I've been trying to get an idea of what the poser community would like to see in terms of content for male figures, so I thought, instead of spending more hours than I already have searching through all the threads in the forums here, and at other sites, I'd just ask the question straight out: 

If you were looking for a new male figure, what would you look for?

What is missing from the current selection of poser guys and what would you like to see? 

What do you think has caused previous males to fail and why?

Of course everyone knows that the Poser community is dominated by Vicky and all her incarnations, but there still seems to be a strong underlying desire for a male that somehow has not yet been met by the majority of content creators and all the previous male figures that have come along, so what should be done to help correct that, or at least fill the void. 

There's no wrong answer, so let's hear some thoughts?

To me I'd like to see one who was less 'pretty' out of the box.  Possibly that could be a function of the textures he ships with, but sometimes I think regardless of texture some of the guys lack a certain masculinity.  I'm not just talking about being a big beefy action hero type.  More normal sized people like Harrison Ford and clint eastwood have masculinity to burn..  

Not sure if that helps much as Its pretty subjective and pretty hard to pin down what the specific qualities are that I'm looking for

I think the thing that was missing from previous male figures is that they weren't female. I'm not trying to be a smart ass. It just seems that since I've been around (circa 1998 or thereabouts) it's always been The Vicky Show. I never thought it was right either, but that's the way it is ;).

I think an Eric Bana morph is missing too, but we won't go there...lol.

Laurie

For me, this is a hobby and I like girls. I don't do romance or sex, so there is little use for a male figure. I'm afraid that is true for a lot of people that use Poser. I think this may be the problem you are running into. Yes, there is less competition for male figures but there are also a lot fewer customers.

Right, and I get that. So for those who don't use male figures in their work, this thread will be of little use to them. 

The question is for those who do use male figures, not whether or why they prefer the male figures over the female figures, or vice-versa. 

I must confess that I don't use male figures very much, so I'm probably the worst person to express an opinion on the matter. Never the less I feel compelled to get in my two cents worth. As I don't use males very much, I would like something that is usable straight out of the box, without having to buy a lot of extras.

Three things specifically. A good range of facial expressions included in the package. A good degree of genital dexterity. A passably good default texture bundled with the figure.

I don't want the default shape to be an anorexic wimp, or a fat slob, but neither do I think that we need another Schwarzenegger on steroids figure. Fit enough, but well within the normal range that you might see everyday on the street, is what I would like to see.

Hi to be honest  there is no longer major void to be filled in the area a poser/DAz males  with the possible exception of a weight mapped male figure
and apparently one is in the works for poser pro 2012

DAZ M4 has enough versatility and content support  for most peoples needs and of course on the DS only side genesis covers everything else.

Cheers

I think the daz males are pretty boys that should be in some boy band and lack the mophs to make them more rugged. The SM guys are a little more rugged but lack morphs to make to make them pretty boys. So I guess they lack versatility. And content. I know WW can convet clothed but it doesn't do so hot converting textures.

I use a LOT of guys in my work.

With the exception of David3, Daz's males have always been overly muscular. To make them into believable "average" guys has always been a challenge. That is not to say that we don't need a muscle morph...we do... but I don't think a gym rat is what we need as a starting point. A Harrison Ford/Clint Eastwood build as the neutral point would be perfect in my book.

Secondly, well... let's get down to brass tacks: Genitals. A male figure needs to be... well.. MALE. And ALL of his boy parts need to pose smoothly. That part is tricky... there are times when it needs to be extremely flexible (I'd say 6 segments at a minimum!) and sometimes it needs to be... less flexible. The ability to pose this part should also be built in. Scaling for length and circumference would also be a plus.

Please, however, so NOT make him a male version of Antonia (for my part) in that you make him SO average that he has little character of his own. Also, a full morph set for him so we don't get twenty different sets to contend with.

In short, the functional equivilant of David 4 with morph++ would fill the bill for me. (Weight mapped, as long as I'm wishing!)

Responding to another couple of comments...

I've heard the criticism of all Daz character's that they are too "pretty." Well, let's put this in perspective: Take a look at any movie. The "average" people in most movies would make the "A" list in most general population groups. Most art tends to be idealized to one extent of the other. I have a number of quite average, even homely morphs for both M4 and V4 in my stable, but I don't use them very often. It's sort of like... um... why go with something hard on the eyes when you have something easier to look at? Were this not so, we'd have a lot more people like Michael Emerson as leads rather than Mathew Fox.

Again, I know I'm speaking for myself, but I think it's like with slutwear... the vendors make what people buy.

I don't mind a male character being handsome... even pretty... as long as the morphs exist to make him otherwise.

I go along with basicwiz, with the exception of the genitals.  Should be there, but erectile tissue olympics not required for my uses, I usually clothe them anyhow. 

A dynamic clothe suit would be nice, not a tux, already got one that I don't use.  Just a casual or business suit with a few variations possible.  Dynamic as that's my preference YMMV.

D.

I agree. I've love a dynamic business suit!

10 000 years of art show that most popular subject is naked female characters. Even homosexual artists like Leonardo da Vinci portrayed women. Why do you expect then Poser pictures should be different.

A decent set of everyday poses instead of stripper or effemenate model ones.

All the best.

LROG

I Wouldnt call this a "pretty boy"

Cheers

The only problem the DAZ males have are their comic book style default proportions because Poser (still) lacks proper single axis scaling.

Took me a lot of work to re-rig my 3rd Generation based figures to get more realistic proportions.

Other than that, it just depends on what you do with the mesh.

IMO, at least with the 3rd Generation DAZ mesh, there's absolutely no limit in the looks you can achieve.

BasicWiz, do you create your own morphs or draw from morph sets? 

It's a bit early now, but I may be looking for someone in the near future to help create morphs for the model I'm working on. 

From a technical standpoint, morphs can only do so much and are always limited by the mesh they're being applied to. It seems mostly that it is a Poser/Daz concept, as the more professional side of 3D usually does not rely on morphs to generate new characters but instead models them from scratch to be uniquely their own, with their own mesh and rig, relying on morphs only for blend shapes and motion (facial expressions, phonemes, muscle movement, etc).

So to that end, if you're starting with a model whose features are more feminine, (the unimesh), then you're never really going to get a truly masculine look from it before distorting the mesh to an unacceptable level, unless you increase the resolution of the mesh, and most poser figures are at a relatively low resolution compaired to what other applications usually use (not including video games). The same rules apply to creating a muscular morph from a much thinner base mesh - at least at the level of resolution that most poser figures are. Increasing the mesh density will definitely improve morphing capabilities, but it lowers your room for other scene content.      

Of course Genesis solved all those scaling problems Poser still has, so what took me weeks and sometimes months with the 3rd (And 4th) Generation figures can now be done in minutes with just some dial spinning.

Personally, I'll stay with my 3rd gen based figures until Genesis is really fully implemented into Poser. I have too much time invested into them.

But my point is, you'd have a really, really hard time creating a better male figure than the 3rd, 4th and 5th (Genesis) DAZ males already are.

I think you'd be better of supporting them than trying to create your own mesh, unless you strictly do such a figure "for the honor" and expect zero commercial success.

lol, the only one who doesn't look like he used to be a girl is the big boy on the left, but still, nice examples JoePublic. 

Its in the hips and the faces mostly, JoePublic. And you said yourself you had to re-rig them to get them to work properly. 

I'm not trying to criticize your personal work by any means, so don't take it that way. And I'm not directly bashing Daz or anyone else who has created models so far. 

But to state that it's unlikely anyone will come up with a better mesh than what Daz has come up with so far is laughable and defeatist. I see and work with far superior meshes every day. The only difference is that no one has bothered to bring a better mesh into Poser yet. 

Genesis will likely never be supported by Poser, as it functions on different technology than Poser currently has, or plans to support in the future, from what they've stated on the issue so far, and Daz has already stated they have no intention of developing a Poser-compatible version of Genesis. Whether or not that changes on either side is yet to be seen, but somehow I doubt it. It seems quite likely that the two entities have gone their separate ways. 

So does that mean that Poser is left to rely solely on old versions of Daz figures and whatever modifications its user community can come up with that make them function in future versions of Poser without violating copyrights? Surely there is room for new Poser-based models to be created that utilize the current abilities of Poser and are just as versatile as anything Daz ever did, if not moreso. 

And this is not supposed to be yet another thread about Daz vs Poser, so don't take it down that road. It's about the male figures and what they have available, or should have available, regardless of their creator. 

As someone who uses more men than women I'd say what's missing the most are a decent selection of good skin textures that aren't all commercial, aren't all pretty boys and aren't all high priced. Most of us are hobbiests. Especially those of us who do fan art, whether it be comic book or sci-fi or fantasy and as hobbiests, most don't want to spend $20+ for one skin texture.

Another reason males tend to suck is their default textures are too bland. More options in default textures would be nice.

Poser scaling works pretty well if figure has correct smooth zones. Apollo looks good as a preteen and old man.

http://carodan.blackraven3d.com/

Quote - BasicWiz, do you create your own morphs or draw from morph sets? 

 

I couldn't use a mesh creation program if my life depended on it. I depend on the dials and sometimes a bit of touch up with the Poser morph tool.

"... there still seems to be a strong underlying desire for a male that somehow has not yet been met by the majority of content creators and all the previous male figures that have come along"

Well, there could be some missing ingredient that everyone else has missed. I think it's more like David Beckham or cheerleaders aren't going to make professional socces madly popular in the US. IOW, the market's at its saturation point. I'm sure a figure with better this or that would be welcomed, but it would be possibly further fragmenting an already (relatively) small market. I say that not to be discouraging, but a lot of the gaps seem to be not a need for a new figure as much as support for the existing ones in terms of clothing, textures etc. I'd like to see more ethnic/racial diversity (this is true for the female figures as well). Once you go beyond Caucasian and Asian there's not much. Again, that's something that could be addressed to a large extent with greater support for the existing figures. Variety and improvements are always good though, and it's an area that could use a shakeup.

The only things missing are Clothing, clothing clothing, clothing, and clothing.
The girls get it all, but males ????

Males are less popular.
New males ??? Do not know, but clothing, clothing, clothing.

I use M3 and H3 constantly.

Didn't like M4 and only very rarely use him to fill armour to make it easier to pose - and then often stick M3's head on top. M4 always seems somehow squashy and unformed to me.

I haven't actually tried any of the Poser guys yet as I've only had Poser since PP2012, so of course I have no content for them to use anyway. Should give them a go though.

So far as what I need for male characters..... hmm.. I dunno. A weight mapped M3 maybe? ;)

Quote - The only things missing are Clothing, clothing clothing, clothing, and clothing.
The girls get it all, but males ????

Males are less popular.
New males ??? Do not know, but clothing, clothing, clothing.

In real world is the same. When I compare mine and my wife wardrobes...

Oh.. and content... always need more armour!

Despite pillaging my way through Xurge's store (hooray for Newsletter discounts) and converting the spoils to M3, I always need more armour and armour-type stuff!

Male characters are always a bit light on poses, expressions and suchlike. Always good to have some pre-made poses to start from. Most of the male stuff just looks like poses from clothing catalogues. Yeah, there are some, but nothing compared to the vast outpourings for V4 etc.

Quote - In real world is the same. When I compare mine and my wife wardrobes...

lol, well, that's not because there aren't as many fashion choices for you, just that you choose not to involve yourself with them. 

I know several guys who have more shoes and boots than all the females I know combined. And that's just shoes and boots. 

One guy in particular has over 300 pairs of boots - and yes, he wears every pair. He has a boot fetish. I don't judge. 

Quote - The only things missing are Clothing, clothing clothing, clothing, and clothing.
The girls get it all, but males ????

Males are less popular.
New males ??? Do not know, but clothing, clothing, clothing.

As in the real world, "Most" men aren't as flamboyant in their clothing needs so there's not a lot of differences you can make to pants, shirts & shorts other than adding pockets and zippers and buttons and using different materials.

Clothing business casual. Golf shirts with and without front pocket and the fornt pocket works. Dress pants with and without cuffs and the pockets work. Short and long  sleeve button down the front collared shirts that again you might wear to the office. Again with and without pockets and those with pockets they work. Sports coats that can double as a suit coat with the right texture. Go sit in a chain restruant at lunch and observe how the 25 plus working crowd is dressed.

Wet suit and skin diving gear

Oh and add a package morph to your clothes. I swear some of the pants in the market place are so tight in that area, it is a wonder any guy would be cuaght dead wearing them

All the above for M4

I say make products that appeals to male fantasy. Think of James Bond.

Violence, sex (or having an attractive body desirable for the opposite sex), cool gadgets, expensive possessions, power, money...

I also make use of male figures alot more than female. And I use poser for practical reasons not for emotional fulfillment.

(Marty Robbins White sport coat and a pink carnation running through what's left of my mind)

  No self respecting young man of the late 50's - early 60's would be without his sport coat, slacks, and Florshiem loafers.  (Back when I could afford Florshiem and they weren't Chinese made.)  Turtle neck sweaters, or western style shirt, (Think M4 Cowboy) bolo ties.  Sometimes western style boots, but never tooled, just shined.

D.

A highly detailed Firefighters outfit with all of the official gear.

Cheers

Quote - As someone who uses more men than women I'd say what's missing the most are a decent selection of good skin textures that aren't all commercial, aren't all pretty boys and aren't all high priced. Most of us are hobbiests. Especially those of us who do fan art, whether it be comic book or sci-fi or fantasy and as hobbiests, most don't want to spend $20+ for one skin texture.

Another reason males tend to suck is their default textures are too bland. More options in default textures would be nice.

What he said.

I use Daz's 3rd/4th Gen figures along with the G2M from SmithMicro. I have found some nice texture sets for the G2 Males, & then I spin my own figures.

I would like to move on to Ryan, but I haven't found any developed characters for that mesh

Quote - > Quote - In real world is the same. When I compare mine and my wife wardrobes...

lol, well, that's not because there aren't as many fashion choices for you, just that you choose not to involve yourself with them. 

I know several guys who have more shoes and boots than all the females I know combined. And that's just shoes and boots. 

One guy in particular has over 300 pairs of boots - and yes, he wears every pair. He has a boot fetish. I don't judge. 

He must be a shoemaker ;) Anyway you know several guys who have a lot of shoes and plenty of girls who have a lot of ... everything.

Now seriously - Poser market is similar to real market. In every mall you can find few times more shops with clothes for women then for men. Clothes for men are more similar to each other then there is no purpose to make 5 different office suits. People do not use Poser tools. One uniform and few minutes in material room is enough to create 3 different uniforms.

Quote - So does that mean that Poser is left to rely solely on old versions of Daz figures and whatever modifications its user community can come up with that make them function in future versions of Poser without violating copyrights? Surely there is room for new Poser-based models to be created that utilize the current abilities of Poser and are just as versatile as anything Daz ever did, if not moreso. 

And this is not supposed to be yet another thread about Daz vs Poser, so don't take it down that road. It's about the male figures and what they have available, or should have available, regardless of their creator. 

No, and you are right. Someone needs to fill the void left by Daz.

Laurie

Quote - (Marty Robbins White sport coat and a pink carnation running through what's left of my mind)

  No self respecting young man of the late 50's - early 60's would be without his sport coat, slacks, and Florshiem loafers.  (Back when I could afford Florshiem and they weren't Chinese made.)  Turtle neck sweaters, or western style shirt, (Think M4 Cowboy) bolo ties.  Sometimes western style boots, but never tooled, just shined.

D.

You know, we definitely do not have enough period clothing for all eras, for either figure. 1920's (for both figures). 1890's, middle of the 19th century.....all the way back to medieval times and perhaps even beyond. Yes, the plethora of fantasy fetish wear really gets to me at times....lol. I don't do any fetish stuff, so that part's out for ppl like me. I actually like normal clothes (odd as that sounds for a Poser user). I'd also love, like I said, much much more period wear. We've never had a Gibson Girl. We had a zoot suit but it didn't really look all that authentic ;). No spats and the only button up boots we've had for the females are, again - the fetish sort of boot. Not my thing ;).

Laurie

The issue going forward on figure development both male and female is resources.

I'm going to use Antonia as my example because I feel she has been the most successful independently created figure in the last several years.

Antonia was a community creation. I have no idea how many people worked on her, but I know it was a sizable number. I'd really be interested in seeing the man-hour figure invested in her. I bet it's huge.

Let's look at what we got for all the time and effort:

1. We got a mesh that bends beautifully, but a shape that is (to put it kindly) quite plain. (I personally think she's butt-ugly out of the box, with a body only a mother could love, but that's just me.)

2. We have several morph sets, none of which is "official" and none of which matches the accuracy or versatility of Daz's morph++ for V4. In short, I can't make her into what I want.

3. We have very few available textures, and those that are available are quite plain.

4. We have only very limited vendor support. (see #2 above) I know... the knee-jerk answer is: "Make your own _________."

NOT an acceptable answer IF you want the character to have wide use and acceptance among any group other than the type person who lives in these forums. Most of us do not have the talent/ability/knowlege to "roll our own." Besides, that is not what I want to spend my "Poser" time doing. I'm an illustrator. I make tableaus. The fact that the marketplace exists and is the primary function of the Renderosity site supports the contention that the vast majority of users depend on the talent of the vendors to provide the raw materials for their renders.

Viewing the above, we've seen what the community is capable of doing on its own. While the results have shown great talent, they don't show commercial viability. My own opinion becomes "The next great figure will come from a commercial enterprise willing to put the combined manpower of multiple artists behind it, with the ability to create a complete, integrated product ready to go at the moment of release." There will also be at a minimum a starter support set of clothing, underwear, shoes, and hair (or fits). The figure must have out-of-the box attractiveness and at least two or three mats included (to appeal to the very large group of casual Poser users) and high accuracy and flexilibility (to appeal to the power users who worry about the details.)

Sound familiar?

It's the Daz model.

No, Daz is not the only company with the resources to do it. Smith Micro could, were they willing to put the manpower behind it. I'm not sure if Rendo or RDNA are large enough, but I suspect they are IF they see a chance of getting vendor and community support to bolster their investment in the figure itself. 

An individual COULD do this, but I doubt they could if they have a regular job to go to and eat up 8-10 hours of each day. Anton did it with Apollo (sort of.) I'm not saying the OP couldn't bring this off, but I suspect it would be a fulltime job, and by the time it was ready to go, Poser 10 would make it obsolete.

I return to my case: Some commercial entity with the bucks to put a couple fo people on the payroll would make the most sense. I just have no idea who it might be that is willing to make the investment.

"So does that mean that Poser is left to rely solely on old versions of Daz figures and whatever modifications its user community can come up with that make them function in future versions of Poser without violating copyrights?" That's pretty much the situation. Creating a figure that could rival Genesis would take a lot of time, talent and money. First you need access to a full body laser scanner to create some realistic human 3D shapes. No "eyeballing" or "tracing photographs" for Genesis. Then you have to translate that raw mesh into a topology that works inside Poser and on most peoples low end computers. I.e. you have to limit yourself to perhaps 70.000 to 100.000 polys yet have all the necessary edgelooping to depict anatomically correct musculature without elaborate displacement maps. Of course the mesh still has to bend well using Poser's render engine, so you need to exactly know the optimal placement and number for the edgeloops for the joints. Then UV-mapping. You need to know how to map to achieve the least texture stretching even if the mesh morphs from pre-teen to adult to alien life-form to fantasy monster. Then the morphs: First the necessary JCMs as even weightmapping is not able to create realistic joints on it's own. Then all the different human and non-human bodystyles. And don't forget the expressions. People in the Poserverse also expect a sh*tload of content right from the start, so you'd better have a small army of top end content creators eagerly waiting to support that new line of figures. Sorry if that sounds defaetist, but that's pretty much the current situation as I see it. By not supporting Genesis, Poser painted itself into a very dark corner, and no "3rd party" figure will be able to save the day unless that figure is every bit as good as Genesis is. And sorry, again, but after twelve years of seeing each and any of those "3rd party" figures failing completely to even put a tiny scratch into DAZ' bottom line, I don't think any individual can do that unless that individual is willing to pump SERIOUS money into that project. Poser is to 99% about the figures. Everything else is secondary. And DAZ was able to build a full fledged monopoly over the years and we all, and especially the owners of Poser, happily let that happen. Grassroots efforts like Antonia or a WM'd this or a WM'd that won't keep Poser afloat. If Poser wants to survive, something more professional has to happen. If you can do it, please and by all means, do it. But Poser and so called "professional" 3D apps are two completely different kind of animals. Don't think for a second that a successfull Poser figure could be made easily or would be cheap just because Poser is cheap and easy to learn. I'm modelling for Poser for twelve years now and I've seen hundreds of models that looked fantastic in MAX or other high end modellers but were completely unuseable in Poser. So in the end, whatever I wanted for Poser and what hadn't been done already by someone else for Poser, I had to build myself from scratch. The DAZ meshes, including Genesis, are far from perfect and I really don't feel much love for DAZ as a buisiness, but they have the experience and they have the support and they pretty much know what they are doing. I welcome any attempt to "challenge" them as I don't like monopolys, but I won't give give any praise or encouragement just for "effort". No cop-outs or cutting corners. Build a truly better mesh than DAZ can and I'll give you happily all my praise. But I don't think it'll be going to happen and because of that my outlook for Poser's future is quite bleak. As crappy and as buggy Studio 4 still is in some respects, and as great as Poser's SSS ond lights are now, if I hadn't had my own set of figures to work with, I would have dropped Poser like a hot potato the moment I've tested Genesis the first time. Sadly, people don't want to hear the truth. I predicted the big rift the moment I peeked into V4's magnet ridden cr2. But people kept their eyes firmly shut and rather wanted to believe that DAZ "never would let their most faithful customers down" Now they want to believe that Poser could survive without a set of professionally made figures. Good luck with that.

I think part of the problem is that we need to teach people to spin the dials but that hasn't really happened yet. People complain about the DAZ males being too pretty but you can spin the dials and change the face shape in a few minutes, same for the body (though you will have a harder time putting clothes on him). But the morphs and tools are there if people take the time to use them.

most males are either way to muscle bound or girlly to me...

the only male i ever liked and wish for more stuff for was HIM by sixus1

the squareness to his features and the bit of muscle i find to fit best with my style.

its too bad there was never a ww file created for him or i would use him all the time.

Well, maybe that it's hard to get a realistic looking male (like one of the Daz iterations) or a stylized male (like HIM) in one figure is what's missing. Actually that's always been my gripe. One size does not fit all. That's why I liked the Gen 3 figures. They didn't try to lump them all into one multipurpose figure. One figure can't be all things. Yeah, it's expensive and a real PITA to have to buy a separate wardrobe for each one, but that's what the converters are for. And now that the figures are weightmapped that part of it is somewhat easier, or so I'm led to believe.

Laurie

omg he shaves his pubes that looks wierd, anyway how about seeing actual body hair on a a figure that looks natural like arm face and leg hair done without the help of needing textures.

I use all the male figures I have, and I think I have all the available ones for Poser. The face is most important since I use the figures clothed. The face must be able to morph to represent a variety if ethnic types. For me, believeable African characters are important, and I need a good range of expression morphs. They don't have to be handsome.

I would say: check the galleries and the store:

Mec4D does some great guy models

Lundqvist does great male images, as does Roland58.

All the best.

I agree with what BascWiz and JoePublic said. I think Laurie sums it up very well. You can have a family of figures. I don’t know much about the males but the female Generation 3 figures provided some compatibility in terms of textures and morphs, ditto Generation 4. The other alternative, truly separate figures is ideal in terms or versatility but it comes at the cost of separate wardrobes, morphs, converters etc. That means more expense, more files, more work, and more figures vying for a limited market. Despite its shortcomings and whether or not it succeeds, Genesis is a another vision. No matter which strategy one prefers, it does take money and a professional organization to have the best chance of it working long term.

There are certainly enough talented creators out there to do it. Some entity like Renderosity may have the financial resources – note learn from DinaV. Having a company with employees or contractors would ease the cat wrangling. I don’t count the (non Antonia) WM project only because it is building on the foundation DAZ created. Make sure that, as others have said, you have content ready to go; don’t run it up the flagpole and wait to see who salutes. Of course, Apollo is, by all accounts, a great figure, and IIRC had a fair amount of stuff early on and got some commercial support. Even doing everything right isn’t going to change the basic gender equation; but at least you have a fighting chance.

There’s a conflict between wanting variety and wanting support. The more unique figures there, the less support for each one. Yes, you can convert or tweak some things, but I still believe that each extra step sheds customers. I don’t know how many male figures the market can support – maybe no more than two or three with a reasonable amount of content. Even amongst Mike, David, Apollo and Hiro, people still feel a lack of content exists – and that’s given the generally smaller requirements of the male wardrobe. Put them all in a room and let them cut cards, play rock-paper-scissors or duke it out – crown whoever comes out king. The king gets all the clothes, hair, ethnic choices etc. The rest will just be naked White guys.

All good points to consider. 

Overall, I think it is about quality over quantity in most regards. 

The Daz figures are higher quality than most of the others available, even if they are not as anatomically accurate as the others. The meshes are generally cleaner, uv maps easier to work with, and the morph combinations are much broader - all three aspects that most of the other available figures fail to provide. 

The one thing that has always bugged me about Daz figures is that in most cases, no matter where you are on the web, you can almost always tell if its Vicky or Mike being used. It goes beyond the joint bending issue that's always been a problem in both DS and Poser. The lack of realism I think is what stands out most. Other figures are more realistic in appearance and usually a bit more difficult to spot, but fail in the polishing, and thus fail in the vendor support. If a content artist has to contend with sloppy UV maps, or stray vertices and split seams that make morphing difficult without significant work-arounds, then the figure loses support from the vendor side. Without vendor support people aren't going to bother with it. Why spend the time to fight with the hassles of an unpolished base, when there's the Daz figures that work much better out of the box. 

There is no denying that the Daz figures are currently the best that is available. Any Poser/DS marketplace is proof of that. I just don't think it's the best that can be done by a long shot, even with Genesis in the picture. 

It also seems that most of the 3rd party figures that have come along, lose the support of their creators before they ever really get a chance to be recognized by the community. There's a lot more involved than just making the base figure and throwing it out there. Proper functionality is only part of the job and only gets it barely out the door. 

But then you have other artists who make their living producing several original figures on a regular basis, and while the artistic quality and funcionality may not be the greatest, they still manage to develop a following. If enough people like their style they can continue doing what they do.