Just a note:

Nobody has really addressed what's going on in the "Market" and the typical demographic's... time and how they consider a new purchase.

Poser is very easy to use and very good at what it does - Still Rendering. This appeals to a select group of people with some segment also desiring animation rendering capabilities, which it also does fairly well. There are even commercial users who like Poser's quick and easy animation rendering with a wide base of content, but that's probably because either "That's what they already have" or "They can't afford to hire out for more heavy-duty production capabilities."

Where do "new users" come from? Mostly, it's going to be those that saw a pic somewhere rendered in Poser that they liked. There's painfully little brick-and-mortar shelf-space out there and almost all electronic media has flown to the net.

That means a much more even playing ground with competitors competing across a very wide segment. There's lots of rendered pics out there from lots of engines. (How many potential first-purchase users interested in 3D have ever heard of the "firefly engine?" Zero. Well, maybe one or three, but that's about it.)

So, the guy that saw the pic he liked which was rendered in Poser? Well, he may have done some other image searches and has seen stuff rendered in a great many other programs. Poser doesn't have "box competition" to back it up any longer. Now, it's competing with "results", for at least one demographic. There is no limited "shelf space" on teh interwebz...

But, take a look at the typical demographic  - Mr. User." What else are they interested in? If they're interested in "animation", as well, Poser isn't going to be top of a google search on "animation programs" is it? And, if it did pop up, what are the animations going to look like when compared to other products that "do the same thing?" (Remember, they're a neophyte, they know very little about the capabilities or intellectual requirements of the programs they're drooling over.) So, Mr. Possible Poser User is bombarded with things like the Unreal Engine or Unity or even Blender and he gets to thinking...

"I like animations. I like cool pictures. I like games. I like boobs. Can I have all of these?"

The answer is, of course, "Yes, Mr. Possible Poser User, there is a Santa Claus and you can have all of these things."

Mr. User is torn. He's making a purchase decision, but he's also making a decision concerning his time. He can only spend so many hours a day using his new toy, so what is he going to choose? And, even if he choses Poser, will it satisfy his need for those things that Poser doesn't do or those things it doesn't do well. Mr. User has diverse interests, after all, and if he likes cool still pictures, he probably like moving ones, too. And, if he likes all of these computer graphic thingies, he may think he could program a game or three or model 3D figures and create something that rivals anything produced by a professional studio! (Mr. User is typically a neophyte and doesn't do much research beyond an image search.)

Now, let's add in the younger demographics. They're pretty savvy, when it comes down to graphics and 3D. (Compared to a few years ago.) Their addiciton is also heavily supported by the most popular applications out there. They can get "free" and very powerful software, like Blender (Let's not talk about its UI) or they can even log into their Steam account and grab some development tools for their favorite games. They can get something like Unreal and start mucking around with the stuff that they really love. Where's the attracttion for Poser for that segment? Where it that segment's "creative spark" generally pointed?

I don't know if Poser's user base is shrinking. However, I am certain that their target audience is shrinking. Those are two different things. Poser's target audience is budgeting its time and its attention and, right now, Poser is not very strong at commanding either of these for users who have access to other tools or even newer ones. "Why spend a bunch of time learning Poser when it will never be able to do some of the things I want to do? I can do laser blasts and boobs in Unreal! So cool... bewbs..."

(A Note: Don't think so? Count the number of vidyo gamez with bouncing bewbs... Case closed - Poser bewbz don't bounce unless you really work hard and spend a lot of time making them bounce. You want Poser boxes to fly off the electronic shelf? Add real-time in-window rendering for soft object dynamics, like bouncing boobs, for Poser 2018 or something. They wouldn't have the bandwidth to support the rush to the servers.)

In order to escape the enevitable doom of a shrinking audience, SM has to expand its product's capabilities. (Remember, that's a "shrinking audience", not a "shrinking user-base." The audience is more important, long term, since it is what limits the possible number of new users. )Right now, Poser is exactly what it say's on the non-existent box "A posing and rendering program." That is no longer enough. It will shortly be "not enough" in the next year or so, without good innovation or extreme polish. Poser has to diversify its capabilities in order to compete. And, it's worth noting that is "only to be able to compete." That does not guarrantee it a place in the market, that only expands its potential in existing markets, where it will still have to compete with other products.

Honestly, Poser will be around for awhile, yet. But, it has to adopt capabilities that other programs are already ahead of the curve on. Either that, or it must radically improve it's already targeted capabilities, like import/export functions, integration with development tools and work-flows, animation, rendering, accurate real-time rendering, content generation, increased object modeling and manipulation tools, etc... in order to rise just high enough to get noticed and to renew the current segment's interest in still-shot and pure motion animation rendering with easy content management and content expansion.

I like Poser. I enjoy Poser. But, I don't enjoy the fact that if I put my time into a game dev engine, I could have a richer experience in modeling and rendering as hobby and my ceiling for that experience isn't as limited by the program I'm currently using.

 

PS- By the way, how, in this day and age, can one have something called an "animation package" that doesn't do particle effects? And, why is that? Is it due to limitations or is it a cost/design consideration? Medicine can be expensive, I know. But, if I don't buy it when I need it, I might die... Poser needs accessible particle and lighting effects, pronto, quick-like, in order to "wow" audiences, old and new alike.