"I know this effect can be done in Poser..."

     Oh, yeah;  I'd bet money that it can be done.

     Creating a poseable surrounding aura is not a trivial task;  Rokket wisely realizes this.

     An alternative -which I have not tried- would be to use a duplicate doll parented/conformed to the main doll.  Set materials for things like inner mouth, etc. to be invisible.  For the outer surface (exposed skin, clothes, hair), try adding a constant* and fairly large displacement (this gives you an envelope) and use the ambient edge blend as the texture.  Worth a try.

*  If the outfit is a "second skin" displacement & texture applied to the doll's skin, then just add the second skin displacement to the constant displacement.

Poser 12, in feet.  

OSes:  Win7Prox64, Win7Ultx64

Silo Pro 2.5.6 64bit, Vue Infinite 2014.7, Genetica 4.0 Studio, UV Mapper Pro, UV Layout Pro, PhotoImpact X3, GIF Animator 5