I am thankful for... my wife and dog, my geeky online friends especially those that make me laugh, the patrons that enjoy my work, being inspired by those around me, music and movies on demand (hey it's the little things sometimes), bacon and a good cup of coffee.

Love me some furries! Look at the avatar!

CJZ hands down. AJ is just too charicature and doesn't lean to a more neutral base.

IMHO, Poser will continue to live as long as enough people continue to support it with content, we all continue to help each other learn and grow as artists and creators and we keep having fun using it.

I think the biggest issue is not having flagship figure that builds upon the types of things that made the Victoria line of figures compelling for creators and users. It should also build on Poser's feature set and strengths. Attractive or even neutrally attractive, decent bending, good topology, symmetrical, clean internals without a lot of extraneous things, maps without burnt in things like shadows that have FF and SF material presets. There are a lot of fine details we could go over but it might be pages long. Yes, we can still use Victoria but really Poser should not be dependent on a 3rd party figure. It's not about DAZ, it's about a dependency where you don't control the pricing, marketing or outcome. Do I hate Pauline/Paul? No. Do I think it's optimal enough to be embraced by creators and users? Honestly, no. This isn't against 3rd party figures at all but they should be squarely auxillary - this obvioulsy isn't how things have gone but really it's the direction where things need to be going. Furthermore, any flagship figure for Poser requires the continued support of the originator in terms of addition, even if that means purchasable content. But you've got to get the figure optimal first.

I still think Poser will continue on without a lead figure that folks are drawn to, but it's going to have a much, much harder road. Frankly, it's been on that road for several versions now.

I'm still excited in Poser and I'm still in the game, so to speak. Well, honestly, it took me some time to get back to things but I'm putting my best foot forward. I don't think I have ever, even for a moment, took making things for Poser for granted but I can tell you that while employed elsewhere for over a year, I missed it terribly and I believe that counts for something.

I'm going to do my part releasing some new products and freebies for Poser, the best and most interesting stuff I am able to design and put out. I'd like to continue, and have always enjoyed, helping out fellow users and artists, be that teaching, helping to solve problems or demystifying Poser's little nuances.

I know I'm just one person but maybe I can help inspire others the way that others have inspired me.

I'm speaking to the spirit of the OP's post. Not everyone is leaving for DS or Genesis or what-have-you. I also have zero issue if others want that. I just know what moves ME as a user, artist and designer.

Is the WM version still available, post RDNA shutting down? If so (and we don't have one yet at Renderosity), I'd like to suggest a sticky with links to essential content, be they offsite or not, in the name of community.

Here are some additional external library tricks. Some things I do myself.

• Install an alternative browser for your external library. You could go with Seamonkey, Firefox, Opera or something similar. The reason is that you can configure your alternative browser to be very minimal compared to something you are using often. I run 64-bit Firefox normally and use Seamonkey as my Poser Library browser.

• Make a browser shortcut that points directly to the contentlibrary.html. In Windows, you'd add the IRL that wim mentioned at the end of the Target entry box. So, I have: "C:Program Files (x86)SeaMonkeyseamonkey.exe" http://127.0.0.1:11530/nonVirtualAssets/ContentLibrary/release-1.9.1/ContentLibrary/ContentLibrary.html as my "Target".

• You can customize the shortcut of the above with a different "icon" by using "Change Icon" (Windows). I used the AIR library icon in the .exe. You can use whatever icon you are comforable with. You can then pin this to the taskbar (or whatnot) and it will have the icon in that pinning. This will help distinguish it from having a different browser open.

Hello all! What's happening?

Hey all. I haven't been around much at all and I will be changing that very soon. However, I do cast my vote for more "reaching across the isles" in terms of cross-site cooperation, sharing and broadening the sense of community. It can be done while retaining your own sense of identity and marketplace volume. This has always been a very small community and keeping things isolated doesn't help with growth. Think of all the little places that we used to go that are dead. There isn't anything joyous in that. Rendo, think about being a leader in community that involves the whole of the Poserverse. Think of all the extra patrons you'd catch if you applied more honey than vinegar. Just something to ponder, perhaps. Well, back to the shadows for me! Thanks for reading.

Doubt anyone will cry over it, but I tend to come here less and less.  I used to stop by frequently and even though I didn't post all the time, I did lurk the forums and browse the store.  However, every time there's a forum change I have to come up with overrides, the categories are all but gone in freestuff and the marketplaces.  I don't know how anyone can find anything.  In fact, in Firefox I can see product thumbnails but no images on the product pages themselves.  Now, I do run a pretty tight ship with regards to blocking scripting and so forth but even relaxing everything up, I have to view the marketplace with IE, which I barely use.

I hope this is taken as being constructive in the hope that things change for the better here, in the future.  And yes, I do tend to hang elsewhere, but I enjoy visiting all the Poser places, at least from time to time.  As a visitor and guest, I'd like to see a Renderosity that is changed for the better, not changed just to change things, which is what it feels like has been happening (to me).

LOL, that's like saying when DS added game features it was a desperate move as well.  I think there's nothing wrong with having them in DS or Poser.  More tools are a good thing and if you don't care for them or are disinterested, spend the extra ($25/$50) elsewhere....?

has anybody managed to get the DSON/Genesis in Poser Pro 2014 to behave itself and use it as effectively as you would expect a poser native or older Daz figure to work?

As effectively as a native Poser figure or older DAZ figure?  No.  Absolutely not.

If you keep your scenes light, I think the figure is manageable to some degree.

You could probably make it "closer to effective" if you export it from DAZ Studio as a cr2 by baking it into a native file.  There are multiple things missing from the export and code blocks that need to be removed or DSON for Poser wants to "pick it up" when you load it.  You also loose some of it's native "features" going this route.

Very cool use of Chip.  Looks very good in the later pics with the chest. :)

EC: Jared Padalecki plays Sam, not Dean.  Just saying :)

There's a 4th option - make it yourself.  That's not "oh pfft! Go make it yourself!".  That is instead saying, you can learn and delight in creating new models if you have the temperament, creativity and drive to do so.  In a way, Poser and DS and the like are shells or players that require you to stick something in them.  There are certainly things to explore that are beyond the program if you are feeling limited.

You could play with material nodes and create/discover all kinds new things.  Or play with different render engines via 3rd parties.

You could could up with little python tools and snippets that make Poser more interesting and they're certainly some creative fun in doing that.

Another thing to muse over:  If I render the models I have made and rigged, I do think it's an artistic endeavor and certainly has some additional depth to it.  Though I also have no problem with what folks might consider compositional art.  Load things, compose, pose, etc. click Render and for some it's still thrilling and fun.  And clearly people all render to different degrees, some are very talented and have grasp of placement, evoking emotion (isn't that art?), telling a story with a single image, setting up lighting and using it effectively and so on.