DreaminGirl posted at 2:04PM Mon, 11 February 2019 - #4345820

LaFemme looks very much like my cousin, especially the jaw (and the eyes). My cousin is not a neanderthal thank you so much.

Funny thing is, the default face looks very much like one of my cousins, too.

For the record, she's not neanderthal, either. That said, current research suggests we all have a number of neanderthal genes. :)

The irony here is that Neanderthals actually had pretty weak chins compared to the strength of their brows.

llynara posted at 9:21AM Mon, 11 February 2019 - #4345805

Haven't had a chance to catch up on this thread, but here's a test I did, with postwork. Still struggling with grain in Superfly. La Femme is gorgeous and worth the effort!

Beautiful IIynana! You're getting there with Superfly.

Let me tell you that you have a very narrow path to success then...

Looks a lot like Scarlett Johansson to me. Eyes and chin should come close with the included dials, for the rest I would use the Morph Brush or ZBrush.

qaz posted at 11:08AM Mon, 11 February 2019 - #4345832

Blackhearted posted at 9:10AM Mon, 11 February 2019 - #4345817

qaz posted at 6:15AM Mon, 11 February 2019 - #4345806

Ok, this is going to come across as figure bashing, but that is not my intention. This is an awesome figure. It is easy to make morphs for, it bends well, the HD morphs are great, BUT there is a big problem in the face department. It is not a good base for creating new characters. I have tried to create a better base, but so far failed - see results below. Her brows are too high physically (not the eyebrow texture as someone suggested), The eyes are too large and in the wrong position. The poor girl is cross eyed. The girl has a jaw a Neanderthal would be proud of. Women's jaws are small due to lack of testosterone. These are mostly correctable, but the low density mesh makes it difficult. The mouth though is a real problem. It looks like it belongs on a puppet. There are holes on either side of her mouth. I have failed to correct them. The success of this figure will depend on getting this sorted out. Now it may be that only HD morphs are going to fix this, and I believe BH said he was going to show how they can be created. Also I can't at present move the eyeballs independent of the face. Is that to do with switching off JCMs or something ? I'm more than happy to share this for free, if I get some help. I want this to succeed, but we need to get the most important part of her body up to V4 levels.

This is a 100% subjective opinion that reads like a total bash post whether you 'intended' to or not. Her 'success' depends on correcting her 'neanderthal jaw'? Not sure how on earth that's not a bash post?

Look at the image I just posted. People have different sized eyes, and I'm not even going to post a pic of Anne Hathaway because that would be too easy (AFAIK she is a human being). LaFemme's eyes are smaller than V4's eyes. Eyes focus on objects and are always slightly crossed depending on what distance object they are focused on. Her base eye geometry is 100% perpendicular. There's a 'cross eyes' dial which can be dialed in either direction to focus them. If she's crosseyed in your renders that's user error. Like I posted earlier noone should be using 'point at - main camera', thats a very lazy way of posing eyes and always results in the 'dead eyed' poser look.

Those 'holes on the side of her mouth'? It's called a commissure, and people have them. Lips don't just sprout forward from the surface of the face.

When you select a body handle there are two sets of side-side/twist/bend dials that do totally separate things: try them. If you use the move tool and just drag the handles around that moves one set of dials, the other has to be changed via dials. For example if you select the corner of the mouth and move the chip around it's changing the twist/narrow-wide/up-down dials and influences the cheek as well, if you go into the parameter dials for the chip and change the right-left/lower-raise/in-out dials you get a totally different kind of control. Add the 140 injectable morphs and there is little you can't do with it. There are morphs included that can raise or lower the brow however you like, or you could simply grab the body handles and lower it.

The funny thing is if you compare her base head to V4 they are actually similar in proportions:

One notable difference is that LaFemme's eyes are deeper set. If you don't prefer that look then it's easier to address than any figure to this point since you can just select the eye and use the depth/height/shift dial to set it up the way you'd like - that also moves everything else including her eyelids/lashes/tearline/etc. And (I'm starting to sound like a broken record here) there are also morphs included that do this.

It's a base figure. I've been morphing figures for nearly 20 years and her base shape and mesh resolution reflects exactly what I would like to work on as a base if I'm morphing a figure. It's very flexible, a huge amount of morphs are already included, and I'll be working on an HD morphing tutorial just as soon as my mic arrives (I'm sure noone wants to listen to me on my tinny laptop mic).

If you need help changing something I'm happy to help (time permitting), and I'm sure Denise is too. "Hey, I prefer a weaker chin, can you help me out?". Id have sent you a morph already instead of posting this.

But passing off a subjective personal preference as 'this is a grotesque error that needs immediate fixing or the figure will fail' is not exactly constructive, nor will it illicit a constructive response. Especially when it's in reference to a free figure that people are supporting in their free time.

So, yes my opinion is subjective. I am however trying to be constructive. Some will agree with me, some will not. Here is a character with fairly exaggerated face proportions. First face is V4 out of the box. Eyes too big, eyes too wide, face too wide, The last face is the one I'm trying to create, but the face proportions are way to individual to be any use a base. What i want is the middle one as a base for figure development. AVERAGE facial proportions. In my opinion for what its worth, I think the proportions of la femme are closer to the one on the right. For La Femme to be a success for me, I need to be able to recreate (nay, improve on !) the character on the right. Is this possible ? Can you help me ?

It is a BASE model. There are over 140 face morphs included with La Femme. Look in the Pose folder for the injectors.

To edit the base model geometry at this point will not only affect any content and morphs that have already been created for inclusion with the figure, but could also affect content created by vendors since she has been released.

And to be honest, if you think the one on the right is exaggerated, I suggest you check out Scarlett Johannsen photos because that was the first real person that came to mind with that morph.

PS ... according to my DNA results I am 2% neanderthal. LMAO

qaz posted at 10:11AM Mon, 11 February 2019 - #4345832

So, yes my opinion is subjective. I am however trying to be constructive. Some will agree with me, some will not. Here is a character with fairly exaggerated face proportions. First face is V4 out of the box. Eyes too big, eyes too wide, face too wide, The last face is the one I'm trying to create, but the face proportions are way to individual to be any use a base. What i want is the middle one as a base for figure development. AVERAGE facial proportions. In my opinion for what its worth, I think the proportions of la femme are closer to the one on the right. For La Femme to be a success for me, I need to be able to recreate (nay, improve on !) the character on the right. Is this possible ? Can you help me ?

Sure, but you'd make my job easier if you morphed it at least part of the way with the dials and face chips.

I will say though that those brows are startlingly low. I won't say impossibly low because there are over 7 billion people on this planet, but they're low. You seem to be going for a Scarlet Johansson kindof look but even hers aren't that low. That is definitely not 'average' and there would be no room to do any upper eyelid/eye morphs under that.

But if that's what you want and it's not achievable with dials then send it over and I'll help you out.

Blackhearted posted at 10:33AM Mon, 11 February 2019 - #4345843

qaz posted at 10:11AM Mon, 11 February 2019 - #4345832

So, yes my opinion is subjective. I am however trying to be constructive. Some will agree with me, some will not. Here is a character with fairly exaggerated face proportions. First face is V4 out of the box. Eyes too big, eyes too wide, face too wide, The last face is the one I'm trying to create, but the face proportions are way to individual to be any use a base. What i want is the middle one as a base for figure development. AVERAGE facial proportions. In my opinion for what its worth, I think the proportions of la femme are closer to the one on the right. For La Femme to be a success for me, I need to be able to recreate (nay, improve on !) the character on the right. Is this possible ? Can you help me ?

Sure, but you'd make my job easier if you morphed it at least part of the way with the dials and face chips.

I will say though that those brows are startlingly low. I won't say impossibly low because there are over 7 billion people on this planet, but they're low. You seem to be going for a Scarlet Johansson kindof look but even hers aren't that low. That is definitely not 'average' and there would be no room to do any upper eyelid/eye morphs under that.

But if that's what you want and it's not achievable with dials then send it over and I'll help you out.

They really are that low, and you could cut yourself on her cheeks. That chin is just ridiculous ! I'm not really getting my point across. Yes I agree that the middle figure is not a good base. It's just a half way point between standard v4 and the complete morph. The brows are so low that even the average is "off" A decent base would have the eyebrows higher and the lips and chin wider. The Scarlett you see is a combination of dial spins and a morph I created in a separate program.

Now, I'm not looking to recreate her in La Femme just yet. I want to know what I need to do to recreate morphs like this in La Femme. I want to get to see if I can get a base that I am happy with. I need to be able to position eyes and mouth in morph creation software (like Zbrush, though I don't use Zbrush) and then move eyes, teeth, tongue to fit afterwards. I have been spoiled in having a high density mesh to sculpt with (V4) and I am failing to make the adjustments I want in base resolution La Femme, so I'm keen to see how you can create HD morphs. Cheers

Here's the thing about Scarlett Johannsen.

She has EXTREMELY exaggerated facial features. And the other challenge about creating an accurate morph for her is her face shape has changed over the years. If you look at her younger pictures her face is softer. As she is aging, it's getting more angular. If you want an accurate morph of Scarlett, just finding good consistent photo references is a huge challenge.

As far as "Is it easier to create Scarlett in V4", no, not really. There are two images in my gallery of an attempt I made in 2007, and even that morph took me three days.

Three days. With V4.

Earliest attempt here:

Scarlett 1

Final attempt here:

Scarlett 2

Given the challenge I've stated above, with the strength of her features and the difficulty in finding a set of photo references from the same date, Scarlett morphs prove to be challenging with any model .... even V4.

Oh ... and because of her exaggerated features the morphs won't stop there. You'll need custom smiles, custom phonemes, custom expressions. BECAUSE her face is so strong.

All that being said, I managed to get at least this far with about a half hour of dial spinning with the morphs included with LaFemme, some of Gabe's high res face morphs to add a touch, and the facial chips for a little bit of expression. Granted, it's not perfect. But like I say, the V4 morph took me three days by comparison. ;-)

Preview window. Not final render.

bantha posted at 1:21PM Mon, 11 February 2019 - #4345738

operaguy posted at 3:20AM Sun, 10 February 2019 - #4345693

[bantha]

1. "La Femme's base mesh is very light weight, but since it works that well with SubD, it's relatively easy to add even the finest detail to the mesh, as long as your machine can handle the polygons. V4 has [too many polys]" -- True, if that slows you down, a lighter-weight base is better.

V4 has too many poles. Poles are points in the mesh that cannot be smoothed by subdivision. I even linked a thread in it which explained what poles are, where to put them, what their problems are. Too many polys isn't what I meant. "Unsuitable geometry" would be better to describe it.

With a figure like La Femme, you can have a low poly figure in the viewport, saving memory when it counts and making posing more fluent. Still you can render a high detail mesh in the final render. You can reduce La Femme's subdivision in the viewport without any differences in the render, V4 is much more polygon heavy than this. Still you will get every detail from Blackhearteds HD morphs when rendering. Try that with V4, it will not work quite as good. The mesh wasn't built for subdivision.

5-pointed poles are not a problem in most cases - provided they're used sparingly and placed properly. Every mesh has poles, they're unavoidable. The bad poles that should be avoided at all times are the 6+ pointed ones, which are what older figures like Miki and the G2 series are riddled with. And they're always avoidable just by redirecting the edgeflow in those areas slightly. Often it's due to the mesh being too dense to begin with. You should only add geometry where the shape you're trying to achieve requires it. When you have more geometry than what you actually need, you start running into issues where 6 (or more) pointed poles(stars) start appearing. But this really only applies to organic shapes and doesn't really matter with hard surface models for the most part, since they generally aren't being rigged and posed. But even with that, only add geometry when you need it to achieve the shape you're aiming for.

Well... I thought that something with La Femme is VERY not average. So I grabbed an average white american image (one of the multi-person-average-images) and...

The only really not-average thing seems to be ears position. And a bit too narrow/idealised face and neck. But nothing that included morphs can't do.

The big point is, everyone has their own idea of "beauty". LaFemme is versatile enough to let most folks get close to that "Ideal Beauty". No-one will ever be really satisfied, but that's Life. That's what the Advertising industry makes it's money on. :)

Beauty. Not difficult really.

Letterworks posted at 3:05PM Mon, 11 February 2019 - #4345853

and none that do it with included dials

Morris' Angela for S4 at DAZ3D (Snooki Polizzi from Jersey Shore) is entirely dialed using S4 and Morphs++, but of the many, many characters I've purchased, that's the only one I know of without a single embedded morph target for the head.

Except for the clothes, this is all in the base pack. Fitting morph for Pauline's Amy hair, standard skin, standard face morphs. Ugly?

You can create fully new characters with just the default La Femme resources. This young lady was spun up from the injection morphs that come with the free base.

Default skin map with SSS. Only the default morphs, no face chip manipulation. Juno Hair by Biscuits. Firefly render with GI settings.

::::: Opera :::::

I finally got a chance to work with Le Femme, and I have to say I love it. Great work. now to see where my imagination can take her.

stallion, what is that hair model?

That is AlfaseeD DesirHair nice hair model has lots of movement morphs

Thanks for responding ... yikes, looks like it is an RDNA orphan. Not in Alfaseed marketplace here.

Here I just changed the facial morphs. The texture is the same, which still makes them similar. But the morphs are very versatile, even without morph packs.

I should have moved the llower teeth a little bit in the upper image. No time to rerender right now, too late for editing anyway. Hmpf.

So a critique if I may - since I've seen no one else mention it. Probably just an oversight during the development/rigging process but the weight maps in her wrists need some adjustments, as the current weighting creates an unnatural crease when her hands are bent down. The mesh pretty much collapses in that area leaving a very unnatural pose. Ideally there would be an additional edgeloop or two right at the wrist in order to give a bit more volume for weight painting, but since adding them in now would break all existing morphs, just some additional weight painting and perhaps a small jcm to bridge the gap should help. It's an easy fix and could safely be added to an update without breaking compatibility with any existing content.

I fixed them here in about 5 minutes, just using the weight brush on Add, and adjusting the bulge map strengths somewhat. Took longer to put the images together than it did to make the corrections on the weights.

Also, the bend limits are too low, (in my opinion). Most human wrists bend about 85 to 90 degrees up and down without external force pushing them further, but LF's wrists only go to -75 down and 60 up, with limits turned on. Adjusting them to at least -85 and 85 would be more natural.

Anyway, hope this isn't misconstrued as 'bashing' since I demonstrated how it could be corrected. May seem insignificant to some while others might be turned off by it. So, hope it helps.

Next stage of development of my pic. Worked on finalizing the cloth: increased the resolution of the mesh and did some controlled adjustments of the drape, in MD. In Poser, I have been working on the face.... using the control points plus the morph tool. The reference image is odd (and limiting, as there is no side profile to check against): the front part of the face looks long and narrow, but the jawline is soft and round. I still need to perfect that.

@AmbientShade

The wrists have troubled me as well. Your fix looks excellent.

RobZhena posted at 10:53AM Tue, 12 February 2019 - #4345941

You have been more than courteous to @qaz. Hmm. What do you get if you flip the q upside down?

Hah, I didn't notice that.

Either way it's best to get the preference thing out of the way. It's a base. There's a $#!@ton of redistributable morphs included, fully working scaling, body handles, etc -- so if someone doesn't like it, change it. Then give that change away, sell it, or keep it for yourself and gloat. You're free to do either.

What? Don't you think i'm beautyful?

@qaz ,Why not liberate yourself ,from the decisions of others, and and develop the modeling skills to sculpt your own custom face morphs??.

As an animated filmaker I wanted a CG version of my good self based on the Daz genesis 2 BASE male for animation in Iclone

The Genesis 2 BASE male looks nothing like me by default.

That is the purpose of a generic base model.

However like any other BASE model , he has been reshaped to look very much like me ( I am told) with my custom morph sculpted in MODO.

I make all of my clothing as well ,conforming & Dynamic

Modeling is not that hard if you really apply yourself It is a skill well worth learning.

ghostman posted at 1:35PM Tue, 12 February 2019 - #4345952

What? Don't you think i'm beautyful?

LMAO. You funny! LOL

wolf359 posted at 12:40PM Tue, 12 February 2019 - #4345959

@qaz ,Why not liberate yourself ,from the decisions of others, and and develop the modeling skills to sculpt your own custom face morphs??.

As an animated filmaker I wanted a CG version of my good self based on the Daz genesis 2 BASE male for animation in Iclone

The Genesis 2 BASE male looks nothing like me by default.

That is the purpose of a generic base model.

However like any other BASE model , he has been reshaped to look very much like me ( I am told) with my custom morph sculpted in MODO.

I make all of my clothing as well ,conforming & Dynamic

Modeling is not that hard if you really apply yourself It is a skill well worth learning.

Nice work ! I do have those skills, spent years developing them and my intention is to do exactly that. What you are seeing here is people who are being a bit sensitive, and have jumped into defense mode at the hint of a attack on 'their' figure. I think its an excellent figure, and I want to give it my full support.

Reading through the comments it is obvious that If you try to please everyone, you end up pleasing no one. (Aesop’s Fable, “The Miller, His Son, and Their Ass“.)

I am having a jolly good time getting to know this gal and using her in some scene work. I am certain she probably has a few kinks, but over time they will be addressed. Just glad to see that Poser is finally getting the attention it deserves.

I'm not sure I even get what the argument is anymore.

La Femme has enough geometry in her face that any shape you want can be made from it if the included morphs don't meet your needs. You should definitely be able to get close to what you want with combining those morphs, spawn them into a new morph and then continue building up from there if you need to. A morph is not the base shape. It's a morph. You can use it as your own base shape if you want, and then build characters from that new morphed shape. The difference is that if you intend for others to be able to also use those characters then they would also have to have the morph you built them off of. There are other characters in the store(s) that work that way. One example is Anastasia and Shae. Anastasia is a morph of the Alyson base figure. Shae is a morph of the Anastasia morph. That means she requires Anastasia in order to look and work as intended.

But the zero base La Femme shape cannot be altered at this point without having to adjust all the morphs that exist for her, and that would just be ridiculous. No base figure is ever going to satisfy everyone. That's why we make morphs.

Ug, you've let one person ruin an otherwise productive and celebratory thread. Maybe ask a moderator to come in here and split those posts to something else so the last four pages aren't a bunch of muck.

JohnDoe641 posted at 4:11PM Tue, 12 February 2019 - #4345983

Ug, you've let one person ruin an otherwise productive and celebratory thread. Maybe ask a moderator to come in here and split those posts to something else so the last four pages aren't a bunch of muck.

This constant stuff is one of the reasons I don't come here much anymore. :( I'm just trying to follow along and instead gotta wade thru "You said THIS" "I did NOT say that!" garbage. Urgh.

Laurie

I do have those skills, spent years developing them and my intention is to do exactly that.

Excellent !!

So why make multiple posts debating with people about the Base shape not conforming to some culturally biased ideal beauty standard ??

Make your scarlet johansen (or whatever morph) ,in a modeling program, and be done with it.

Those of us ,with actual modeling skills, and access to the required tools can achieve our character type & content objectives, pretty easily.

No debating or begging at the doors of other creators, needed.

LaurieA posted at 4:59PM Tue, 12 February 2019 - #4345993

JohnDoe641 posted at 4:11PM Tue, 12 February 2019 - #4345983

Ug, you've let one person ruin an otherwise productive and celebratory thread. Maybe ask a moderator to come in here and split those posts to something else so the last four pages aren't a bunch of muck.

This constant stuff is one of the reasons I don't come here much anymore. :( I'm just trying to follow along and instead gotta wade thru "You said THIS" "I did NOT say that!" garbage. Urgh.

Laurie

Correct. This should be a promo thread. Technical issues should go in another thread. If mods here had the ability to split threads that diverge in topics that would be awesome. I tried to get them to add that feature back when I was mod but no one understood what I meant.

LaurieA posted at 3:58PM Tue, 12 February 2019 - #4345993

Your avatar looks pissed off

The prefitter has an extension for La Femme now. I tried it with some clothes from V4, and while it's not fully automated it does 98% of the job.

I started out doing a La Femme wrestling tag team today, then I ended up in this room somehow instead. LOL.

Go figure. I already had a damn fine spanking this morning too!

LOL. I'm kiddin'.

TheDarkerSideOfArt posted at 7:13PM Tue, 12 February 2019 - #4346000

LaurieA posted at 3:58PM Tue, 12 February 2019 - #4345993

Your avatar looks pissed off

LOL....she is I guess. The image was of a female warrior ;).

Laurie

Qaz-please let this go! Now as to the La Femme team- can we have Ghostman's morph as the base figure? It's closer to my ideal. I REALLY have to get over my reluctance to dive back into Zbrush. I just hate relearning what I already knew. Five years on. Ghostman-I did similar characters for the Dawn base in Zbrush. Here's another as a possible "base" for Dawn. :-) Dawn was lacking in Reptiloid Gecko People so I made one in Zbrush. :-) ghostman posted at 7:08PM Tue, 12 February 2019 - #4345952

What? Don't you think i'm beautyful?

OK. Now you're both brats.

(I've called Ghostie that before, he knows I like him LOL)

BUT ... that morph would definitely put "animated joint centers" to the test LOL

bantha posted at 2:06AM Wed, 13 February 2019 - #4346004

The prefitter has an extension for La Femme now. I tried it with some clothes from V4, and while it's not fully automated it does 98% of the job.

A prefitter... where did you find that? Nice image by the way.

I've read about it at the SM Forum, IIRC. I think it was here as well.

The Prefitter is a figure with fitting Morphs for several figures. You load your garment into the Scene, conform it to the Prefitter and copy the fitting Morphs to your garment. You unparent the garment and have a fitting Morph for the figures you selected in it. Without parenting, you dial in the Morph in the otherwhise zeroed garment and it will mostly fit your zeroed target figure. After that you can use the Fitting Room to make it conforming.

This work better than fitting with the fitting room, because the Morphs in the Prefitter are created with Marvellous Designer's Cloth Simulation. It does not move the Cloth like the figure would move but rather how a garment on the figure would move. The results aren't perfect, but way better than with the fitting room. Usually some strokes with the Morph brush are needed to correct the garment where the Transformation isn't perfect - you do that before the fitting room.

I do have ZBrush, I used to refit my clothes with that, but the Prefitter saves me a lot of time to get the clothes 90% correct. For me it's wll worth the Money.

Link to the Prefitter

Link to the Extension for La Femme

bantha posted at 2:51AM Wed, 13 February 2019 - #4346034

I've read about it at the SM Forum, IIRC. I think it was here as well.

The Prefitter is a figure with fitting Morphs for several figures. You load your garment into the Scene, conform it to the Prefitter and copy the fitting Morphs to your garment. You unparent the garment and have a fitting Morph for the figures you selected in it. Without parenting, you dial in the Morph in the otherwhise zeroed garment and it will mostly fit your zeroed target figure. After that you can use the Fitting Room to make it conforming.

This work better than fitting with the fitting room, because the Morphs in the Prefitter are created with Marvellous Designer's Cloth Simulation. It does not move the Cloth like the figure would move but rather how a garment on the figure would move. The results aren't perfect, but way better than with the fitting room. Usually some strokes with the Morph brush are needed to correct the garment where the Transformation isn't perfect - you do that before the fitting room.

I do have ZBrush, I used to refit my clothes with that, but the Prefitter saves me a lot of time to get the clothes 90% correct. For me it's wll worth the Money.

Link to the Prefitter

Link to the Extension for La Femme

Hmm, interesting. Thanks

Why is the Prefitter "Legacy Discounted Content"? It sounds like it's still being supported.

Is it worth using even if you don't use Marvelous Designer?

The Prefitter is still supported. It was migrated from Content Paradise, maybe that's why.

You don't need MD for it, just Poser. MD was used to create the Prefitter. There is a version with the MD files, but you only need that if you have MD and want to create more fitting morphs for different figures. Most people will be happy with the base version.

I've described the workflow above, no MD in it. Just Poser. Load, conform to Prefitter, copy relevant morphs, un-conform, load target figure, dial in the morph, fix remaining Problems with the Morph Brush, make conforming with Fitting Room. No MD in this workflow.

Works for hair and most boots as well, according to the description. I've just made clothes up to now.

Official Documentation

Thanks, bantha. I might try it. The price is sure right.

Thank you all, for giving permission to include your wonderful renders.

This one is for y'all with hugs!

Thanks for the Welcome!

Blackhearted posted at 4:31PM Wed, 13 February 2019 - #4345811

llynara posted at 6:13AM Mon, 11 February 2019 - #4345805

Haven't had a chance to catch up on this thread, but here's a test I did, with postwork. Still struggling with grain in Superfly. La Femme is gorgeous and worth the effort!

Very nice.

You can get around the grain/slow rendertime by reducing the amount of unnecessary samples in your render.

Keep in mind I am not a technical person, so if anyone wants to correct me or add info by all means, I'm all ears. I achieve results through sheer stubbornness and patience, so my way may not be the best way but this is how I rendered all of my promos. This has no transparency, transmission, etc. SSS and emissives seem to be controlled by the diffuse samples so you will get those. Eyelashes and refract shader eyes will render black. I render my scene like that then bump up settings and re-render the eyes/lashes with high transparent/transmission bounces and caustics turned on using Area Render to draw a small box around the eyes and the immediately adjacent area they will affect with bounced light/shadow.

This brings me to the hair. Even a midrange PC has a lot of cores/processing power available these days - not to mention modern GPUs. However people have been spoiled by making hair for biased (ie: toy) render engines like Firefly and we've reached a point where any sort of optimization has gone out the window. We're stripping figures down to ~20k poly base meshes and then loading ~300k poly transmapped hair with a half dozen 4k maps and thousands of individual transparent strips stacked 20+ layers deep. This is not ideal. After 20 years of development there ideally should be a working strand-based hair engine in Poser, but failing that there should be some attention paid to optimizing hair for a good balance of realism and rendering speed.

In the meantime you can get around this by rendering the scene with the settings above and then going back and Area-Rendering hair with about 6 max transparency bounces (if necessary going back and spot re-rendering any spots that may still remain dark). This is still much much faster than simply turning up all render settings and taking 10 hours to render your entire scene.

But people have been spoiled by using biased rendering engines for years. Remember the mass protests when Poser added Firefly and D|S added Iray, while people were still learning to use them. The Poser 4 rendering engine was an absolute POS, and the only reason it was fast was because it was wildly inaccurate, and both the P4 renderer and Firefly further sped up by 'cheating' due to Poser's small scale: items in the scene were so microscopically tiny that the renderers were discarding a lot of scene information and thus rendering faster. For years I used to squeeze better renders out of them by scaling everything in my scene up to 1000%, with a significant boost in shadow quality but also in rendertime. But quality renders take time -- a high quality ~2000x1500-ish render always took me between 2-10 hours whether it was in Firefly, Iray or Superfly. Good results take time, there is no instant gratification when it comes to indirect lighting.

I'll typically do a few dozen small, grainy preview renders while I tweak lights and pose, use area render to check areas like the eye focus/highlights, feet/hands properly in contact, etc, and then just leave the final render going while I go do something else, watch a movie or sleep. In the final render if something is amiss like a tiny spot of pokethrough I didn't notice in the preview I can fix it and spot-render that little area in a minute.

Thank you for your suggestions, Blackhearted! I hadn't thought of spot rendering problem areas. Lots of good info. Will put it to good use!