Quote - Okay, never mind, I guess my characters don't open their mouths much.  (Which makes me wonder why I spend time on teeth!  Hmm, must get lost in the creative process.)

Here's a link to my favorite teeth pic  (and only really good one in my gallery!  IMHO)

Let me know if the teeth suck, I really need to know if I'm overdoing it.

http://www.renderosity.com/mod/gallery/index.php?image_id=1302988

(Warning:  NO NUDITY!)

Paying attention to the invisible details isn't always a bad thing... :p
The teeth in your picture look great for a living person. The teeth are of color A2, I would say, what's not bad for a dead and rotten person, lol. I forgot about the non real-world pictures before...

Quote - For what it's worth, when my father looked at my pin-ups he thought they were real girls, LOL! He asked me where I got them and if I had to pay them for posing.

:lol: That's funny! I remember that people who don't care much about the creation of 3D-art are often say something like "wow, this person looks like real" and such things.

Quote - hmm.  let me clarify.  i wasn't saying: is poser perfect or can it do the same things as maya?  in fact, i wasn't even talking about animation (i should have been clearer about that).  this was still images. and i didn't mean here, i meant elsewhere.  if you want to rant on the commenting system here, please do that in another thread because it's completely unrelated.

let me repeat myself : "is it impossible to break into any professional cg ranks at all using "poser" figures or content?  is the bias so strong, that no matter what quality the work, people only see the flaws?"  notice the "poser figures or content."  not,  "is poser limited."  this is about the bias against it, not the quality of work.  as i mentioned, i've generally seen significantly worse posing and expression at other cg sites, and i've rarely seen work as good as addy's worst.  i'm not saying poser isn't limited- i've used it for years and i know its limitations well...

In the recent Buzz3D related thread I said already that I can not confirm this biased approach for the professional artists that I know. I noticed however that it can be difficult to explain the value(s) of 3D-art to professional traditional artists. But that's more of a philosophical thing than something related to technical capabilities of either way to get the result.
Poser figures are sometimes used in professional context in some part of a workflow and sometimes they aren't. If the Poser figure serves the need than it will be used rather than creating a completely new figure.

The bias... Well, even if it does not sound nice I will say it like I hear it all the time: what is considered way above average Poser work here or at some other places is considered mediocre by many, if not most, professional artists. Especially if they studied both, traditional and CG art. Their arguments are that some addy-style pic requires nothing more than some practice. Practising the eyes, learning the applications that are used. Thus they won't consider it noteworthy skill just like it is not really a "skill" to learn a 3rd or 4th language over many years.
While studying art there'll be a point, I think it was after 6 semester, when students are expected to do pictures of way above average quality. A serious pro artist will of course many years after study and with thousands hours of painting only look down on those who dwell all life long on their mediocre level and think of them as great artists.
This looking down is not because of results but because of limits; - self imposed or natural.

Then again, if I ask our professionals what they think about what I did in some of the fancy apps by going most windingly ways to reach my rather poor result they don't look down at it. There are some technical comments and some saying like "oh yes, that's interesting, you should spend more time doing this" - something similar to some of the "great work, excellent, hugs, kisses, luv ya" here.
Ahem... Yes, it is possible to get respected by professional artists for using premade content.
It is not even more difficult than trying it with selfmade content.
If one uses some ready figure and clothes and creates some other parts of the scene by himself the picture suddenly won't look like all the other pictures. If this person has some skill using his chosen app then the result can be a decent picture. Showing this picture to any professional artist won't automatically make them look down at it as soon as the creator mentions Poser. There is some more logic for this statement in my other comment on the Buzz3D thread.

Using Poser right now and posting the results to certain galleries/forums will unlikely convince biased or ignorant people. That now is only the logic behind being biased or ignorant and the natural behaviour of people sporting said traits.More successful could be to use their favorite apps to make art they appreciate and then switching to Poser and do exactly the same.

Take Photoshop and XSI. With Photoshop it is said that one needs not much skill to totally destroy the least bit of artistic content an picture had. With XSI one needs much more skill to (artistically) destroy a pic, but one also needs a long time to see only a simple first result.
PS postworked pics will almost always look like that: PS postworked pics. Another category that is looked down at.

One could say it's the wide userbase that uses PS without a certain level of skill and thus their many mediocre / bad results drag down the few sophisticated results with them.
That's the same with Poser.
Those semi-professionals that fear the sight of Poser content in their sacred galleries have not much in comon with professional artists; except the will to dedicate themselves to their application or technique.
A professional architect won't look down at roman architecture because, if compared to gothic architecture, all they could do was to build squares or rectangles with some simple holes in the walls that serve as windows. - That's now a very reduced description and not an erudite one.
Some aspects of Poser can be compared to roman architecture, others are on pretty much the same level as in more flexible apps. A Poser picture done with knowledge about the application and with artistic skill is a Poser picture; ergo it can not be compared to a Max or Maya picture as it is. It can be compared with the used program in mind and by it's artistic value.
Those who can do this will do it. Those who can't do it today because they still have to estimate and judge about things will do it some far away day.
This leads to: it is definitively possible to "break into any professional cg ranks at all using 'poser' figures or content".

Quote - Is it me or did anyone else notice? I'm not too sure, but it seems to me that in many many renders teeth end up looking too bright. Even in those where the 'nostril flow' has been fixed, the teeth, where they should be in a shadow, look too bright... Like a commercial for Orbitz!
Ends up making smiling faces somewhat unnatural?

Often yes.
Sadly it's not only the brightness/whiteness but the lack in matching teeth color and skin color.
I don't even want to speak about teeth colors and age and lifestyle.
For some sort of portrait picture it is certainly more important to get the teeth colors right if the teeths are visible than it would be in some larger scene.
Considering all the other errors in any arbitrary picture I won't say this is among the major esthetical transgressions.

Quote - The sad thing is now that I have turned off my ratings, that person hasn't commented on my last 3 images! Go figure!

You have now his name... Let's find out the real-life name and adress and... be creative. ^.^

Much more than the current rating system I would prefer a list, some control boxes, of good/bad things that people find in a picture and click on that list.
Let there be 30 or 50 entries in this list that describe attributes of an image.

One can now instead of writing a long critical comment click in the list what is applicable and add the things that are not on the list. The list would work well because most pictures suffer from the same technical shortcomings.
The hug-club prolly ignores this feature because it requires to spent a few seconds looking at a picture.

Quote - I didn't even understand what you said. All she's looking for is the name of the node that she is supposed to connect to the displacement node in the Poser Surface window. Does she use the Image_map node and connect a grey scale image of the texture map she used?

:lol: That's what quick answers usually cause... Alas, my long answers are even worse to understand.
Since displacement is not thought to have any other input then displacement data, i.e. values for vectors, you can connect either a b/w picture to it or math nodes. Connecting any color information to it won't do any good except that colors are more information that will require more memory.
That and the difference to Bump are the reason why the pages from said Poser manuals are listed instead of explaining in detail what displacement is or what kind of input it does expect.

Quote - You can connect math nodes to the displacement channel, but more often a simple b/w image map is connected to it.

...

A quick answer... Please refer to your

• Poser 6 Reference Manual: p. 147; p. 229; (maybe) p. 310; p. 321; p. 342
• Poser 6 Tutorial Manual: p. 125
  There is only 1 displacement channel that should not be confused with the bump map channel if you look in the material room advanced settings. It's somewhere towards the lower end near the alternative node channels.

You can connect math nodes to the displacement channel, but more often a simple b/w image map is connected to it.

Quote - I honestly hope that no one is offended by this thread because I am expressing my feelings about V4 Body Morphs for clothes boots/shoes etc. I need to get this out of my system because I do believe that there is a bias and perhaps a prejudice going on with some artists who make really excellent clothes for V3 and V4 but exclude the V3/V4 muscular morphs from their products because of a personal opinion about what they think womens clothes and appearance should be, or because or so they say, that in adding all the FBM morphs to the product will increase the overall filesize and make it difficult to manage or download.
.
.
.

To sum it up, artists, please give your buyers a real choice and let them decide if they want to use the muscularity morphs or not with clothing but PLEASE INCLUDE THE FBM MORPHS!

I totally agree with you if it comes to including the Muscle Morphs. It is something that should be done and it is something that is very useful to me.
Since these morphs are relative new it won't be done in a week tho.
Maybe some poll about the user preferences would help the vendors in deciding which morphs to include.
The suggestion to include selected morphs by injecting them is of course the best solution.

Out of personal taste I often prefer to morph a woman more muscular than what todays real world average women looks like.
However, overly muscular women look just as unesthetic to me like the extreme skinny ones or those who are "natural". Same with men...
Field and track athletes and gymnasts have often the right shape that is a mix between functionality, combat value (or survivability under natural conditions) and retaining their gender specific attributes.

:lol:
Seriously, what attitude would that be? That's far beyond ignorance already.
Is Posering the 8th deadly sin?

I can use Max / Maya / XSI somehow but don't look down on the users of these apps just because they can't code their apps, dunno much (if anything) about semiconductor physics (to understand their computers) and can not express themselves as fluently in math as in graphics.
I can also use Poser somehow but can't find the logic behind some valuing of one app over another.

For an hobbyist it's about the fun in the first. For an professional it's about productivity and possibilities with certain applications.That application A does not allow for x,y,z while app B does does not make B better if the goal Z can be reached with both apps. Z is to have fun.
That the overly professional Maya artist that was born with a Wacom have no idea what is involved in constructing the aircraft which he just designed does not degrade the application nor the artist.

Many Poser pictures are done out of fun, not to be memorized as a stage of human evolution.
Max / Maya is used a lot in advertising, does this contribute to it's possibilities to create art or does this elevate the few specialists of these apps over any other human?
Will they be granted a place next to the feet of those who invented and refined the computer for their ability to use a tiny part of this kind of machine's capabilities?

Oh, and must I look down on those who use Windows and windows based apps (like Max)?
Or do I have to visit CG forums about Max / Maya art and tear the pictures and their creators apart for violating nature laws and not sticking to long known facts.

Guess I go now watching some of nature's unique creations again. - Including boobs.
At least it builds from scratch with single atoms and never the same creation twice.
Odd, that nature doesn't look down on me for all my shitty low learning speed, scientific approximations, assumptions, lack of understanding and need to see a nviatwas from time to time. And for using Windows to run ... cough ... Poser...

Creating morphs with magnets in Poser can be a fast solution sometimes.
If you want heavy modifications you're prolly faster in an modeling environment.

I don't know C4D's coffee... Maybe you can add mirroring via a script in C4D.
OTOH, it's hard to believe that C4D does not support mirroring by default coz it is some very common function.

Clothing the character first and then model (or deform) the morphs to it sounds really odd.
It works well with magnets in Poser because you can often apply the deforming on the figure also on the cloth part. That saves you the work of doing it on the cloth from scratch but also requires most often additional deformers for tweaking the cloth.

That's some interesting way to react to Poser or the art created with it's help.
If I look at the 3D app related talking in work there is no looking down to the artists that can only do nice colorful models and animations of products or illustrations for theories while the scientists and engineers have to work many months without much more then a bunch of numbers as a result.
There's some bitching about to creative artists sometimes and some sort of fights over time at  specific computing hardware but that's some work related issue that can't be applied for hobbyists.

Someone who creates a model or scene from scratch and uses photographies for textures has of course more work than someone who loads a model and some texture with a mouseclick.
The important point is that both methods are nothing more than work.
Different amounts of work but nothing artistic so far.
There is no logic behind the statement that placing some points in some virtual space is art.
There is no logic behind the statement that building complex shaders with DarkTree or Poser or whatever is art.
There is no logic behind stating that pressing a button of some camera or pressing some buttons on some musical instruments is art.There is also no logic behind the statement that using some brush with some color on some canvas is art.

Art can only be found in the result of such processes.
A process is not related to art and a process engineer is no artist.
Neither the process of creation, the result nor the interval from before creation to it's end are  necessarily related to art.

Building an highway is work, modeling work, that does not lead to artistic expressions in landscapes.
What some viewer thinks and feels about this highway is relevant to estimate the highway's artistic value. The result can not be absolute.
Mixing worth with work is not rational.

The most likely cause to see one's own work as superior - in whatever way - over the work done by someone else with different tools is the inability to analyze what was done and what is the whole state of the viewed matter. (I don't mean if something is finished; that is never the case with anything. It's the state of the specific matter to the whole)
The amount of work is not a part of the set of art. It can be related to art but it never is a native part of the set. At least in mathematical logic.

The next reason for people mixing up art with work: they fail to see the set and what is part of it. They maybe feel better if they exclude this truth.
It's not nice to realize after maybe two weeks of modeling and shader work that all that is left is a damn single room and still dozens of errors. It alleviates the pain if one can include all the hard work in the resulting artwork.
It could be even worse if this person is a decent modeler that can with some precision depict what real world allows to exist and what nature created before him.
Maybe this person went to great lenghts to gather information about all the details of the object he wants to model. The person traveled to somewhere to take reference pictures, learned the used modeling app somewhat better to realize the wanted attributes and went then to model the object for some long time.
The resulting picture maybe shows nothing more than some rare physical effect. It's not art, but a somewhat precise depiction of reality.
Now a Poser user comes and clicks the library tab to load the figure that was made out before mentioned model and does some fancy renders with it...
And quite some people praise this persons artistic skills for the creative usage of someone's else model and textures...
To make it even worse the original creator get's a single line of credit that many will not even read and many other will have forgotten 5 minutes later.

Now there's another point why some Persons believe their 3D apps make them superior.
The only appreciation they get is that their chosen 3D app doesn't crash or that it doesn't react with error messages on the user's actions. A hobbyist will not get paid for his effort of learning any 3D app or achieving whatever horrible or good results with it. The only useful reciprocal exchange is that of appreciation by the viewers of this persons (art)work.
Now the up-dressers could endanger this source of appreciation that other human viewers are because they get it for much less work and this on less time. And human viewers usually prefer an steady input, like from some Poser user, over that sporadic and hard to estimate input of an serious modeler.

BTW, there's sometimes a similar behaviour between scientists and engineers and scientists and hobbyists. Science aims for precision while engineering can be done solely on approximations as long as the goal will be reached. For the reason of sacrificing precision of real world functionality sometimes a scientist looks down on an engineer. While a scientist often has to study longer and more, it doesn't always enable him to create some device.
But it's also common that for example an chemist tells his chemical engineers what to do or what is OK. Physicists can be even worse due to the broad spectrum they studied about.

Basically you can use any serious modeling app. If you are most used to work with Max then that's a good way to go.
If you can handle Poser deformers better then this is likely the better way.

That "blonde hair definition" was actually funny. :D

Dunno. There's something about Poser that screams "hobbyist" way to loud.

Maybe a highly professional order that's done with only productivity in mind is not the right solution.
Whole Poser itself isn't designed for high productivity.
It's more like some tuned gameeditor that lacks a real script interface. HoMM V Editor, UnrealEd, NWN Toolkit, SpellForce Editor, Earth 2150 MapEditor are all designed for productivity in some way.
Poser is closer to these applications than to pro 3D apps. That's actually a good thing.

I have to say that I'm happy about the fact that some people enjoy it to provide content for the community, freebie creators or vendors, it doesn't matter.

Poser should stay with this trait of an fun-application but something needs to be done to manage the huge amount of 3rd party content.
The ability to create and rename, copy and cut folders and files using the Poser GUI and a decent script interface with syntax highlighting is something that e-frontier has to take care of.

Regarding the 3rd party items it would be useful already if they find some conventions and stick to them. That alone would already help to limit the organisation work/time for the user/buyer to acceptable amounts.
Only thing required is that everybody sticks to such a convention what shouldn't be asked to much sice industry can do it too and for many decades already.

:lol::lol::lol::lol::lol:

After a reinstalling Poser and all kind of add on content I had a Poser folder that looked similar to your screenshot. After this accident I started to add Poser and related files to the sys DB and sort them the way I want them. Right now I have 8 folders in Poser. I'm not done with changing relative paths in some files so that I can clean up the Runtime folder. There is a total of 10000+ folders under the Poser directory...

Quote - I compliment - even if it is for any of these reasons is always appreciated.  This is different and I must be expressing myself poorly.  

To describe - it is as if a man walks up to a red headed woman and says GEE I LOVE your blonde hair.  Then proceeds to walk up to every other man woman and say GEE I LOVE your blonde hair.   After 5000 or so ppl the statement becomes meaningless and random ppl start to wonder if the man has lost his mind and is absent mindedly mumbling.

I appreciate the compliments where the people actually looked.  But there are 3 to my knowledge who I am SURE aren't even glancing.

@jjroland: GEE I LOVE your blonde hair! :lol:

Ok, actually I kinda hate blonde hair, but sometimes I leave some sort of praise without criticism on some images.
Sometimes I do it simply to let the artist know I looked at the image. That's btw, always a good looking, not a quick glance.Sometimes I don't feel like looking up the right english words to express my critic about an image.
And sometimes it even happens that an image is really good and I like it on an technical and emotional level. That happens maybe once a year but there won't be much negative criticism about this work then.
Since the fixes, if I know how to do them are often pretty long text and or illustrations, I do that via PM. If the artist states exactly what he want's to improve it is easy to write about this specific issue. If the artists says "all kind of comments are welcome" then I'm often to lazy to write about everything that I can see in a picture.