Attached Link: http://www.zenwareonline.com/vuemaster/vuemaster.html

Hi, Every now and then on this here web thingie somewhere or other you can run into someone who really wants to help change things. About a year ago I ran into such a guy, Daniel Wilmes, who writes graphics programs from his home in Connecticut. After purchasing his program *CR2Edit*, which does more thing to a Poser CR2 file than you can ever imagine, I began my continuing online friendship with him. Since then I have seen *CR2Edit* go through I don't know HOW many versions, and it's STILL being developed. Incidentally, Zygote more or less paid for Dan to write tyhe current version. But this isn't about that, instead it's about one of his latest, which Dan calls *Vue Master*. Essentially, *Vue Master* takes a Poser PZ3 file and stores the texture, bump and transparency info from it, into a format which Vue can read, *without* having to have your exported .obj files in the same folder as the textures. I am proud to say that it was yours' truly, I who first requested this, and had the pleasure of being his very first beta tester, and I am still testing it, when I can find time. Suffice it to say that it works. Better yet, Dan provides FREE lifetime upgrades, as well as free personal support to any question you might have about his apps. And he's one funny, funny guy, too. Just ask Martin. :) I would encourage anyone who might find this interesting and useful to check out the link I've supplied here, and also to email him with questions at: dwilmes@neca.com Tell him Mike sent ya! I don't know if VM works with Vue 2, because I'm not sure if Vue 2 has .mtl file support, but I do know that it does work with Vue 3.1 And another thig is, *Vue Master* will work with Bryce, and any other program that uses .mtl information. Really. Also, for a look at some of his other cool apps, such as *Zen Paint*, a very cheap and cool image editor, and *Zen Grid*, please check out this link: http://www.zenwareonline.com And for CR2Edit: http://www.neca.com/~dwilmes/cr2edit.html *If you decide to buy these VER INEXPENSIVE and SMALL uyilities, PLEASE first make sure you have communicated with Dan, in order to insure compatibility. He would most definitely rather tell you if you can't use it, than sell it to you for no reason!* Thanks for reading this, and again if you are interested, please don't ask here, but rather go straight to Dan. He will be very happy to help. Perhaps Martin will come along with some input on this as well..... Cheers, Mike PS: And NO, I do not intend to make it a habit of offering advertising here! Dan is a friend, and Vue Master is a very useful app.

So are u saying that we no longer have to export the pz3 into wavefront format? or is it still necessary, but we don't have to supply the texture maps? I'm confused. Sorry Mike...it sounds great if it can do all the sorting out that we have to do manually. Thanks for the heads up and for your response. hugs

Hi Beck. hugs :) Actually, you save the pz3 and export the .obj. Vue Master sticks them into its' own folder it makes in the Poser directory, along with a .mtl file. Normally, a .mtl file contains the list of textures, but no the full paths. a PZ# file contains ALL the info-- full paths to all textures, including bump maps and trans maps. Now, when you import this "altered" .obj into Vue, via the PZ3 info, Vue is supplied with all that info, and textures, bumps and trans maps are all loaded. VM automatically converts Poser .BUM files into .BMP files. SAnd everything loads into Vue, completely, with the same settings as are in the PZ3 file. In other words, correct--- no more doing what we have to do now, which is either: A) edit the .mtl file manually, providing FULL path info... B) manually remnaming .BUM files to .BMP... C) keeping all texture files in one massive folder so Vue can find them automnatically. But, I urge you, please write to Dan at dwilmes@neca.com He's a helluva nice guy, and always has been happy to help. :) hugs back at ya sweetie! Mike

wow, my typing keeps getting worse and worse.... LOL sorry!

THanks for the reply.......so let me get this right. We save the pz3 and export the object as per normal. However, Vuemaster makes a folder in the poser directory with all the relevant info. So when we open up vue, and say import obj..we point it in the direction of the folder vuemaster made and all is well? Ok..so how does vuemaster know when we have made a file, so that it can create the folder....and do we still have the rotten trick of having to play with the eyelash/eyebrow transparency stuff like we do now? I did write to Dan ..but not at the address u listed..I wrote to him at the infor@zenwareonline addie. I guess I should have waited, but this whole concept got me too excited. LOL Mike ...do u know if he has a demo version of vuemaster available? I know he does for zen painter and tile ? (I forgot its full name) ps. Typing 101 is out for the summer break Mike, so I guess we will just have to deal with Typos are we ;] Take care hun Beck

Attached Link: http://lauriesvue.com

Cool! I'll have to check that out. And only 15 bucks? Wow, can't beat that! :) Laurie

Beck, What you do is save the PZ3 file and export the .obj file as well. All done from Poser, and you can put these anywhere. it's actually cool, because then you have a copy of the PZ3 to use if you decide you want to edit the pose or whatever--as for me, I wasn't always in the habit of saving PZ3's before, and would sometimes have to go back and redo everything. Then, you close Poser and open Vue Master. The first thing it asks for is a PZ3 file, so you find it and load it. Then after a minute, VM asks you for the associated .obj file, which you then load. it austonamtically then sticks a copy of the .obj file aand it's new .mtl file into a folder called Vue Master Output, which it creates once, and always uses the same folder. Then you open Vue, and load the .obj file from the Vue Master Output folder into Vue in the normal way, and then Vue loads it all at once. let me do some more experiments before I answer anything else, OK? I'll be back soon. :) hugs

"austonamtically" ??? LOL! Oh, I can't wait for the Fall term!

LOL....ok hun hugs Actually I kinda like "austonamtically" is sounds like a good cross between astro physics and tickles ;]

Hey Mike...while your checking....do we still need to provide the texture's with the exported obj? or will vuemaster link it directly to the poser program? I hope this is the case cos it would certainly help to slim down our object folders considerably. hugs

LOL! Hey, I seem to be missing a necessary .OCX file or something at the moment. Had a Windoze blowout last week---really weird... but until I can get ahold of whatever I'm missing, I can't experiment right now. But I CAN answer that, no, you don't need to make any additional copies of the textures; VM "remembers" all that. :) tickles ;)

You seem to be doing well enough by yourself Mike :D What I will add is that you can save the PZ3 and the objects out of Poser in different folders. One other thing is that I have found the conversion from bump to bmp to give excellent results, and need no extra adjustment in Vue. Now in my testing of VM, have had tried to break it. One scene I exported consisted of Posette, Zygote Eagle, P4 Dog, Dork and Buck. Dork and Posette where fully clothed, and VM handled it without a hickup. All the textures appeared without fault in Vue...but it did take some time to import the OBJ file in the first place LOL! As Mike mentioned, any app that can read .MTL files should be OK with VM. One thing you do need to do, is edit the .MTL file if you decide to save the object and bump map to a new place. As the bump map is a copy, the MTL file points to it in the VueMasterOutPut folder. If I remember correctly there was a decision not to save a copy of the bump map in the original .BUM folder, as obviously it would not take long to have a GIG or so of extra bump maps on your HD ;) One last thing, VM will overwrite any previous conversions if you left them in the OutPut folder. I'm bias, but I have found it invaluable, even when it was in the early beta stages. Martin

Oh I forgot. Dan also gave it an option to reverse the trans maps to Vue's way of reading them. I also said; "One last thing, VM will overwrite any previous conversions if you left them in the OutPut folder." Obviously you should only worry about that if you need to save the bump map :) Cheers

But- isn't Vue 4 going to do this- read in Poser files?...

We assume so Fox, but that's why I specified this is for Vue 3, and also Bryce, and anything else which uses the .obj/.mtl format. Vue Master might very well be a misnomer, and might be changed. Dan is also aware of this. Remember though, not everyone will be buying Vue 4....

Mike, I just thought I would let you know that Dan replied to my email, very promptly. In fact as you said, he was extremely helpful! I shall be trialling it today, and I will let you know how I fare. wish me luck....cos as u know, poser and I aren't very friendly ;] Once again......thanks and HUGE hugs ~ beck

Hang on here...whats going on? Mike says to beck: "hugs back at ya sweetie!" "hugs" "tickles ;)" becks replies with: "hugs" x 4 "Take care hun" I can't even get that kind of response from my wife...even after I have done the decorating for her LOL! Cheers

Aweeeeeeeeeeeee Martin, I'll hug ya too LOL Besides, Mike get's his hugs for being such a cutie ;) I saw his pic in member's ..where's yours?

I'm afraid Sacred has you there Martin. Ahem.... Laurie :)

It's GOOD to be da mod! LOL ............. OK, it's late and I'm tired-- I promise my next comeback will be better.... :)

Cheers, you need to start using words like "austonamtically". Drives the babes wild, I hear. ;)

Ahhhh thankyou beck :D I'm the only one in the house who knows how to use the camera, so I'm afraid my photo never gets taken ;) Cheers austonamtically, austonamtically, austonamtically, austonamtically, austonamtically, austonamtically, austonamtically, austonamtically, austonamtically, austonamtically, austonamtically, austonamtically, austonamtically, austonamtically, austonamtically, austonamtically, austonamtically. ;o)

Ohhhhhhhhhhhh Baby!!!!!!! You are just driving me wild!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! purrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr grrrrrrrrrr purrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr OH YEAH!!!!!!!! Say it again LOL ;] hugs

ROFL! See, it works! :D

Sorry beck, it took me all day to reply becuase of me being in shock LOL :oP I'm going to try it on the wife when she comes home now ;) austonamtically, austonamtically, austonamtically, austonamtically, austonamtically, austonamtically, austonamtically, austonamtically, austonamtically, austonamtically, austonamtically, austonamtically, austonamtically, austonamtically, austonamtically, austonamtically, austonamtically. Cheers ;)

It's all in the delivery: Aus'to-namTic'ccccalleeeeee.... ;)

oooooooooooooooooh yes......mike, you are right! I'm shiverrrring right now even. ;) hugs sweetie