I have Poser for quite a while know and i was wondering if we will ever see a major update for poser. I know curios labs is not so big as adobe for example but I think there are still many things to fix in Poser(Yes I know its easy to say i you dont have to programm it) For example what about collisiondetection.It took me 2 hours to render a dancer just to see her leg coming through the skirt. What about the possibility to tell your figure just to grab something... What do you think or does anyone know more than me. thanks Gustav P.S.Before I get to many mails about replies about that English is not my native language so please excuse the errors and dont post about them.

Collision detection will be in Poser 5, as will a better renderer. When we'll actually see Poser 5 is another matter for debate.

I've had Poser 4 and patch working for 2 1/2 years, about as long as it has been out. The patch fixed a lot. And I too would like to see some fixes, improvements and new features. BUT, I have still not mastered all there is in this versatile program. Not all features are of primary interest to me, but I would like to be competent in all, if not a master. Besides posing and scene creation, there is Lighting, Animation and Walk Designer, Magnets for morphs, the incredibly versatile Sketch Render designer, and so on. Wow! that's a lot to get to know. And I don't even have the Pro-Pack. I'll wait til it's all in P5. So, I'm not in a hurry. I can wait for Poser 5. I am sure it will be as cool as P4 once was after P3.

I am starting to doubt that we will ever see Poser 5 unless a company with more resources (time and money) aquires Poser. When Curious Labs aquired Poser from MetaCreations almost two years ago I was excited. Now, I wish a REAL software company would have purchased Poser. I have given up waiting for Poser 5. If it ever does get developed, I will be one of the first to purchase it, just as I was for Poser, Poser2, Poser3, and Poser4. But I seriously doubt we will see it. I think the whole Poser5 hype from Curious Labs is just a smokescreen to keep milking all they can out of Poser4 through news sales and Pro Pack updates. Just my opinion.

It is being coded in India at this time.

Somehow, that sounds like a load of ____________. Poser 5 would be a nice thing, however I take the same view as rwilliams. It would be nice for it to come but I doubt it really ever will, CL now seems full steam ahead with avatar lab and being compatable with adobe's atmosphere. I tried the demo and was impressed but not enought to continues using it or buying it. Mega-super-cool-uber chat is not what I want from 3d. So I would say, get pro pack for that is as close as poser5 is ever going to coem to being reality.

It is being coded in India?! I had some visions pass through my mind that I stifled.... What's wrong with having the work done in the US?

I just don't understand people saying they doubt Poser 5 will ever come out. To me that sounds more like a "sour grapes" type of statement than a logical well thought out thing to say. Curious Labs bread and butter IS POSER. Most if not all their resources are geared to that one product. It takes A LOT of time to develop a FULL version release. Patience! Unless you have some sort of inside information from Curious Labs, I suggest you hold off on all the doomsday talk. You can bet your 3D Virtual Farm that Poser 5 will be released and it is going to be great!

Ah ... software is now a major business in India, and they have some VERY good programmers. The big advantage for India is that it's 12 hours time difference from the US - so they work during what for the US is nighttime.

Now, I wish a REAL software company would have purchased Poser.<< That's the last thing I would wish. The big companies aren't interested in pushing a product unless it has potential for selling to nearly every computer user in the world. Poser will remain a 'niche' product, though its market (I'd guess) is at the larger end of 'niche'. Curious Labs doesn't have the massive resources of a Microsoft, but with only two or three major products in its stable, it does have the motivation to give full attention and focus to Poser.

Pardon my confusion, but what would it matter if India's daytime is our night time? If the job is being done there rather than here, it shouldn't matter. Unless maybe they're working on it here and there. Then I'd worry about too many hands in the pot.

Unless Santa Cruz has become a new Indian province (in exchange for Kashmir?), there is no coding taking place there. Aside from that, I can't and won't comment :-)

"Collision detection will be in Poser 5", gee, are you sure? I'm not even sure if this could be done on a PC, except perhaps on the basic figure only. Thinking about conforming clothing, some of which will load already in collision, I don't think this is even do-able. I'm starting to think like rwilliams. If it comes out great, I'll buy it, but I'm not holding my breath. AS to being coded in India, the mind starts to boggle! ;-) "And it's Din, Din, Din, Gunga Din Your a better software coder (or at least a cheaper one) than I am, Gunga Din! When you heart is in your mouth and your debugger is going south Poser 5 may never come out- Gunga Din" Apoligies to Kipling!

I had visions of poor people with turbans on their head, and cows wandering around outside. (sacred animals) Not too clear a picture, but it seemed funny at the time.

Jim:

The comment I made about collision detection was in reference to the "physically driven, dynamic draping system" kupa mentioned in a similar thread two months ago. If it doesn't use a form of collision detection, I don't know how else it could be done. kupa also dropped a few tantalizing hints about the Poser 5 renderer.

Link to the thread in question

Curious Labs bread and butter IS POSER And I will remind you of MetaCreations, who apparently woke up one morning and said to itself, "Bryce? Ray Dream? Poser? Feh! Why bother?" and promptly sold off all of its 3D software to other companies. Now MC is a tiny little niche company that... well, to tell the truth, Im not sure what if anything it does now. Just because something is a companys strongest suit doesnt automatically mean the company knows which side is buttered.....

I do not know anyone that is a part of Curious Labs, but I get the feeling that Poser is not their primary source of income. I often think they probably have day jobs and fiddle with Poser code after real work is over, hoping to some day be able to do what they love to do for a living. If you think this is far fetched, think about it. Whenever a thread like this comes up you NEVER see any reply from a Curious Lab contact. Yet when other types of questions arise, many times they jump in and help. Do you really thing that nobody from CL has seen this thread? And if they have, why haven't they jumped in to clear it up? After two years in the making, you would think they would have been able to show us something. A screen shot, or some fancy rendered scene, or something. But to this day I have seen nothing, and I miss very few posts in the Poser Forum. Just think about it for awhile and then make your own conclusion.

They could tell you... but, of course, then they'd have to kill you. Surely you don't really believe that folks like Underdog, Allerleirauh, Zorbak, Anson, Mobius, PANduRUS, bushi, Sherlock, Hafeli,& TriMax all just got burned-out and left? Suspicious, Very suspicious. Methinks they knew too much. Excuse me, there was just a rapping at my chamber door.

Ummmm....not to bum out those who thrive on negativity, but this thread has in fact been seen by someone at CL (nosfiratu). You'll note that he took a "no comment" stance, but this does not surprise me as most software developers don't go around broadcasting their business plans and trade secrets on the internet (at least, not if they're smart). Moreover, as Little Dragon points out, kupa (and you just don't get more CL than kupa) has dropped a few hints here about P5 in the past. Could they come up with a neat screen shot for us? Sure, but would this accomplish anything other than a ratcheting up of complaints about P5 not being ready yet? Frankly, I applaud any software company that actually does things other than hype their vaporware. What is CL doing? Well, as this thread and others show, after rescuing Poser and hooking up with the Germans, they did ProPack...and I expect that that experience will pay off for P5. And AvatarLab. (start your own company, get backing and code 2 products in how long a period of time? You try it!) And slowly, but surely, P5. And if they take their time, maybe P5 won't need a patch. BTW, in anticipation of cynics, not only am I not affiliated with CL, I do not know anyone who works there, have never spoken with anyone there, never had e-mail with anyone there, and, to the best of my recollection have never directly addressed CL folk in this forum (but I haven't used the search function to verify that because R'osity has been slower than Uncle Joe for me the last 2 days). I just thought I'd volunteer some defense and let CL keep coding.

This is just some guesswork based on my experience building software. Since Poser 5 is supposed to be a major release, figure 1 year to 18 months from the point your developers finished the last major project (which would probably be the pro-pack and the SR's for it). So, you're looking at some time this year as a SWAG by my reckoning. The year to 18 months comes from a normal development cycle for a major program. Figure n months each for requirements analysis, design and prototyping, coding, test, integration, fix and rework, beta testing, etc. As for collision detection, I don't know if it is in Poser 5 but it would be doable for a single CPU PC in the 450 MHz plus speed range. Certainly in an animation/rendering mode and quite possibly in real time or near real time for the GUI. Again, that's based on some work I did at my day job.

figure 1 year to 18 months from the point your developers finished the last major project So that's why MS never has a decent operating system... =)

"I don't think this is even do-able" Collision detection in close to real time is very do-able in reasonably modern systems... a real time physics system called "Havok" does it now and is used in several of the larger 3D software systems (3DS Max for one). So dynamically draphing clothing in P5 on a PC would in fact be possible.