The new Macs run on intel so why not license DirectX from M$?

Quote - Hey Don, you might find this interesting.
First off, I set Poser pro up as you suggested. I've messed with all that before with Poser 7, but not yet with Poser Pro. Seems like it might be a little faster. Anyway, I've always used hardware accumulation.
But anyway, what's interesting is then I opened up the Nvidia Control Panel and under Manage 3D Settings I added Poser pro to the list. I didn't change anything, just left it all at default settings. I was just curious to see if anything would change.
When I opened Poser back up and loaded a figure, it all seems quite a bit faster now, like maybe by adding it to the list it turned something on... who knows, but it's stable and much faster. An old scene I had which guaranteed an insta-crash every time, loaded just fine.
Might want to give that a try.

Ok mike I added Poser Pro to the Nvidia control panel as you did and still stable but didn't notice any speed increase. It didn't hurt anything though. I think the settings I used did the trick though and thats all I care about :)

Don

Yes it's an Ultra that I bought from New Egg. It has 1 gig plus it's a hybrid dual card but uses only 1 slot. It's a monster.... LOL

Don

I have maybe discovered how to set up Poser Pro for these high end cards. In render settings / Preview Tab use OpenGL / Hardware accumulation on /  Transperency Actual on / Enhanced Multilayer Transperency on /  Texzture display 1024

The Preview window responds a bit slower when I load a scene but maybe Poser just couldn't keep up with the fast response of the video card and this gives it time to catch up. Who knows why but I can't seem to crash it now loading any scene.

My system specs are: Vista 64 Ultimate, Intel core 2 quad 3ghz, 8 gig ram, 8800 GTS overclocked (factory) 1gig vram, Vista controled swap file (16 gig) on secondary drive, Alternate runtime also on secondary drive.

Don

Quote - Poser is just terrified of good video cards is all it is. It's intimidated by power. It was designed in the days when a user was lucky to have an onboard 3dfx card with 32 MB of RAM on his 1998 Compaq. ;-)

See though, what did I tell you? It's only Poser. It's always only Poser.

Whatever you do, don't overclock that 8800 GTS and try it with Poser. You wanna talk terrified? I never saw Poser move so quick before. So quick to crash, that is. ;-)
I tried it with Riva Tuner and the EVGA Precision Tool and got some nice benchmarks in 3D Mark and Half-Life 2 Lost Coast, and it seemed perfectly stable with all the other graphics apps I have, but Poser didn't like it one little bit.

I have a special 8800 GTS card that is factory overclocked and has 1gig of dedicated DDR3 Vram and Poser doesn't seem to like it. I have been trying to play with Posers render settings to see if one setting or another stops the behavior. Sometimes changing the settings works and sometimes not. So who knows... LOL

Don

Ok I have definitly determined my problems are some kind of issue with openGL and my video card (only with Poser). It is an intermitent issue because sometimes it works and sometimes it doesn't. When in Sreed mode it never happens. Like others I thought it was V4 that was causing it but it's just intermittent and almost any character  will cause it eventually. I'm starting to think that displaying transperency may be the issue. I will do some more tests.

Don

Quote - Hi i am getting the same problem but it is mostly to when i use V4.1 also since installing latest service pack for poser 7 i cannot access my external runtime folder.When i try to link it i get a message not a runtime folder only been happening since  SR3,so at the moment is a waste of time trying to run poser anyone anyideas.
Thanks, Blue

Try putting a poser.exe file in the folder where your external runtime resides. Example:
E:/MySavedRuntime/Poser.exe
E:/MySavedRuntime/Runtime

Your external runtime can't be in a drive root dir.

Don

Thanks MikeJ That is the driver version I have. I was having Poser problems with the two previous drivers. Different ones but problems so I don't know how far back I have to go. I have "let the 3D app decide" checked. Since the GPU is only assisting the preview I wonder if sreed would be sufficient?

Don

Quote - Hi. Sorry I wasn't around. Vargas #1 is already much less of the color map. You're using #2, which keeps a lot more color.

But I see you found a way to mess with it.

I honestly don't completely understand that shader any longer. I was very in the zone on the day I wrote it. Some of the techniques I used were rather roundabout, and I'd do it maybe a bit more simply today.

The link above will take you to the original Vargas thread at RuntimeDNA. I posted renders, and then we had a long discussion about "simpler" ways to get the same render. Actually, there are few simpler ways to get the same. Hehehehe. The key thing is how to get "Vargas" to draw your color map - nipples included!

The devil is always in the details... lol I have been playing with this for only maybe a few hours since you showed me how to get VargasVSS loaded.  As I understand VSS's purpose is to simplfy applying a shader to several figure parts/figures with a simple click. Once the shader is written presumably by the user. Your provided shaders are supplied so users can test VSS and as such are NOT a part of VSS.

That being said I'm starting to feel like a dog chasing his tail... lol  Here's my dilemma.  Following in the spirit of VSS I have been trying to create a shader to give me a style of render for my art. Granted I started with VargasVSS but have made many changes to it already. I want the effect sans the red and some specular added that makes the skin look pretty good and with some tweaks I'm getting it.  I removed the copy rules from the teeth,eyes,  lips, inner mouth and all nails. Now come the problems. When the skin is what I want the available light is insufficiant to illuminate the eyes, teeth etc. If I increase the light I blow out the skin. So I have been increasing the diffuse value of the non effected items to in essense self illuminate them. That is helping but not perfect yet. Now I have the issues of nipples and make-up. Can .png or .tiff files be used in the material room? If so I should be able to apply those with a trans map to get the image to overlay the shader in thoseareas. I could perhaps use blend nodes to control this so that it's soft and in keeping with the skin.

Or maybe I'm just not getting this and have lost my mind... LOL

Thanks,  Don

edit: Hearing that you were in the zone when you created the Vargas shaders and can't figure them out now just scares the HELL out of me... LOL If you don't know then were dummed. hehehe

Quote - Hi, all files in a runtime are 'relative', and within any additional runtimes as well. It's references to files residing in outside folders that cause the problems. If I were you  I would do two things. First I would try running Poser in administrative mode. Also check your graphics drivers, most Poser problems stem from them. It's possible the files you're attempting to open have their preview set to openGL hardware support and this is where the troubles reside. One simple test is switch to SreeD for preview mode and make sure it's saved as the default. If things are more stable, then the graphics card's openGL isn't compatible with Poser. Try newer drivers and maybe switch to openGL sofware support under preview settings.

Regards...

Thats an interesting though re: the video drivers. I do have hardware excelleration turned on. I have the most current Nvidia drivers now for an Nvidia GTS 8800 with 1 gig ram. The drivers are configured to let the application decide how the card is used. I know this was/is a very popular card, however no guarantee it's fully compatible. So I will try that and let everyone know.

Thanks,   Don

Quote - You've achieved a more realistic image but its less Vargas like. I prefer the previous, but this one looks good aswell. You might be achieving your own style. Keep at it.

Yes I agree the first one is more Vargas like but I am trying to achieve a certain look. Trying to get a soft realistic kind of look.

Don

My UAC is and has been off. I am aware of the relative path problem but iff that were it how could anyone use Pro with multiple runtimes?

Don

Quote - [ I've read that Poser Pro uses relative paths in pz3s, while poser 7 and earlier used absolute paths. If you use multiple runtimes, Pro can get hung up looking for files. Also, the User Account Control can cause problems if you're trying to write a file into the Program File folder. Are you saving your scenes in default save location within the poser program folders?

I saved the files in Pro. I'll check UAC. No I am not saving in the defaul folder, does that matter?

Don

Don

Quote - > Quote - you need AO.

I have some AO on the materials. I think the red is a part of the shader nodes to accomplish the Vargas look, which is correct but I would love to know how to control it for a bit different look.

Don

Ok I cut the saturation back to 1 in the HSV node and that did the trick :)  If this is wrong for some reason Bill let me know. Will post a revised image in a few.

Thanks,   Don