There is a big differance between constructive critism and simply being spitefull or hurtfull.  It is possible to offer someone ways to improve their style in a polite and kind manner.  Courtesy costs nothing.

It is also, I think, important to remember that often hurt & anger can cause us to express ourselves in ways that might on the surface seem perhaps discourteous to our peers.   In such moment's of weakness and pain on the part of others compassion and understanding are important.

Everybody stumbles sometimes.  If one should fall, can another not extend a hand to pull them back up?

It is generally considered bad form to kick someone when they are already down.

Don't let it get you down, alot of folks can only make themselves feel big by trying to make someone else feel small.  And anybody who thinks that "anybody can do them" or that it does not take skill to create 3D art, I'd disagree with strongly and I've worked in several artistic mediums.  Their are incredible things that can be done with 3D art and animation, and I've seen a great deal of creativity with it.   But like any art form it takes time, skill, and vision.  That's true in any art form.

Creativity and expression are our birthrights, and I hope you will continue to use yours.  ^^

"As far as images go...well..I don't post many images anymore so I'm pretty safe there." ~Hawkfyr

**Thankyou.  I needed a good laugh.  And I actually think you offered some sound advice in regard to posting images you think are questionable.

As has been pointed out previously, however, and by more then one person, many have posted images in good faith, believing they did not violate the TOS in any way and the images were then removed after subjective evaluations.

There is an analogy I think that fits this rather well, taken from an old Western movie called Unforgiven.  In one of the final scenes of the movie, the corrupt sherriff (Hackman) who lies dying on the floor after being shot laments, "I don't deserve this...I was building a house..."  (If you see the film you'll understand the last part of that).  The response by Will Money (Eastwood) is I think rather appropiate to what happened here during the May Purge.  "Deserve's got nuthin' To do with it."

**

Oh! The little kitten is petting the ducky! Cuteness! ^^

And just for the record so it doesan't get confusing I'm not disputing that at all and in fact the lyrics were taken down by me shortly after posting here.

Giggle

More kitten sillyness! ^^

Put on a more serious note:

To Cruzin:  On the issue of possibly allowing some clemency in terms of members who were banned to return, particularilly in regard to this issue I'd there's a few things I'd like to say.

• As has been pointed out throughout this thread, the decision to ban these individuals was not one that was made lightly and occured only after repeated violations of the TOS and after all the previous steps were taken to both curb future transgressions, and to allow the members in question a chance to continue in the Community.

Having said that, I would point out the following, but I ask everyone to bear in mind that the information to hand is limited and also being viewed subjectivily.  In other words I could point to a wall that was white and claim that it was light grey and argue about it until I was blue in the face, but that wouldn't neccessarilly change the actuall color of the wall.

The bans that were made, in the purest technical terms, were as I understand it made with justification and with due process.  This is with the understanding that every member who signs up for an account here does read and agree to the TOS and with the process of warnings and if neccessary a temperary ban being done prior to a actuall life-long ban.  The changes made to the TOS in regard to potential underage nudity are provided for in the orginal TOS so in the purest technical terms the actions taken are wholly justifed by the TOS contract which was signed by everyone.

There are a few things I think which need to be considered.  The system of warnings/temp bans/ and or final bans is set up on a cumulative bases, and has no statuet of limitations.  As I understand it in some if not many cases this proved to be a problem for some of the members who were banned because previous incidents that happend years prior to the ones that cost them their memberships and may well have been completly unrated were counted up against them.  It's my opinion that it might be better to revamp the system a bit so that at some point these older warnings or incidents are no longer counted up against a member possibly being banned for example.  Of course, I also think there should probably be some exceptions to this, and in all cases that while the cumulative effect would be removed, that it would remain on the member's record for reasons discussed previously in this thread.

I'm not by the way suggesting a short period of time before that cumalitve effect would be removed, but after for example a year it might be reasonable to consider it.  Ultamitly I think this would give the moderators and administration more power to act in cases without neccessarilly resorting to the step of perminate banning, because it would mean one could once again issue either a fresh warning or temporary ban, again letting the person know this was not acceptable, without having because of the cumulative effect of old offenses having to go right away to a perminant ban.

I do think that sometimes people can make comparitivly minor mistakes often unrelated to each other and spread far apart and that that needs to be a consideration.  Let me give a personal example of what I mean.  Last night I saw a render that featured a old song title as it's own title.  I rather liked it and since the song itself is very old I thought I'd quote it's lyrics from memory for those not familiar with them.

This morning I recieved both a e-mail and a PM from this site basicly saying that I needed to remove the post with the lyrics for copy right reasons.  I completly understand where they're coming from and will do so later today but at the time it never occured to me that it would be an issue, an honest enough oversight I think on my part.  Weather or not this counts as an official warning on my record wasn't really made clear to me, I'm going to ask for clarrification in fact, but let's assume for a moment that it was.

Now let's also pretend hypothetically that the one render of A3 I have up that has nudity involved in it is removed for something like potential underage nudity (it hasn't been and won't be I don't think since there are no morphs to A3 at all so by the moderator's own statements she qualifies as being adult, but let's pretend for a moment).  Okay, so now I have two strikes against me.  I go through my ban period, come back and commen sense says at that point that I should tread very carefully if I want to stay a member here.

So for the next year or so I keep my nose clean, I'm very carefull stop leaving comments on other people's works at all keep to myself, etc. etc.  So now it's a year or two after all this has occurred.  Now let's say one day I do something else unrelated in nature to the first two offenses that violates the TOS or a change to the TOS in some way.  Say for example there was a policy change that now says we're no longer allowed to show a particular type of armor (I use alot of armor props in my stuffs) because it's been deemed inappropiate for whatever reason or something.  So I post an image with that armor, maybe I just missed the e-mail or what have you telling me about it, point is it's now up in the galleries.  It gets removed, and because of the two previous and unrelated marks on my record that happened years prior to this, It's my third strike.

That raises some concern because while the situation I've posted is relativily hypothetical there are have been serveral actuall cases mentioned that might fall into this sort of catagory.

I also think that if some members are allowed back, that it would probably have to be on something like a probational membership.  This would mean for example that certain safe-guards would have to be in place.  For example they would not be permited to post any images at all to the galleries without submiting them first to a moderator, even if the content was obviously 100% withen the TOS guidlines they would still have to submit it for approval first before it could even be posted.  That's one example of a possible restriction perhaps after a certian amount of time when the member on probation had proved themselves worthy of the freedom that comes with regular membership they could then be restored, which I think would give them something to work for and more reason to cooperate as well.

I'm sure there would be some that if such an offer was made might reject it as being insulting or being made to feel like criminals, but I also think that with reasonable terms for probationary re-instatement some people who genuinly care about the site and would like another chance might take it.

Anyways something to think about.

To Bonestructure: I would agree it can be a frustrating issue, but not I think an unsurmountable one, or else I wouldn't still be here talking trying to find away to better clarrify and compromise on things with everyone.  Oh, and one small correction, Sailor Moon if I recall correctly has the main characters like Serena (IE Sailor Moon) in highschool, although there were a couple EPs towards the end of the series where the Sailor Scouts did meet older versions of themselves.  I'm not sure about BubbleGum Crises, I've heard the name but I'm not familar with the particular anime.

While there are certianly quite a number of animes that deal with younger based characters, their are also a fair number of animes that deal with compartivily mature adults and are more adult orientated in theme.  To name some recent examples that have appeared in the US: Ghost In The Shell: Stand Alone Complex.  Witch Hunter Robin.  Wolf's Reign (I'm pretty sure I got the name wrong I only got to see one EP but the one I did see was very brutal and action based and also brought me to tears with one scene in which one of the characters is killed falling from a building during an attack).  Those are some that have been around awhile but are still compartivily recent here in the US.

Most anime characters are generally geared towards their target audience in terms of characters.  So for example Sailor Moon which was aimed at the younger female audienceand used a group of girls as it's main characters with enough variety withen the group to allow for the different personalities it was meant to appeal to, and the supporting cast of characters was built to compliment that primary group.

The various Dragonball series were meant to appeal primarilly to the young male crowd, and so most of the characters tend to be ampified personifications of various traits that crowd would find appealing.

By comparison, Ghost In The Shell: Stand Alone Complex was meant to appeal to a older audience, primary adult, and in fact many of the traditional younger anime US fan base found it boring and unappealing because of it's general focus longer plots and dialoge and compartivily brief action sequences.

So there's certianly a variety of different styles of anime and character out there.  ^^

I certianly didn't.  I do get the periodic save 10% on $25.00 or more  purchase ones but that's it.

The more I hear the more nervous I get simply because so many of you have much more experience then me.

I'd have to disagree about DAZ Studio  though.  It's my only software, and I can use models all the way through Poser 6 typically without problems, and the studio is not only free but so are the new versions.  It's only because someone pointed me to the DAZ site and the free studio product that I got into 3D rendering at all.

It's allowed me to spend what little money I have to play with on things like characters, clothing, etc. 

I'm pretty happy with the Studio's versitality,  and for relativily new artists who don't have alot of money to invest it's wonderfull, and they're kind enough to offer both support and upgrades to the latest versions for free.

Just thought I'd put in a good word, I may complain occasionally about the prices but I do think they have alot to offer.

Not at all, I understand The Girl is quite a popular figure like many of the spinoffs such as The Freak for example (which I still do not have owing to his high price tag).

I'm quite happy with the A3 and Hiro models currently available, but then I'm going to most likely be buying V4 primarily out of neccesity (in the long term) to keep up with different product lines by various venders here and at DAZ I like to support with my small purchases when I can scrape togeather some funds.

My last major purchase was the Morphs and Maps for A3 so I'd probably let out several loud shrieks of dismay and fall over in little spasms with spirals in my eyes if they came out with a A4 just when I've finally begun to really gotten to experiment with everything A3 has to offer.

As with all the Millenium 3rd generation figures there are so many products and freebies out there for A3 as well as for that matter V3, M3 and so on that I could be quite happy for some time just slowly getting everything for those characters and maybe working on getting the rest of the 3rd generation figures (most of whom have hefty price tags).

But with V4 already in the stores, and the increasing popularity of the A3 model, it's probably going to eventually come to a A4 model being released (although my guess is not until well after for example M3 would get a makeover to M4 or something).  Part of it may also depend on user demand and competing products releases.

Of course many people speculated that V4 was not going to be released for awhile yet, and all of a sudden she's her, so I guess you never know ^^

And a Merry Christmas to you! I'm waiting till after Christmas as well, I think (although I may break down if I think I can still afford it).  While I'm not advanced enough to use many of the main feautures people are complaining about I do use some of them, and I'm intrested to hear how more advanced users are feeling after playing with her a bit.  Also how DAZ plans to address some of the issues, if at all.

I'm also taking a look at different V4 renders to see how she looks in action and what more advanced and creative artists then me are able to do with her which is quite inspiring.

And of course she is only a few days old, so as much as I'd like to try her out for myself, hearing what everyone else thinks is the next best thing and I'm picking up some good tips on how to use her.

Additionally there are already several V4 freebies at Renderousity, and I imagin over at DAZ as well (haven't checked today yet).  So we'll see what happens ^^

OH! The mech's on sale too... Oh my... I don't know if it works in DAZ but the Micro Tank did... so I... Oh dears.. what to do what to do...?

(Has already bought the spidertank but won't have it for a week or so)

It looks good to me, could you clarrify what specificly is bothering you in the renders you are doing?

I wouldn't presume to speak for the site moderators of admin. but going  by what has been discussed in this thread previously and also the TOS, I'd guess that the answer to your first question Cruzin would be yes, the picture of the girl who might to many appear to be underage but was in fact over the age of eighteen with verfiable ID would probably be allowed to remain, despite complaints unless it could be proven that it violates the TOS in some other way.

And I'm afraid in answer to the second part of the question, putting a notification or disclamer saying something like "All models dibicted are over the age of eighteen" or something isn't what the staff considers sufficiant evidence.  In fact, Primal, who started this thread, stated in opening statement that he'd put such a clarrification in the text for his render to avoid confusion saying that the model he was using was in fact an adult.

The difference being of course that a real life model can be asked for and have her age verfied through a photo ID.  A 3-D character of course cannot (I really ought to do a render with A3 proudly holding up an ID card saying she's eighteen or something.. like that heh).  So in those cases the moderators are once again forced to fall back on how the picture appears to a majority of them and decide if the image remains or is taken down on that basis.

That is why establishing ways to morph A3 in ways that are going to satify the need for artisic expression and at the same time keeping her apperance over eighteen is important in terms of giving people the ability to use that as a tool in there artwork and at the same time not creat a situation where the site could come under fire from it's sponsers for fostering underage or potential underage dibictions of characters and or situations.

In a previous post you used the example of a police officer pulling over a speeder and the speeder complaining to the officer that the reason they were speeding is that everyone else was going fast.  I would suspect the officer in question would probably explain to the speeder that simply because other people around you are breaking the law is not an excuse to do the same.

As it relates to the galleries here, one would relate it in terms of if someone sees a 3-d character or a photo were the models or persons appear to them to be possibly or obviously underage, it would not justify that individual putting up a image they themselves thought might be called into question simply because they feel someone else might have gotten away with it.

I realize from speaking with some members in private and also from what has been said and expressed here that there are some, perhaps many, who feel that certian areas of the site and/or certian galleries are possibly being favored in respect to this issue, while other galleries and members may have taken the brunt of the punishment dolled out, particullary during the transition period or "May Purge" as I will still refer to it.

Certianly it's possible that given the sheer volume of daily work combined with the crises situation might perhaps have effected the decision making process.  If such is the case I would certianly hope that their would perhaps be some introspection, review, and possible clemency for those individuals.  It is a little disturbing to hear stories about the number of people effected in a compartivily short time frame.

I do also think that personal responsibility on the part of an artist is important.  I am reasonably sure that their were those who submitted images they knew might be called into question, even being aware that it might mean a perminant ban from the site instead of first submitting it by e-mail privatly for approval or disapproval.  It is also important to remember those, however, who submited their images in good faith, honestly believing they were in full TOS compliance, and who because of past mistakes or indescretions where then banned, especially in the confused period following the shifts in site policy.

And one other thing I think is imporant for folks to remember here.  It's not just Anime or any other type of art or gallery that has been effected by this, although certianly the Anime genre seems to have been hardest hit.  There have been cases mentioned that had nothing to do with either A3 or the anime field.

So for people to shrug their shoulders and think, "Well it doesn't really effect me 'cause I hardly use A3 and I don't like anime" is both short sided and foolish in my opinion.

Many of those standing in the van guard and holding the line for the rest of the galleries may favor the anime field and or characters like A3 or the Girl, but it's incredibly naive I think for people to suppose that if that front collapses that someone might not be knocking on the door to their choosen field of art next.  So go ahead and continue to hide behind a veneer of smug and self-secure apathy if you will.  Thing is, one day those people may wake up to find there is nobody left or willing to fight for them when it's their turn to face the music.

IT'S HERE! IT'S UP! IT'S IN THE STORE! GO BUY IT! AND IT'S ON SALE! GO! GO! 

Runs around in little circles and dies from happyness

Now I just got to wait a week for them to process my check and it's MINE ALL MINE! BWAHAHAHAHA! 

Thankyous Bugzlife! ^^

From what has been said in the DAZ forum, the V4 base was and is being offered over the weekend free to PC members so that they get a chance to play a bit with the base model before deciding if they want to get the whole version.  It's much the way the V3 (which was free until recently) base model as well as the M3 and A3 models (and several other models at different times such as Hiro) were offered either to PC members or the general community of costumers (of which I am sadly a member you can't get a PC membership without puting down a CC) so that they got a chance to get an idea of what those models could do first and then make decsions on upgrades.

From what I've seen that is fairly exceptional in most market places, and I thank them for it.  I've been using DAZ for about alittle over or under six months or so now, and if the studio and it's base content as well as the variety of different freebies for models offered both at DAZ, Renderousity, and a plethera of other sites throughout the web hadn't been made available it's unlikely that I would have later made the decision to start in buying commericial upgrades and products.

I may occasionally gripe a bit about the prices or not being able to get in the PC or such things, but I'm honestly very fond of DAZ and it's various models.  I look forward to adding V4 to my runtime liberary and for PC members I think it's a really nice premotion on DAZ's part to let them get to try her out for free (you lucky stiffs)  ^^