since youre obviously quite passionate about these issues, how about funneling all that energy that you expend bitching about it in the forums into either fixes for the existing figures, or an original figure of your own? 

I love the new figure from Sixus1! She is really gourgeous and I think Les has gone beyond my personal expectations.

But I have always loved Les's figures from Trixie on up because of their very different looks and also the support given by the creator.

Vilters, you think all the commercial poser/ds figures are wrong??

so, build and make your own, there are plenty of free modelling apps out there.

one other point, make your normal figure, try and make it a commercial success.

if you succeed, then you can belittle other peoples efforts as much as you like. but until that happens.....................

a figure developer is not going to spend time making a normal ( to your aesthete), when they know full well they would not get a worthwhile return on their time and effort.

a large majority of users WANT the 'ideal' in their figures

 @ 3anson

YES, up to the point I thought there was some volontary bad will involved.

YES, I am morphing my own.

YES, they are more normal looking.

NO, I do not sell, Poser is my hobby, not my living.

YES, I hope the new HumanZ are error free figures.

Happy Posering to you all.

@ Khai

Yes, I know.
And I will continue to do so with the single purpose of getting better and error free meshes and figures in Poser/DS.

And if you do know?
Then do something about it too.

In the end?
All we all want are good figures/characters.

But OK, I will stop repeating myself.
Untill the next trigger. :-)

"Yes, I know.
And I will continue to do so with the single purpose of getting better and error free meshes and figures in Poser/DS."

And when you finally get the *"perfect ",error free"*poser/DS figure you will do what exactly?
 
Create some naked renders to show how great the joints and non balloon breast are.

Finally post something in your little internet user profile gallery,
perhaps complain about the lack of content for it
etc etc etc .

Were sorry that  the  inexcusable ncompetence  of the rest of the Poser /DAZ creative class has frustrated you so much.

But there is a solution to rescue you from this artistic abyss
but sadly it would require a little more effort ,on your part, than typing the same old gripes and hitting the "post reply" button.

Cheers

Hey, lets keep it friendly here.  He is passionate about poser as we all are.  He is frustrated by what he sees as things that could be fixed which are impeding us from making our artwork being better.  He's trying to help.  Not everyone here can or wants to make their own models, but we can still give opinions, and sometimes it helps our frustrations to vent a little when triggered.

Love esther

I echo that. Wether I agree with Vilters or not, he's a right to his opinion and a right to voice it in a public forum.  

That said, I'm looking forward to seeing the figures released. More models for Poser are a welcome thing in my book.

I agree with you Tomside.  It's not so much the converting (although it never quite looks as good), it's the adjusting joint zones that I really dont like.

those renders look really good.  particularly the one in teh shorts.  He would almost be useable for me.  I didn't realize he could look that human.

edgverse - your comic looks really good!

"He is frustrated by what he sees as things that could be fixed which are impeding us from making our artwork being better.'

Hi using poser itself and expecting "perfect figures"  is not a logical pursuit
and will only lead to endless frustration IMHO.

And it would help ones credibility of one had some posted renders to show what efforts one has made to get the best results with what is available.

I am the biggest critic of posers decrepid animation tools but at least I can show that I have actually pushed them to their woeful limits
and do not simply come into every thread and slam the programs animation tools from some theoretical fever swamp.   

You get what you pay for and what you all are paying for poser and its figures is not going to get this elusive "perfection" some seem to be chasing.

No amount of complaining is going to really change the brutal economics of this fact I am afraid.

Thats the reality of it.

P.S. on the new Sixus figure they will run their usual course:

Release

A few clothing items from the originator,

one maybe two third party offerings.

some posted renders,

some polite praise of the renders,

within six months they will take their place in the forgotten
depths of hoarded content that are the runtimes of the average poser user

Cheers

Quote - But Allison and Ryan are Smith Micro's answer to average looking people (pardon me while a gag up a fur ball).  I don't know, there is just something subtly wrong about them.  I've said it on other threads and I'll say it again--for the most part people don't want ordinary looking people. 

You know, they did a study of attractiveness which shows that the more "average" a person is, the more attractive they are.  We don't really describe beauty, but rather the absence of imperfection.  We notice eyes that are too close together or too far apart, chins that are too shallow, pointy or broad, cheeks that are too fat or too gaunt...  It's harder to describe a person that is totally average, but most would agree that such a person is indeed attractive. 

Personally, I like a face that is "mathematically" average but also has one "flaw" to give it character.  A nose that is too big, or teeth with a gap, can be quite attractive on an otherwise "average" face, and the overall appearance is IMHO more attactive than the same face with the "flaw" corrected.

So, something tells me that Allison and Ryan probably aren't average enough but rather have specific features that many people don't like and which also make them very recognisable.

I will say I do prefer figures that look more like the actual (attractive) people I see daily, and less like the Holywood/comic book ideals, but then I'm used to being an oddball around here.

Yes, Behemoth 2 has a more human look for sure.

Quote "

You get what you pay for and what you all are paying for poser and its figures is not going to get this elusive "perfection" some seem to be chasing.

No amount of complaining is going to really change the brutal economics of this fact I am afraid."

I disagree. I  think complaining may motivate people who make things take their views into consideration and although of course we won't ever achieve perfection there is certainly nothing wrong with striving towards it.  of course one person's perfect is another persons too many polygons etc.

Love esther

Sorry Anabran, but it shouldn't be too hard even for someone developing for a low end program like Poser to load a few reference photographs into his modeller to get at least the basic human proportions right.

Or look up some studys about human atractiveness on the web.

Yes, 99% of the Poser models available are done by eyeballing, which is especially tragic when you see an otherwise beautifully detailed car or plane where not a single proportion is correct. But those models were done by hobbyists, so asking perfection from them would be a little excessive.

The models shipping as the default figures with Poser I hold to a higher standard, though.

They are the face(s) of Poser, they are the virtual friends and family we spend our Poser time with. We cloth them, we pose them, they are in the center of the storys we tell.

Noone expects them to be as photorealistically perfect as what some CGI masters can do with high end software like MAX or MAYA.

But they shouldn't be so full of errors and sloppy design and general crappyness that they are completely unuseable.

I don't think my standards are higher than most, but I just want my virtual Poser people to look like real people. Nothing more, nothing less.

And I showed already years ago it's not Poser's "ancient" technology that is the limiting factor here.

Alyson and Ryan and all the other failed Poser meshes are just bad craftsmanship. Nothing more, nothing less.

I don't think Smith Micro will ever care as long as sales are not drastically plummeting.

But I still think it doesn't hurt pointing out once in a while that crappy Poser figures are not something we have to live with just because we are hobbyists.

There is the new Poser man coming out soon that is supposed to address some issues, I'm hoping for the best.

some of those figures look pretty good to me Vilters.

Can anyone link to where I can see images of these Humanz?

Quote - Can anyone link to where I can see images of these Humanz?

Yeah, I was wondering too....

Laurie

Quote -
within six months they will take their place in the forgotten
depths of hoarded content that are the runtimes of the average poser user

 

Cheers

That is an interesting arguement & perhaps it was true in the past.  Clothes content is only a problem if the user is aggressively uninterested in availing themselves of solutions that for the most part, only take a few clicks of a mouse button.

Nowadays, the rules have changed from what they were in Poser 5.

Native content is prefered, but today other options are available.  If I wasn't using those programs, M4 would still be waiting on a good business suit.

All of my characters have access to all of my clothing content via WW or Xdresser.

All character morphs can be added to clothing via Morphing clothes.

In the scenes I am working on I use the following caracters:

Vicky 2,3,& 4, Michael 2,3, & 4, David, SP3, Luke & Laura,  Mill kids, Aiko3 & Hiro 3 from DAZ.

Don & Judy, P6 James & Jessi, Sydney, Jessi, Olivia, James, Simon, Koji, Kelvin, Miki 1,2, & 3, Ryan, Alyson, Ryan 2 & Alyson 2 from SM

Antonia, Apollo Maximus, FemaSu, Kez (successor to K),Maya Doll, Rikishi, & TY2. I'll be adding the Sanctum Art figures in the near future.

The only character I have that I am not using is Mariko (PhilC needs to get cracking on a WW plug-in for her.)

Due to that grey "thing that shall not be named" people are having to look over what they have & what they are going to do going forward.

I am looking forward to the new and/or upgraded characters, but I am not waiting on anyone anymore.  I am going back & pulling out old figures & going to town with them.  I have weight-mapped a couple already (Luke - Laura - Rikishi)

Photoshop Elements & Hexagon are getting a workout also.  I may be spending less, but I am rendering more - and that is why I got into this madness in the first place.

Quote - > Quote - Can anyone link to where I can see images of these Humanz?

Yeah, I was wondering too....

Laurie

There's some images here:

Humanz Update

Les said he was going to be posting some pictures of the male figure.  There was one earlier in the thread, but I've sure it's evolved somewhat since then.  Sixus said there will be clothing available for them--a lot of it I take it will be in a fantasy vien, but not all of it, and Phil C has promised Wardrobe Wizard support.

Wow, better than I expected (but not crazy at all about the hair). Hope there is a morph to shrink the eyes - they're way too big. I was envisioning another HER (who I think is fugly...lol). But, it's been a long time since he modeled that figure and has grown in his technique ;).

Hope he does well with em.

Thanks toastie :)

Laurie

The female Humanz figure looks amazing.

I think the eyes are very expressive and cool.  It will be interesting to see what options these figures have.

Quote - Hey, lets keep it friendly here.  He is passionate about poser as we all are.  He is frustrated by what he sees as things that could be fixed which are impeding us from making our artwork being better.  He's trying to help.  Not everyone here can or wants to make their own models, but we can still give opinions, and sometimes it helps our frustrations to vent a little when triggered.

Love esther

Happy to see someone here that isn't completely rude to someone stating their opinion. As I recall that was one of the things that sent me away before.  The community had gotten so rude.  For me if I don't agree in a public place, it's pretty easy to just scroll past.  Even easier than walking away irl.

BTW, I love the outfit the character is wearing. Did he make that for the figure or is it a fit of another figure's clothing? I don't remember having ever seen it before (which in no way means it's new...I miss a lot...lol). It reminds me a lot of the kind of stuff francis used to do.

Laurie

Quote - within six months they will take their place in the forgotten
depths of hoarded content that are the runtimes of the average poser user

I don't think that will necessarily be the case moving forward. 

I think the reason that's happened in the past is in large part due to everyone using V4 and M4, and all their predecessors. But now, V4 and M4's poser days are numbered. There won't be a new generation of Daz figures to fall back on, and people want new figures. A handful of artists are trying to deliver on that. The positive side of that is that multiple artsts creating new figures breeds diversity, more selection for the users to choose from, and more styles rendered, giving the users more freedom to express their own vision. 

Personally, I've never been a fan of Sixus1's human figures, but I love a lot of his monsters and creatures. They have a very Giger/Wellian feel to them, especially his older stuff. If he studied human anatomy a bit more, I think he could make some pretty awesome humans. But every artist has their strengths and weaknesses.

~Shane

There are more pictures of the lady up.  The eyes can be normal human scale from the pictures posted.  I view these people as being more stylised, which i think is fine.  I am very much looking forward to seeing some promos with the male character.

Quote - > Quote - within six months they will take their place in the forgotten

depths of hoarded content that are the runtimes of the average poser user

 

I don't think that will necessarily be the case moving forward. 

I think the reason that's happened in the past is in large part due to everyone using V4 and M4, and all their predecessors. But now, V4 and M4's poser days are numbered. There won't be a new generation of Daz figures to fall back on, and people want new figures. A handful of artists are trying to deliver on that. The positive side of that is that multiple artsts creating new figures breeds diversity, more selection for the users to choose from, and more styles rendered, giving the users more freedom to express their own vision. 

 

~Shane

I think part of this argument centers on what one may consider to be the best approach to figure design to allow users to 'express their own vision'.

Over the time I've been using Poser there seem to have been two main approaches:

• Single figures with lots of body morphs to shape individual characters and looks. 

• Multiple figures with very limited morphs out of the box.

I get the idea of diversity with the multi-figure/mesh approach - a wealth of possible mesh designs, rigs and shapes from different creators. That's great. But it's always struck me that this has certain disadvantages for the end user specifically, most prominently that it means they have to buy lots of different figures to achieve a variety of looks. I tend to notice that many of the less mainstream figures lack details like decent expression morphs (or shaping morphs of any kind), rendering them pretty useless to me. Content is less of an issue these days with various clothing converters, but there is still an additional cost that can spiral for example in the case of having to purchase multiple support packages for Wardrobe-Wizard. Textures are also a problem in a similar way. I'm certainly not poor by any standard but my resources are limited for any given project, and I'm guessing that many Poser users have even tighter purse-strings.

I've typically found it harder to break the specific look of any given figure that has less shaping morphs included with it to achieve the variations I've wanted. This usually results in spending much more time with the morph brush or magnets etc than I'd have liked, where with a figure like V4 I can achieve very different looks very quickly with a combination of included face morphs. I can get to know that figure and its morphs in depth, learning how to get the looks I really want.

Although I'd concede that there are limitations to what you can do with any given mesh, the main disadvantage of the single figure approach in my mind is to the creator - a much greater investment of time to design and craft a well balanced mesh with enough included morphs to make it a viable option, especially if you want any of those elements to be of a quality that will bear the test of use. 

My understanding is that with the inclusion of animatable joint centers in Poser we now have a viable route to achieving flexible rigs to accommodate big changes in morphed body shapes, much as genesis works. This may well need further development and my knowledge is as a non-creator, but the possibilities for making a decent all-in-one figure seems much more viable.

My preference will always be to use a single figure with lots of morphs that I can freely shape and refine - this to me is how you as a creator can deliver the means for the end user to 'express their own vision'. Just because Daz may not be putting out a Poser version of the unimesh concept we shouldn't necessarily give up on that formula, one that has proven very sucessful in the marketplace. Maybe it's just too big an investment of development time for any one individual.

But this is just my take on the issue.

Back in time where V4-M4 came out, there was no competition.
V4-M4 where it, or you where stuck.

Back then 1.000 clients had only one product to choose from. V4-M4, and that was it.
They all had to buy the same thing.

And V4-M4 generated some nice income for the content builders.

These days, the same 1.000 clients have lots of options. Lots of figures to choose from.
And all being equal???? Each new figure will get 10% of the market at most.

Resulting in the content creators also "only" selling 10% if they build for that one particular figure.

And V4-M4 's days are not over yet.

THE figure that will put V4-M4 aside has not been born yet.
THAT figure really will have to be special, more then special.
And only the creators of that figure can make it popular enough for the content creators to kick in.

If the creator can not make his/her figure performant/popular enough to push V4-M4 of their thrones, V4-M4 will continue to be the most used figures and content creators will continue to build for the figures that bring the most money.

It is not enough to build the best figure and put it out on the market.
The creator HAS to start a marketing/hype to get his/her figures popular enough to get the momentum going.

I admire all efforts, I humbly kneel down for all figure creators. It is a damm tough job to build a new good figure.

But even the best efforts will need “a hype” to get off the ground.

You do not make/build 2.000 support items overnight to get your new creation attractive to users/content creators.

And it will take a lot more, to push V4-M4 aside.

But ?? I do see a change over time.

Some years ago, when a new figure came out, the first question in the forums was: "How many poly's does she have?"

These days the first question seems to be; "How does she bend".

Perhaps in the future that question will change again to:

"How user friendly is that new figure".

And secondly:

"How content creator friendly is that new figure."

Let us all hope so.

A "user friendly" figure will be used.
A "content creator" friendly figure will be build for.

Vilters-

I know this may sound a pedantic point, but V4/M4 did have competition, just not viable enough competition as it turned out. I think Daz got their specific formula with V4/M4 just right enough for the time and marketplace conditions that existed (and perhaps that still exist) at the time. There were figures that had some features that far excelled V4/M4 that were released before them, and that in some ways may even have inspired the form that they took. But in their entirety as figure packages they weren't good enough to compete in the final analysis.

I agree with much of the rest of your post though, particularly the market analysis. It's a reality that sometimes quickly released products (relative to the time it takes to produce any kind of figure) tend to dilute rather than enrich a market and the resulting competition of this nature doesn't always provide the end user with what they really need or want. I think this has long been the case with Poser native figures.

@Corodan
We fully agree then.
Lets lift a glass to: "The user firendly figure".

Like you, I prefer a single mesh, with exelent poly distribution, making it very morphable.

Pretty much I think, although I prefer higher poly figures and I'm very demanding when it comes to morphs these days - they have to be realistic, well referenced (JoePublics point). And how many expression morphs have I seen lately that have been little more than an after-thought.

Yes, I prefer lower poly but with good poly distrubution and topology.

With weightmapped re-rigging and Smoothing ON, Lower Poly figures have become very usable not needing high poly figures to get soft skinned, well bending body's any more .

In my case anyway.

its in pretty poor taste to have a discussion like this in someone's figure announcement thread. whether you like Sixus1's figures or not, they represent a lot of hard work on his part. if you want to have a long philosophical discussion on the failings of Poser figures and how you think they should be done, start a new thread and show the guy some respect.

Disagree.  I've seen many threads in the past about specific figures turn into discussions about all figures.  If I were the creator I'd be happy that the post stating 'HumanZ Are Coming' was staying at the top of the forum.  I'd be happy as well that the content of the thread hadn't petered out to kitten discussion.  As much as I love 3d - the community is a difficult lot.

Now about that figure.  I liked it a lot too.  I remember when he first started working on that stuff, impressive how far he has come.  I agree with others about the Iris, to me that is not useable.  I do like the rest of the face.

To be fair the thread was neither started by Sixus1 nor was it an official announcement of his figures here. I don't see anything poor in taste about anything we've been debating here.

In fact, I don't even see a post made by Sixus1 in this thread.

I don't think it's disrespectful. Especially since he's not even the one who started the thread. Does he even post here anymore?

Disrespectful would be bashing his figures without lending constructive criticism. 

I would welcome that sort of discussion in my own thread, as long as it stayed relatively on topic and provided an overall consensus of what people wanted in the figure(s). It helps to keep the thread alive and allows more people passing through to be aware of what is in development, etc. 

I like the most recent shots of the female compaired to the previous shots he posted. The eyes look better, even the overall shape of the face looks better.

~Shane

The latest pics of the Female figure look good, but I really don't see myself needing any more female human figures at the moment. With A3 and V4 and the several tons of kit I have for them and another few tons of stuff I've converted for them I'm not in any danger of wearing them out just yet. :)

I had a bit of an "Ooooh! Shiny!" moment with GND-Anastasia and I'm struggling a bit to find enough use for the poor lass so far.

I think I'm more interested in new figures sort of the other way round.... if a load of great stuff comes out for the figure then I'm likely to buy the figure to go with it. And I do like that witch hunter kit.

I see no problem in asking for, and discussing; "user friendly, or content builder friendly" figures in a polite, open and honest way.

There is a pletora of new female figures on the scene, I will probably get this one because I'd want the matched set--the male and the female.

Wow, I must have that witch hunter outfit :P

Laurie

Quote - I don't think it's disrespectful. Especially since he's not even the one who started the thread. Does he even post here anymore?

Disrespectful would be bashing his figures without lending constructive criticism. 

~Shane

Shane what good is lending constructive criticism to someone that you said does not even come here? I thought constructive criticism was suppose to help someone? If that was truly your intent why didn't you join in on the discussion on RuntimeDNA?

Les comes here. It's not like he never visits the place ;). He just hangs out at RDNA more since his stuff is in their store I guess. But he does post here.

Besides, there's critque and there's opinions and I guess opinions is more what we have here. Everybody's got one, good or bad...hehe.

BTW Lilwolff, I was just playing with your Koshini things the other day. I dug her out of my vault...lol.

Laurie

I agree on that score.  To me those would be the foremost things I'd like any figure creator to have in mind.  Passable modelling is actually not overly difficult from my experience, so a figure that is easier to take from modelling for to 'usable poser content for' is going to be very likely to get my support and I bet many others on the content side of things.

One thing where the Humanz will have a bit of extra help is that, from my understanding, sixus has more uses for the figures than just selling them to poser users, and as his other projects generate content he plans to release it to the poser crowd as well.  Having that established content support should help.  

I'm not 100% sold on the figure.. but I do quite like that outfit she is wearing 

Quote - I see no problem in asking for, and discussing; "user friendly, or content builder friendly" figures in a polite, open and honest way.

Quote - > Quote - I don't think it's disrespectful. Especially since he's not even the one who started the thread. Does he even post here anymore?

Disrespectful would be bashing his figures without lending constructive criticism. 

~Shane

Shane what good is lending constructive criticism to someone that you said does not even come here? I thought constructive criticism was suppose to help someone? If that was truly your intent why didn't you join in on the discussion on RuntimeDNA?

Uhm... what?

I didn't say he doesn't come here. I asked if he still posted here. Two different actions, and statements.

I was neither bashing his figures, nor attempting to lend any real constructive criticism. I simply expressed my own opinion - denoted by the word "personally" - in a thread of several others also expressing their opinions. And most of what I did say about his work in my two little posts was positive. 

I've never posted anything on rdna and only pop over there briefly when I come across something of interest.

~Shane

If another modeler told me I needed to study anatomy to improve my figures I would  appreciate them telling me just where, in their opinion, my figures were off. Then it would go from being an opinionated remark to being rather helpful....

But Hey that is just my opinon and as Laurie says everyone has one. 

Oh Gawd Laurie! I haven't looked at my Koshini in ages. But I can fondly remember how much fun she was!