I think those wishing for the $1500 Poser will have better luck praying for world peace. Take a look at SmithMicro's product line. Does anything suggest that they have either the financial or technical expertise to pull off a high-end professional 3D application? That's not a knock on them, just reality IMO. Most people seem to acknowledge that what Poser needs is a complete clean slate rewrite. To create a product that would be able to compete at the lever people seem to want is a daunting task. During that lengthy process, development of the existing product would probably be minimal unless they had the money for a whole new development team. I don't think that anyone throughout Poser's long odyssey, with the possible exception of e-Frontier, has had the resources to even seriously contemplate such a move. Poser's best chance for such a development probably dies when Corel picked over MetaCreations catalog and decided to pass on our beloved application. The only realistic prospect remaining in that direction would be for AutoDesk to look behind their sofa cushions and come up with the pocket change to buy Poser. But why would they do that? They'd have to rewrite it anyway so all they'd be buying is the name (which they probably wouldn't use) and a vocal user-base who are, to put it politely, are probably not within their preferred demographic. I also tend to disagree that such an acquisition would not mean the end of the "hobbyist" level Poser. Sure, they have student versions of their products and limited, non-portable file format versions of their pricey applications but AFAIK, they done tend to have sub $300 consumer priced versions.

Poser has always been a hobbyist level application which some people have used for professional purposes. That has been and will probably continue to be the sweet spot for profit. Advanced rigging schemes and more professional animation tools are all well and good but I doubt that they are what a good 90% of users want. How many users have achieved a good degree of competence and comfort with dynamic hair and cloth? The continued robust sales of conforming hair and clothing suggest to me not that many. It's not that those aren't great features but they seem to be implemented with a degree of complexity similar to their counterparts in high-end 3D applications. Maybe that's the way it has to be but I've long advocated for a multi-level interface with oodles of presets and wizards for the masses and number crunching for the more geekily inclined. I think this is essentially one of Morkonan's points though I'm not sure that Poser itself should be focus on development tools - that should probably be done in a full-fledged SDK developer's version. More easy to use ZBrush style figure sculpting tools might be good and Poser could certainly learn something from Daz Studio's dForm tool and their new AniMate plug-in. The first cut questions for any improvements should be,' Will it be easy to use?' and 'Will it be fun?' Those aren't the criteria some would prefer but if they're not met, the vast majority of folks won't use them. More importantly, if DS implements something similar that does meet them, guess what?

Poser can and should improve its ease of integration with applications that can supply the advanced functions that exist in abundance at every price point. Poser itself should stick to what it does best, providing a fun and easy way for the masses to pose their Vickies and create what to them at least is art. The vast barely tapped market today is in the virtual world of games and online universes where people are probably eager to have their "custom" characters and avatars. Put a make Second Life or GTA button next to the Make Art button and you'll sell far more copies of Poser than adding GI with a rocket scientist interface. And yes, selling content is an integral part of making enough to keep the application alive. If SM stops hawking CP then look for Poser to be seeking another home. That just may be when Microsoft comes looking for a way to populate their TrueSpace worlds. Did you know they actually owned XSI at one time :-)

  

"Democracy is a pathetic belief in the collective wisdom of individual ignorance." - H. L. Mencken