Based on V3's shelf life, it probably won't be too much longer before V4 is updated to V5. I hope it is not a revision from the ground up, because we all have so much invested in V4. But there's no denying Vicky has her flaws, which could be addressed in V5 or even V4 point X.

My favorite Vicky peeves: 

• She is proportioned at 6'2" tall. I don't want to have to use Stephanie to get a more realistic female figure.

• Her armpits are way too high when her arms are in a normal down position.  Did her designers never work with her except in default zero position?

• Why is her zero position like a scarecrow, anyway? Why not make her arms' zero position in the down position, like a real person? 

• Her toes have been called monkey toes for the way they look when bent.

• Some of her joints behave oddly when moved into perfectly normal active positions that are nonetheless a wide variance from zero.  Vicky could never be a cheerleader or a gymnast.

• When limits are imposed, they are not real-world limits at all in some cases. Thigh bending, for example. Young females without a disabling condition can bring their thighs up much closer to their bodies than Vicky can with limits imposed. I think the limits are more to minimize the design flaws in her joints than to reflect realistic limits. Fix the flaws, I say. Don't hide them by creating a false limit at a point before they become evident.

Maybe rigged with the newer capsule fallofs would help.  Maybe someone could do that for V4.

Be sure to market it as New and Improved
Make it even more resource intensive so a huge video card can't just cache the maps with more seams to destroy the uniformity and too many poly's to run in a dynamics simulation even on a $4000 Quadro Card. No lagacy compatibility and cheaper then V4 (Pay Me To Bother with the Thing)

it is unlikely they'll try to add additional encumbrances for poser users, as they're the ones
with the money.  dan would never allow his modellers to make it D|S only IMVHO, but they
may be asked to make it incompatible with V1234, as mentioned above.  they may have finally
realised that constantly increasing polygon count is bad modelling, like a carpenter trying
to fix a goofball job with several cans of wood putty. 

Feet, toes, fingers and hands need to be more functional than they are in V4. Fix the blasted shoulders and arms, fix the blasted thighs so when she bends they do not explode out of her slacks. Actually I don't know why I even bother listing anything Daz will do what they want anyhow to the normal chorus " We want her now, now, now or we will hold our collective breaths!!!"

Then complain that she was released too soon with so many bugs. But hey another thing to fill your already busting at the seams Runtime folders that load up slowly then complaints about Poser and the library system. I don't know as for me I am not upgrading to nothing anymore, figures or software, unless it a major, colossal and out of this world change. All I can say is she'd better have the goods because I will not die or lose sleep if I don't have her.

The reason for the T pose - AFAIK - is because it's a compromise between the extremes of arm movement.  Theoretically, you could make different versions of the model for use in varying arm poses but this would probably be too much of a faff about for the modellers and users.

I really do not like the V4 default shape at all and this also translates through to the majority of characters I've seen.  IMO, V3 is much better looking because the model is relatively anonymous.

 I'd like someone to take notice of anatomy and proportion before they commit to a finished model.  Making the eyes more in keeping with human size would be a good start.  Yes, it's easy enough to correct with morphs but why not get it right in the model?  Likewise, the huge towering stature is completely ridiculous.  So, a somewhat shorter, realistically proportioned model, shaped nearer to V3 would be worthwhile IMO.

And, oh yeah, something to make it completely impossible for character makers to produce huge, pouty, smacked in the face lips would be a great addition.  :)

Quote - I really do not like the V4 default shape at all and this also translates through to the majority of characters I've seen.

This is pretty unanimous, I think. And it may be deliberate. Giving Vicky a nondescript, boxy default shape (and shipping her with a los-res default texture with ugly lo-res purple bikini and butch hair painted on) is actually a very effective way to get users to head right out to the marketplace and buy stuff to make Vicky more appealing.

By the way, I think it's interesting that  many of the vendors who make the sexiest V4 characters are female. Same goes for the "hot" outfits, sometimes referred to by the more jaded among us as slutwear or skimpwear. It shows that the V4 marketplace is not just about men doing stuff to suit their own tastes. (It could be argued that the women are doing stuff to empty men's wallets, but I'd like to think they are also fulfilling their own ideas of what is hot). 

@ imax24 - I have a feeling it's the former.  Women are generally a whole lot smarter on the subject of what makes us men tick than we are about them.   

Quote - • She is proportioned at 6'2" tall. I don't want to have to use Stephanie to get a more realistic female figure.

That's using the Poser 6+ measuring system. Before that (and to a large extent still, even in content made for more recent versions of Poser) the common systems were 1 Poser unit = 8 feet (96") and 1 Poser unit = 100 inches. DAZ worked to the 1PNU=8' scale, by which V4 is still tall at 5'10" or so but not as extreme as 6'2".

Quote - ... but they may be asked to make it incompatible with V1234, as mentioned above...

DAZ already doesn't guarantee compatibility with any Poser version prior to Poser 8...

forum.daz3d.com/viewtopic.php

Quote - > Quote - • She is proportioned at 6'2" tall. I don't want to have to use Stephanie to get a more realistic female figure.

That's using the Poser 6+ measuring system. Before that (and to a large extent still, even in content made for more recent versions of Poser) the common systems were 1 Poser unit = 8 feet (96") and 1 Poser unit = 100 inches. DAZ worked to the 1PNU=8' scale, by which V4 is still tall at 5'10" or so but not as extreme as 6'2".

You're saying she was only 5'10" in Poser 5 and earlier? That isn't much comfort! Since I don't use Poser 5, I need Michael to be about 7 feet tall to make Vicky look the right size standing next to him.

I guess it doesn't matter so much if EVERYTHING is scaled for a 6'2" Vicky. But why make the scale so out of whack to begin with? Just fix the damn measuring system if that is the problem.

What should be changed?

No magnets! Better rigging and JCM, eg loose the flat on the thighs when they are bent forwards, improve the bending for collars, elbows, and knees. Visible translate and scale dials for the eyes. Fix the eyes so that they scale correctly when the head is scaled. Feet flat on floor in zero pose. Leg IK off by default. Better default texture. There are probably a lot of other things, but those are some that mediately spring to my mind.

Or just forget about Victoria and use Antonia instead. 

The no magnets thing interests me Les. I have been told time again, when I bring up I'd rather use a JCM, that magnets are better because they can be transferred to clothing easily. Do you find this isn't true and that's why the no magnets or is it simply you have a dislike for magnets in general?

lesbentley, Teyon

Personally I like the no magnets as well for the simple fact that I can make morphs into more precise shapes than the results using magnets. Especially using Colorcurvatures MorphLoader or Daz;s Reverse Deformation tools. Magnets are a great resource and have their uses, but using them to repair joint shapes and transfer those shapes to clothing can give you some really unexpected results.

I don't particularly enjoy working with magnets, either, but I don't see the point in taking magnets away from everybody.

I don't use the Face, Hair, or Cloth Rooms at all, and the Setup Room only when I need to turn a group of props into a figure and then back to a single prop. (Any other method produces odd results when any of the props are morphed). But I don't want those rooms to go away. I just ignore them.

I use magnets when I can't get what I want with the Morphing Tool (some meshes don't play well at all with that tool). But I wish there was a way to get to the same end without using magnets. Somebody will say, "Easy, use Zbrush." OK, buy it for me and you got a deal. I've sampled the free and cheap modeling apps, and didn't much care for any of them. I'm comfortable working within Poser, I finally have got the hang of most of the things I want to do... it's just that the methods are too clunky, like magnets, or too limited, like Morphing Tool.

Anyway, a bit OT from what V5 should look like, it's more like what Poser 9 should look like! 

 M4 doesn't have magnets and he works fine.
I find it a pain to magentize the clothes after conforming, and also when I scroll in my heirachy editor and other such lists, they get in the way.
Love esther

Creating dependancies has never been easier...there's almost no excuse now to use the magnet JCM system.  Further, there's really no excuse for bad joints, because you can morph whatever the crap you want and make it dependant to bending.  The next Vicky should bend flawlessly with inherent JCM morphs.  There's really no more guesswork involved.

I hope they don't listen to this, but something like my "PoseMagic" should really be standard with future figures.  All parameters and partial poses on one long parameter dial.  We shouldn't have to scroll through 1000 body parts anymore to pose a figure. 

I have come to deeply resent the systematic release of add-on shape packs.  The next vicky should have standard characters on-board at release.  Vicky, Stephanie, She-Freak, Girl, and Teen.  Drop the "Male" morph IMO and just get to Mike X. 

More Precise Facial Morphs!  Somehow there's been a downward progression from V1 to V4.  I seem to remember you could do anything to V1 and V2, V3 jsut about and V4...very difficult to get good morph results. 

 Overall I think V4 is technically superior over V3.  However, I do not think she has the soul that Aiko 3 does.  And V4's Gumby armpits need  to be addressed.

Regarding armpits, doesn't corvas morph fix those? I do not have them, I must admit.

Another thing that comes to my mind is that DAZ and Poser are not working identically. The differences e.g. in scaling have never been completely vanished, to my experience. I really wonder whether Poser-compatibility is still a prio1-topic for the next DAZ figure generation... does anybody know about DAZ's strategy here?

Quote - ... I really wonder whether Poser-compatibility is still a prio1-topic for the next DAZ figure generation... does anybody know about DAZ's strategy here?

In the DAZ link in my post above they explain are currently doing compatibility testing  with Poser 8 and higher.  There seems to have been dialogue with SM to fix the Freak 4 scaling issues.  Beyond that, we'll see what happens...

Quote - > Quote - That's using the Poser 6+ measuring system. Before that (and to a large extent still, even in content made for more recent versions of Poser) the common systems were 1 Poser unit = 8 feet (96") and 1 Poser unit = 100 inches. DAZ worked to the 1PNU=8' scale, by which V4 is still tall at 5'10" or so but not as extreme as 6'2".

You're saying she was only 5'10" in Poser 5 and earlier? That isn't much comfort! Since I don't use Poser 5, I need Michael to be about 7 feet tall to make Vicky look the right size standing next to him.

I guess it doesn't matter so much if EVERYTHING is scaled for a 6'2" Vicky. But why make the scale so out of whack to begin with? Just fix the damn measuring system if that is the problem.

No, up to Poser 5 or 6 there was no official scale for Poser so people guessed - using 8 feet or 100 inches both gave nice round figures, and of the two I think 8 feet was most widely adopted (including by DAZ - and it is the conversion DAZ Studio uses, and I believe the one 3DS uses if you export for Poser). Poser 5 or 6 introduced the formal statement that 1 PNU is 8.6 feet, making anything modelled to either of the generally used scales over large (and anything eyeballed against Victoria or Mike even larger, given that they were taller than average figures even on the 8-feet scale) - there was much negative comment at the time on the way the number appeared to have been plucked out of thin air, though people have found grounds for thinking it may have been implicit from an early stage (and certainly the older Poser figures are shorter than their more recent descendants, as would be expected if that were the case).

Argh - I have upgrade exhaustion for the DAZ3D figures.

I'll continue to play with Aiko3 and Michael3, and Aiko4, maybe Michael4.  That's about it.

Quote - Regarding armpits, doesn't corvas morph fix those? I do not have them, I must admit.

Yes and they work beautifully both on M4/V4. He also created some for M3/V3 as well they too work wonderfully!

I think the point is that we shouldn't have to buy fixes to correct DAZ design errors, and that DAZ should fix those errors themselves in the next release. It is incredible that they have not done so in previous releases, especially since this particular mistake (the armpits) is so easy to fix. Most of the design goofs in Vicky, in fact, are easy fixes for those with the necessary expertise.

About Victoria 4.44678356-2336
But then what about all those clothes to fix?

Quote - About Victoria 4.44678356-2336
But then what about all those clothes to fix?

That's what modelling programmes like Winds3D and Blender3D are for.

C'mon, you can do it! You know you want to! :biggrin:

ETA: Or you can always use the Poser sculpt tool... never had much luck with it, but your mileage may vary.

I started with V4,and have found many good things with V3. I like and dislike them both for different reasons.

If they were doing a V5, rather than spend time with what I feel are silly things like a male body morph, I'd like to see easier ways to change the V5 to match the variety of real people proportions. Longer/shorter hips, hands, abdomen/chest.  With V4 there seem to be many ways to modify the breasts, but in comparison not so much with the overall body.

For instance, if you go to a photograph of a beauty contest line up, can you easily re-create/mimic the body styles you would see?  Then can you clothe those changes? Not really right now. But  I'd like to see more thought given for ways to do that.

What about the genres of body types (pear-shaped, etc [just selecting one terminology that I can think of there are others along this line]).

Also if sites are starting to think about physically manufacturing the creative designs that many artists come up with, there should be a start towards making characters somehow compatible with real clothing size, shoe size, hat size fits (size 7, 8, 10, etc).

I think there is a real possibility that fashion design can be done in the future on a regular basis with these types of characters.

Also, If they were doing a V5, I 'd like to agree with Wm_the_bloody [nice avatar pic, tough name!] above. Easier posing. And also body morph packages that somehow make some real-world sense.

I also got a kick out of Sam Therapy's comments about 'smacked in the face lips.'

Everytime I see a V4 Character like that I am reminded about a funny Robin Williams comment/mimic about Angelina Jolie (sorry Angela).  Something to the effect that the lips look like someone always sucking on a glass fish tank.

But I thought I was the only one noticing that.

I like pouty, full lips more than thin lips. But I agree it may have been done to death. Like body shapes that look like Dolly Parton in zero gravity.

It's not that I don't like it; it's fine and is usually attractive. It's the prevalence - the 'done to death' part that is what makes me notice it on V4. There's a point where if you have more than one character and the vendors like same lips, then the faces start looking alike because the feature is distinctive.  There must be other ways to get that attractiveness, not just the one, but the V4 character seems to be set to make that one easier.

My wishlist for Victoria 5:
--Poser 7 compatable, because not all of us have the funds to run out and get the latest and greatest edition when we have one that works
--Fewer polygons, so I can place two or three ladies in a scene without fouling up my computer
--Body shape morphs for individual body parts so that we can give a figure, say, skinny arms but muscular legs
--Morphs and a good texture included (or if that would make the figure too expensive, then fine! Charge for the figure--it's practically charged for anyway by the time you're done buying the stuff you need to make a nice image.)

That's all I can think of right now, but I'm sure I'll come up with some more.

Quote - ...--Fewer polygons, so I can place two or three ladies in a scene without fouling up my computer
...

Bit of a side note: I have PP2010 - which I thought I'd never get until a deal came up I simply couldn't turn down! - which I'm running on this really pov system with only a gig of RAM. had the same issues as you: two people on the scene, and THUNK! system brought to its knees. Not a pretty picture.
Well, I had a chat to KobaltKween about it, and she suggested resizing the skin - creating a smaller version - so I reduced the texture image size from 3000 x 3000 to 2000 x 2000: this had a net effect of dropping the file size for, say, the face from 3.13 megabytes to 122 kilobytes!

And, from a render standpoint, when rendering two people, you really can't see the difference.

I've been reducing other textures as well in hopes of bringing down the texture-memory levels to where I can add more items to a scene.

Yeah, I know perhaps I should consider upgrading to 2 or 3 gig of RAM. They say RAM is so cheap these days. Well, I just bought some - just now - and DDR2 isn't as cheap as newer stuff... and besides, there will always be a point when you run out of RAM, even on a 6 gig system, so it's a good thing to be thinking about.

the best  thing that  could be done to a   V5 model  is  .....

Dont make it.

for God's sake, let's get on  with our lives, people.

Quote - the best  thing that  could be done to a   V5 model  is  .....

Dont make it.

I actually agree wholeheartedly. Victoria is nice, now somebody do something with a different model! But my guess is that as long as Victoria continues to be popular, DAZ will keep making new models of her :mellow:

That is a good tip about the texture size! I will have to give that a try next time I'm doing a multi-character render.

V4.......Hated the figure. Magnets galore, and all sorts of problems. But wait, let me qualify, I dont really like any of the commercial figures, so no surprise.  But then came M4, and I was actually half impressed, so much I even made some things for it, and I dont make anything for any figure but my own usually. Nice clean rigging without all the junk added to it. Out of all the figures produced by Daz or SM I think M4 has been their best. (except perhaps M2 still pretty good.) M4, a bit high res but I dont mind high res. Smooth mesh and decent to good joints, definitely a step in the right direction. IMHO.

So for the future V5 Lose all the junk, work on the rigging, simple but elegant. I would like to see the new P8 rigging used but if it's adds too much junk then dont. Realistic proportions would be nice, but not a deal breaker, so make what sells. I would like to have a quick lite version with just the basic rig that a person could be allowed to work on it without violating some proprietary rules.  Let people make their own V5 with it, basically, you may like some of the things people come up with. A developer version I suppose. I dont know how that could be done really, but I would like it.  One last thing, a good book or manual on Daz Studio so I can learn more of it than just the set up tools, please. 

cheers.

By "junk" I assume you mean the dozens and dozens of deformation morphs embedded in V4. I wouldn't mind them so much if they were completely out of view, never in the way. They're supposed to be hidden but they pop up sometimes, flooding the parameter panel with dials that cannot be used manually, they just sit there cluttering up the place.

And if you ever need to scroll through the Parenting hierarchy, for example, there they are: endless lists of deformations or magnets that make it difficult to find the actual body parts. Of course Poser allows no way to hide them in these windows like you can in the main Hierarchy Editor. All those deformations, together with the ultra-skinny scroll bars in Poser 8, make getting through those lists a major PITA.

Whatever they are accomplishing, is there a better, simpler way to accomplish it? How does M4 do it? Is he more limited than V4, in either a good or bad way? Or did some magnet-happy person just go wild when designing V4, instead of using other methods?

imax24: Ya thats what I mean by "junk".  With M4 they left most of that stuff out and just did a better job with the rig in the first place. A HUGE improvement IMO. The M4 rig was actually pretty decent and worked well without a lot of junk. Scaling for Poser was a bit messed up but no big deal for me to fix. Anyway I thought it was a breath of fresh air.

cheers.

Quote -

Bit of a side note: I have PP2010 - which I thought I'd never get until a deal came up I simply couldn't turn down! - which I'm running on this really pov system with only a gig of RAM. had the same issues as you: two people on the scene, and THUNK! system brought to its knees. Not a pretty picture.

Muchas I love Poser it will be a while before I get a new version. Unless SM gives me one!

I'm not a fan on thin, lemon sucking lips but there are limits.  Some of the characters look like they were chewing on nettles or have a massive peanut allergy.

@ 3dstories re clothing variously morphed body shapes:  Having never made clothes (I make hard surface models), I can only imagine it'd be a royal pain in the nether regions to accommodate every single shape and size in clothes.  I know a lot of DAZ's stuff has the morphs built in but I think that's an option most vendors don't have, or can't implement without a lot of headache.

As for V4's topology, I confess I haven't a scooby there but, even if it is good, the model's default shape is pretty damn horrible and the morphs available really don't do much to alleviate it.  Yes, I could take it into a modelling app and play around but I'd rather stick needles in my eyes.

I was fortunate enough to have V4 bought for me but I'd be pretty damn hacked off if I'd forked over for it.
 

V5 should be a community fix of V3RR  ;0)