Hi there all. I’m guessing this is quite a large subject but I’m getting to the stage where I would like to try designing my own clothes, objects and characters for Poser and really want to know where to begin.

I would say I’m an intermediate level user of Poser (I have version 7), and I’m also guessing you need an 3rd party 3d application for modelling stuff to use within Poser. I quite like to look of zBrush because of its organic method of working. Would this be a good option?

Any help or guidance would be most gratefully received because I really am a novice at this sort of thing.

Cheers,

@ndy.

you can try blender as a 3d application because its free. Z brush is better but expensive and usually it is used in organic modeling.

Regards to designing, you can first take a look on some other advanced artist work, not to copy them but to train your brain and eye to recognize what is beautiful.

As all artists have been, they take inspiration and borrow design from their surroundings, nature itself. Ex. the volkswagen, there is a reason it is called "the beetle" or the elf warriors' armor in Lord of the rings which look like leaves. Mixing concepts is also a good idea too.

Its easy to create concepts unless you have a noisy left hemisphere brain that always wants to tell you what to do which you can always shut up by drawing and let the quiet right hemisphere work. Once you create a habit and practice all the time by having a neat little sketchbook with you wherever you go to jot down and sketch ideas, you will be a design machine.

A simple practice:

Find a jacket in your wardrobe. Then think, what can I do to make this look COOL? Think of a setting like, what if this is a jacket used for outerspace? Take a quick research and draw some little inspiration from nature or anywhere around you. Create your first design, it may look weird and not that cool but don't throw it away for you might be able to use it later.

You may overdo it with detail and sometimes simplicity and making drawing a habit is the key.

Since you are a beginner in poser there is a site called www.poserpro.net which have a general info in making clothing, dynamics etc and the rest you can find on the poser forum tutorial links so good luck and stay healthy.

If you have little to no knowledge of modeling clothes and making them Poser ready you might want to a search for Dr. eep's tuts on the Setup Room, joints, rigging. Read through them, play, and get a feel for what all is involved. As far as modeling apps, try the free ones, such as Blender, wings3D,Anim8tor, first. Try the demos of the more expensive ones. Find the one that suits your likings before investing a lot of money.

Zbrush is not the easiest application to learn to model with. It's method of going about modeling is a little bit unorthodox.
I'd recommend it for masochistic beginners, and little more advanced users.

Wings is a good and in poserdom pretty widely used free application for 3D modleing.
When it comes to short learning curve affordable little applications, I tend to use hexagon - even though I have 3D max too.

Good thing to start learning is going to be subdivision modeling. If you do some searching on rendo and other places, there's a lot of tutorials that cover it's basics. I've even seen instructional videos for it on YouTube.

Quote - Zbrush is not the easiest application to learn to model with. It's method of going about modeling is a little bit unorthodox.
I'd recommend it for masochistic beginners, and little more advanced users.

Seen Blender recently Connie ? :biggrin:

I do all my modelling in another free app
check www.anim8or.com
Simple and free

anim8tor is one file, and fits on a 1.44 floppy (anyone remember those?...;) Gerald Day has a link on his site to Anim8tor. I've used it a little as a curiosity (before I found Wings..;)

There's thousands of modeling programs out there, each with people that swear that it's the best solution. If it can create objects, modify them, and allow for textures to be applied, it's a good start.

Wings is pretty easy for most folks, anim8tor is fairly easy as well. Blender is....well, jack of all trades, master of none. It can do a million things, but you have to know which menu...ok, I'll stop...;) But they're all free. Heck, I think some older versions of Truespace are still out there, though it made me feel like I was modeling using Qbert (but am I dating myself now...;)

This is a perennial favorite topic. There's tons of advice on this in the forum, going back as many years as you want for suggestions and tips. Do a search on modeling, take a nap, and the first few thousand will show up. Still, it's important to ask.

'sides, you might come up with something neat and nifty, so we all want that.