A project I was contracted to do required a casual figure in an office environment.  Before modeling the props I decided it was probably a good idea to use standard dimensions for desk height, chair footprint, etc.  I know there were/are disagreements over Poser's units, but I also felt it only mattered that I pick one and stick with it.  I opted to use Fire Angel's Measuring Tools as the 10 foot rule exported easily into Wings where I'd be modeling the environment props.  Noticing that I had begun a number of characters over the years using different base figures I found it handy to add the 10 foot measure to my base scene to make it easier to gauge relative figure proportions.

With EZSkin I found I frequently needed a quick way to save the older materials that EZskin would overwrite, usually to copy the original's diffuse colour to the new material's alternate diffuse channel (not saying you should do that, just that I do it).  My solution was to add three more materials to the ball prop, and check it to invisible.  This gives me a handy dummy object to temporarily store/compare four materials while running mat scripts etc.

My ground plane is a farily basic ground texture with a gradient transparency over a grey background colour.  This gives a pseudo fogging effect that looks good when creating/modifying figures.  I use a single infinite light and (probably) ran the image gamma and/or Render Firefly scripts along the way.

I just thought I'd share this set-up as I don't hear much discussion of default scenes beyond how to delete Andy or some other such initial customization.  I'm interested in what other users have changed to make Poser more useful for their way of working.

Sounds like a good set up, I too use an invisible ball prop to hold materials ( I have one that I made in wings with several material regions). I use a default lighting set up of an infinite preview light with diffuse and specular disabled, a raytraced shadows spot in front and back, and a diffuse fill point ( all except the infinite are set to off by default). Starting to get to the point where the envirosphere might make it's way into the preferred state as I end up using mostly IDL with one infinite, though.

The Hierarchy editor is always open as I've found this to be the most expedient way to manipulate things in poser.

ps. like the gradient trans map on the ground plane.

i always start with blank scenes -- always have.  but i don't do projects like you have.

NUMBER ONE TIP:  once you get the pp12 pieces anchored where and how you want, for heaven's sake, turn OFF their ability to tear off.  i can't tell you how many times i've accidentally torn one out of place and had a devil of a time getting it back where it belonged.  (though i suppose the ui dots can help with that.  still.)

also, moo...  i'm using ezskin 2 (dunno if that is different), but to get the original diffuse colour chip into the alternate diffuse colour chip, i just click the alternate and sample the original.  is your ezskin actually overwriting the original diffuse chip??  (mine doesn't.)

Quote - NUMBER ONE TIP:  once you get the pp12 pieces anchored where and how you want, for heaven's sake, turn OFF their ability to tear off.  i can't tell you how many times i've accidentally torn one out of place and had a devil of a time getting it back where it belonged.  (though i suppose the ui dots can help with that.  still.)

 also, moo...  i'm using ezskin 2 (dunno if that is different), but to get the original diffuse colour chip into the alternate diffuse colour chip, i just click the alternate and sample the original.  is your ezskin actually overwriting the original diffuse chip??  (mine doesn't.)

I had the problem of my floating preview wanting to dock, but I don't know if I disabled it or not.

Yes, EZ has been replacing the diffuse colour with white.  Maybe there is an option I overlooked...  (I am using EZSkin2 also.)

I cleared everything out of my starting scene. no ground, no figure.

I do have it set for highest render setting and with my preferred working lightset loaded (4blue eyes Classic IBL)  so I dont have to do that over and over.  I do a lot of clothing creation and other things where the less stuff in the scene the better.

Lyrra

It may have no practical benefit, but I actually find it more inspiring than the default infinite empty space.

Here's what the ground shader looks like.  Not really sure why I have the reflection node connected, it isn't set to do anything.  It works well over grey with an infinite light, and also looks nice over black with spot or point lights.

My default is similar to Lyrra's. I have an empty scene with no visible ground, my preferred lights and a very quick custom draft render setting.

I wonder if there is any penalty to having SSS, IDL, and displacements enabled vs. disabled when nothing is using them?  I'd assume not.  I leave most everything on by default, as I tend to be careful having that stuff the way I want it for each prop and figure in my library.  I generally prefer quick over quality, but start with high quality settings and then turn the settings down as the scene becomes more complex if the render time starts going up.

First off I did the standard sort of stuff. Set up the elements of the Pose Room UI the way I wanted them, then saved a UI Dot. Then I did a few alternative layouts, like maximum size Document Window, and one with the Joint Editor open, one with the library pallet open, etc, and saved UI Dots. Also set up UI dots for the Material Room.

Killed 'Drag-Docking Enabled' on most things.

Set up the GROUND to diaplay normally.

Set up all the cameras the way I wanted them, longer focal lengths, Hither at zero, etc.

I added a cross-hair prop as an aid to positioning. Outline display style, and transparent so it does not show in renders.

When I make character morphs, the arms often get in the way of viewing the torso, so I made a pose to hide the arms, hands and fingers, and saved it as a read-only Pose Dot. And another one to show the arms again.

I added a set of custom orthogonal cameras that are easier to position, as the Poser ones are a PITA! The basic idea is six locked cameras parented to a prop. The cameras are then positioned by moving the prop. Once I have the prop lined up in all three dimensions with the point of interest, and scaled appropriately, all the six  cameras are also lined up and zoomed by the same amount. It's got its downsides, but it beats the hell out of the Poser orthogonal cameras, IMHO.

P.S.
I too like your ground shader affect.

Typical empty scene/ preferred lights, but my "trick" is settin' the animation slider to 15.

I use dynamic cloth a lot, & because I tend to pose/ shape my figures before clothin' them, I can easily revert to zeroed pose/ morfs by slidin' back to frame 1 when I'm ready to add clothing.

Quote - Typical empty scene/ preferred lights, but my "trick" is settin' the animation slider to 15.

I use dynamic cloth a lot, & because I tend to pose/ shape my figures before clothin' them, I can easily revert to zeroed pose/ morfs by slidin' back to frame 1 when I'm ready to add clothing.

So you make all of your modifications on frame 15 and use the scrubber as an undo fader?  That's just crazy, son. 

I take it you aren't one to be bothered by draping dynamic clothing...  I, for one, hate every single moment that anything looks wrong.  I could never do things like grow a figure into its clothing or drape anything from a T-pose, because I find the interim steps to be creepy and aesthetically unappealing. 

Ground set to shadow catch only.

Two render lights: 1 white IBL for fill, one infinite Sun for shadows and specularity. If I need IDL, I just disable the IBL.

Eight additional preview lights (which don't render) as I want my OpenGL preview to look as realistic as possible. After all it's what I'm looking at most of the time.

No hardware shadows as they stopped working on my machine with SR1. They made OpenGL slow as molasses anyway and looked very ugly, so no big deal.

Default render settings that make a "good enough to post in the forum" render in a few seconds, but I have several other presets saved, too.

Of course I have dozends of different lightsets, but this is my "standard- day" lightset and I tried to make the preview as close to it as I could.

And yes, all eight lights are needed. I can get an OK-ish preview with three or four lights, but as the lights don't render anyway, I might use as well all eight. :-)

i keep the heirarchy open too, docked under floating library.  one day :hopes: a dual monitor setup for the library.

i try to make a gui skin by changing colors. and added keyboard shortcuts to my favorite menu commands in the xrc file.

haven't found a way to make the font bigger on the parameter dial palette?

Bagginsbill's envirosphere set to a neutral grey gradient

2 lights - 1 Infinite, raytraced shadows, 1 Diffuse IBL, same gradient as the Envirosphere.

1 single poly plane, positioned for Ground, with my own reference texture on it.

see attached example...

I placed Bagginsbill's light meter in my default scene.  It hasn't helped me learn to light things better so far, but now I can more easily see just how overlit my scenes really are.  :lol:

This is my set up. While I've got 2 monitors my desk is over crouded so the second one is off to the side so I don't use it as much as I would like. The scene has only the ground and BB's environsphere. The sphere has an image called whiteroom.hdr on it. It gives ok reflections and lighting without adding much color. I have it set as outline becasue I like to have the backfacing polygons on and it sometimes gets in the way. I have 5 lights, 4 of which are infinate and have the diffuse and specular turned off so they don't render but are just to help me see the setup. The fifth light is a point light set so it gives ok renders that don't need special lighting.

Guess I'll sort all of those morphs out neatly one day and share them as an INJ for my HiRes Plane freebie, like I said it's my multipurpose sketchbook for the time being.

cool morphs there primorge :thumbupboth:**
**

Thanks pitklad! Coming from you, that is very flattering.

Once you have things the way you like, make backup copies of the Poser.ini, Poser UI Prefs and preferredState.pz3 files.  That way you can easily restore your settings if things get wonky.  You can also backup RenderPresets and dots.

Be Well,
Rªnce

My default is nearly identical to moogal's.  On a 1080p 39.5 inch monitor my document window size is 1300 x 742.   I tried different default arrangements but after using the same default for years I would instinctivly move the mouse to where what I was looking for was somewhere else, so I changed it back and left it that way, never changing it since. :)

Les:  Very interesting idea of making 6 orthogonal cameras that work together.  I'm always frustrated by those cams when setting joint centers and such.  Think I'll copy the idea in python!

Mine is a empty scene with the ground off and my favorite light set.  I have two monitors so one carries the library plus the panels for Netherworks Camera Panel Plus, Light dots and Render dots, Shaderworks Figure Manager, Document Display Style, Parameters / Properties and Light controls are also on the second monitor.

I use a 3D Navigator and used in conjunction with Camera Panel I have no need for the Poser camera window so this is not visable.

All this leaves on the main display is the main preview window with the editing tools down the left side and the animation/frames control along the bottom.

Pretty much default layout, ground plane off, one infinite light.  Camera moved in Z to have M4 almost go from bottom to top.  Then I do everything else depending on what I'm going to render.

Doric