I can only speak for myself, and my own experience. Others may have other ideas, beliefs, and methods that work well for them.

I beleive realism is acheived by not neccesarily striving for perfection. I prefer photorealism in my artistic renders, though there is also illustrated realsim, etc.

Things that kill realism in my opinion:
Lack of eye contact, not neccesarily with the camera.
Poser camera 'mm" settings too high and thus too flat looking
Lack of shadows
Lack of blur or everything in focus
Camera angles too high as if on tall ladders
Lack of accurate body contact with the ground or itself.
Lack of interesting lighting
Lack of expression
Lack of facial details
Lack of neck and face shadows from hair

**Things that help add realism:
**Asymmetry to the face
Figures partially turned away from the camera. Avoid Mug shots
Different types of shadows
Blurred edges
Postwork corrected hues.
Background out of focus while foreground is in focus.
Softer saturations

Figures don't make a render realistic. From a facial stand point, many EF figures have much more realistic looking faces. It is what you do with the figure you use. Don't feel you have to only use a certain figure by a certain maker. Once you buy into that crap you are already limiting yourself.

I have some nice render settings and light sets included with Apollo's free download.  Renderers aren't always perfect, nor are settings always. Photoshop can help save time and help with minor corrections with tone, contrast, erasing stray artifacts, etc.

This mesh was rendered in Poser6, using some of my own shaders and the lights, settings, I mentioned.

Anyway, best of luck. Remember, perfection isn't always realistic.
Anton

-Anton, creator of Apollo Maximus
"Conviction without truth is denial; Denial in the face of truth is concealment."

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