The problem sometimes surfaces of fixing one model to another at more than one point, e.g. a man holding a tool or weapon in both hands, e.g. one query mentioned a man swinging a golf club in both hands. This would make a closed circle of linked parts, sometimes called "circular IK chain" in Poser Forum message titles. In e.g. my flamethrower model, that problem occurs twice, as its tank is parented to his back, and some other means would have to be used to make both his hands stay on its nozzle's handgrips as the nozzle is re-posed to change his aim. I suggested this method to try to keep part A and part B of a tree of articulated parts in the same relationship as they move, if A and B are not adjacent in the tree structure:- --- The user says that B must follow A. -- If the user moves A:- - Poser moves A as usual. - Poser calculates position X and orientation Y of where B would have been if it had followed A. - Poser acts as if the user had tried to drag and rotate B to the position X and orientation Y. If that fails, Poser beeps or complains and the user has the option to undo the whole attempt to move A and B. -- If the user tries to move B directly:- - Ditto with A and B swopped, or Poser treats it as an attempt to move A. -- If the user tries to move a part C which is up or down a chain of parts from B, and that results in B wanting to move:- - Poser remembers position X and orientation Y of where B was before. - Poser moves C and acts as usual. - Then, Poser acts as if the user had tried to drag and rotate B to position X and orientation Y. If that fails, Poser beeps or complains and the user has the option to undo the whole attempt to move A and B and C.

It would also help if I could issue along with the flamethrower model a pose-type file mentioning BOTH the nozzle AND its user's hands and finger parts. In that file there would be a new special cr2 language command "DragToRelative" with coordinates (x y z) and orientation angles (xrot yrot zrot) relative to a specified other part, e.g.:- actor nozzle:1 { channels { ... DragToRelative lHand .012 .034 .065 123.5 32.6 33.87 DragToRelative rHand .053 .023 .056 321.8 34.6 45.84 ... where the six numbers are x y z xrot yrot zrot in that order; the fingers are posed relative to the hands by their ordinary "rotateX" etc cr2 commands. Then the user could do this:- - Put the flamethrower on a man's back. - Parent its tank to his chest part. If applied it tries to attract its wearer's hands to the place of operation, and then as above. It would be useful if a conformable garment model could include parts which are attached to it but do not try to conform to its wearer. Then I could define my flamethrower's backpack plate and harness straps as a conforming garment (if I could tell it to keep the backpack plate rigid), and its tank and hose and nozzle are merely attached to it and are posed by other means. That would make it easier to pose any device that has backpack straps: flamethrower, backpack helicopter motor and rotor set (where I would need to be able to pose the rotor and any large control levers separately), blowtorch with backpack cylinders, garden sprayer, rucksack, parachute, scuba diving breathing set, etc. (Some of these are in the Poser Fun Stuff (to find them, text search for "appleyard"), but I had to make their backpack straps etc as posable "tails" of several segments.) And it should be possible to pose it and its backpack straps fully if it not being worn but lying on the floor or whatever.

A corrigendum:- - Put the flamethrower on a man's back. - Parent its tank to his chest part. - Apply the above-described pose-type file.

Well, if you turn off bending for the part you can get things to remain rigid. I have never tried to conform a rigid part to a figure, however.

Someone suggested that in Poser 4 the flamethrower's hose and nozzle can be treated as a "conforming garment". But the wearer's hands and arms must conform to the flamethrower's handheld part, not the other way round. Also, in life the hose would not follow his arm but would hang in a long loop.