The Poser 8 figures were by-design intended to look normal in their facial features and stature, rather then idealistic or fashion model-like. Many users have expressed the need for figures that look more like you and I, rather than pretty faces; architects, medical illustrators, industrial designers for example. That was a guiding principle behind the creation of the new figures.

We consider the figures to be akin to a 64 color box of Crayola Crayons. You can color inside the lines or combine them to create unique new variants. They are designed to be very easily modified with the included morphs and controls, and as supplied in the box, they are primary starting points, ready for you to work with and tailor to your needs.

When sculpting the figures we used Freedom of Teach’s excellent human models as a reference for proportion, bone protuberances, and musculature. Are they perfect? Considering that we created full collection in an incredibly tight timeframe, no. But they really work well, are very mutable and very closely follow real-world proportions. There are without a doubt some limitations in how the figures can pose, as is with most 3D figures. We think we achieved a reasonable point with the Poser 8 figures.

That said - I’ve seen some great variants of Alyson coming out already to create a more doll-like appearance. Bravo!

Here are some stats for you:

Alyson, Maria, Alysha and Izumi include:

• 305 head morphs
• 123 body morphs
• 31 advanced body controls
• 15 breast controls
• 7 hand controls
• 4 toe controls

Ryan, Marcus, Tomo and Diego include:

• 305 head morphs
• 109 body morphs
• 31 advanced body controls
• 7 hand controls
• 4 toe controls

At the Body Actor level each figure includes an array of Full Body Morphs broken into:

• Full Body
• Upper Torso
• Lower Torso
• Breast (female character only)
• Arm-Hand
• Glute-Hip
• Leg-Foot

At the body level you’ll also find Advanced Body Controls for controlling groups of actors, treating the figure like a marionette. These ABC's are broken down into:

• Upper Body
• Arms
• Legs

For both the male and female set of characters the head morphs are broken down into:

• Ethnic morphs: to alter the basic named character facial shapes
• Head Expressions which include:

• Face Expressions: 22 full facial expressions based on Gary Faigin's “Complete Guide to Facial Expression”. These full face expression morphs are broken down by facial region in the categories below along with morphs for basic expression creation, such as lip corners up left and right, for instance.
• Eye Expressions
• Mouth Expressions
• Lip Expressions
• Lower Face Expressions
• Upper Face Expressions
• Nose Expressions
• Tongue

• Head Shapes which include:

• Face Shapes
• Ears
• Eyeball
• Eye Shapes
• Mouth Shapes
• Lip Shapes
• Nose Shapes
• Lower Face Shapes
• Upper Face Shapes
  Also included with the head are:

• Phonemes to work with Poser 8's Talk Designer
• Partial Body Morphs to link into the Full Body Morphs

For the female characters there are:

• At the Body Actor level, 17 Breast Morphs controlling size and nipple/aerola details.
• At the Chest Actor, 15 Breast Controls to change both breasts or just left or right with side to side, up and down, flattening, squeezing, lifting body controls.
• The Hip actor includes both a Genital Crease and a Genital morph.

For each male character, there is a separate superconforming penis figure with support for the Full Body Morphs and 18 morphs to control size, state, foreskin, position, scrotum positions and testicle positions.

Cheers,

Steve Cooper
Poser Product Manager

Steve,

            This is just a suggestion for SR1 for the people. Include an "Expression Only" CR2 for both Alyson and Ryan. By this I mean a CR2 that only has Expression and Phoneme morphs  on the heads. Why you ask? Well here's why.

You've still included a "Random Expression.fc2" Pose for both of them in their facial expressions folder, but when you run it it randomises EVERY BLOODY HEAD MORPH and you end up with some real monsters.

I know how to create Expression only CR2's myself and have done so for nearly all of the figures I use, but others may not know how or want to take the time to do it. Without a Base Expression CR2 that only contains expression morphs and Phoneme's, you can't really get anything decent out of that "Random Expressions.fc2" file.

Either that or I guess do something even better/simpler and give us a New and Improved "Random Expressions.fc2" file that only affects those morphs needed for expressions.

Just some food for thought for you guys.

LiS - great suggestion - we were planning on including an updated python script driven by the Random Face in the expressions that would ignore the full facial expressions and face sculpting morphs, but it fell through the cracks. The python volunteer author is in my office now, I'll surprise him with this momentarily. :-)

Quote - Many users have expressed the need for figures that look more like you and I

Coop, judging by your avatar at RDNA, nobody asked for a figure that looks like you. ;-)

Quote - > Quote - Many users have expressed the need for figures that look more like you and I

Coop, judging by your avatar at RDNA, nobody asked for a figure that looks like you. ;-)

I no longer have a mohawk, but wish I did. BTW, that was taken the year I turned 50. :-)

LostinSpaceman, I have a golden nugget for you. Turns out the new python script was added. My surprise, but it blends between the full facial expressions.

Now for the gold.

If you look at the Poser 8>Alyson>!Random Face .fc2, you'll see it's basically an empty shell calling a python script.

The current Alyson/Ryanscript is called: randomExpressionAlysonRyan.py and is found here:
Poser 8>Runtime>Python>poserScripts>GeomMods

If "one" were so inclined, "one" could create a copy of the !Random Face .fc2 and rename it to something like "!Random Face Shape .fc2" and then create a renamed variation of the randomExpressionAlysonRyan.py that includes only the specifically named sculpting morphs you want to control. Lastly, edit the new.fc2 "one" created to point at the new pythoin script, and voila, "one" would have a new custom face shape randomizer.

That's Cool! Thanks I'll see what I can get it to do.

Quote - I no longer have a mohawk, but wish I did.

 
Can do. I'll bring my straight razor in the office tomorrow.

Quote - > Quote - I no longer have a mohawk, but wish I did.

 
Can do. I'll bring my straight razor in the office tomorrow.

When SMSI hired me, they said specifically I was forbidden to have a mohawk in the office. I asked. And I was denied.

One would think with all the recent cash flow you'd be in a position to renegotiate that.

Quote - > Quote - I no longer have a mohawk, but wish I did.

 
Can do. I'll bring my straight razor in the office tomorrow.

Do it!  Do it!

I think Deecey should lead the way.

Quote - > Quote - > Quote - I no longer have a mohawk, but wish I did.

 
Can do. I'll bring my straight razor in the office tomorrow.

When SMSI hired me, they said specifically I was forbidden to have a mohawk in the office. I asked. And I was denied.

You could start wearing a fedora while at work, and a mohawk everywhere else ;)

Quote - I think Deecey should lead the way.

Now THAT would be funny. Me with a Mohawk.

About the closest I would go is a Sanjaya-do. Now THAT would be funny! LOL

Quote - .... we achieved a reasonable point with the Poser 8 figures.

Thank you, your post is an excellent clarification of the rationale and development of the Poser 8 figures. I couldn't agree more with the above quote.

It's a shame this was not published earlier. I believe that most of the nonsense being spouted about the P8 figures can be attributed to a simple misunderstanding of what was intended - false expectations breeding unreasonable disappointment. (But it's true that some people just love to moan).

By the way, thanks for the huge effort you and your team have put into this product. In my humble view this is a big step forward for Poser. Innovation is essential and laudable, and people need to realise that bugs and instability are the inevitable (but temporary) cost of moving forwards.

Now waiting patiently for the Poser Pro 2010 Beta version!