What is all this fuss over? And why is this forum not being used constructively? This looks like childess attacks which make you no better then the ones you accuse of wrong doing! GROW UP Poppi and the rest of you who make fun and degrade this site. This site doesnt have to post your art! And I can go to the bathroom to read crap! Support your administrators!

Katrina... calm down. It's okay. And there is a valid complaint here. While I do not agree with some of the points raised, I, myself, have absolutely no respect for the Hot 20.

i have just one question for everyone here. ANd I want you to all stop and think about it and give me a clear answer Why is the HOT 20 so important? Do you really and honestly think some one who is coming here to find the next and greatest artist is looking only at the HOT 20 and nothing else? Answer me that.

I dont! I give a hoot about the hot 20. I like the art. the pure beauty of it, The hot 20 can be just a popularity contest. I get such pleasure in visiting galleries of the artists who pour there soul into this.

Yannow... I think I've looked at the "Hot 20" all of ten or twelve times in the past year? So, from my point of view, Stormrage, it's NOT so important. The Freestuff section and the galleries themselves are far more important than the "Popular 20"

CryptoPooka: "Trends. (...) Spies and assassins -- check." I feel a need to react: I can assure you that my assassin is in no way connected to any trend. First, it started as something else, as is usually the case with my pictures. Second, I generally don't cruise galleries and I don't know what's in them. I'm on a modem and downloading great number of big pictures is a pain. Third, I did a search in the galleries to see all the assasins, and after a couple of pages, I see mine is different. It's a male, kinda. Fourth, it's also different in being in Bryce gallery ... well, I'm not certain whether to post the link, but here it is anyway: http://www.renderosity.com/viewed.ez?galleryid=278129 Everybody, feel free not to view it, if you think this is blatant self-promotion. Finally, I may be jumping at shadows. If I am, I apologise. Karma: "Renderosity should have a protection where you can't right-click (internet explorer), or whichever and save-images and steal them." The ONLY way to protect your picture is not to put it on the Web. (Or put a great big watermark all over your picture, but noone would be able to see it then.) Once it's displayed in somebody's browser, it's impossible to prevent anything.

Same old rehash except for one brilliantly bizarre note, Hisminky blaming the Renderosity admins for his/her not getting published. Now, I'm waiting for Al Gore to blame his election loss on Tipper's hairdresser. If a publisher is going to dismiss someone's work based on the tools used to create it then or what other people have done with that tool, then blame that person for being narrow minded, ignorant or just plain stupid. If anyone has the main responsibility for promoting Poser, it's Curious Labs. That's why they have galleries displaying what they consider some of the best art created with the program. Of course, they do have at least one naked lady in there so perhaps they too fail to realize the heavy burden of their responsibility.

just posting to uncheck the damn ebot spam thing thing.

I've found a simple solution to getting illustrations published that were done in poser and vue. Don't tell the publisher how you did it until they have accepted the work. I've been asked what medium I'm using, had pieces mistaken for airbrush work and had one editor convinced I was telling him fibs when I said that it was entirely CG without any post production. I'm not even using custom models most of the time. Just the Daz figures, hair and cloathing with a few props and scenery I've built myself. I tend to tweak the textures which helps to give them an original look. I do spend quite a lot of time making each figure look like an individual so they don't suffer from looking like the same old Mike and Victoria models straight off the CD.

Well there you go, after all these years I thought that art was about expressing ones self, and not about getting to the top, or moaning about who was at the top of a "hit parade". Geez, the "Hot 20" means absolutly nothing, people! As I said before there are more important things to worry about. If a piece of art impresses me, I will always take the time to send a personal email to the artist...that alone should mean more to an artist than a "Hot 20". Can you imagine going to the Tate Gallery, and having a wall showing the top 20 paintings for that week...NO! Enough said ;o) Cheers

Same old rehash except for one brilliantly bizarre note, Hisminky blaming the Renderosity admins for his/her not getting published.<< Either you misread my posts or you deliberately interpreted them wrong just to sound quasi-informed. I've BEEN published, and been paid for it as well. As far calling the person who writes my paycheck as being stupid for thinking Poser is a program to create porn, exactly where are they to get a clue otherwise, as this is the largest Poser site on the web?

"Can you imagine going to the Tate Gallery, and having a wall showing the top 20 paintings for that week...NO!" That would be pretty hilarious though. :)

I do feel pretty sorry for people who need to have friends vote for their image. Sad to see that they need that kind of self-assurance. And yes, the poser hot 20 is corrupt, it should be removed.

I guess I'm the only one not bothered by the idea of friends voting. That's what friends do, and I don't think anything would eliminate that. It's not as if we have many people who are trained art critics on the lists so I'm not sure I distrust the opinions of my friends anymore than I would distrust the opinions of strangers. I invite my friends to view my graphics....they aren't members so they can't vote (nor would I ask them to) but I do like to share what small accomplishments and progress I have. That's just natural, and natural for friends to vote for friends. Not horrific. Not the collapase of the universe. Natural. The Hot 20 just isn't that important. If someone feels compelled to do something that gets them on the list, then let them have their fun. It's meaningless and hurts no one. Is it corrupt? Well, no more so than anything else that encourages random voting. No one has to post in the galleries. I just don't get the point of people telling us over and over again that they don't (especially when they make a point of telling us their art is too good for the likes of us....that really is unnecessarily insulting). If you post anywhere on the Internet, you take the risk of getting ripped off (whether or not it is your own website, whether or not you have right click disabled, whether or not you splash watermarks and copyright notices all over the graphics). The Internet is not a civilized place. Since it goes out to the entire world, policing is a very difficult thing. I don't have a great solution, obviously...it's just something we all have to be aware of.

well, what i'm getting at is that it's ok for friends to vote for your image.. if they truely think it deserves it. Not telling a friend they have to vote for an image or just out of courtesy. It should come from the heart of what you think is good, not by someone telling you to vote. Images should be quality NOT quantity! Putting out 3 images per day would be quite difficult if it were to have quality. Instead there are people who are just cranking out images left and right, a figure standing in front of a backdrop staring into space like a vegtable. I personaly think an image should come from the heart and that you try to put all your effort in it. It's not a contest on how many you can post per day or how many views you get.. Really it should be for your own personal satisfaction, but originality is quite lacking these days...

When I go to a real art gallery I don't vote for art pieces, no thumbs up or down. To vote is to compare and something's always lost in the comparison. I try to become the work, to feel what the artist was feeling, to hear the sound of the brushes on the canvas, to breathe in the dust of the sculpted stones. It's a privilege for me to vieuw a work of art, not the other way around. If you speak to me with respect you may get my attention, if not, you won't. Hot 20 or not. Q

It's all a matter of taste. There are people who really like to create and stare at the staring figures. I don't know why, but they do. And I am not sure I'm the one to criticize them. The best advice anyone gave here was to ignore the voting, ignore the hits, and do what you most want to do without letting the popularity contest get to you. Frankly I can spend hours and hours on a single graphic and still have it come out looking like amateur night in the Poser lounge. I just don't have the ability of other people here. Speed doesn't mean lack of ability. Spending time on a graphic doesn't necessarily result in quality. It's just different levels of skill for different people. We have to accept that people with wildly different interests and abilities are trying to coexist in the same gallery, and the result is going to be a little chaotic. But there are some very interesting graphics being posted. Sort through the identical pictures and you can find some thoughtful creations. That's what I wish we would focus on. The Vickys in the Temple get all the advertising. Why not do more promoting of the original spirits on the galleries?

Dialyn, When I meant quality, it should be an image that you want to create. Not just putting images out to get views or what is popular i.e. naked vicki's (i'm not trashing nudity, but really it should be something tasteful in my opinion, not soft porn). I understand that renderosity hosts a wide range or artists, postwork shouldn't be everything. Postwork isn't the quality I was talking about. (Heavily postworked poser images should be in mixed medium anyways!) It should be an image that comes from you and your feelings. But somehow it seems like the artists that constantly post images each day, nonetheless 2-3 PER day usually make images that I often dislike (i.e. female standing about with no expression or reason to be standing there). But that is my opinion. Anyhow, you're right, the best advice that came out of this string is to "ignore the voting, ignore the hits, and do what you most want to do without letting the popularity contest get to you."

Karma, I agree with many of your points....though I probably feel less strongly about postwork than most people. I'm not a purist about such things, but that's just me. I've looked at your gallery and you obviously put a lot of thought and heart into your graphics...I wish everyone did the same. All I can say is that if people paid more attention to the carefully crafted and created graphics, then we might see more people inclined to put more time and energy into each graphic. Maybe if no other good comes from this thread, some people will be inclined to check out your gallery and discover the treasures there. I know that wasn't your intent but it would be a good investment of their viewing time. :)

I almost missed your response between all of the hair-pulling and name-calling. I'm going to have to be embarassed here and admit that I have no idea who you are, Erlik. But I'm a good girl and just looked you up. I think we got our wires crossed somewhere before you started defending yourself. I wasn't talking about gallery image trends at all, but the similarities in goods that show up in cycles (a segue from dialyn and Poppi's earlier posts about the sled). You're jumping at shadows. ;) As to the rest of your post about trying to protect images on the web ... ugh, I have to agree with you. The only "safe and sure" method is not to show it to anyone. I'm starting to think that use of the internet should hinge upon a mandatory study volume when you first hook up your new computer, with a test afterwards and you have to pass to get anything other than the most basic connection required to send the test and registering your software and system. And a mandatory psych exam while we're at it. Jeeze, people, switch to decaf already.

Absolutely no need to be embarassed. I usually hang out over in Bryce forum and started coming here only since I got Poser 5. Sorry for misunderstanding you. BTW, are you talking about an Internet driving exam? If so, I'm all for it and been advocating it for some time. :-) Anyway, I'm going to jump into the fray: Dialyn: "Speed doesn't mean lack of ability. Spending time on a graphic doesn't necessarily result in quality. It's just different levels of skill for different people." Speed doesn't have to mean lack of ability and can mean a higher level of skill. But I know several artists/illustrators/animators in RL. None of them creates three good finished images in one day. Yes, of course, it can happen they were working on a couple of images and the end of work coincided, but it's an exception, not a rule.

did i notice? no, i have a life ;) okay, not MUCH of a life, but more of one than to bother worrying about the top 20 and who votes for what.

"Yes, of course, it can happen they were working on a couple of images and the end of work coincided, but it's an exception, not a rule. " Heh, this is what caught me recently. I had a project tossed my way, and money is money. I put aside several pieces I'd been working on in favour of cash. When the project was done, I had two or three "near" finished images that I'd been doodling on in rare free time when I needed to unwind. Sudden flurry of Pooka postings, followed by the usual gap. But 3 every single day? Gack. They must have at least 8 hands and as many computers. I'm jealous. :)

Well, if they are doing 3 very fine graphics a day, then they aren't doing anything else. Actually, I was thinking more along the lines of the fact that I could work on a graphic for a month and not necessarily have anything wonderful to show for the time invested in it. While three a day may seem too many for doing quality work, for some of us even one a day would not result in improvement. Does that make sense? And I'm not speaking of anyone but myself when I write that. I am so plateaued that if I only posted once a month, it would be too many for someone looking for improvement. I'm just saying that time spent does not automatically result in quality work. That's all.

well....having your friends voting you into the hot 20 is a "grey" area, at best. TROLLING ANOTHER'S GALLERY, AND BRINGING DOWN THEIR RANKINGS IS YET ANOTHER. That is what happened to me, today, while I was at work. I certainly hope that the admins fix it, quickly. i even got a "heads up" nastygram, informing me...or, rather alerting me that something could be horribly wrong. NOW you see the calibar of the person we're dealing with here? here's the little "heads up" nasty gram...and, yup.....she must have gone through and given my pics the most stinko rating you can find cause some of them went down 2 levels. Subject: up yours Instant Message from RNKarenER: thanks Miss Honorable, I needed a good laugh~~after I saw your gallery I had a real snicker! Have fun trolling, but you wont bother me in the least (Sent 12/9 08:38) [Reply] [Reply & Delete] [Reply & Archive] [Archive] [Delete]

Karma "Renderosity should have a protection where you can't right-click (internet explorer), or whichever and save-images and steal them. The moderators should really try to give us a little more protection there." no right click is a javascript, and can be circumvented by not having javascript enabled on your browser. a nocache header for ALL of Renderosity would solve the using the cached image files. I know that Boris and Julie have a good system, if you right click it will allow it, but you get a heavy watermarked image. I think that is done with a redirect. both of these are SERVER configurations, not scripting. the nocache can be scripted into the headers for every page on a site. ( look at how much work that would be ) hmmm....if the upload script was to make a "thumbnail" and store that for display, with no cache activated, and at the same time "watermark" the image with the Artist's name, that is what people would get when right clicking and saving as... ~wandering off thinking about how that would have to be coded...~

Poppi, Something similar happened to me today too, except I didn't recieve an IM like you. I checked in on one of my images and it had dropped 2 rankings too. And guess who left a comment? Yup, RNKarenER. She left an alright comment, but I'm pretty sure that she gave me the worst ranking availible to drop my image. I thought she wrote something to this effect "Personal attacks on others are both unprofessional and are hurtful." Who's the immature one here??

i notified jeffh about this. it is just for her to do stuff like that...i just got an im from yet ANOTHER member who actually pulled their gallery...and, miz karen did the same to her. what a piece of work. i think you should be sure and let a mod know about what happened...you can link to this thread, if you like...and they will see you aren't the only one...i wrote to jeffh about this. it is definitely against the tos...no grey area, this time.

Hmmmmm, seems to me these personal attacks are getting out of hand. Ladies, calm down. as a member of renderosity I sit and watch this go on and have to think " are these professionals" Just a thought as a fan.

Posting to remove the e-bot notification.

Trolling, what a weird term. So in other words if someone actually has a comment that may be anything other than beautiful and lovely they are condsidered a troller? Trolls are such ugly creatures, I wonder how this came about? Wonder why they did not call this a goblin or gremlin? Why do people not want to be told how to improve their images? And then they call names like troll and spite those that may offer some advice by getting them back which would then make them a troll too? I don't understand. I looked at the top twenty and cannot understand myself why so many images are similar. Some are absolutely great, others are so, so, and it is the fact some are not at all the best they probably could be that I wonder about. Should these not be the best they can be? I am not an artist myself so I may be flamed for this because I have no work to share. I just happen to enjoy art galleries and art forums and like looking at the visuals they offer on display. If a non artist like me can see mistakes or art that is not better than many in the gallery that perhaps should be on the top twenty instead, then maybe there is a problem? Does anyone else feel this way too? Will I also be a troll now for saying this? I hope not.

You're not a troll if you comment on someone else's graphic. You're a troll if you make personal attacks or maliciously spam another artist ... if you are not making constructive criticism but harrassing another individual. At least that's my take on it. Nothing you have said would qualify. Generally, but not always, people who open their artwork for comments are hoping to learn what you like and what might be done to improve their graphics.

Hisminky, whatever dude. I did get that you've been published. Good for you. I stand by the assertion that anyone who would look at your work and then say, in effect, "OK but I've looked at Renderosity so this is porn," ain't right bright. Where else should they look? I did a Google search on 'Poser.' Curius Labs, Inc. is the first listing. Renderosity isn't even on the first page of results.

Hisminky, whatever dude<< Last time I checked, I was a girl.

I am fast losing respect and patience with people who ooh and aah over EVERY render, no matter how good or bad. If they do that (and I am not nec. referring to Karen's pictures), how seriously can I take them on feedback on mine... it's always the same gushing? And now comes the usual shit of "Turn comments off", riiiiiight... which I would if it wasn't for the few REALLY constructive remarks. Now, tell me, what is Hot20 about YET another dull-skinned space-chick staring right at you with crossed eyes???

BillyJ, I offer the following definition of the terms 'troll' & 'trolling' which has been posted & reposted across usenet for at least a few years... 1. v.,n. [From the Usenet group alt.folklore.urban] To utter a posting on Usenet designed to attract predictable responses or flames; or, the post itself. Derives from the phrase "trolling for newbies" which in turn comes from mainstream "trolling", a style of fishing in which one trails bait through a likely spot hoping for a bite. The well-constructed troll is a post that induces lots of newbies and flamers to make themselves look even more clueless than they already do, while subtly conveying to the more savvy and experienced that it is in fact a deliberate troll. If you don't fall for the joke, you get to be in on it. See also YHBT. 2. n. An individual who chronically trolls in sense 1; regularly posts specious arguments, flames or personal attacks to a newsgroup, discussion list, or in email for no other purpose than to annoy someone or disrupt a discussion. Trolls are recognizable by the fact that they have no real interest in learning about the topic at hand - they simply want to utter flame bait. Like the ugly creatures they are named after, they exhibit no redeeming characteristics, and as such, they are recognized as a lower form of life on the net, as in, "Oh, ignore him, he's just a troll." Compare kook. 3. n. [Berkeley] Computer lab monitor. A popular campus job for CS students. Duties include helping newbies and ensuring that lab policies are followed. Probably so-called because it involves lurking in dark cavelike corners. Some people claim that the troll (sense 1) is properly a narrower category than flame bait, that a troll is categorized by containing some assertion that is wrong but not overtly controversial. See also Troll-O-Meter. The use of `troll' in either sense is a live metaphor that readily produces elaborations and combining forms. For example, one not infrequently sees the warning "Do not feed the troll" as part of a followup to troll postings.

Attached Link: http://www.tuxedo.org/~esr/jargon/html/The-Jargon-Lexicon.html

Thank you cooler. I am now a troll expert thanks to you. I believe I have met quite a few trolls, and still know some. Now I know what to watch out for and no more bad dates.

Hisminky, sorry madame. BTW, making money from your work is indeed admirable. It may take a bit of time but poser (and Daz) will garner a larger market, tarining, marketing, print, video the internet... It'll be more dificult (and poorer business sense) to dismiss the tools or stereotype their uses. Good luck!