Heyas is there any interest in a beginner to intermediate user's book on 'digital illustration with poser'? what are the kind of things you would like/expect to see in a book of that title? thanks for any and all feedback Lyrra

It sounds good to me, since most people realize they have to retouch Poser images to fix the many glitches it introduces. This is a serious problem with animations, so if your book had some batch techniques for fixing Poser screw-ups in animations, that would be a real break-through. But maybe market research like this should be in the product placement section. You've posted a discreet and reasonable request where you know it will get the most notice, but a few years ago it seemed like every other post here was an ad for something. Then they cracked down a year or two ago, and now the ads are mostly limited to CP and Daz, which I guess are allowed for some business considerations.

as one of the moderators (at the time) who 'cracked down' I thank you for your thoughtfulness. But um .. IMO even then I wouldnt have moved this post. (but then they may have changed the rules since then....) Unfortunately I have little experiance with animation (poser or elsewhere) so I'd need to track down a willing victim to bug on the subject.

This thread doesn`t need moved, there is no actual product yet and there is no advertising either. I would want to know more what the book is about.

About 4 books ago I thought the last thing anyone would want is another Poser book. But they still keep coming. It seems that if a book is on the shelf. Someone will buy it.

I think it's a great idea, as long as it's done well with a really good, thorough breakdown of the steps involved. Often I find books dealing with graphics are confusing because they don't explain things well enough, skip steps, or make steps unclear. I would love a section on great ways to combine renders into one image. I need to find a good tutorial on that...

I would love a book on Photoshop techniques with rendered output. I don't know about the latest version of Poser, but Vue Infinite and Lightwave, etc (most of my rendering is done in Lightwave) can export to a layered photoshop file format. I don't have a clue as to how to tweak these layered images in PS but wish I did. Yeah, I'd buy it if it were available!

From looking at the galleries it seems to me that there are ALOT of bona fide experts at creating stunning illustrations by painting over poser renders with photoshop so lets hope they see this thread Such a book/discussion might upset the myopic,NO POSTWORK!!! Poser" purists" though ;-}

Most poser books are technical referances- discriptions of buttons and there functions. Whats need is a "How to" book. Like how to bone a figure or how to make a smart prop, ect..ect.. or how to pose properly...

I'll take one!

The idea of another Poser book is a good one. However, I'm not exactly sure what you mean by "Digital Illustration with Poser and Photoshop". Are you talking about how one would take a Poser render and work it in Photoshop in order to produce a gallery image? I personally wouldn't find a book like that of any use. However, if it was a book on how to get realistic renders, putting together an entire scene complete with background inside Poser and adding lights and shadows and sky (have no idea how to do that at all), reflections, wind effect etc, then yes, that would be something I would be interested in purchasing. Art is unique and individual and it's based on the creator's perception and their "mind's eye". I personally don't see the value of a book that tells someone how to compose and combine a poser image with other graphics inside a graphic program, in order to make a picture. One can already look up a host of tutorials on the net for digital effects/painting and blending etc inside a graphic program, be it Photoshop, PhotoImpact or PaintShop Pro. I think it's possible to teach techniques, but you can't teach someone to create. If they don't have the imagination for it, all the books in the world isn't going to help them.

Perhaps if you post a rough outline, chapter headings etc. folks would be better able to judge. The proposed title could cover a lot of territory. What specifically will you be covering?

at this point I havent even started sketching out an outline .. I'm most interest in seeing what people want and or expect from a poser related book of that title. If I was just going to cover postwork well ..thats not a poser book really now is it? that would be just photoshop :) and the world abounds with excellent photoshop books. wolf359 who said it had to? it is possible to get good effect from a straight poser render. But it is also often faster and easier to use some postwork here and there. And then I have some images which are 90% postwork and very little poser. It all depends on your goal and your time. Since I'm always heavily pressed for time as a commercial illustrator I always think of 'how fast' well before anything else, when you're pressed for time workflow is everything. Geo for such poser rigging voodoo you want BL Renders book. I'd say that is the definitive book on the subject, hands down. As for posing ..thats definately a subject that most people need to think about, especially figure and object interaction. Acadia "all the books in the world" Absolutely. But getting the most out of poser & photoshop together takes some serious thought about setting up files and what to deal with where. Setting up a complex scene inside poser is not for the faint of heart and if a book can help point out pitfalls .. well I think that would be helpful don't you? As for the 'creative' aspect of it ... thats a challenge I'd leave up to the reader. Lyrra

Good idea. Here are some of the topics I might expect to see: Postworking a render would be a sizeable part of such a book, ranging from mild touch-up to full-blown hair and cloth painting. You might also cover areas such as filtering for effect, e.g. colour balancing, contrast enhancement, effects like monochrome, sepia, faking TV pictures etc., right up to things like Virtual Painter. Too much to summarise here. Using the Sketch renderer. Toon rendering techniques. Compositing a render (or several) on a background using the alpha channel. Combining digital elements with "conventional" techniques such as pencil, ink and paint; and with scanned images and digital photographs. There would also be some discussion on composing the scene, and maybe the ways in which you might plan your render in the knowledge that you'd be using Photoshop on it afterwards, rather than trying to make a perfect render from the off. I wouldn't expect to find anything about animation, illustration means still pictures to me; but I wouldn't complain if there was such a section, as long as it didn't take too much away from the rest of the book. If it's not too much to ask, I'd like it to be usable with other image processing programs, not just Photoshop. ;) Oh yes, and an attached CD packed with goodies. :D

Great idea, but I don't know that I'd just limit it to Photoshop. I'd like to see a book that addressed the scope of digital portraits and illustration, and included not only aspects like postwork in Photoshop (and other digital paint programs), but also creating the scene in such programs as Bryce, Vue, etc. I agree, most of the Poser-related books seem to be technically-oriented, with little relative concentration on creating strong final illustrations (and apologies to Shamms Mortier, but the illustrations in his books would make me not buy Poser!), so anything you do should have the very highest standards for the final results.