hi Laurie,

personally i don't think it's that hard to figure out, it's just hard to explain to people who don't have the background talents to do the figuring out.

It reminds me of a discussion with some manager: driving a car is not hard, changing the engine is not hard, changing the tires is not hard and slipping along a row of pilons is not hard either. But changing the engine as well as the tires while driving and slipping along the pilons all at once is a challenge.

The same holds for Poser: it goes from physics (cloth mechanics in Cloth Room, Optics and materials / light interaction in Mat Room and Render) to math to program coding to user interfacing while at the same time the manual should address the user input - working process - render output in a way that is easy to grasp for non-tech non-math visual artists who did not desired a carrier in quantum astrophysics for a reason.

That requires a very serious bunch of skills in the technical writing department, and those skills are very rare as you can tell from about any manual from about anything you buy, or from (looking at the teacher in) most math and physics classes in average highschool.

That exactly is what this thread is all about. For the "teacher" explaining reality without math is like talking to the deaf without using his hands. For the user it's like a Roman Centurion trying to understand a US Drone Controller fighting Taliban from his home office. There is a mental gap. It can be bridged. That's the challenge.

At least for me it is. Just my view.

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Usually I'm wrong. But to be effective and efficient, I don't need to be correct or accurate.

visit www.aRtBeeWeb.nl (works) or Missing Manuals (tutorials & reviews) - both need an update though