I think you have some good points and suggestions that would be worth a look for SM to consider.

It would be nice with a more advance preview render that would allow for testing or specifying specific elements you would like to test, such as shadows, displacements etc. However Poser do have the ability to render out a PBR preview simply using low settings, the ability to area render at higher settings and so forth.

With Poser's viewport, Firefly and Cycles interpreting the same materials so differently, it would be interesting to see how Poser's viewport could be modernized without breaking all existing materials.

I don't think its possible to do this, taking into account that these render engines are completely different. I know I have said it before and that it tend to rub some people the wrong way, but there is no future in Firefly, for SM to spend resources on it would be a waste of time, it would require them to give it such an overhaul that they might as well spend the time implementing a new render engine instead. In my opinion they should rather spend their energy making Superfly faster, better lighting features, especially HDRI.

Instead people still ask for better figures, replacements for V4 or Posette even.

I think these should be kept separate from the features you refer to. Adding new high quality figures one or two each release would not interfere with the developments that you are referring to. And besides that, you have to ask yourself if such muscle/body feature would solve anything if they were applied to existing Poser figures? I doubt that. I do like the idea that you are talking about, but for this to work you need decent figures first. I can't help thinking about the facial features that they added to the new characters, where you could manipulate their faces in new and "smarter" way. Yet people did not really care, because the underlining figures were of such quality that it didn't matter. So don't get me wrong I would welcome the idea that you suggest, if you could apply it to existing figures at will like the Gs and Vs characters, but if you can't, new figures are needed first.

But considering the aforementioned competition, is there a single thing Poser does better than all of them? I'm struggling to think of what it could possibly be.

I don't really know if that's a relevant question, meaning it would be the same as asking is there anything that Maya does better than Max that would make you change from one to the other. I think you would find the answer to be almost purely what people prefer. And again can only stress that rarely only one program is used in any production, people use bit and pieces from several. Nothing prevent you from Posing in Poser and import the stuff into 3ds max or blender and continue working there, if you find some of their tools are working better for what you need.

I can only speak for my self since Poser is part of my workflow, that I use Poser because I think its faster to work in, the cloth room is easy to use and I haven't had that good experiences with Daz cloth features. Since I normally export everything to 3ds max anyway, its fairly few features that Im actually using that much. I do agree with you, that I would move more of my workflow to Poser were some of the features better. In fact I might move everything here, as I mostly use 3ds max, for rendering, hair, camera and lighting. Especially the last two, because I really don't like how these work in Poser. Since this is my workflow, the one feature that I personally would appreciate the most, would be for materials to be correctly imported into 3ds max, as this is currently what takes the most time for me.

So just to sum up, I don't really disagree with anything you are saying, but I think that they have to do it in the correct order, you can't keep adding advanced features when the basic of what people need is not working correctly. Meaning the characters in general, add those and then introduce what you suggested.

operaguy posted at 11:20AM Fri, 26 October 2018 - #4338231

3D-Mobster, you are welcome to your opinion, of course. However, I have two developers in a major media corporation who have the units, and they confirm the results are fantastic. They are hotly developing content for it on a show-time level. Maya, Adobe, Unity, and Android are all pouring resources into this concept.

I won't purchase the Hydrogen myself ($1300) until I prove out my content concept for it, which I am pursuing full speed ahead as we speak.

And remember, this is depth-effect ... with no glasses.

Red/Leia have constantly remarked that it is futile to show the effect of H4v on any 2D device. If this were fake, Red would lose stupendous face in Hollywood and around the world. Many films are shot on their Red cameras, and they are all the way in for high stakes. Also, there have been three tremendous failures to bring non-glasses depth-viewing to devices, and we are all aware. The critics would have no qualms about pouncing, so RED and Leia are making sure this is "a thing."

::::: Opera :::::

It might look really cool in real life, which I guess will be known very quickly if it is as great as they claim. Maybe its just their promotional stuff that rubs me the wrong way. :D I hope they can pull it off and it can launch a wave of new technologies, however I wanted to be fair, so I looked for reviews and found one from a person that have seen it in action. And he doesn't really seem to impressed either and actually have the same impression that I did, that this is a bit hyped for no reason.

You can read it here if you are interested. https://www.reddit.com/r/Filmmakers/comments/8kt7by/hands_on_review_of_red_hydrogen_prototype_demo/

Anyway, you obviously have no obligation to defend it and if people think its a good product they will buy it and make it popular. But then again it doesn't really matter since you asked about cameras in Poser. :)

This is a complete guess, but maybe you could do it through scripting, but guess it depends on how the camera is suppose to work.

I looked at the page you linked and have to admit that I know nothing about this technology, but I got a weird feeling straight away, that something seems a bit off. I watch the trailer and it shows nothing, the only thing you see are peoples reaction to something that they see on the screen. Which obviously got me more interested to find out why exactly their main trailer doesn't show anything. So looked further and finally found another video on their site showing what they are talking about and my guess for why they don't show what people is seeing on the camera in the trailer, is most likely because its not really that amazing, Maybe you have to see what it looks like in reality, but to me, it seems more like some people desperately trying to sell a product by saying that its over the top amazingly good and trying to convince people that its the case, when it ain't. :)

This is the video im talking about where he shows all the cool stuff. Try to compare that with those people in the trailers reaction. Something doesn't really add up I think.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?time_continue=784&v=qA5qECI9xX0

TheDarkerSideOfArt posted at 11:34AM Fri, 21 September 2018 - #4336402

RorrKonn posted at 11:49AM Wed, 19 September 2018 - #4336398

There's a old saying " Don't put all your eggs in one basket " It's a centuries old saying but it's still true to day.Wisdom is timeless .

So if I get 12 baskets and put 1 egg in each basket but put all the baskets in 1 shopping cart, does that still count? ?

Yeah, that is pretty much what Autodesk did, they bought all the baskets with the eggs :D

bantha posted at 12:07PM Tue, 11 September 2018 - #4336030

But even if not, P11 does work for me. I don't like the Genesis figures that much. I don't know if Iray is really that much better. Heck, if there won't be another version this year I will get Octane to see if it renders better.

Unless someone goes into technical details in regards to why Iray should be better than Superfly (Cycles), I really don't think that the issue is with the render engines as much as it is with everything else.

Both of them can produce very good looking images. But I think a lot of people are fooled by Iray using HDRI by default, which gives it a nice look if you just do a quick render. Whereas Poser doesn't, so you have to setup this manually.

Here is a quick test, with a plane and a sphere.

Looking at Poser default, it looks rather poor, dull colors, weird shadows and the low default render settings doesn't improve it either. The Iray default, even though its very bright looks more pleasing than Poser does.

The last two I have added HDRI to Poser, increased the render settings to better match the time Iray uses. And I have turned down the intensity of Iray default light as well. Personal to me I think cycle give a better result in this case, the shadow underneath the sphere seems to bright in the Iray. This is not to say that Iray is then worse than Cycle as pretty much no settings have been tweaked or any effort made to actually setup lighting, its pretty much as default as possible.

So what becomes interesting when looking at these, at least to me have little to do with the engines themselves, but rather options available. Daz does shine in HDRI compared to Poser, there is really no default controls here, where you have a lot in Daz. It doesn't mean that Poser handles HDRI worse, but simply that you lack a lot of control here compared to Daz.

Here is a test of glass:

Again only HDRI is used, which are not the same maps for each program, but regardless of that, I don't think that cycles does a worse job at this than Iray.

Last is a single spotlight test:

Again the results are slightly different, due to not using the exact same settings. But wouldnt say that cycle does a worse job here either. There is a black weird box in the Iray render, which might be because of the sphere being at lower resolution than the one in Poser, but to me it looks like a bug in Iray and have no clue why it is there.

To me, it seems like there is a bit of confusion or miscommunication whenever there is a talk about what render engine is better, because unless you are really getting into the technical stuff, which I can't :D. I think its more a comparison of what options are available in each program. And currently in my opinion Daz have better options overall, whereas Poser lacks a bit, especially when it comes to controlling HDRI, but also I think a lot of Poser users, because HDRI is not used by default and might not know how to set it up, draw the conclusion that Iray must be better then, which is simply not true, when it comes to render quality, i see very little difference between them visually and pretty much comes down to how they interprets light in the end. So having more options or better control is a benefit in Daz compared to Poser. For instant the camera an light controls are not very good in Poser, I think. But is something that could and should be fix in a new Poser version. Then you have some bloom controls etc in Daz which is also nice, but again these are more effects, than actual render engine qualities. And can easily be added in Photoshop afterwards.

The joy of art and creativity is the work you put into it and witnessing the improvement in your own skills. Poser and therefore Renderosity and the artwork displayed by members on this site have a history of not showing a great deal of improvement over time. I mean that's fine, people do this for fun, I get it, but somewhere lost in the mix is the inspiration to do bigger and better things. Individuals who aspire to be artist must challenge themselves to get better! That does not seem to be a common thread here. You look at zbrush art and you are just blown away by the artistry and skill. Poser users are lacking this level of inspiration and I believe it is hurting the entire brand. Whats the solution for a hobby based endever ? I'm not sure. Part of the history of Renderosity is allowing amateurs to present their work and that's a good thing! On the other hand it doesn't represent whats possible to achieve. I guess the only solution is for everyone to work to improve their work, that's where the fun lies. Stop posting really crappy embarrassing stuff. Take pride in what you do. Compare your work to really good stuff before you smear it all over the internet.

I always find these posts a bit rough, because i think some of the things you say are correct, such as its important for people to challenge themselves to do better. But I think its a poor comparison to pick out pieces of stuff made in Zbrush and say look at how good it is. I have mentioned it before, Its a completely different program with a lot more people approaching it with a different background than an average Poser or Daz user. The goals might not even be the same in what they are trying to achieve, Zbrush is a professional tool, used in many huge projects such as movies, games, commercials and so forth. So its not really difficult to find very well made stuff all over the place, because there are so many users and these come with a completely different background than Poser/Daz users. So I did a search and found an image at random which I think looked well made.

So I looked the person up to check their background, The person have 3 years experience in the gaming industry and his main focus is modeling and texturing with some experience in rigging and animation. He uses the following applications... 3ds Max, Zbrush, Photoshop, xNormal and Quixel suite

I hope you see my point, a lot of people posting Zbrush stuff are people that have some sort of experience working with it professional, because its being used a lot in the industry.

I know that you make it clear that Poser/Daz users make stuff for fun and you are ok with that. But comparing what they do with a professional and say that there is no progress is wrong, if you ask me. Because most people that uses Zbrush and post all these very cool images, have spend hours upon hours learning it, not only the program, that's just a tool. But you have to learn anatomy, either through some educational background, drawing classes etc. You have to know how to model correctly, color theory and how to apply that to a model and so forth. What im trying to say is that its not just a matter of moving from Poser to Zbrush, or assume that its because of Poser/Daz and that this is where people go wrong. Most people can't spend 8-10 hours a day learning and improving their skills, so it would be wrong to assume that they could make stuff like you see the professionals do and that they are not improving. Poser/Daz hobbyist should not try to or be compared to these people. If it were the case that they could be, the professionals would use these programs like crazy, as I have mentioned before, people that make 3D from scratch do not care how it is made, what programs are used, how many they have to mix together to achieve what they are trying to do, if it gets the job done, its more or less, from what I can see, a Poser/Daz user issue, that it have to be either Daz or Poser..

I do agree, that not all images that people make should be posted and that they should try to challenge themselves in order to improve, but it depend where in the process they are, remember there are lots of very bad Zbrush stuff as well. But I have said it before and will say it again and by looking at the person's program list above as well, you shouldn't simply stick to one program. Use whatever you need to do what you need. But to me, assuming that the average Poser/Daz user don't have enough time to learn all required programs at once, the program that I think would help or benefit them the most, if they want to take their stuff to the next level is Photoshop or Gimp. Its almost impossible or not even worth the time trying to get a perfect image out of any single program, whether thats Zbrush or Poser, looking at his image above, its very obvious that Photoshop have been used to create the final image, not that he did a bad job or anything.

But when that is said, I overall think that people should keep posting what they make, but others shouldn't compare it to stuff made by professionals and judge it based on that, its just not fair, you wouldn't do that in any other discipline either.

Besides that, the true art of Poser/Daz is to make it not look like it was made there and a lot of things, like that comic that I can never remember what is called, is made using V4 and M4 and yet with a bit of Zbrush you can't tell, so some images might use Poser/Daz without you actually knowing it. But you rarely get anything interesting out of using only one program. Even looking at the image above, obviously the model is very well made from a technical point of view, but its not very interesting as an image I think. if it doesn't have some emotions to it, a story to tell and so forth, then it doesn't really matter from an artistic perspective I think. To me its purely interesting due to the technical skills of the person, but I will forget such image very fast, despite how well made it might be.

Not sure your question is understood correctly, doesn't the disc rotate around its own axis by default, meaning any of them (X,Y or Z)? my guess is that this is something you created in another 3D application? If thats the case its most likely easier to center it there as it probably have a center pivot functionality and then import it again into Poser. If that is not what you are after and want to see how it should be in Poser, you can add a standard Cylinder from the library and look how its done. Basically you want both of the points in the center of the disc with the end point slightly above or below in the Y-axis. So what you do is place the center point where it should be, and then you copy/paste the X and Z values to the end point and just move the Y a bit up or down. I think you have to press the "Align" button afterwards to make sure the axis are correct.

Clothing ? dont know An actual Figure? bad idea.. But I can tell you what would happen with the figure idea. After the dust settles I would email you and say. I told you that was a bad idea ????

Just an email? The least you could do would be to visit me in jail :D

Fat David is probably well into the realm of parody and would probably have no issues in a commercial application. Which brings up an even murkier subject with copyright Fair Use.

There's no copyright on Michelangelo's David, as the statue is over 500 years old. Copyrights do expire eventually. 130 years I think from the death of the creator. Something like that. You can find replicas of it all over the place. I have one in alabaster that's about 6 inches tall I got 20+ years ago.

Its weird, because it says in the description, for the fair use:

1. the purpose and character of the use, including whether such use is of a commercial nature or is for nonprofit educational purposes;
2. the nature of the copyrighted work;
3. the amount and substantiality of the portion used in relation to the copyrighted work as a whole; and
4. the effect of the use upon the potential market for or value of the copyrighted work.

Because from what I could figure out, there is a commercial copyright or something on the statue of David, as companies have apparently used it to promote themselves without getting permission. However the Fat david above is clearly a commercial product, so either they have a license to make it or the copyright does not cover it.

But to take a photo of the statue and then claim copyright over the image and place the image in the public domain for anyone to use is likely see you in court with the actual copyright holders of the statue.

I doubt that, again looking at Ebay, there are lots of postcard being sold of him, some looks like they were made with a very poor camera. Check this one:

Look how low the color quality is, noise etc. yet its being sold for 2.5 pounds. I doubt a professional photographer would sell an image of such low quality. But i would guess that the person in theory have copyright to that image.

Im not saying that you are not right, merely that it seems that either people and companies like Ebay is breaking the rules, by allowing copyrighted material to be sold. Or the rules for what is allowed and ain't is nearly impossible to figure out.

Look at this, I doubt they got a license for this: (I added the black box, but its all there looking at you)

Cost 13.5$ From what I can see its just someone that think it funny that have made it. Its categorized as unbranded.

And if you were to give the V4 model - or any other human model - to 10 different rigging artists then you would get 10 different rigs. While the shapes may be similar from one human model to the next they are not exact, and the joint parameters would rarely match exactly

Yeah your right, but the question is still if a rig can be copyrighted, I really don't know. Because is it the dimensions of the bones? the amount they can bend, twist etc. which in theory have no limits. So what exactly is copyrighted? Not saying that you are wrong, but I would assume that to even get something copyrighted in the first place, you would need to be at least somewhat specific in regards to what exactly you want the copyright to cover. And I just find it very hard to believe that Daz or whatever company can say that they want a copyright for a specific rig. Because what you are saying is, that no one in the world in theory can make a rig like V4 or any of the other genesis character. Again im talking in theory, if what you say is the case.

Now what would happen, if I created a high res mesh, an exact copy of V4 just more polygons and sold the mesh as a highres version of V4, BUT to use it people would have to own V4 and copy the bones, morphs etc. from her to my model, before they could use it. Because reading their Eula:

Three Dimensional Works. DAZ wishes to encourage the expansion of the catalog of Content available to its users. Accordingly, User may access, use, copy, and modify the Content to create one or more derived or additional three-dimensional works provided that:

• any such derived or additional three-dimensional works are designed to require or encourage the use of Content available through the online DAZ store either by (i) requiring the use of such Content to function, or (ii) allowing only limited function when not used in conjunction with Content from the online DAZ store; and

• upon receipt of a written request from DAZ, User will immediately cease any and all distribution of the derived or additional three-dimensional works User has created from the Content, if DAZ has determined, in its sole discretion, that (i) such additional or derived work is substantially similar to or is a clone of existing Content; or (ii) such additional or derived work fails to require or encourage the use of Content available through the online DAZ store as described above.

The first part seems to fall into that category, my model would require people to buy V4 from Daz, however looking at point 2 it would clearly be a clone of existing content. Now I doubt that Daz would allow me to sell such product on their page, but nothing would prevent me from selling it on Renderosity would it?

Maybe that is why it became art in the first place, the mystery of the leaves :D

On a more serious note and have to admit that I might remember wrong, but as you probably know, they used to make them with genitals and so forth as sign of virtue etc. But i think it came with the Catholic church that didn't like it, so they chopped them off and might be why they started to cover them up as it was seen as vulgar or some religious thing. So maybe a leaf were the least they could get away with, could explain some of reason at least, but again im not 100% sure :)

Check this one:

That is being sold on Ebay and cost 140 bucks 3ft garden statue.

Title: Fat David Michelangelo Super- Size Garden Statue Sculpture

If you do a search there on:

David Michelangelo

There are 1000+ items like that you can buy

It depends, you could do it, but you might risk getting sued by whoever owns the copyright if they thought that you were breaking it. And in that case you would most likely be told to not do it or risk a lawsuit where you would have to argue your case.and you would most likely loose if its were clearly a copy. So as I said, you are NOT allowed to make a copy of his statue and call it "David 2", if its obvious that your intend is to copy it. But you could make a statue standing the same way with long hair, a slightly different body shape and call it Leonardo, I don't think there would be anything wrong in that.

I really doubt that they have a copyright on his pose, his hair, size of statue, material and whatever you can think of. Its a copyright on that particular piece of art.

I know that you are thinking no one can copyright the human figure, but that isn't quite true, have a look at the Michelangelo's statue of David for example... What exactly does that copyright cover as David is just a naked male human figure, right.

I don't think this apply here, first of all its not a digital file which can be manipulated into something else, so you would have to destroy the statue of David to make it into something else. But I would assume that this statue is not protected because its a man standing there, but is protected as any other piece of art, so its the uniqueness of the whole statue. it doesn't mean that no other artist in the world can create a naked standing man in a similar fashion. But you are not allowed to copy his statue and for instant call it "David 2, twice as good". At least that's how I understand it.

Hmmm... I really don't know, I get the impression that even the lawyers are not sure, by looking at others cases. Someone asked if it was legal to make a 3D model based on a 2d image found on google, like a building for instant. Some say that it is considered derivative as the building is copyrighted, others say that it depends. Pretty much all 3D modelers uses reference images either from google or some real stuff item, which apparently in most cases, from what I can understand is illegal, even if they just get inspired by them according to some of the lawyers.

This is the original question that the person asked:

Question:

In 3d modeling copyright law, Is it okay to base 3d models off of photographs of objects? when building a 3d model I have noticed that most, if not all modelers create their models from images found through google searches. Oftentimes they trace the objects in 3d and build from there. Is this legal? Obviously having a company's logo included in the model is illegal, but appropriating the image into 3d, is this lawful?

Here is two answers from IP law attorneys:

First one:

Your 3d object is likeley a derivative work of an origional i mage or picture. it is therfore an infringement of the origional copyright owner's rights. Engage an experienced copyright attorney to counsel you on your specific fact.

The second one uses a blender as example.

Second one:

Q: "As an example, say I want to make a blender. I go into google search and look for an image of a blender. Taking that image I begin to make a blender in 3d. I may change some of the angles to make it more to my liking."

R: Basic copyright and trade dress / design patent laws apply.

As for copyright, the general rule is that absent a license it's unlawful to create a 3D sculpture from someone else's 2D image. The 3D sculpture would infringe the 2D image copyright owner's exclusive right to make "derivative" works based on his work. But there's a wrinkle: To be an derivative work the 3D sculpture creator must create a copyrightable work. A 3D blender is NOT, however, a copyrightable "work" because copyright does not attach to "useful articles." I think copyright law does not prohibit the creation of a 3D useful article based upon a 2D photograph.

As for trade dress law, the specific, source-identifying appearance of a useful article is the exclusive "trade dress" of that product's manufacturer. Moreover, any new and non-obvious ornamental appearance of a product can be protected by a design patent [visit the link below to view some design patents claiming the appearance of blenders]. Before creating a blender that looks a lot like someone else's blender [or any product] it's first necessary to determine if the appearance of that product is protected under trade dress law or by a design patent. Your own intellectual property attorney can provide this "freedom to operate" opinion.

I really don't know what to think, its so confusing :D Pretty much all 3D modelers could be accused of doing something wrong. So I looked at how it is in Denmark where im from and from what I can see, its no problem to get inspiration by others work, you can't obviously copy it, like Mickey mouse etc. as these are trademark of Disney and their shape, color and name is protected. Damn Im glad im not a lawyer!! :D

Another thing you can do combined with what the others have already suggested, is "clever" camera work and prop placement, so you can create the illusion that there is a lot of people.

I ran into the same problem when making this image a long time ago by now.

I think there is 8-9 characters in total, which is not a lot when trying to illustrate an army, but as you can see, the main focus is the girl on the horse, so she is blocking the rest of the army, so what you see behind her, the spears, flags as well as those spears coming in from the side, is just spears placed so it looks like there is a person holding it. Gave them some huge shields that is held so they also block the view. I think it works quite well as an illusion.

So you could do something similar by making the shot slightly narrower, place some signs or whatever feels natural to your image and just show maybe a hand or feet like someone is just about to walk pass it. It can save you a lot of work, you have to remember it just need to look correct for that single shot :D