I opened a Poser 9 cr2 file.  In my case, it is the cr2 for Antonia WM.  I noticed that the weight maps are defined by the sections started with "weightMap" then the ID of the weight map.  I also found "mapname" with the ID of the weight map in the file.  There are few questions I would like to ask:

1. Why there are duplicated weight map ID's?

2. If there is no matching "mapname" with the ID of the weight map in the file, the weight map is not being used?

3. Some weight map ID's are in numeric, are these ID generated by Poser automatically?  If yes, are their corresponding weight maps generated by Poser too?

4. I would like to understand the Poser weight map "code", is there any documentation about it?

I'm reasonably certain that the numerical ID numbers refer to the number of seconds since 0:00 January 1st 1970, that being the start of the Unix Python epoch.

import time
print "Epoch started at:"
print time.gmtime(0)
print "Number of seconds from the start of the epoch:"
print time.time()

Running that this morning gave me a seconds from epoch start of 1330436377 which is comparable to the numbers found in Anastasia.

Poser is generating the ID number and the weightmap. Weightmap editing tools are found in the Joint Editor of Poser Pro 2012.

Similarly I am of the opinion that the weightmap format is vertex ID number followed by the proportion that the vertex will move. Zero does not move, 1.000 fully moves.

Which just goes to prove that some of us should get out more :)

1. The weight map IDs can be duplicated in several actors, since one map can spread over any number of actors.

2. Correct.  Poser will carry around deactivated weight maps, which can be safely removed from the file.  If a map number is not referenced by a joint in the channels section, it is inactive.  Somewhere I have a script which will remove these.

3. Most weight map IDs are numeric, and Phil has an excellent guess about how those numbers are being generated.  That's been a mystery.  Woo hoo, PhilC!  :woot:  The weight maps for these are what the user defines in Poser, using the joint editor.  The non-numeric map names are bulge maps, and Poser's bulge map naming methods are bizarre.  I have seen many different bulge map naming formats over the past several months and I'm not sure how Poser determines what naming to use for these.

4. I'm sending you a PM.  :D

I've started a thread at Poser Place which attempts to gather all of our current knowledge of Poser's weight mapping in one place.

http://poserplace.phantom3d.net/forums/viewtopic.php?f=37&t=328&p=13956#p13956

If anyone has any corrections or additions to suggest, they should feel free to join in.  :laugh: