3-DArena posted at 3:29PM Fri, 08 January 2016 - #4247237

DreaminGirl posted at 4:45PM Mon, 04 January 2016 - #4247221

V4 is not the only model out there for Poser.. Ever tried making something for Dawn? The interest for her is growing, actually

No V4 is not the only model for Poser, but the most viable one.

Yes I did create for Dawn, I've actually created for most figures (except Scarlet) in the almost 15 years I've been doing this (including commissions for CP for Miki and Sydney). Not much for Dawn left in my store as they went through clearance. Despite that, I have been keeping an eye on Dawn but have yet to feel that she is the next "go to girl" for Poser. When I don't see much coming out for her offered by her own creators it doesn't garner a lot of faith in the model. When said creators worked with V4 there was a lot more support on their end, be that staff created outfits or commissioned/buyouts. I don't see that support for Dawn and if they don't see a value in that it doesn't encourage vendors either. There are a few things for her I've considered, and I haven't ruled her out yet, but I'm not currently compelled to create products for her as they have not paid off for me in the past (and from what other vendors discuss it didn't pay off for others either). I've considered a few items for her, but have not really been inspired to do so yet.

For example at Hivewire there are 189 clothing items for Dawn in about a year and a half, 42 of those are bundle/stack products which makes them redundant listings. Of those only 6 are Hivewire products. Yes there are those by their exclusive staff/vendors, however if the company itself isn't supporting Dawn beyond 6 products I'm not sure how much interest there is, not enough for Hivewire to create more themselves, or commission or do buyouts. After all these are the same people that made DAZ what it is today. They have the same marketing staff and they know how to be successful. I actually know and like most of their current staff and have worked well with them in the past, I'd love to see them succeed with Dawn, you have no idea how much I wanted to see that.

There are some beautiful dynamic outfits for Dawn that I personally adore but again, it's not Hivewire items, the lack of which is my concern regarding Dawn.

I'd love to respond here to this. The issue is about resources for us. We are a small team. I get the feeling that folks think that HiveWire is larger then we really are. We are 2 business partners, that being Lisa Buckalew and me. We have Paul that produces content and our rigging and packaging up. Alisa is over quality assurance. So we have 3 people producing content, and juggling other business matters such as store and forum and managing artists and the like.

We'd love to be able to commission content for our figures, and to do buyouts, but we don't have the resources to do that. There are other companies that when they have a product planned they can garner a large pool of artists, plus buyout a ton of supporting products to carry that product forward. We can't do that... yet. So, we simply do what we can with the resources we have. We work long days and thru weekends to move our dream forward and to attract the support that we can. And we are attracting support. If others don't create for Dawn or Dusk or Baby Luna or for our horse, then we have to do that, and we're happy to do so, and we do and we will continue to do so.

We produce quality products and continue to add advances and versatility with each HiveWire product. As we balance products and efforts on several base figures, we're also trying to broaden our base with new figures, such as our HiveWire Big Cat that is currently in the works, and our new ponytail hairstyle that will fit all our figures. We're also doing several other animals such as our Asian adult elephant, baby elephant, toon elephant, mule deer family, bighorn sheep, Spanish bull, milk cow and still others. This does not mean we're abandoning Dawn or Dusk. We will continue to develop for them also. Our Dawn SE product was released in August. We don't release a new female character every other month or so like some others might, and are pressured to do so to meet month over month revenue goals. Dawn is a strong base and as people recognize that and apply regular, steady efforts to support her and other figures they will steadily attract support.

Dawn is our baby, we will never abandon her. At the same time we don't see ourselves only producing content for just one figure. If we only crank out stuff for Dawn, then we neglect other figures or find ourselves not pursuing other figures that can and will over the long haul increase the base of HiveWire. So we strive for balance. Last week we released a head morphs product for Baby Luna and just today followed that up with an Expressions and Visemes product for her.

We are fortunate at HiveWire to have other very strong artists creating content for our figures. Laurie Prindle/CWRW is currently working on maps for the mule deer, our stylist Unicorn named Whisper and is committed to create the maps for our Big Cat/Leopard/Panther. She has very recently submitted a character for Dusk named Rodrigo which is gorgeous. That should be in our store next week. Our western tack for our horse is going to beta on Monday, and work on rigging our Shetland Pony breed will begin on Monday. Ken Gilliland is of course producing his birds and other products that take flight. He has 2 new moth sets out very recently, and they're beautifully done. Lully continues to create dynamic clothes for Dawn and we are eternally grateful for her doing so. Virtual World is about to submit another beautiful character for Dawn. Three other artists have characters in progress for Dusk and you can see those on our forums.

Trust me when I say that we're marching forward. Our store is strong, our new forums are up as of this week and they're rich with features. Products are advancing, and the Hive is alive and moving forward, maybe not at the expected pace or focus that others wish for, but you can expect to see a steady stream of quality coming from the Hive in the year 2016 and beyond.