Just letting you know you have a forum stalker. I read all of these forums everyday and more than anything, I find them intimidating. I purchased Poser 9 some weeks ago, just because it had a great price for awhile and I had been interested in it for some time.

I have purchased a few figures, and gotten them to open, but I am still struggleing with the basics of where to put my stuff before I collect anything new.

I got Phil's basic tutorial yesterday....more intimidatation, but at least I have that. I have not found many tutorials that deal with Poser at the absolute beginning level.

I think getting set up is the most important start and I have already messed it up I am sure. I used the organization format that the basic tutorial on the Poser site recommends. I still can't quite figure out the logic, but I am leaning towards having only one Runtime. It is the Runtime organization files that are making me kind of crazy. So often, I open M4, and one of the other M4 based characters will not open for me.

Then, when I see just how complex this can actually become by the postings I see here, it is hard to know what path a beginner should take.

I have been working with Blender for about a year and half now and I hope that looking at Poser will actually increase my understanding of both Blender and Poser without making either confusing.

I enjoy everone's forum postings and seeing what you are doing.

Joey

Poser is easier to use than Blender, from my personal experience.  

I agree..Blender is definitely more than a headache.

If it makes you feel any better, it took me almost a year to get a grip on Poser. That may scare you, tho I hope it won't ;). It was just so different from anything I'd used up to that point.

As to Poser's file system, I feel that it's actually logically sound. Props go in the props folder, figures and clothes (which are also figures) go in the figures folder, poses in Pose, etc. It's the things you install later that tend to muck up your runtime ;). But as the basic file system goes, it makes sense.

If you have a specific question go ahead and ask and someone will be along to help you. We were all newbies once :). Just make sure you preface every question with what version of Poser you use since we still have ppl that use even Poser 5 in here :).

And one more thing you should know about Daz figures: if you're asked if you want to initialize the figure upon installing DO it. It will save you frustration later ;). Daz installers are also VERY confusing for a Poser user, so if you have a question please ASK. A lot of the newer Daz installers want to install to DS by default, which is a completely different program. And because where Poser is installed and where the files that you use in Poser actually reside are in two different places (if you're on Windows Vista or 7 and have UAC enabled), the confusion is deepend.

Laurie

Acadia had a thread purely for beginners but it was obv an earlier version of poser. 

I'm in a poser yahoo group which are very good at helping beginners. The group is poser101  just go to groups and searc poser 101. TheN look in the tutorialsection and also the file section. There are tutorials there on setting up your runtime. Basically everything a beginner needs to know. You must join the group first though. 

There's so much information dispersed through this forum, intended for users at all levels, that to a 'noob' I'm sure it must look pretty intimidating.

Keep plugging away at Poser and reading through all this stuff and it'll start to make sense after a while.

Finding an answer to a specific question, or the solution to a particular problem, can be a nightmare (the search function here is fairly hit-or-miss): check the 'stickies' as they contain or point to a lot of the most common questions and problems.

And if you don't find what you're after, just ask. If it's something that's been dealt with 1,000,000 times before, the answer might be terse, but don't let that put you off - it will at least point you in the right direction.

may seem scary now but you'll soon get the hang of it, coming from a blender background you have a big headsup on a real newbie ;-)

as for a character(morph) not loading on to m4 , do you have the required morphs for it to work?? there is some things that have to be done in order or they wont work, a lot of the character morphs need the basic morphs injecting first in the pose folder there should be a folder for the daz m4 ++ morphs, inject the morphs you need (or all of them lol ) and then the character should work

Quote - may seem scary now but you'll soon get the hang of it, coming from a blender background you have a big headsup on a real newbie ;-)

as for a character(morph) not loading on to m4 , do you have the required morphs for it to work?? there is some things that have to be done in order or they wont work, a lot of the character morphs need the basic morphs injecting first in the pose folder there should be a folder for the daz m4 ++ morphs, inject the morphs you need (or all of them lol ) and then the character should work

 

How funny, inject the morph :)  See how easily one takes for granted that everyone understands the current jargon. It could take me a while to decipher this wonderful advice :)

Thx

sorry

in the pose folder there should be a folder with all the m4 morphs in (errr the ++ morphs are buy stuff not being rude have you bought them?? if not most of the characters will not work)

is some files called inj and others are rem (injectremove) can inj the whole head morphs or just some of them after injecting the "base" morphs(think shapekeys) then the character pose should work

hope thats helped

Welcome :)  Some information to help you along :)

http://www.renderosity.com/mod/tutorial/index.php?tutorial_id=155&page=1

I apologize for any broken links in the following

The following is a great deal of information to process, but it's only meant as a guide and not to be memorized.  I have it broken up into sections. My advice is to read it through once, print it out and keep the print out next to your computer for reference as needed.

Here is an essay of information that I have been compiling which is geared to the brand new user. **It has links for free characters, tips on clothing, file organization, newbie tutorials etc.
**
V3, M3  and Aiko are free.  3D Models Pack  Free from Daz at Download.com

You just need the morphs packages to change their shape. 

A picture to show you the file structure of a Poser Runtime can be found here:

http://www.daz3d.com/support/faq/index.php?id=94

Basically, what it boils down to in a nutshell:

If you are looking for a Character or a piece of clothing/shoes, in Poser you will find them in libraries/character. These files have the extension cr2 (uncompressed) and c2z (compressed)

If you are looking for hair, you will find them in either library/character/hair OR library/hair

If you are looking for character texture addons, hair textures, clothing textures, you will find them in library/poses. These files have the extension pz2 (uncompressed) and p2z (compressed). Sometimes on the rare occasion, a merchant will package their textures so that they go into the "Camera" folder (.cm2 files). If that is the case then you can either apply them from there, or do what I do and change the file extension to .pz2

If you are looking for props, they are located in library/props. These files have the extension pp2 (uncompressed) and ppz (compressed)

Sometimes you will find clothing and hair or shoes in library/props too, depending on whether the item is actually created and saved as a figure, or it was created and saved as a prop.

Figure (cr2) items like hair and clothing are "conformed". Figure items like wings are "parented"

Props are parented. Some props that are made for a specific figure will seem to go where they are supposed to and "stick" without you having to do anything. Those are called "smart props". You can use those on other figures, but you have to use the XYZ trans dials to place it where it belongs on the different figure. Then you need to parent the item to that new figure's body part.

If you are just starting, it's best to get started on the right foot. DO NOT just install files into the runtime! That will only lead to frustration because you won't be able to find anything, and not all files are packaged equally and land up all over the place.

Here is a link to a tutorial on using multiple runtimes.

http://forum.daz3d.com/viewtopic.php?t=9060&start=0

http://www.drgeep.com/p5/run/run.htm

Another tip is to never just unzip or install anything directly to your runtime. Always unzip or install to a separate folder. Then browse through the folder to have a look at the structure of where things are going and make sure that it's in "proper runtime structure" so that when you move it to the runtime, they get into the proper folders.

Once you get your files installed, the next thing you want to do is to start making things :)

Here are some great newbie tutorials that will get you through the bare basics. They are for Poser 5, but it is still the same in newer versions:

http://trekkiegrrrl.dk/tut1.htm

http://www.poserguide.nimprodaction.com/issues/issue2/cover.htm

http://www.poserguide.nimprodaction.com/issues/issue3/cover.htm

http://www.poserguide.nimprodaction.com/

http://www.canary3d.com/tutorial/3d-intro.htm

http://www.ebonshire.net/tut-posb/index.php

http://www.cooltuna.com/poser/poser-tutorials.html

Dr. Geep Studios ( Basic to Advanced Tutorials. Periodically offers free classes for Poser)

http://www.anniescorner.net/posertuts/GettingStartedinPoser5.htm

Getting Started in Poser

Video Tutorials

If you don't have the Daz  V3 or the V4 figure, you should pick one or both.I'd personally suggest that you go with the V3 one as it's been around for years and there is a TON of freebies around for her, as well as a TON of stuff in the various Poser stores.  It will be a couple of years before V4 catches up with clothing content and stuff, especially FREE stuff  and  V3 stuff won't work on V4 because they are different figures. There are work arounds to getting clothing from a figure to fit another figure. I've included information on that further down. 

Victoria 3

3D Models Pack  Free from Daz at Download.com

Victoria 4

But if you want to change the look of her face and body, or use any of the available character addon packages, you need to buy the head and body morphs.

The V3 head and body morphs are here:

http://www.daz3d.com/shop.php?op=itemdetails&item=3008

There is also "Michael 3".  He is available free at the link above at download.com.  Again, like Vicky, you need the head and body morphs to change the shape of his head and body. Those can be found here:

http://www.daz3d.com/shop.php?op=itemdetails&item=3009

If you have both figures, you can get both of their head and body morphs in one package, here:

http://www.daz3d.com/shop.php?op=itemdetails&item=3010

NOTE:  You can use the textures from the character addon packages without having the head/body morphs. 

If you want to change the look of the head/body and have the head/body morphs, do the following:

Install the head and body morphs. 

Locate the morphs you want to use in the "Poses" folder.

Find the set of morphs you want to inject IE:  Full Body, Full Head.... or just certain parts. 

Left  click the picture

Click the Single Checkmark at the bottom of the page.

Go to your Parameter Dials and start turning dials.  (make sure that you have the part of the body you want to adjust as the active one IE:  Morphing the ears, make sure you have the had selected.

Also, you can find many, many free morphs and textures for Vicky, and Aiko, and some even for David and Michael.  So you don't have to turn any dials if you don't want to.  Here are a couple links to get you started.

http://www.renderosity.com/mod/freestuff/index.php?user_id=55140

http://www.renderosity.com/mod/freestuff/index.php?user_id=178490

http://www.renderosity.com/mod/freestuff/index.php?user_id=105158

Using ready made character addons is pretty easy.   You need to have the figure and it's head and body morph packages installed.

Load up the figure IE: Vicky

Go to the Poses folder, and instead of looking for your morphs from the packages, look for th character you want to use.  Left click the image that has INJ, click the SINGLE checkmark at the bottom and the morphs for that character's look is injected into your figure.  No dial turning necessary.  Of course if you want to tweak the settings you can, but that's not mandatory.

Next locate the textures (if the package has some). They will be usually in the same library menu as your INJ that you used.   Left click the image for the texture and use the SINGLE checkmark to apply it.  If you don't like that texture, apply another one overtop. 

You can even use a texture from another package.  IE: Morphs from package A  and textures from package C.  Or morphs from packag A, texture from package C, eyes from package D, lips from package E.  the combinations are endless :)  If the packages have their head morphs seprate from the body ones, you can mix and match morphs too. IE: body morphs from package A with head morph from package D.  That allows for even more versatility.

There are lots of sites out there that has free V3 character addons, and some that have for Aiko, Michael and even David.

Hair, clothing and textures are all figure/item specific, which means:

Michael 3.0 needs hair and clothing and textures made for Michael 3.0
Victoria 4.0 needs hair and clothing and textures made for Victoria 4.0
Victoria 3.0 needs hair and clothing and textures made for Victoria 3.0
Victoria 2.0 needs hair and clothing and textures made for Victoria 2.0
Aiko needs hair and clothing and textures made for her.

Like figures, a texture made for one hair style can only be used on that hair style.

Clothing is also specific when it comes to textures. A texture for a pair of pants, won't fit all pants... just the pants that it was made to fit. Same with all clothing items.

Sometimes you can manage to  clothing item to fit another figure by tweaking of dials and increasing or decreasing the scale percent, but that doesn't always work. Sometimes a clothing item for Victoria 2 will fit Victoria 3, but their joints are different so posing a figure wearing clothing not made for it specifically will be hard.

Some figures can share items more easily than others, here is a link that will help sort that out:
http://market.renderosity.com/mod/forumpro/showthread.php?message_id=2682279

There are 3 types of clothing:

Dynamic:  This is clothing that you use inside the Cloth room. It takes longer to work with and there is a bit of a learning curve, but it's not too bad, but the results are more appealing in that the clothing actually looks more natural instead of "posed and stiff".  I have included information about this type of clothing further down.

Confroming- Non Morphing:  This is clothing that you conform to a figure. The clothing is made to fit the base figure.  If you change the shape of the figure you will also have to refit the clothing, which isn't always easy if there aren't any corresponding body morphs in the clothing.  Plus posing a character in positions where they are not nearly upright is difficult.  But many prefer this type of clothing over dynamic.

Conforming-Morphing: This is the same as conforming-non morphing, only there are morph dials that you can turn that have corresponding body morphs for easier fitting.  This is the preferred type of conforming clothing because it's easier to fit.

Using a clothing item on a figure that it is meant to be used on, after you have added morphs and adjusted the shape of the body,  can be problematic because the clothes are made for the default figure shape and not the new morphed up shape. So the clothing no longer fits and you get parts of the body showing through the clothing after you add morphs and change the shape of the body.

There are programs that can help fit clothing from one figure to another, or even from the same figure to one that has been "morphed up" using their morph packages.

The Tailor, which can be bought here:
http://www.daz3d.com/shop.php?op=itemdetails&item=677

Wardrobe Wizard (I use this one and it's great). It can be purchased from PhilC's site here:
http://www.philc.net/WardrobeWizard.htm

Clothes Converter, which can be bought here:
http://www.daz3d.com/shop.php?op=itemdetails&item=3069&cat=131

Things like hair can be used across all figures just by tweaking the scaling and trans dials and then parenting the hair to the figure.

Poses are something else that can be used across most human-like figures with just a bit of tweaking to dig out a hand, or fix a shoulder.

Dynamic Clothing (more information):

A nice thing about dynamic clothing is that you can easily use clothing on various figures.Here are some tutorials on how to use dynamic clothing in the cloth room:

http://www.renderosity.com/mod/forumpro/showthread.php?thread_id=2665209

http://www.philc.net/CC_sampleVideo.htm

http://www.poserfashion.net/howvic3dress1.htm

http://drgeep.com/p5/cr/cr.htm

Here are some links to some great FREE dynamic clothing:

http://www.renderosity.com/mod/freestuff/index.php?username=mapps

http://www.renderosity.com/mod/freestuff/index.php?username=svdl

http://www.renderosity.com/mod/freestuff/index.php?username=Stegy

http://www.renderosity.com/mod/freestuff/index.php?username=carib98

http://www.renderosity.com/mod/freestuff/index.php?username=teyikung

It's also possible to make conforming clothing into dynamic clothing:

http://www.renderosity.com/mod/tutorial/index.php?tutorial_id=868

And it's possible to take a conforming outfit and work with it in the cloth room so that parts of it act dynamic.

http://www.renderosity.com/mod/forumpro/showthread.php?thread_id=2517340&page=1

ORGANIZATION

Never install anything directly to your runtime. Always unzip / install to a folder on your desk top so you can see what is in side and what the folder structure is.

Organization in Poser is very important.  Libraries grow quickly and it soon gets to a point where you can't find anything.

So far as organization goes...

You have 2 options that can help you with organizing and being able to find things:

1.  Create sub folders inside the library folders.

This is the preferred method for many. It uses one single runtime with lots and lots of sub folders within the main library folders, in order to organize the content.  The learning curve is minimal. If you can right click and create a new folder and drag and drop, you can do this.  The learning curve is knowing what folders you can move files around in and what folders not to touch.

You can move around the files inside the library sub folders. 

Don't move, touch or rename files or folders  in the top level of the library folder that carry the name of the merchants, or the "Morph" or the !DAZ  folder because those are morphs and need to stay where they are.

Just work with the standard ones inside the Library folder such as camera, faces, hand, pose, props, hair, lighting, character. 

Leave the files inside the geometries and texture folders alone.

Right now you have a hodge podge of files for various figures in each folder plus props, poses, lights etc.

Open the character folder and create sub folders for each of your figures IE: V3, V4, M3, D3, Aiko, Apollo etc.  Do the same for each of the other library sub folders.  You can also create other folders too, such as "Poses" or "Props" or "Backgrounds" or "Hair" etc.

Then go through your files in each of the library subfolders and move them into the appropriate folder for the figure they belong.

Things like lights, and poses and hair and props are universal items really, and can be used across figure, so I like to have those separated instead of filed by "figure" because I often use V3 poses on Aiko and hair for Posette on V3 etc.

You will run into a problem for items that are for more than one figure. Like where do you file those?  For exxample an outfit that is for V3 and M3 and Aiko and SP3: where do you file them? If you put them in the V3 folder, then you forget that they can be used for M3 and Aiko and SP3 too. It was this complication that prompted me to move onto using external runtimes (described below).

I did it this way at one time and it worked well enough,well except for items that could be used on a few figures like I described above.   I decided I wanted even more organization, and I didn't like having one huge runtime because it was impossible to really burn it to a CD/DVD without having to break it into bits and pieces.  Plus it took Poser forever to load because the runtime was so big.  So I tried option 2 below.

**2. Multiple External Runtimes
**

This is my choice for organizing my installed content.  I did the first method first and it worked for awhile, but as my content grew, it became cumbersome, so I switched to multiple external runtimes, which works out great.

 
It's really pretty easy.  The problem is that most people over think it.  

Just remember that an external runtime is exactly the same as the runtime in your Poser folder, only it's just sitting in a different location.  

It functions exactly the same way. 

And files are installed / added to them in exactly the same way. 

And they have the same folders in them as the main runtime does. Well almost the same folders.  Scripts for example have to be installed into the main Poser runtime and won't work from an external runtime.

Here is a sample of an external runtime.  Simply download it and unzip it. You will have a folder called "Runtime_Sample"

www.divshare.com/download/8531562-1f6

Find a place on your hard drive that you want to have your external runtimes living. For me it's on my partitioned drive D.

Make a folder called "Poser Runtimes"

s263.photobucket.com/albums/ii124/Acadia_ca/

Then simply copy that sample runtime you unzipped into that "Poser Runtimes" folder and make as many copies of it as you want to.  Change "Runtime_Sample" to whatever name you want.  Here is what I named some of mine:

s263.photobucket.com/albums/ii124/Acadia_ca/

Then all you do is simply install your content into whichever runtime you feel it fits best into.

Once you have finished installing your content look in the Runtimes where you have Daz characters such as V3 or V4 etc.  Go into the Library folder and look for the !DAZ folder.  Make a COPY of that folder and place the COPY in exactly the same place in the main Poser Runtime. 

Poser looks there first so by placing a copy of them in there, you are helping Poser out.  Don't delete the !DAZ folder from your other runtimes though. That defeats the purpose of having external runtimes, which is not only to allow Poser to work faster, organize your content better, but also to not lose your installed runtime content in the even of a crash because hopefully you have also saved your external runtimes to a couple other places for easy access in case of the need to reinstall.

Hope that helps.  If you have more questions, just ask.

Oh yeah, never install anything directly to your runtime. Always unzip / install to a folder on your desk top so you can see what is in side and what the folder structure is.

So far as organization inside the runtimes, continuity of naming goes a long long way.

Let's say for example that LaurieA gave me a beautiful clothing package for V4.  The package consisted of the following:

Dress
Shoes
Purse
Hair
Poses

When I get that file I will unzip it into a folder on my desk top in order to see what is inside.  Here is what I find

Dress inside a folder in the character folder aptly named "superstar dress"

Shoes inside a folder named "LaurieA" inside is another  folder named "V4" inside is another  folder named "props" inside are 2 more folders: 1  called "V4 Flats" and finally inside that folder are the shoe files, the other called "V4 Purse" with the purse file inside.

I find the hair  in the hair library, deep inside several folders as I did the props

And finally the poses for the figure are found in a folder in the Pose Library called "Gotta Have Fun" and another folder that simply said "dress textures"

Now if I were to install all of that into my runtime I wouldn't have a clue later on when I went to look for stuff to use from that one package, of what went with what!

Which is why it's important to open things onto your desktop and look through it and rename some of the folders that the vendor created.

The example of above is a very real nightmare that for some reason many vendors seem to do.  Another nightmare is using there real names as names for the folders instead of their vendor name.  That only adds to the confusion.

Here is how I would sort out the mess above while it was still on my desktop.

LaurieA - Superstar Dress
LaurieA - Superstar Dress
LaurieA - Superstar Dress
LaurieA - Superstar Dress
LaurieA - Superstar Dress

Yes, each folder in each libary is now called the same thing.  BUT I now have no doubt that when I do to use the superstar dress, that I will know what I'm looking at when I open up each library.

You can get even more organized.

For example under Poses, if you have found 5 new textures for that dress by 5 different artists, you can keep them all in one place. For example:

Artist 1 - (superstar dress) - sequins
Artist 2 - (superstar dress)  - dragon textures
Artist 3 - (superstar dress) - metalics
etc. etc. etc.

Just plunk those extra textures you found, as named above, inside the LaurieA - Superstar Dress  folder in the Pose Library.  Now when you want to use the superstar dress you have all of the textures at hand in one place.

HOLY MOSES Linda..that'll scare em for sure! LMAO ;).

To the OP: Ask Acadia anything...she probably knows or knows where to get the info/item..lol.

Laurie

Acadia...

where did I leave my keys.....

Welcome to your new addiction/time killer/bank account emptier.

You'll have noticed by now Acadia is our Oracle.  Can find lists and instructions faster than anyone here.  And a really nice person, too. 

Everyone here - make that almost everyone - is willing and able to help.  One other thing when you ask a question as well as telling us your version of Poser, also tell us your OS.  Some of Poser's idiosyncrasies are due to the OS you use as much as anything else.

Remember to be as specific as possible, even in your titles.  A thread with "How do I make Victoria 4 taller/skinnier/fatter/etc." in the title will get more of a response than "Help!".

Never, ever be afraid to ask questions.  If it's something in the manual you may get ribbed for it but it never hurts to ask.  If it's in the forum, somebody will point you to it but remember to look at pages beyond page 1 and try the Search function here.  It's a bit manky but it sometimes does the job.

Finally, don't let the software or the forums intimidate you.  What's the worst that can happen?

f you are completely new? Start with the start.

Open Poser
Goto Window in the top line
Goto Quick start in the drop down menu

There are some basic starter lessons included in Poser with VIDEO

Follow there carefully before doing anything else.

And??? Read the manual.
All 800 page of it..

Good luck,and Happy posering

If all else has failed , there is a manual in pdf format available through the application Help menu. Its fairly basic and meant for someone new starting with the program.

When asking questions always put your skill level and Poser version in the question.

Quote - Welcome :)  Some information to help you along :)

http://www.renderosity.com/mod/tutorial/index.php?tutorial_id=155&page=1

---

I apologize for any broken links in the following

The following is a great deal of information to process, but it's only meant as a guide and not to be memorized.  I have it broken up into sections. My advice is to read it through once, print it out and keep the print out next to your computer for reference as needed.

http://drgeep.com/p5/cr/cr.htm

Here are some links to some great FREE dynamic clothing:

http://www.renderosity.com/mod/freestuff/index.php?username=mapps

http://www.renderosity.com/mod/freestuff/index.php?username=svdl

http://www.renderosity.com/mod/freestuff/index.php?username=Stegy

http://www.renderosity.com/mod/freestuff/index.php?username=carib98

http://www.renderosity.com/mod/freestuff/index.php?username=teyikung

It's also possible to make conforming clothing into dynamic clothing:

http://www.renderosity.com/mod/tutorial/index.php?tutorial_id=868

And it's possible to take a conforming outfit and work with it in the cloth room so that parts of it act dynamic.

http://www.renderosity.com/mod/forumpro/showthread.php?thread_id=2517340&page=1

---

ORGANIZATION

 

Never install anything directly to your runtime. Always unzip / install to a folder on your desk top so you can see what is in side and what the folder structure is.

Organization in Poser is very important.  Libraries grow quickly and it soon gets to a point where you can't find anything.

So far as organization goes...

You have 2 options that can help you with organizing and being able to find things:

1.  Create sub folders inside the library folders.

This is the preferred method for many. It uses one single runtime with lots and lots of sub folders within the main library folders, in order to organize the content.  The learning curve is minimal. If you can right click and create a new folder and drag and drop, you can do this.  The learning curve is knowing what folders you can move files around in and what folders not to touch.

You can move around the files inside the library sub folders. 

Don't move, touch or rename files or folders  in the top level of the library folder that carry the name of the merchants, or the "Morph" or the !DAZ  folder because those are morphs and need to stay where they are.

Just work with the standard ones inside the Library folder such as camera, faces, hand, pose, props, hair, lighting, character. 

Leave the files inside the geometries and texture folders alone.

Right now you have a hodge podge of files for various figures in each folder plus props, poses, lights etc.

Open the character folder and create sub folders for each of your figures IE: V3, V4, M3, D3, Aiko, Apollo etc.  Do the same for each of the other library sub folders.  You can also create other folders too, such as "Poses" or "Props" or "Backgrounds" or "Hair" etc.

Then go through your files in each of the library subfolders and move them into the appropriate folder for the figure they belong.

Things like lights, and poses and hair and props are universal items really, and can be used across figure, so I like to have those separated instead of filed by "figure" because I often use V3 poses on Aiko and hair for Posette on V3 etc.

You will run into a problem for items that are for more than one figure. Like where do you file those?  For exxample an outfit that is for V3 and M3 and Aiko and SP3: where do you file them? If you put them in the V3 folder, then you forget that they can be used for M3 and Aiko and SP3 too. It was this complication that prompted me to move onto using external runtimes (described below).

I did it this way at one time and it worked well enough,well except for items that could be used on a few figures like I described above.   I decided I wanted even more organization, and I didn't like having one huge runtime because it was impossible to really burn it to a CD/DVD without having to break it into bits and pieces.  Plus it took Poser forever to load because the runtime was so big.  So I tried option 2 below.

**2. Multiple External Runtimes
**

 

This is my choice for organizing my installed content.  I did the first method first and it worked for awhile, but as my content grew, it became cumbersome, so I switched to multiple external runtimes, which works out great.

 
It's really pretty easy.  The problem is that most people over think it.  

Just remember that an external runtime is exactly the same as the runtime in your Poser folder, only it's just sitting in a different location.  

It functions exactly the same way. 

And files are installed / added to them in exactly the same way. 

And they have the same folders in them as the main runtime does. Well almost the same folders.  Scripts for example have to be installed into the main Poser runtime and won't work from an external runtime.

Here is a sample of an external runtime.  Simply download it and unzip it. You will have a folder called "Runtime_Sample"

www.divshare.com/download/8531562-1f6

Find a place on your hard drive that you want to have your external runtimes living. For me it's on my partitioned drive D.

Make a folder called "Poser Runtimes"

s263.photobucket.com/albums/ii124/Acadia_ca/

Then simply copy that sample runtime you unzipped into that "Poser Runtimes" folder and make as many copies of it as you want to.  Change "Runtime_Sample" to whatever name you want.  Here is what I named some of mine:

s263.photobucket.com/albums/ii124/Acadia_ca/

Then all you do is simply install your content into whichever runtime you feel it fits best into.

Once you have finished installing your content look in the Runtimes where you have Daz characters such as V3 or V4 etc.  Go into the Library folder and look for the !DAZ folder.  Make a COPY of that folder and place the COPY in exactly the same place in the main Poser Runtime. 

Poser looks there first so by placing a copy of them in there, you are helping Poser out.  Don't delete the !DAZ folder from your other runtimes though. That defeats the purpose of having external runtimes, which is not only to allow Poser to work faster, organize your content better, but also to not lose your installed runtime content in the even of a crash because hopefully you have also saved your external runtimes to a couple other places for easy access in case of the need to reinstall.

Hope that helps.  If you have more questions, just ask.

Oh yeah, never install anything directly to your runtime. Always unzip / install to a folder on your desk top so you can see what is in side and what the folder structure is.

---

So far as organization inside the runtimes, continuity of naming goes a long long way.

Let's say for example that LaurieA gave me a beautiful clothing package for V4.  The package consisted of the following:

Dress
Shoes
Purse
Hair
Poses

 

When I get that file I will unzip it into a folder on my desk top in order to see what is inside.  Here is what I find

Dress inside a folder in the character folder aptly named "superstar dress"

Shoes inside a folder named "LaurieA" inside is another  folder named "V4" inside is another  folder named "props" inside are 2 more folders: 1  called "V4 Flats" and finally inside that folder are the shoe files, the other called "V4 Purse" with the purse file inside.

I find the hair  in the hair library, deep inside several folders as I did the props

And finally the poses for the figure are found in a folder in the Pose Library called "Gotta Have Fun" and another folder that simply said "dress textures"

Now if I were to install all of that into my runtime I wouldn't have a clue later on when I went to look for stuff to use from that one package, of what went with what!

Which is why it's important to open things onto your desktop and look through it and rename some of the folders that the vendor created.

The example of above is a very real nightmare that for some reason many vendors seem to do.  Another nightmare is using there real names as names for the folders instead of their vendor name.  That only adds to the confusion.

Here is how I would sort out the mess above while it was still on my desktop.

LaurieA - Superstar Dress
LaurieA - Superstar Dress
LaurieA - Superstar Dress
LaurieA - Superstar Dress
LaurieA - Superstar Dress

Yes, each folder in each libary is now called the same thing.  BUT I now have no doubt that when I do to use the superstar dress, that I will know what I'm looking at when I open up each library.

You can get even more organized.

 

FANTASTIC! Thank you so much. This is much easier for me than the manual. This will keep me busy for a long time.

A VERY long time....lol.

Remember...have a question? Don't be afraid to ask. We may seem scary, but we only eat noobs on Wednesdays and Saturdays. So, you're safe. Well, right now you're safe. Until tomorrow >;).....

Laurie

noob in BBQ sauce with roasted garlic.... oh my....

Quote - FANTASTIC! Thank you so much. This is much easier for me than the manual. This will keep me busy for a long time.

You're welcome.

The essay is very old. I did it before V4 came out.   If you find any links that are broken, please post the broken link and I'll see if I can find a fixed one for you.

Quote - > Quote - FANTASTIC! Thank you so much. This is much easier for me than the manual. This will keep me busy for a long time.

 

You're welcome.

The essay is very old. I did it before V4 came out.   If you find any links that are broken, please post the broken link and I'll see if I can find a fixed one for you.

I decided to do external Runtimes based upon your information. I have an extra hard drive that I don't mind putting a lot of stuff on to.

So, do you end up having a Runtime for each chararcter (morph?) or do you have one for each main character, like M4 and make characters based on him as children but in the same Runtime?

If you make an M4 Runtime, and make all of the variations into their own Runtime, will the variations work once you load Michael? I guess what i am asking is if it is Ok to take parts for one character from various Runtimes that are not related structurally?

I tried the first one. I have Zane as a zip. So I extracted it to a temp folder, then picked the various folders with the same name in the template and moved each of the Zane folders to their corresponding place in the template. For instance,  If there was an empyy Runtime in the Template, I deleted it and moved the Runtime for Zane into its now empty spot. There were folders in Zane that did not have corresponding folders in the template so I moved them to the same relative path they had in the extraction.

When is it Ok to change the name of a folder and when it is taboo? Is it only the direct children of the Runtime folder that have to keep their original names?

It seems weird to me that a body variation (is this a morph?) should be in the Pose folder instead of in the character folder, but they are sometimes, right?

I was able to load Zane after loading Michael 4, but not easily. I had to try severl files before one of them worked. There were Rem files, and other various extensions, I don't remember which one finally worked, But, even then, his little black shorts stayed on very dimmly for awhile.  I added a chair prop and moved Zane over to put his hand on the chair. Then, I stopped, worn out.

Joey

Well, you could have left the template runtime. The folders from Zane would have just placed themselves in the corresponding folders when you dropped Zane's runtime over the template runtime. Windows will put then where they need to go. If you're on a Mac it's quite different and it's not really safe to do that.

You can change the names of folders if you REALLY think it's necessary; however, NEVER change the name or location of the textures folder or the texture files. Those all have absolute paths. You may set up your external runtimes the way you like. I have mine set up by figure. Some set them up by type (Poses, Figures, Props) etc. Some have them set up by vendor. You can set them up any way that works best for you.

Anything that's in the pose folder (body variation) is a morph. All morphs are in the Pose folder. Things called MAT files are also in the Pose folder. Those are special poses that apply textures.

Laurie

But don't pick and chose what you want out of the content set, or you will break the character.  Since Zane is a complete package and is setup exactly as it should for a runtime proper structure, it can be placed entirely into external folder of your choice.

http://www.gimp.org/ free

http://www.daz3d.com/ 3 apps free for a bit, if ya get them now.

http://www.pixologic.com/home.php killer app , a lot of fun.

ds ,z works with blender

after blender any other app your pick up easy enuff.

I've spent the last 15 years learning some cgi app ,hopefully will get to spend the next 100 years playing with cgi. :)

Quote - http://www.gimp.org/ free

 

http://www.daz3d.com/ 3 apps free for a bit, if ya get them now.

 

http://www.pixologic.com/home.php killer app , a lot of fun.

 

ds ,z works with blender

 

after blender any other app your pick up easy enuff.

 

I've spent the last 15 years learning some cgi app ,hopefully will get to spend the next 100 years playing with cgi. :)

I'm not quite sure what the point of this post is.

Laurie

What you do and do not put into external runtimes is a matter of how you view things and your workflow.

I have a set of standard runtimes and then I have working runtimes for the projects I'm currently working on.  When the project is completed, the runtime is archived with the rest of the working files in the event I need to work on the project again.

It's also not uncommon to set up your runtimes one way only to find a year or so down the road that you need them another way as you workflow changes.

One thing new users want to watch out for is what I call "this for that" syndrome.

Read the editorials carefully before you make any purchases and make sure you uderstand exactly what you are getting and what it is meant for.

For every outfit, model, or prop that comes out, there will be a slew of texture options released in short order for it. So, if you see hair you really like for example, make sure it is not a texture pack for an orignal hair figure you have to buy first.

I know that's not Poser operations specific, but it's gonna come up sooner or later.

As far as using Poser for rendering, learn the material room and the how the lighting works and it will increase the quality of your renders by a huge amount.

I could go on all day, but one other thing to make note of is that since you are coming from Blender and no doubt have it in your mind to make your own Poser Props, Poser requires certain "irregularities" to be optimized correctly before it will play well with the object. I have made this mistake a few times and had a really nice model in Blender only to have it explode or do something unexpected in Poser. Watch out for the triangles ;-)

@OP   get  away  from the rendo  forum  and go  use poser for a while . that's the only way to  know it.

Quote - > Quote - http://www.gimp.org/ free

http://www.daz3d.com/ 3 apps free for a bit, if ya get them now.

http://www.pixologic.com/home.php killer app , a lot of fun.

ds ,z works with blender

after blender any other app your pick up easy enuff.

I've spent the last 15 years learning some cgi app ,hopefully will get to spend the next 100 years playing with cgi. :)

I'm not quite sure what the point of this post is.

Laurie

DS ,Z are plugins for Blender
Gimps for painting textures ,meshes for Blender
Bryce for back grounds in Blender
AS long as your CGIing your learning something new.

Quote - however, NEVER change the name or location of the textures folder or the texture files. Those all have absolute paths.

Why do people keep reposting this myth? I have always, since Poser 4, rearranged my Textures subfolders by figure so that all the textures for each figure are in a sub-folder for that figure. Poser has never failed to find them. Ever. It may take a little longer to search but it finds them all the same.

Quote - Why do people keep reposting this myth? I have always, since Poser 4, rearranged my Textures subfolders by figure so that all the textures for each figure are in a sub-folder for that figure. Poser has never failed to find them. Ever. It may take a little longer to search but it finds them all the same.

In Poser 4 I always had trouble if the texture wasn't located in the right place. It didn't just search - it would hang until doomsday searching, and more often than not fail to find the texture. Maybe it was just Windows 2000 acting up. 

Whatever the reason, old habits die hard and I personally prefer to leave my textures alone. YMMV - and obviously does! 

Geometries are another thing that shouldn't be moved. In the "old days" you could edit the cr2 file and fix the problem, often found in freestuff but once in awhile in a badly-tested purchased item. JMHO, of course...  

I've never had good luck relocating the texture files. Like brynna, I prefer to leave those alone ;).

Laurie

Quote - I've never had good luck relocating the texture files. Like brynna, I prefer to leave those alone ;).

Laurie

Tnank you,

I will move the minimum for now, but it does seem nice to have everything I might want for one character to be under that character.

I know I would like everything based on M4 to be in the same Runtime as M4, and if the 'owner' of a file is not evident when I want to use it, that will be confusing.

Joey

Quote - I decided to do external Runtimes based upon your information. I have an extra hard drive that I don't mind putting a lot of stuff on to.

So, do you end up having a Runtime for each chararcter (morph?) or do you have one for each main character, like M4 and make characters based on him as children but in the same Runtime?

If you make an M4 Runtime, and make all of the variations into their own Runtime, will the variations work once you load Michael? I guess what i am asking is if it is Ok to take parts for one character from various Runtimes that are not related structurally?

I tried the first one. I have Zane as a zip. So I extracted it to a temp folder, then picked the various folders with the same name in the template and moved each of the Zane folders to their corresponding place in the template. For instance,  If there was an empyy Runtime in the Template, I deleted it and moved the Runtime for Zane into its now empty spot. There were folders in Zane that did not have corresponding folders in the template so I moved them to the same relative path they had in the extraction.

When is it Ok to change the name of a folder and when it is taboo? Is it only the direct children of the Runtime folder that have to keep their original names?

It seems weird to me that a body variation (is this a morph?) should be in the Pose folder instead of in the character folder, but they are sometimes, right?

I was able to load Zane after loading Michael 4, but not easily. I had to try severl files before one of them worked. There were Rem files, and other various extensions, I don't remember which one finally worked, But, even then, his little black shorts stayed on very dimmly for awhile.  I added a chair prop and moved Zane over to put his hand on the chair. Then, I stopped, worn out.

Joey

Here is an example of some of my runtimes:

Runtime Name:  V4 Character Addons

In this runtime I put all character morphs for V4.  If the character morph package comes with clothing and/or props, it still goes into this runtime

Runtime Name: V4 Clothing

I put all clothing for V4 into this runtime.

If the package is a jewelery or prop package without clothing, then I put it into the Props runtime.

Runtime Name: M4 Character Addons

In this runtime I put all character morphs for M4.  If the character morph package comes with clothing and/or props, it still goes into this runtime

Runtime Name: M4 Clothing

I put all clothing for M4 into this runtime.

If the package is a jewelery or prop package without clothing, then I put it into the Props runtime.

Runtime Name: Props

Props are not really character specific and can be used across character with tweaks of the dials.  Things like weapons, music instruments, purses, hats, umbrellas, jewellery, boxes, furniture, vases, urns, dishes etc go into this runtime.

Runtime Name: Hair

All hair packages or hair related packages go into this runtime.  This way when I look for hair, I know that if I look in this runtime that is all I will find.

Runtime Name: Poses

Only Poses go into this runtime. No texture addons. I'm talking actual poses such as sitting, praying, walking, standing, etc etc.  Even hand poses and expressions.  I sort this runtime further by figure IE: V4, V3, M4, M3, Aiko etc.

So far as naming folders:

1. I strongly suggest that you do not move or rename anything in the textures or geometries folder.

When you open the runtime folder you will find:

Textures  (Do not rename or move files/folders)

Libraries (Ok, the name and move some of the files/folders inside)

Geometries  (Do not rename or move files/folders)

When you open the Libraries folder you will find:

Character  (Ok to move and rename the folders inside)

Hair  (Ok to move and rename the folders inside)

Hands  (Ok to move and rename the folders inside)

Props  (Ok to move and rename the folders inside)

Camera  (Ok to move and rename the folders inside)

Poses  (Ok to move and rename the folders inside)

Lighting  (Ok to move and rename the folders inside)

Materials   (Ok to move and rename the folders inside)

Morphs  (DO NOT move or rename this folder or anything inside of it)

"Other folders with names of vendors etc". These are morph folders. (DO NOT move or rename this folder or anything inside of it)

DAZ!  These are morph folders.(DO NOT move or rename this folder or anything inside of it)

When you use multiple runtimes, when you install a package, for example, into M4 Character Addons, all of the files for that package are in that runtime only.

Sometimes a package will be for more than 1 figure. Quite often an outfit for V4 will also fit Aiko.  If that is the case, I install the package into the Aiko runtime too.  Or into whatever character addon runtimes I have.  For example something for V3, SP3 and Aiko 3 would go into 3 runtimes. Of course I would delete the non related files for each runtime.  IE: the files for SP3 and Aiko from the V3 character runtime.  V3 and SP3 from the Aiko Runtime.

Just remember that a runtime is a runtime is a runtime. They all are the same thing, only external ones are sitting outside of the main Poser folder.  And all "multiple" means is that you have more than one.  All files get installed in the same way.

PS:   Don't confuse "Figure" with "Character"

The figure is the base IE: V3, M4, V4, Aiko 3, Aiko 4, Apollo etc etc.

The character is the morph that you apply to the Figure to change the shape.

So basically think of the "Figure" as the actor IE: Johnny Depp, and the character to what he is turned into once he has been to wardrobe and makeup  IE: Captain Jack.

Just FYI, I am reading and saving these jewels. There is one question I have not seen answered yet...what about the .exe files, should I just run them if I have them in the runtime I want them to be?

With .exe files (I'm assuming the installers from Daz), you don't need to put them in a runtime first. Just run them and the installer program will put the files in the runtimes you point them to. You may as well delete those you placed in runtimes. They're doing nothing but taking up space ;). You can run those from your desktop if you like.

Laurie

I'm having issues with installing Michaels Morphs++.

My Screen Shot is in the attachment, it gives me the msg that Poser TM, "Michael 4 Morphs ++" must be installed to the same directory as the application excutable; due to restrictions on support fole locations..

Please select the directory that contains your Poser executalble.

I've tried so many different folders to install the Morphs this morning that I've lost tract of what I have and have not tried.

Help Please, I'm more than a bit stomped by this one.

Thank you,

Lisa

It means it has to be installed into the runtime that's in your Poser installation folder. The folder where the Poser.exe or PoserPro.exe is.

Actually, Poser.exe is what is what the Michael installer is looking for.

Choose a folder that you want the morphs in (should also be the same folder you have Michael installed in as well). If you don't know where that is, do a system search for blMilMan_m4b.obj. That is Michael's geometry file. Whatever runtime that is in is where you need to also install Michael's morphs.

Make an empty text file. Name it Poser.txt. Now, click on the actual file until it allows you to change the name and file extension. Change it the whole name and file extension to Poser.exe and save it. Windows will give you a warning about unstable or whatever - just save it as Poser.exe and ignore Windows ;). Now, put that file just above the runtime that Michael is in and where you want to install his morphs.

If you are using Poser Pro, you'll have a PoserPro.exe and for whatever reason, Daz did not set up their installers to look for PoserPro.exe, but only Poser.exe instead. If you have Pro, you'll still need to make that dummy, empty Poser.exe. Thanks Daz. :P

Laurie

I tried it your way, nothing. I let my husband whom is well versed in pc try, noting.

So since I am using PoserPro 2010, I read somewhere to install using the DS format and not the Poser format.

Now it is working, but have another question.

Since I installed M4 and V4 plus their Morphs++ would I also need to download character morphs in the same format?

Thanks,

Lisa

All 3D rendering and modeling programs worth their salt can seem overwhelmingly complex at first. What sets Poser apart im my opinion is its brilliantly designed user interface. It's clean, friendly and makes life much easier for every user, no matter what their experience level.

Good luck and welcome aboard. You'll find lots of friendly, knowledgeable people here who will be happy to help with your problems, should you have any. All you have to do is ask.

Character morphs can be in any format, either executable or compressed.  Executables from DAZ will follow a similar install format, however, once you establish an installation pathway, it gets easier to add content to your runtime or external runtime. 

Compressed files can offer a different challenge if the vendor does not conform to hierarchal runtime standards to easily migrate your content into the right locations.  Purchased content shouldn't be a problem, but freebie packaging can be rather unintentionally careless and poorly assembled.