There are some professional types mixed in here, but I'm sure you are right and the majority of people are not making 100% of their living off of digital video/3D production. Nonetheless we want to make sure the support is right for each type of customer. With the availability of Vue 4 Pro, we are getting a lot of new customers that are using it for production, and they are likely to look for answers in established Vue oriented communities as well (and Renderosity is a one of them). Best regards, Lynn Fredricks e-on software

I like free tech support myself. Im not advocating eliminating the free support (and its never been discussed internally). That needs to continue, but it will have to be socketed into everything else related to support. The hobbyist market and pro market are totally different beasts however. When a product isnt working right, everyone wants an answer 15 minutes ago. The difference with the pro market is that there are Pro customers who are charging their customers $300 for that 15 minutes. They need someone on the phone ASAP or they are in big trouble. MightyPete, yes, we are discussing the plant situation. We want to bring more plants to market, maybe suppliment or add to whats currently available. By getting the Plant Editor out there, it also creates a viable third party market for plants that leverage SolidGrowth. Im hoping we will see some third party plants real soon now (I know of at least a couple of folks working on some). Best regards, Lynn Fredricks e-on software

Howdy all, This follows a separate thread in which someone asked about professional level technical support. This is only in regards to folks who need help now on the telephone -- folks who are often billing their clients a mighty sum. This isnt for the hobbyist. Megalodon, Im putting this out for your feedback, but understand that LightWave has about $1,000 worth of padding in their price compared to Vue 4 Professional. Id say some of that $1,000 is allocated to support bandwidth. Part of the support picture is figuring out what to make an included side-dish and what else should be ala carte. The free email and knowledge base support, as Steve indicated, is under review. I apologize for any delays support has in responding. I know from our internal reviews that in many cases, delays are caused by a lack of detailed information needed to reproduce a problem. We have one, for example, which remains unsolved because the customer won't send in a screenshot. Significant new functionality was added with Pro, and while Pro was thoroughly tested in the beta cycle, you cannot anticipate every possible configuration of hardware and software -- and Pro defintely has a broader number of "connects" than Vue d'Esprit. Only upon public release can a software company get the real picture, and then respond with updates, fixes and workarounds. That's what we are doing -- engineers are not twiddling their thumbs. Folks, if you want to turn this thread into a venting session, I can step back and leave it alone. I think direct dialog is a better way though. Best regards, Lynn Fredricks e-on software

Attached Link: http://www.renderosity.com/messages.ez?ForumID=12368&Form.ShowMessage=1515145

Tim, We are working on a solution for the Pro market. That being said, you are incorrect about there being no customer service support. What's provided is in response to the issue at hand, but it comes with the assumption of that the support is free and that what's wanted is free support. Most of the issues that come in through knowledge base questions are usually already answered in the knowledge base (ie download a new driver from Nvidia, download recent Vue update, try without OpenGL, turn off old copy of Crashguard, etc). We can have someone tell a customer to do that over the telephone, but do you want to pay to get that kind of information? The assumption for Pro's is that they do, because they really need an answer yesterday. For customers who want it free, its self help first, then email support. Microsoft does the same thing. You can get free email support from Microsoft, however it take 2-3 business days to get an answer. Fortunately we can do a little better than that without asking for a credit card. If we get a problem (one that isnt "hey, I have a problem, please call me!") that we think cannot be solved by self-help or email then we call. Since its clear that you want to have a paid for support program, Id be interested in hearing from you and from others about what you'd like to have and what you think is reasonable to pay for support. Lets assume that self-help and free non-urgent email support stays free and only look at paid for support. Now is really a good time to give feedback on this so we can develop a program thats wanted and feasible. Im going to start a new message with the topic "Paid For Tech Support Program" as the title. Can we move this thread there? Best regards, Lynn Fredricks e-on software

I believe you can use your Mover 4 you had with Vue d'Esprit with Vue 4 Pro, the installer on the Vue 4 Pro CD being some kind of update. Ill find out what is involved with the transfer. Best regards, Lynn Fredricks e-on software

If its a static import, check to make sure that the pose in in your first frame. The default static import just grabs what's in the first frame. Best regards, Lynn Fredricks e-on software

PheonixRising, maybe we should get together a group of folks who also visit Renderosity on Dark Age of Camelot. I recommend those of you who have never played this kind of game take a look at Dark Age of Camelot. Its a lot of fun, and it will honestly give you some ideas of artwork to make in Poser, Vue and others. Best regards, Lynn Fredricks e-on software

Hey, thanks for the tip! Actually, Im very familiar with what SpeedTree can do. Its used in Dark Age of Camelot, which I play sometimes when the boss isnt looking ;-) SpeedTree is a vertical market tool targeted at the game industry. Game developers use it to create nice looking trees and dramatically reduce polygon count to the point that its mostly just a few planes that load very quickly into realtime game environments. They look good from several angles, but when you flatten trees out you lose flexibility and detail. Best regards, Lynn Fredricks e-on software

Same info should be here and there. $299 sidegrade/$499 full are introductory prices which end October 15. Then its $399/$599. Still a $200 difference between sidegrade and full. Best regards, Lynn Fredricks e-on software

The sidegrade pricing has, built into it, the ability to sidegrade to Vue 4 Professional from Vue d'Esprit so that you get full credit for your purchase of Vue d'Esprit. Its based on the full price of Vue 4 Professional. Vue 4 Professional has an introductory price of $499, which is scheduled to switch to its regular price of $599. That's where the $100 shift takes place. There is still a $200 difference between the upgrade price and the full price. Best regards, Lynn Fredricks e-on software

I cannot go into details as it impacts more than just e-on software, but I can say that we have incorporated specific runtimes into Vue to enable both static (Vue 4, Vue 4 Pro) and animated (Mover) capabilities. What's in there for static imports is pretty lightweight but its more sophisticated than, say, a 3DS importer. But otherwise, you wouldnt have the capability to import Poser stuff at all. Some developers tried to do some tricks with OBJs to bring in Poser content, but my feeling is that is complexity balloon ripe for an ugly explosion. Much of the Poser format has been decoded by users, but there is much that isnt exposed, especially in Poser 5 --what is exposed in a pz3 file may have no relevance without the right interpreter. We see Poser support as a feature that's very relevant to some customers, especially Vue d'Esprit customers. Vue d'Esprit is priced in the same ballpark as Poser and has a compatible but not exactly the same customer mix (we've bundled Vue 4 and Poser 4 before). Pro was released after a significant amount of feedback from interested parties we met with at SIGGRAPH and follow up feedback from others. While Poser support didnt figure much in that feedback, the support for Poser is very important to a number of customers who have Vue d'Esprit already and considering Pro, and we wouldnt have wanted to disappoint them. Best regards, Lynn Fredricks e-on software

Tim, The new OpenGL implementation isnt the only feature in Vue Pro. What's available in Vue d'Esprit 4 was tweaked a little in 4.2, but it does have an older engine than Vue Pro. The Poser import capabilities arent any different between Vue Pro and Vue d'Esprit. Animated Poser support is only available through Mover 4. The timeline problem you are pointing out is the one in regard to a slow down with the preview you mentioned previously? It seems to work fine for many users. Have you followed up with support about it through our website? Im certain the phone number you are calling is our reseller line, and that it directs you to contact us through our website. Have you followed up through our website? Best regards, Lynn Fredricks e-on software

Hi Orio, Honestly, Im not sure, yet. I wasnt on the beta team and we are still yawning and stretching here on the Pacific coast ;-) Under the hood, there are two engines at play -- one for Poser 4 and the other for Poser 5. My understanding is that the two engines are not aware of each other. That might be one to ask Steve so we can get it up on our Knowledge Base. What I can say now is that we've tested with all of the default models in both Poser 4 and Poser 5 and also the latest Michael and Victoria, and it seems to be working well. But the implementation is a fairly strict adherence to "normal" pz3's, so we cannot make guarantees about models that have been customized with various utilities. Best regards, Lynn Fredricks e-on software

Hello all, Forester, thanks for the support!:-) Ill do my best to answer questions where I can. I dont have Guitta's technical expertise, only the black heart of a deceitful sales and marketing weasel ;-) Regarding the technical issues -- we are working on them. Not all issues show themselves during a beta cycle, but as they appear, we will address them. Vue 4 Professional has a new implementation of OpenGL which is superior to what is in Vue d'Esprit. Dont be put off by the dialog that says your video card isnt supported. All that means is that it hasnt been tested with your hardware and driver combination. Someone asked about ATI Radeon 9600 Pro for example, a fairly common card. We havent completed rigorous testing with that card, but that doesnt mean you cannot use the OpenGL engine -- my box uses the ATI Radeon 9600 Pro and it works just fine. If you've downloaded the recent betas, you'll see we are completing basic Poser 5 support. Our friends at Curious Labs and Daz have been very helpful, but essentially we are hosting the vast majority of the Poser application within a Vue framework, which isnt an easy task. Three of the complaints listed above are all the same issue -- loose CDs. We are looking to resolve this. Im about to post reminders on the pricing, but the introductory price is just about over (October 15). Vue 4 Professional has not been marketed as the upgrade to Vue d'Esprit. The upgrade to Vue d'Esprit will be Esprit 5, which will have pricing comparable to our Vue 3 to Vue 4 pricing. Best regards, Lynn Fredricks e-on software

Its exactly the same, you just cannot make anything commercial out of it. We require proof of academic status. Best regards, Lynn Fredricks e-on software