Attached Link: Smith Micro Poser Deal

...and as if by magic this just dropped into my inbox:

http://my.smithmicro.com/marcom/eblasts/poser/20120303/index-web.html

Smith Micro are doing 50% off Poser just now... its a good time to upgrade for anyone wanting to move to V4WM?

;-)

Quote - Well we did the best we could with V4 given that people wanted it right now and not later. There are always the folk who come along to these threads to tear down anything you build or those who wish to build a name for themselves at others expense. Seems to be the nature of things.

Relax, please. No one in this thread is tearing anything down.  Pointing out a couple of minor flaws and suggesting that one prefers to use a different figure is not tearing down your work. Really. It isn't.

As for "those who wish to build a name for themselves," well, if you mean me, um, nope. I don't post to galleries, I don't make content, I don't take part in contests. I just buy stuff, ask advice on bug fixes, and occasionally comment in forums while I'm waiting for Poser to finish a render. I don't need to build a name because I'm just a customer. That's it.

You all may not be particularly interested in what Poser content customers think, as opposed to all of the creative people "in the community" like yourselves, and that's fine.  I thought that the way the OP was worded that you guys might possibly find some value in  the opinion of someone who is not so deeply involved in the creative community. But if not, again, that's fine.

But please don't be offended by my tiny criticism of your fine work.  I certainly did not intend to hurt anyone's feelings, and I'm totally sorry if I did.

So, you're now saying that V4-WM's apparently slow acceptance in the community isn't due to those flaws you pointed out?

The thread wasn't really a critique venue for V4-WM's flaws. It was more about why one doesn't see more about V4-WM in the marketplace. The impression you gave was that the largest obstacle - based on your preferences, of course - to acceptance by vendors were those flaws you pointed out.

I'm not after praise (besides which, it's not my work, so praise is irrelevant to me anyway). I was trying to explore Poser Community penetration of this weight-mapped version based on what was visible in the Marketplace.

 

In case you hadn't stopped by poser place...

http://www.poserplace.phantom3d.net/forums/index.php

Consider this your invitation!! :P  

Ok  to be honest the invitation is and has been pretty much open to all.  But you seem like you might enjoy it.  Feel free to stop by, poke around and see if there is anything you'd like to get involved in!

more to the subject of your post..

You can use displacement for a lot of things to do with detail.  Generally finer detail as far as anatomical stuff.  For instance the little bones and tendons in the hand might work better than the tendons at the back of the knee.  Micro wrinkles might be better served as bump or normal mapped.  I'm not overly sure of the specifics.

A lot of displacement maps are done in zbrush or something similar where they sculpt a higher res mesh and then generate displacement maps to be applied to a lower res one.  That may be just because there are more people with the talent to sculpt that kind of detail than to draw it.  It wouldnt be quite like drawing/painting a picture of someone because the  only really relevant information is height.  So you are looking at greyscale where white is highest and dark is lowest.  Also they would have to be painted onto the UV template so its a distorted image to start with.  Probably quite challenging but not impossible.

If you wanted to work on something like that in a positive environment, with a lot of knowledgeable and generously helpfull people.. poser place is definitly worth a look.  oh... and Antonia could use some of those maps.... just sayin!

 

Quote - Its great to make all of your aquaintance here :-)

As I said in my earlier post, I'm just a newb here and to Poser... hence I'm coming straight in with Poser 9. So, lucky in that respect I guess!

I have a background, originally, in traditional drawing and painting... pencil, paper, oil paint and canvas... but, have in fact been a programmer for the last decade or so and am just trying to rediscover my creative roots a little. I haven't done anything much creative for most of that time... just getting back on the horse.

I didn't have a big legacy of runtime figures. But I have nevertheless invested in what are otherwise quite old stock figures on the face of it... V4 and now M4... and this was predominanty because I can see there seems to be a future in them, because of the V4WM and ongoing M4WM projects... because of the wealth of marketplace stuff available for them too, of course... but I'd say the weight mapping efforts were more a factor for me.

I don't know what proportion of the overal new user demographic I would represent in taking this view... but its probably not insubstantial? Anyway, just saying...

In any case I see the Poser Place efforts as highly commendable and worthy.

When you're talking about creating new texture maps, to go along with V4WM, adding improved surface detail using bump/displacement and/or normal maps, are you thinking greater surface skin details like, for instance - micro wrinkles and creases round fingers... in the interiors of elbow and knee joints etc, more, finer detailed popped veins, inter-pore skin hatching (which is especially evident on human hands close up)... palm creases... some more micro fine body hair... that sort of stuff?

Small tendons in hands, running off from the knuckles perhaps? Tendons on backs of knees, in feet... could displacement be used to suggest that sort of thing or would it involve a morph?

I'm possibly rambling now... sorry!

Would these types of displacement or bump maps be created by processing photographs or would they normally be "painted" (just referencing photos) in something like ZBrush or Photoshop CS5 Extended?

(trying to stay on the thread here - honestly)

;-)

Quote - ...and as if by magic this just dropped into my inbox:

http://my.smithmicro.com/marcom/eblasts/poser/20120303/index-web.html

Smith Micro are doing 50% off Poser just now... its a good time to upgrade for anyone wanting to move to V4WM?

;-)

Wow!  This is a great deal!  I just upgraded another license for myself!

Cool - many thanks!

Invitation accepted... I'd love to contribute... if there's something I'd be useful for!

I'll head over and sign up and take a look around whilst I wait for my shiny new 50% discounted upgrade to Poser Pro 2012 to download ;-)

Hi MonkeyCloud

If you have not already got one- a graphics tablet is a good way to bring your 2d skills into 3D

And yes- you've summed up what most of mean by adding more realistic details. Micro-wrinkles, tendons, pores, etc!

Quote - Its great to make all of your aquaintance here :-)

As I said in my earlier post, I'm just a newb here and to Poser... hence I'm coming straight in with Poser 9. So, lucky in that respect I guess!

I have a background, originally, in traditional drawing and painting... pencil, paper, oil paint and canvas... but, have in fact been a programmer for the last decade or so and am just trying to rediscover my creative roots a little. I haven't done anything much creative for most of that time... just getting back on the horse.

I didn't have a big legacy of runtime figures. But I have nevertheless invested in what are otherwise quite old stock figures on the face of it... V4 and now M4... and this was predominanty because I can see there seems to be a future in them, because of the V4WM and ongoing M4WM projects... because of the wealth of marketplace stuff available for them too, of course... but I'd say the weight mapping efforts were more a factor for me.

I don't know what proportion of the overal new user demographic I would represent in taking this view... but its probably not insubstantial? Anyway, just saying...

In any case I see the Poser Place efforts as highly commendable and worthy.

When you're talking about creating new texture maps, to go along with V4WM, adding improved surface detail using bump/displacement and/or normal maps, are you thinking greater surface skin details like, for instance - micro wrinkles and creases round fingers... in the interiors of elbow and knee joints etc, more, finer detailed popped veins, inter-pore skin hatching (which is especially evident on human hands close up)... palm creases... some more micro fine body hair... that sort of stuff?

Small tendons in hands, running off from the knuckles perhaps? Tendons on backs of knees, in feet... could displacement be used to suggest that sort of thing or would it involve a morph?

I'm possibly rambling now... sorry!

Would these types of displacement or bump maps be created by processing photographs or would they normally be "painted" (just referencing photos) in something like ZBrush or Photoshop CS5 Extended?

(trying to stay on the thread here - honestly)

;-)

Yup - got an A5 Bamboo at present... (in fact I like the A5 size of that personally - which is good cos I couldn't justify spending more on that at the time!) I haven't played with using it much for 3d yet.

Well a bit of playing with it in Sculptris... which is a lot of fun to use I have to say. Although the meshes I've got out of that so far were way too many polygons to use in anything else...

I just got hold of Photoshop CS5 Extended and it seems that this lets you import a mesh and then "sculpt" or "paint" auto-UV-mapped normal or bump textures (?) onto the surface of that mesh... just need to find some more time to explore that really I guess.

I've been getting to grips with what I guess are considered more "traditional" modelling techniques in firstly Shade and then Hexagon, since getting hold of the zero price license for that at the start of the year... started out attempting to learn Blender, but hit a brick wall with that cos I'm not good with keystrokes! Having grasped more of the fundamentals I might try Blender again in due course I guess. Anyway...

...so much great stuff to play with! It's a good time for CG art right now I think :-)

I think it's too early to be too concerned. The economy has no doubt kept people from upgrading what is for most a discretionary piece of software - especially if it would entail a hardware upgrade as well. There's also the XP factor. At some point, things are 'good enough' for many people that they will jump off the upgrade treadmill for a while. 

Quote -  Steve

You mean people care that Furbie or Akira5.0  bend naturally-when the figure itself is not really human looking? I guess it won't look like a real Furbie? :-)

Quote - You don't HAVE to like realism to like good bends.... just sayin'.....

 

Take the Freebie Bender Robot for example. He's not real but people will want him to be able to bend the same way the cartoon bends.... 

Quote - So, you're now saying that V4-WM's apparently slow acceptance in the community isn't due to those flaws you pointed out?

No. I'm not saying that.  The issue isn't so black and white. (Though it does appear that the flaws I see are not visible to the rest of the community). I'm apologizing because it seems that mentioning the flaws I noticed was hurtful to the creator, and that was not my intent.

My intent was to suggest that the timing of the release of V4-WM occurred when all sorts of other fixes were also being released for V4, such that V4-WM had even more competition than she would have had otherwise. IN THAT CONTEXT, any visible flaws showing up in renders and promos might be taken by those who had not yet upgraded to Poser 9/2012 as making the cost of the upgrade and the minor hassle of using a new technology not worth the effort.

I don't think I was or am being at all unreasonable in suggesting this might be a factor behind a somewhat sluggish or less than enthusiastic response by ordinary Poser users such as myself.

Quote - > Quote - Well we did the best we could with V4 given that people wanted it right now and not later. There are always the folk who come along to these threads to tear down anything you build or those who wish to build a name for themselves at others expense. Seems to be the nature of things.

Relax, please. No one in this thread is tearing anything down.  Pointing out a couple of minor flaws and suggesting that one prefers to use a different figure is not tearing down your work. Really. It isn't.

As for "those who wish to build a name for themselves," well, if you mean me, um, nope. I don't post to galleries, I don't make content, I don't take part in contests. I just buy stuff, ask advice on bug fixes, and occasionally comment in forums while I'm waiting for Poser to finish a render. I don't need to build a name because I'm just a customer. That's it.

You all may not be particularly interested in what Poser content customers think, as opposed to all of the creative people "in the community" like yourselves, and that's fine.  I thought that the way the OP was worded that you guys might possibly find some value in  the opinion of someone who is not so deeply involved in the creative community. But if not, again, that's fine.

But please don't be offended by my tiny criticism of your fine work.  I certainly did not intend to hurt anyone's feelings, and I'm totally sorry if I did.

 

moriador:   No the name doesnt ring any bells, I dont think I remember anything you have ever written.  Did we have problems in the past?  If so I have forgotten, my appologies. If you have been particularly nasty in this thread I wouldnt know, you see I havent read it, but for the last page.  I rarely read anything here these days unless someone points me to it.

I have my own forums to keep up on and then I am in the middle of M4 WM so I rarely have much time to come here and read.

No not pointed at anyone in particular so dont take it personally, its not about you. Rather in general that is the way these type of threads go, and its not just in the Poserverse, this is mostly true throughout the world. There are those who try to build and those who try to tear it down. If you feel it pertains to you, then by all means be my guest. But certainly not intended by me.

 

Cheers,

Mike

P.S. In this case I was pointed here to answer the legal shipping reasons we did things the way we did, so I never got farther into this thread, sorry.

> Quote - > Quote - > Quote - The most beautiful character skins are for V3, imo. > > > > > > To remap a figure to V3 textures and be legal to share it, > > > we just have to make sure we don't change zones, right?  > > > It should be a simple import uvs process? > > > >   > > > > Misty, If you really want to use V3 skins on V4, DPH has you (or rather, V4! ) covered :) > > > Thanks. > > i was thinking of Anastasia, or Alyson2 rather. > > I've always been fond of Sydney, but she's not weightmapped. > >  

 

this is as far as i got with mapping Alyson2 to V3. (in wings)

lips and inner ear.  the eyes and eye area are difficile.  lol

a lot harder than i imagined.  couldn't find my unagi headspace.

Quote -
moriador:   No the name doesnt ring any bells, I dont think I remember anything you have ever written.  Did we have problems in the past?  If so I have forgotten, my appologies. If you have been particularly nasty in this thread I wouldnt know, you see I havent read it, but for the last page.  I rarely read anything here these days unless someone points me to it.

Quite amusing. I should be more cautious in presuming that responses posted in a thread are actually to that thread, rather than to a single post within it.  I think this presumptive tendency may be the origin of a very large proportion of misunderstandings in forums.

I shall consider myself summarily dismissed then. ;)

I've never bought anything from you, so your name doesn't ring any bells with me either.

Maybe things have gotten a bit frayed towards the end of this thread? ;-)

Moriador, personally I did get your earlier point about V4's elbows.

In my understanding, that's not a V4WM issue though so much as its an inherent limitation of the V4 mesh... and as Phantom3d Mike said, that was simply not something they could make distributable modifications to, as part of the weight-mapping injection package....as obviously V4 and her mesh is Daz's baby...and they needed to work with the existing geometry in that respect.

The unrelated "Perfect" line currently highly visible in the Renderosity marketplace aims to address such issues in the OLD V4, via morphs... but its also implementing all sorts of animated morphs apparently.

There's substantial overlap there, as I now see it, with what weight mapping achieves - and weight mapping resolves the core posing issues much more profoundly than morphs and with less overhead, as I understand it.

The weight mapped solution works better with conforming clothing too I think?

Posing the weight mapped V4 is like working with a whole new, much more fluid character, in my experience.

But, in my very humble opinion, much more subtle, add-on morphs are probably what is needed now, which are specifically designed to enhance the weight-mapped V4 mesh, in the direction of still further cosmetic refinement... a kind of "V4WM Morphkit" add on perhaps?

Mike and the guys who have done the heavy lifting, re-rigging V4... and have done such a great job making the injection scripts work really well, for both V4WM and the Outfitter, don't need to worry about this though... they really shouldn't concern themselves too much with the above...  I don't think.

Michael 4 WM and so much more beyond, is what people would love to see coming from the Poser Place team now I think?

The idea of doing further, morph-based enhancement is "after-market" relative to V4WM in my view and could well be done commercially... perhaps the guys doing the "Perfect" line should move onto this next? Just a thought...

Seeing a V4WM targeted offering from the likes of them would be great for marketplace exposure for V4WM no?

This is my view as a content consumer rather than as a potential content creator.

As also suggested here too, a lot of further subtle enhancements could now be made via a new set of more cutting edge displacement / normal / bump textures too... that could add great value to the Poser Place WM packages and help generate more buy-in?

As lmk suggested to me, over at Poser Place would be the place to contribute on such things... and for anyone to contribute their views on what should and shouldn't fall within the Poser Place team's remit. I've registered there... still catching up on everything under discussion there to see if I might find anything I could contribute to personally and just taking in all the great stuff happening there :-)

 

Good ON you, MonkeyCloud... that's the spirit!!

;-)

Until I do come up with anything else I can contribute, I am going to try actually making some images for my gallery here, featuring V4WM and some converted clothing...

Not promising a timescale here! My personal poserverse is now in a bit of dissarray since sidegrading to Poser Pro 2012. My runtime ran away...

...and besides my actual job, I am terrible at taking on extra curricular stuff... I'm currently supposed to be writing an iphone app for one charity, a database app for another... and my wife needs a new website for her home business... and then I've started modelling this stupidly huge scale spacecraft in Hexagon too.

Another story... but I will endeavour I promise! :-)