda in every way. I just love that model. ;} Catlin

" Thanks guys! Her head is only bigger because it is scaled up by default, most all of the Poser figures look like pin-heads to me, especailly if you go by the classical 8 or 7 1/2 "heads high" proportions. You can always scale it back, I even include a pose that does that..." haha, aint that a fact. yeah, V3's head/body ratio is severely messed up, same goes for the other figures as well. its slightly scaled up on all of my morphs and characters. again, this is my problem with vicky having such a monopoly - nothing against daz - but when everything on earth gets modelled for and compared to V3's default body and proportions it results in a severely @$#%ed up market full of clones. people are used to vicky for so long that when anyone releases a properly proportioned model or one with a more feminine shape it gets comments like 'the head is too big' or 'i like a more average figure'. i dont know where most of you people live, but v3's default shape is anything but 'average'. its a shame renda is of similar proportions, but its probably a result of this same widespread mentality. if i ever made an original figure i would be sure it would never be even remotely mistaken for vicky or a 'derivative'. cheers, -gabriel

I personally do not know anyone who looks like Vicky or Renda... Yuck!!!! And if that's average then thank god I'm not average!!!!!

Jim, glad to hear that her head's just scaled up. She'll be on my 'To Get' list once I finally grab P6.

Aren't they still selling Alexa at 3dcommune? Or is it a different version? Hadn't heard that there was a problem with her. Marque

X2K said: she's not "better" in any way. It's just Rendo trying to jump on the bandwagon of having their own figure (see also: Alexa, Laroo, etc.). Well, 3DCommune didn't release Alexa to jump on any bandwagon.. :) We wanted to have our own character to get into development and after all that has happened we're still happy to be there and we are deep into it now. Personally I think it's a ton of fun and a great learning experience for everyone invloved. I wish we didn't get burned on Alexa with partial stolen mesh work but all in all it's been a great experince so far. I applaud Renderosity for also joining in that arena or RPPublishing or whatever you're calling yourselves now. Unfortunately all the problems you're having now are due to releasing her too soon before you put her though all the hoops. This is EXACTALLY why we are NOT releasing Alexa again till we have her just as we want her. We want to make 110% sure everything is right before we give her back to our customers and the community. I would rather wait then have something like this happen. I think she looks nice, a little too much like V3 for sure and I would have thought you'd want to do something a little different as well with all the competition out there. Good luck with her and I do wish you all the best with her. Personally I would pull her, fix her, and spend the needed time to get her right and then re-release her. No shame in that in the least, unless you just keep pushing forward with blinders on. Hope you make the right decision. Mark

WOW 192 posts... now i wasn't expecting my thread to be that popular...lol... Blackhearted you spent $30 on seeing Batman begins? jeese it's expensive over there in the US. and i have to agree on the $35 for Renda leaving some room for people to buy 3rd party products to support it.

Attached Link: Alexa Thread

Well, I would think there are two things to mention regarding the "derivative" status of Renda from my point of view. First, it is too incredibly like V3 to be a coincidence. I personally think it was done so that she could use V3 clothing with minimal tweaks and a JP inijection pose on the clothing (though why anyone in their right mind would inject those JP's is beyond me). As such, I think we can (given reasonable expectations) simply take the fact that she looks like V3 for a reason, and that would be to take advantage of the massive amounts of V3 content. Second, Jim is quite right (as one would expect) about the copyright issues regarding Renda should V3 even be used as a reference. One could not use a "fair use" defense on this either as that right is waivedd by the DAZ EULA. It is possible (though unlikely) that Renda used V3 clothing as a reference to get around this. Though technically still a "derivative" (somewhere along the line - V3 was used) - I highly doubt DAZ would go down the path of actively claiming rights over clothing meshes due to the PR issues that would raise. Please note - this is not in support of the Renda figure. I think it is too V3 to be worth my effort and the JP's are frankly shocking. Now Blackheart's morph is quite nice, but it is still subject to the crap JP's and as such will look terrible once out of the default t-pose. There are better figures out there for free - DAZ's figures if you can accept their license (something I currently cannot), Mayadoll & her cousins for the more japanese/manga look (free to use though no redistribution allowed), or my favourite - the Project Human line from Sixus1 (free in almost EVERY sense of the word so long as credit & the PH website link are given in the readme file). Anton's Maximus add some nice features and comes after much testing and tweaking things to get it just right. It is not my preferred figure style, but I have much more respect for someone who delays their release until they have things perfected than those that put somoething out with flaws that not only affect all users, but were informed of before they decided put it on the market. The whole set of actions that have led up to this figures release makesme ask two questions (well three, but one becomes redundant after answering the first question). Did Renda go through the proper testing channels with this figure? If not - why not? And if so - how did it make it make it through with such obvious issues? EK

"I have much more respect for someone who delays their release until they have things perfected than those that put somoething out with flaws that not only affect all users, but were informed of before they decided put it on the market." That's it in a nutshell, that's what we are doing. Mark

"I have much more respect for someone who delays their release until they have things perfected than those that put somoething out with flaws that not only affect all users, but were informed of before they decided put it on the market." That's it in a nutshell, that's what we are doing with Alexa and the Mystery Girl characters. Oh and Spanki and Neftis and Anton, all of your stuff is very, very nice... really great work. I'm jealous. :) Mark

Attached Link: Butt and bend probs

Message edited on: 06/23/2005 11:49

O.o that poor girl 2nd from the left. Her butt has fallen below the loins...her arm is coming off and it looks like she needs a back brace o.O......OUCH!

"Blackhearted you spent $30 on seeing Batman begins? jeese it's expensive over there in the US."

well, $20 on the tickets and $10 or so for some burgers at A&W. but yeah movies are expensive here... hell, a tub of nasty popcorn is like $6-7, and same goes for a watered-down drink. im not in the US, im in canada btw.

"Her but is soooooooooo bad, it looks like who ever modeled it had never seen a woman's ass"

cough, i have.

cheers,
-gabriel