please explain why only one "poseresque" posing/rendering program can exist.

Size of the market. We're an odd group. What would be called "prosumers" in the electronics business. Not quite consumers, not quite professionals. It's always a small group, made up of very hardcore hobbyists and wannabe pros.

DAZ's plan is to grow the market, but I think it's a risky move. D|S may be easy, but I suspect the consumer end of the market will be won by gaming companies. The Sims, the Movies, Second Life, that sort of thing.

My main fear is that DAZ is trying to grow too fast. It's the companies that are expanding that at most danger of failing. And we may be heading into a very difficult economic period, due to record energy prices.

Basically, it's the same thing we saw during the dot-com boom. Plenty of room for everyone when times are good, but when times are bad, "consolidation" occurs.

I've never understood how someone can come into a poser forum and complain about the program having a make art button. Do you use it? If so you are in the same catagory as the rest of us who use poser to "make art". And if you don't use it, what are you doing here? Who cares who does what with what program as long as you are happy with the end result? I'm sick to death of all these threads slamming one product or another, just use the product you like and don't worry about the ones you don't, they will take care of themselves. Can't understand why it makes a difference to anyone except the folks selling the products and the folks using them. No matter what anyone says here in this forum, life will go on and folks will use what they want..you will not sway anyone with your views if they have made up their minds that they are going to be loyal to one product or another, so why waste time? Marque

I want to put my eggs into products that help me get the job done quickly, easily and as cheaply as possible. Sometimes cheaply and quickly don't go together. If a product has the tools I want, then I would be a fool to pay extra for a product just because it's well established. Infact many programs within 3D now find being established a rod for their own backs, because it becomes impossible to delete old redundant code (sometimes 7yrs+ old in some apps) without breaking the entire program. I know of a couple of applications that are becoming more and more bloated (effecting affective workflow in the process) because code can not be changed. Cheers

"Lightwave version of a Poser figure" joezabel, that model is not originally a Lightwave model. It's been converted to Lightwave format recently, but it's originally modelled and rigged in 3dsmax. If you purchase the LWO version, you'd have to do the rigging and facial morphing yourself, although the skeleton is provided. "Included formats: OBJ,3DS,FBX,MB,DXF, LWO(!new!) model has a skeleton; rigging and facial animation are not provided in the exported versions. UVW coords are exported well. all shown garments and hi-res textures are included. For more details see description to MAX version of this model."

I own Poser 6 and have used D|S and IMHO I think both apps. are too complicated. My time is valuable to me. If I spent hours trying to create clothing, figures etc. in Poser or D|S this is time I have taken from something else. The time it takes to build, bone, create clothing, pose and export a figure is ridiculous! IMO, In the future you'll be able to adjust the shape/size etc. of any base figure on the fly and then create, select or modify a piece of clothing and press a button and it will conform to the figure. Another button will allow you to make the clothing Dynamic or Conforming. Right now I have to jump through hoops just to pose, clothe and use a Poser model in my 3D application. It shouldn't have to be this hard. In a few years the way we work in Poser and Daz will look archaic.

D|S cannot be a tool in my tool box until it allows me to take my project back to Poser for the tools I use there. My only "fear" in the split of the market is the loss of content creators to D|S only products.

Randym77 says:

We're an odd group. What would be called "prosumers" in the electronics business. Not quite consumers, not quite professionals. It's always a small group...

I think your example here runs pretty much counter to your argument. Back when I bought "Prosumer" video gear in the early 90's, it was a small market. Now, it is a HUGE market! Video cameras used to be consumer (<$1000) or professional (>$10,000) and only a couple of models in between - now look at the choices all along the price range between those two points.

And you know what? It took years for "prosumers" to get the same tools professionals had in the world of standard video. Not so in the new world of HD video. The Prosumer models come out with feature sets comparable to the pro rigs within the same time frame. Some companies are even INNOVATING in the prosumer space now, and only later adding features into the professional space. In some ways, prosumer has swallowed professional.

Which makes sense. Only so many people can work full time in such a small industry. The potential number of serious hobbyists or semi-professionals is far greater.

As for the price of D|S and assorted plugins matching that of Poser, lets see a show of hands: How many people who bought Poser went out on the same day and bought all the content and extra utilities they thought they'd need to use with it? Anyone?

Now raise your hand if you frequently check your bank account to see when you're going to be able to afford the next Poser goodie you've had your eye on? I know mine's in the air.

I think what D|S represents is pretty much a new type of financing for consumer-level 3-D apps - and the first "payment" is free. Instead of having to drop a sum of money all at once to get in the game, you can work your way in slowly. You might buy the magnet plug-in this paycheck, and the more expensive cloth room plug-in (let's say) two paychecks from now, but you WILL be spending the money. Eventually, you may spend MORE than you did on Poser, but in smaller, more palatable chunks.

What's more, DAZ gets to develop the app a little at a time, instead of having to make this huge investment in programming all at once to try and match Poser's feature set.

And of course, having the tool is going to fuel your appetite for content and the revenue it represents, as has already been mentioned.

Something that seems to be overlooked with D|S, which dissipated my enthusiasm for the product early on. It's a closed system.

IMHO the real success in Poser wasn't anything to do with the app per se, but that it used OBJ format and rational (well mostly rational ;-) extensions. I.e. all in TEXT format.

Poser is what it is today because of USERS, users who dug into, understood and EXTENDED Poser to way more than MetaCreations ever anticipated. With the sad recent "We don't support MAT files (even though we ship them in P6)" exception, these new tricks have been adopted or tolerated by the creators of Poser (but maybe that's just a side-effect of Curious Labs aversion to fixing prior-release bugs? ;-)

NONE OF THIS WILL HAPPEN WITH D|S. The formats are binary, proprietary and encrypted. I raised this in early beta in D|S forum, and to RobW, all said not a problem, will be workarounds, people will figure it out, etc., etc. BS! Does anyone really believe that the encoding process is there for any reason but data protection? (Officially it's for speed of loading! - On what, a 486?) Does anyone really believe DAZ wouldn't seek protection under the DMCA? Truly ironic when you consider that the single largest beneficiary of the current open Poser formats, extending them and building products based on that EULA-forbidden reverse engineering, is ... you guessed it, DAZ!!!

BTW EULA text highlighted byAnton is fairly common language for Software Applications, but I've not seen it used on a free app, nor have I seen it used to cover content. But there is one BIG difference here, it's usually written to be the other way around!!! I guess DAZ doesn't want eFrontier to do to them what they did to Curious Labs???

D|S will be a professional app, an adjunct to expensive apps like Lightwave, no doubt. But it'll never be a Poser replacement as we currently know and understand Poser.

Personally, I have never approved of Daz's use of such a clause, which I interpret to mean that they believe they aren't responsible for infringements. However, I would just like to repeat what I've said many times, that it's a bad idea to discuss a competitor's business practices here.

don't worry MorriganShadow will lock the thread right after DanFarr's rebuttal.

"Does DS to do something P4, PP, P6 can't" While DS doesnt compare with P6 yet. Yes, it does a LOT that P4 can't. Displacement mapping being one. Better rendering engine being another.Better user interface for sure. "I just think it would be more glorious if it were a matter of fair cometetion, not trying to create a glossy/streamlined "immitation of Poser"." DS is hardly an imitation of Poser. It already smokes P4 in many ways. Lets look at it this way. Poser is on version 6, DS is only on version 1 and already smokes the 4th version of Poser. Will DS replace Poser? I seriously doubt it. Anymore than I think MAX would replace Maya. They are tools to do a job. Period. Personally, I really like DS. I never upgraded Poser from P4. P5 was a cluster fuck of epic proportions and while waiting on p6 to come out I started to really enjoy DS. I like the interface,the render engine etc. I may or may not upgrade to P6 in the future, but for a hobbyist like me, DS does just fine. I never use P4 anymore. Yeah, DS doesn't compare to the latest version of Poser, nor should anyone expect it to. Lets wait a couple years and a few versions of DS to see whats what. Lets see if the anticipated p7 everyone is talking about is a TOTAL rebuild. Or just slapping more features on to the old tired P3 code as usual. Thats something you don't seem to see Anton. While DS is behind in the total features dept. They do have NEW up to date code to work with. Poser wants to win in the long run, they will have to re-write from the ground up. Ill believe that when I see it :)As for the plugin debate. THe nice thing about that is I won't have to buy all the plugins, just the ones I wish to use. Yeah, the plugins might be expensive, but you can pick and choose those that you wish to buy.

"don't worry MorriganShadow will lock the thread right after DanFarr's rebuttal."<< What ,in this thread, should Dann Farr need to rebut??? the various claims that he intends to make money from his companies posing/rendering application.??? no shocking revelation there :-)

"Yes, it does a LOT that P4 can't." And P4 does a lot that D|S can't() - so...different needs, different programs. As simple as that. () Sketch rendering, obj morph import, walk designer, much more animation tools, joint editor, etc

And 30 posts later you'll have arrived at the same place you all are right now, which is nowhere.

Everyone's time is probably better spent using one of the programs that's being argued about endlessly here. ;)

Message edited on: 09/19/2005 14:43

"I think you are missing the point, my friend. People will use the software that suits their production workflow the best. Who knows what will happen in the future. What would happen if DAZ included soft body dynamics, particles, muscle group animation, mental ray renderer, advanced node shading, import and export from/to many 3D applications, 3d painting, micro or sub-polygonal dissplacement, fur etc, etc...ok, this may or may not happen, but if 3 years down the line you have the same toolset in Poser as now, you won't fear Studio...you'll be chomping at the bit to try it. I never thought that I would ever change from C4D modelling...but here I am working with one of the best modellers of it's type in the industry (the afore-mentioned Modo) Cheers" What would happen? Poser would win the battle since no one can afford D/S anymore. Of course DAZ can put it in D/S for free too, but then they would go bankrupt, too much investment needed for all of this. In other words, it will never happen, most likely.

Some "business" things to think about (and these are just my opinions): when DAZ releases a MAJOR new female figure that CANNOT be used in poser at all Um, could this be Vicky 4? Once Studio is up and running (and offered for free), why should DAZ support Poser any more? Personally, I think this is a very real possibility and I would also be willing to place bets that DAZ takes this approach with either V4 or Mike 4. The base Studio program may be free, what about costs of "plug-ins"? Do we have a price sheet for them yet? Now, I'm certainly not saying that every single thing in Studio should be free, but if I have to purchase a "render" module for $100 to render the scene, then Studio is now more expensive than the full version of Poser 6. (P6 is currently $99.) And what else could Studio be missing? Would I also have to purchase a $100 animation module or a $50 "hair room" module? Now, again, DAZ is a company and they have every right to make money. But, at what point does the "free" Studio become more expensive than the full version of Poser? And will we be forced to use this "free" software (and purchase $250 in plug-ins) if we want to use Vicky 4 and Mike 4? As for the EULA in Studio- people will debate it and the DAZ staff may pop in and offer their opinions, but the real test will be what happens when DAZ tries to enforce it. Will the content maker give into DAZ, set a precedent of people giving into DAZ, and "allow" DAZ to enforce the EULA on other people? Or will the content maker fight the "unfairness" and completely break down our idea of "open source" files and how EULA's can be written and enforced? --John

I thought Daz Studio was a response to Poser not working well. Why should Daz wait for Poser to work out the bugs so we can have more than four characters in a scene and render quickly. Poser failed Daz so DS was made. DS was also made for the other reason already stated in this post.

If poser did its job well DS might not have been made. There has been a lot of complaints about poser so it made the mutiny that much more possible. Good for Daz. If curiouslabs won't listen to its customers maybe it will listen to the avalanche about to crush them called DS. Go DAZ!

*I think DAZ|Studio pulls the plug on Poser Artist. It's got comparable functionality (excluding magnets) and a better renderer, and it's perfect for newcomers who want to try their hand at 3D rendering.*To be competitive with Poser 5, D|S would need: - magnets and wave deformers; - procedural materials; - dynamic cloth; - dynamic hair; - figure creation tools comparable with the Setup room; - Python support; - Animation; - and probably more I'm sorry but D/S does NOT pull the plug on Poser 4 or Poser Artist in this animator's book! Not until it can animate straight out of the perverbial box like Poser 4 still can. Just looking at the list of things you have as P5 & above only I see 3 things that can be done in Poser 4 and can't be done in D/S. While Poser 4 doesn't have the Setup room in it, figures can still be created with the joint editor with a bit of work and elbow grease. Magnet's and Animation have been part of Poser since at LEAST version 4. And I recall a few people who created figures in version 4 with just the joint editor and the grouping tools. I can't speak for Poser version 3 or older as I joined the bandwagon with version 4.

DS won't replace Poser, not for awhile anyways. It's not hard to create an app that matches/comes close to P4. P4 is there already to copy and all you need to do is improve the code. P6 had to start from P1. DS from P4. I have DS and the 2 free plugs, extra tools that may help in what I do. But it can't and won't replace my P6 for a very long time. It never hurts to have all the tools you can get your hands on. If Daz makes V4, DS only, that would be a very big revenue loss, I can't see enough DS users making up the difference.

*when DAZ releases a MAJOR new female figure
that CANNOT be used in poser at all

Um, could this be Vicky 4? Once Studio is up and running (and offered for free), why should DAZ support Poser any more?
Personally, I think this is a very real possibility and I would also be willing to place bets that DAZ takes this approach with either V4 or Mike 4.*

I don't think they'll do that. I suspect they will make two versions, one rigged like V3 for Poser users, one with D|S-compatible advanced rigging for D|S users.

Meanwhile, Poser 7 will have its own advanced rigging system. It will be backward compatible, so you can use the old figures, but all the cool stuff will work only with their own figures (Fei-Fei, anyone?).

People will be forced to choose, or be locked into the 1990's technology of Poser 4.

MallenLane wrote: "And 30 posts later you'll have arrived at the same place you all are right now, which is nowhere." DAZ employees should realize that The Community is going to hash things out on this subject for a long time, and that they need to let that happen, no matter how frustrating it may be to them as the owners and developers of their baby when opinions are expressed, even overstated or overheated opinions. I see absolutely nothing wrong with correcting false assertions however. In fact, I think it's a good idea, but that's not what the statement quoted above does. Unfortunately, it's a condescending remark directed at "you all" from someone with a vested interest in DAZ's success. As much as I'm a great appreciator of the writer and his company, it's impossible to appreciate being condescended to when a genearally reasonable discussion about the future of our craft's applications is taking place. Surely DAZ saw this coming? I disagree that this discussion has gone "nowhere." For example Spiritbro77 indicated D|S advantages over P4; that's substantial, not just opinion, not inflammatory argument. byAnton expressed his discomfort with the D|S EULA. While I won't let those clauses bother me as a D|S user, I can see why someone else might find them to be of concern. For my own part I dislike the "versus" component of these discussions. Many of us are already using D|S and Poser side-by-side for their respective advantages. My own moderate perspective aside, these "arguments" are just a normal and perhaps necessary part of current developments. Please, we don't really need those with vested intersts telling us that we're going nowhere for discussing these topics. Per usual, we argue because we care. :-)

Can you please tell us more about advanced rigging in D|S. I think all rig system are garbage.

Since starting this thread their have been alot of views being made here. Some contraversial!

I have been looking at forum threads at Daz3d and their seems to be alot planned for DS which will rival P6 and its predecessors.

I will continue to use P6 and P5 as well as use DS until I see what developments they have planned for DS.

I have also tried doing animation is DS and its very simple and its great. Daz have indicated they will be releasing a plugin or update for DS soon that will be as good as P6.

DS seems to be more stable than P6 when rendering large scenes of more than 5 human figures and over 20 props including hair and clothing.

Their will be a variety of plugins currently planned some available for free and some for a reasonable cost. We will have to wait and see...

With regard to P7,Curiouslab/E-frontiers have always been upgrading the old P4 engine and always promising to rebuild the Poser from start. They never did! I will only belive it when I see it!

Third times a charm :) I do think the denigration of two programs in contrast, is pointless.. that may be biased I guess. Poser's good. D|S is good.

Personal attacks need to stop and not happen again. Have the discussion. Don't bring names from outside the thread into it. I wandered in here because I'm a Poser Forum Mod, not because anyone anywhere told me to, but once legal mudslinging starts, this thread will end and go to the post graveyard, and I'd rather you guys be able to actually discuss something without having me or one of the other staff members breathing down your necks. Just...use your judgement. Both programs have a place, maybe not a place on everyone's computer, but they do have a place in this big huge world of ours. Let's not turn this into a "Mine is bigger" contest. MorriganShadow Poser Moderator

DS seems to be more stable than P6 when rendering large scenes of more than 5 human figures and over 20 props including hair and clothing.

If this were to prove to be true, then it would be a strong selling point for me.

But I'd need some serious convincing before I'd switch over to D|S as my main app over Poser. I'm simply too heavily invested in Poser to consider another program......unless if that program can demonstrate some serious advantages over the competition. Not just a few tricks that it does better.

As some others have stated, I'd be happy to use BOTH apps. Why not - other than personal prejudice?

If only Poser and D|S could be designed so as to work well together.

Ah, well. We can dream.

I'll be first on the bandwagon to buy P7 whenever it comes out. As for D|S, IMO it has yet to prove itself. But I'm not above being persuaded.

Yes, I believe that the unnecessary shots taken at MorriganShadow were of the cheap variety.

All this 'Will DS replace poser?' stuff is total BS! DAZ have never made any mention of wanting to replace poser with another app. An alternative? Yes. A competitor? Yes, it probably will become that eventually. And why not? MC/CL/EF have had a monopoly on the poser market for a long, long time, and competition can only lead to improvements in both DS and poser. What are DAZ's motives? Pure and simple. The same as any other business. They want to expand their market, bring in new users, sell more content, etc, etc. What else do you expect them to do? Sit on their butts and wait for people to come to them? If developing a free software, or giving away the vicki/mike base figures for free is how they thing they'll achieve that goal, then why should we care? It's their business. Let them handle it. All they've done is create an embroyo alternative posing app. You'd think they'd started World War 3, judging by the reactions of some people. I use DS for some things, I use P4/5/6 for others. I don't that as being a disaster. The more choices I have, the better. And it didn't cost me a cent to get that extra alternative, which has to be a good deal in anybody's book. mac

" MC/CL/EF have had a monopoly on the poser market for a long, long time" psst of course they did. they invented the bloody thing. ;)

Can you please tell us more about advanced rigging in D|S.

I don't know if you were talking to me, but since I brought up rigging, I'll answer. :) D|S is supposed to have weight-based rigging, eventually.

Poser 7 is also supposed to have a new advanced rigging system, which is why Jessi is rigged like Posette. Supposedly, Poser's new rigging system will make the buttocks group unnecessary.

I think all rig system are garbage.

Rigging is indeed the biggest problem with Poser (and D|S). It's the area that most obviously needs improvement. So I think both Poser and D|S will be addressing it soon.

Unfortunately, I don't see any way advanced rigging can be cross-compatible with D|S and Poser, unless DAZ and e-Frontier decide to cooperate.

You know, whenever DAZ gives away something for free, it makes me very suspicious. I've tried D/S a couple of times before, even downloaded v1. Haven't installed it though. Why? The last time I did download something free from DAZ I ended up spending much more money on it then intended to make it really useable. I still regret it. I'm pretty sure it's the same with D/S. In the end I'm going to spent much more money then I ever intended to, just to make it really useable. I did try the latest beta and it wasn't sufficient for me, but with the release of plugins I can see that it may be sufficient for my needs too. But how much money is that going to cost me? That's very unsure at the moment, so I'm not going to install D/S v1.0 at all. I'm not going to get used to it. I'm not going to end up spending more then intended once more. I'm not going to fall for DAZ's latest hype once more. I'll stick to Poser 6. I know what is in it. I'm certain of it's features. I know I'm not going to spent anymore money on it, since it has more then I need. Don't know that with D/S and knowing DAZ a little, it will always cost you more then anticipated. DAZ never gives you the total price upfront, they just say it's free to get you hooked on something. We all know better, D/S isn't free at all and I'm very sure we will see many people in the future wishing they never left Poser for D/S, because in the end D/S has become far more expensive then Poser ever was.

unless DAZ and e-Frontier decide to cooperate ahem.....yes, that would be nice, wouldn't it?

LOL!!! goood joke Xeno!!

It's one of those types of jokes with a serious undertone.

I believe that both companies would gain a lot more from cooperating with each other than either will from butting heads.

shrug I doubt that we'll see any move like that happen. Too bad. It would go a long ways towards improving things all of the way around in the community. And perhaps it would avoid the "Great Division" which some see in our future. VHS vs. Betamax.

I'd like to see DAZ and e-frontier get along at least as well as.....say.......e-frontier and e-on. It would benefit all of us if they did.

Now it is just outdated as is Propack Like everything else, it depends on what you want out of it. I still use P4 in the main, and it handles animation and lighting just fine for me. But then, bear in nind that I see the CS versions of Illustrator and Photoshop as wastes of time and money. If rthe current version of a program, whatever it might be, works for you, you just have to ask if it's worth it changing just for the sake of changing?

Xenophonz, Daz can be pig somtimes, they were trying to lure poser users away by catcopying some things from Poser product and steal from its dervation development. I do not think efrontier really appreciate that. It is most likely that CL won't get along and ever will enter into cooperation agreement. However as a customer, I actually have no objection to it if Daz proved D|S to be useful for my business. For right now, I think DAZ is way behind on most things that CL have developed such as dynamics, library, and etc. So I am sticking with Poser.

'psst of course they did. they invented the bloody thing. ;) ' Right, khai. Point taken. But inventing something doesn't give you the automatic right to hold a monopoly on it forever. It merely puts you ahead of the competition. Aielkema, I feel sorry for you. DAZ are giving you free software so they can force you into buying things from them. The cunning devils! I seem to recall you making this point before. You remember? The poor people who are forced to spend so much money on poser content (by DAZ, of course) that they can't feed their kids. It's a pretty poor argument against accepting free software (and then not even installing it). mac

Shade 8 is out. Look new sparklie thing.

GWeb --

In my experience, DAZ offers some of the best deals to be found anywhere in Poserdom (uh....Studiodom?). Almost every render that I do involves the use of various DAZ products.

I support DAZ. And I support e-frontier.

I would like to see them support each other more than they seem to be inclined to do sometimes.

BTW - is this thing of ours still to be called the "Poser Community"? Or should we start calling it the "Studio Community? Or perhaps some hyphenated name, like the "Poser-Studio Community"?

For some reason, I doubt that either company would like that. Which is too bad.

"Shade 8 is out" Downloaded & playing with it now

Is that the American version of Shade 8? And does it include Fei-Fei?

I just read some posts before this. EULA with Daz is a big issue. I do not think I want to hire $300 an hour attorney to take a look at it. I think it is not fair that Daz implemented wordings in it to put extra liability on customers. I would rather to buy expensive software for business use that would not do this thing. Daz was supposed to have their own derivation development with their products. Most of things from Daz are from artist contractors. I have no way knowing what kind of agreement Daz have made with them. This kind of practice is similar to Adobe. They had a lot of legal issues with outside developers. I won't want to step into Daz's product to take liability. Shade 8 renderers looks cool and breathtaking. I wonders why CL did not put that renderer engine into Poser.

How big is the D/L file of Shade 8. I've been watching for it most of the day and finally thought I had better get the lawn mowed one last time, before the snow flies.

Did Fei Fie come with it? LOL, crossed posted again, slow dialups do it to you every time.

Message edited on: 09/19/2005 18:34

Nah it's the English version Don't know when the yanks will be allowed to get their version ;) Fei Fei & the rest of the content for the Pro version will be available thru Content Paradise soon And at last the PoserFusion plugin now supports Poser 6 dynamic hair

The D/L is 481 megs, probably worth running a download manager even on DSL, I know I had to

"Let's just say articles 10,14, and 15 of the EULA are unacceptable. They could be seen as unconditional and non-specific. Article 15 could be seen as an indefinate and all-encompassing NDA and could be seen as Non-compete." Not could be. Although the specific clauses are excerpted out of context and highlighted for effect (no offense, but it also makes it more difficult to read the full text as people will tend to skip over the non highlighted parts, which are excessively important for purposes of context), it is indeed an open ended NDA. Within context, (articles 8 on, inclusive) the specifics deal with software programs(and, one could reasonably assume, with EF's potential intent), and not with the cntent itself, except as specifically provided with the program and/or for the program itself (binary data in the native format). While it could be pushed to cover content, it wouldn't stand up at the appellate level in such a case. However, there are some really interesting quirks there. The fact that damages at law may not be enough, and an injunction is possible: that's a pretty way of saying that since they can sue you into oblivion, they can shut you down and forbid you to sell anything. Protective or not, that's an ethical disaster. While its meant to stop folks who might decompile the base code for D|S itself, and not content creators (again, the all important context), it's an interesting part of the agreement that can lead to some pretty icky places. ------------------ IF V4/M4, etc, are released in strictly D|S format, well, big freakin whoop. It's neither new nor news, either -- pretty much that was exactly said by DAZ at their site in the threads regarding the milhorsie rigging, where certain bad sots were blamed on Poser's "limitations" and it was stated that the next gen figures wouldn't suffer from those restrictions. IOW, that's been the plan all along. However, that doesn't preclude Poser versions of the same things. The folks over there aren't idjits. The poser stuff may come out later than the D|S stuff, but its unlikely they will abandon Poser entirely. And, ultimately, it doesn't matter. Poser will still be around, and there will always be new things made for it. D|S is here now, and there will be things made for it. So there's no more Victoria for Poser. shrug Who the hell really gives a rats rear? Most of us bitch and moan about how we're sick of seeing her anyway ;) There will be someone else. Likely several someones. Its growth. Progress. Evolution. Business. Change. (and I've already covered the "change" thing...)

*@maxxmodelz wrote: "ALL of these feature are available in MAYA complete today"

Just for the record, they're all also available in 3dsmax v7 and up too, which is a couple thousand $$$ cheaper than the Maya Unlimited package which, I believe, is the one you meant to specify, since I don't think Complete carries some of those features.

You're mostly right, but Maya Complete only lacks the "Fur" plug-in that Maya Unlimited has.

Just picking nits! ;)

Interesting thread. Personally, I see no problem with having both Poser and D|S Studio available.

Oh....a few vocal parties complain from time to time about the ubiquitous presence of V3. She, and things/characters created for her, still outsell all other characters by wide margins. Some might gripe over this state of affairs. But a majority seem to be interested.

Daz Studio is FREE isn't it? Does anyone have a better deal than that? Perhaps in the future D|S will cost more than Poser; Daz is good about minimal upgrades and plug-ins. The future for Poser lies in its integration with Shade. This is what e-Frontier wants. For now I can think of no reason not to download Daz Studio 1.0 and the 50+mbs of content that accompany it. Thank-you Daz for the FREE one. You won't get a dime from me...

I think (and hope) that it will spur competition from both companies. Poser would do well to have some flexible and modular features in version 7 if it does in fact get written from the ground up - nothing says they can't take cues from DAZ or elsewhere. Studio has some nice UI features and I like the way they are implemented, though still base, but other applications have had docking palettes, tabs and such before this. Still, nothing wrong with that. Studio's Power Pose beats simple IK hands down. It is wonderful to play with. If all the plugins that come out down the road feature the same ease and flexibility, it will surely be something to see and use. This is a free base and a pretty useful base at that - no not the full feature list of Poser 6 but there's no reason that it can't be there as things come out. And if they work well and stay in a low price range, so what? I'd rather drop $10 here or $20 there for a good, functional plugin that I can use with glee rather than some miscellaneous content that gets buried eventually on the harddrive. As far as the encrypted binary format goes, besides the (.daz) scene files, there is a choice to save as a unencrypted text file or an encrypted binary file for saving lights, cameras, material and so forth. Who's to say there won't be a choice there for saving other types of content in a future build. Correct me if I'm wrong but that seems to be an unknown at this time. I guess that my point of view a bit tamed by my position right now, post Katrina (I lived right outside of New Orleans). But I sure do appreciate things more than I used too. Right now, finding a place to live that I can call my own (along with my wife and two cats) would make me ecstatic ;) Things can only go up from here, right? And I still have a great fondness for Poser 6, so don't get me wrong. I'm just in the middle somewhere between these apps. They're both tools to me. Just like the community did great things with Poser 4 (and later) with innovations and cool utilities, it can be done again for those who'd like to use both tools together. Why not?