Ok the forum ate my last message. Probably best. :P Basically, I can find my socks in the dark. And I don't keep them with my feet. Or my feet with the socks. Actually if I were to go by my sock drawer, I'd be convinced I only have one foot, because my washing machine lives on a steady diet of socks... (I'm winning, I buy 2 identical pairs. That way if it eats one of each, I still have a matching pair. HAH!) The last thing I want is to have to deal with lone socks in the middle of my undies. Aaaaanyway.... I have maybe gone into the geometries folder 20 times since I've used poser. And I've used it for years. I go almost daily to textures, be it to add something, or smooth something, or try something out... I don't care where you want to keep your textures. You're free to do with them what you want and to put them where you want. But if you want to sell items other people use, you better make damn sure you're putting the stuff where they look for it. Not where you want it to be, but where people LOOK for it. I'd say at least 75% of poser owners don't even know a geometries folder exists, nor where to look for it. But they know where their textures are, because there is a folder called TEXTURES. Hell I know a lot of people who are pretty durn lost when it comes to find the C: drive! Yes, it would be nice if everyone were 100% computer savvy, but the reality is - maybe about 25% are. The rest aren't. And you have to make it easy for all levels of proficiency, not just the 25% who give out their phone number in Binary. PabloS - ROFLMAO!

Attached Link: http://market.renderosity.com/softgood.ez?ViewSoftgood=23586

I was actually about to ask if it's just me or if anyone else is getting a really slow response. It's been going on for some time now, thought it was me at first but.... obviously not! R'osity - slap your host around a bit an tell them you need to be on a faster server...

Veritas - just don't use Gator. Comes with a slew of spyware attached :(

Ernyoka1 - thank you for the tip! I'll try that. :) Silke (Who wants a camera right NOW because the light outside is incredible and there is a tree in the full BLAZE of red lit just right and........ I HAVE NO CAMERA AT WORK cries and stares at the tree some more....)

I have another one... If MAT files start with MAT and POSE files start with POSE then we won't have to hunt so much. Oh yeah, I don't like poses and mat's mixed either. If I look for a MAT, I will scroll to MAT's, if I look for a POSE I will scroll to POSE Very very often I rip out the pose files and shove them into another folder and (if it lets me) rename a "XYZ MAT" folder to MAT for XYZ Oh yeah, if something has ISSUES with different versions of Poser, please say so in the readme. I know some stuff will not work in Poser 5, some will but it will come out differently. If it was never tested on P5 (or P4 for that matter) then please please say so. I remember a girl having real issues with Transpond's flowers. The tulips rendered with black smudges and what have you. For example: I've recently bought Versa Bench and - God help me - used the Firefly renderer. The result was.... lets just say I won't be doing THAT again. However, there was nothing (unless I didn't spot it) to say that it would result in bits bulging in all directions. (I am not kidding). In fact, I don't recall there being a mention of whether or not it would work with P5. Such info is vital. Really really vital. For the simple reason... if I were a beginner, I might not know that P4 renderer may do it because it's totally different to Firefly. But if the readme said "Not tested in P5" then at least I know it may not work. BTW this is in NO way meant to discourage anyone from getting Transpond's Versa Bench. It's an awesome piece and very versatile, and I'm not regretting the purchase at all. I just render it in the P4 renderer now that I'm aware of the Firefly thing.

(R'OSITY, let us EDIT)

Blazer,

For what it is worth, I just voted for your image. :)

Why?
Because out of the lot, I thought the composition was excellent, the mood was excellent, the lighting was excellent and it said "Samhain" to me.
A lot of the images - IMHO - completely missed the point. The theme was Halloween - not Horror.

Yes, we associate Halloween with all things spooky, but it still has to say "Halloween" to me to get my vote, not just "I can render a ghoul/vampire/skeleton (insert monster of choice)."

I'll post the link to Blazer's image here:
http://www.renderosity.com/contest.ez?contest_id=235&ShowQuestion=6996
Some others that came pretty darn close to getting my vote were:
Aquiring Ingredients - Calum5 - http://www.renderosity.com/contest.ez?contest_id=235&ShowQuestion=7081
This was the second choice. I sat there for AGES staring at both trying to make up my mind lol. I really love that one, it does say Halloween to me - but not as much as Blazer's does. (Go figure) I wish we could vote for our top 3!
Goblin Jamboree - Mutedbanshee - http://www.renderosity.com/contest.ez?contest_id=235&ShowQuestion=6771
I love the idea and I really like the mood and composition of it.

Demonica - http://www.renderosity.com/contest.ez?contest_id=235&ShowQuestion=6813
I really like the idea, and the execution of this image.

Mommy there is a ghost on the stairs - Mellygrl - http://www.renderosity.com/contest.ez?contest_id=235&ShowQuestion=6819
I love the image! The character and the composition of this are truly outstanding - but it didn't say "Halloween" to me. :)

Yes.. open it - Redhawk - http://www.renderosity.com/contest.ez?contest_id=235&ShowQuestion=6921
Very very nice image, well done, well lit, well rendered, well postworked but.... same as above, it scraped in just below saying "Halloween" to me.

Liewald - http://www.renderosity.com/contest.ez?contest_id=235&ShowQuestion=6930
I just think the image is very well done

Bothellite - http://www.renderosity.com/contest.ez?contest_id=235&ShowQuestion=6931
I ADORE the look on her face! It's very halloweeny but whatever she's sitting in... spoiled it a bit for me. :)

I could go on and ON here, there are sooo many I liked and which caught my eye.
Loved Wyvern7's spiderweb thingy... Skydancer's witch... Gawd...

How dare you people make me CHOOSE?!?!

Anyway, I felt that maybe it would have been nice to be able to leave comments on the images we like, but didn't vote for, so that the artist knows why we didn't vote for it despite liking the image a lot.

Silke

One thing I would add, which I found works relatively well when combining figures with real photos, is to select the outside edges of the figure and blur them. Reason being, if you look at a photograph, the edges on people are never sharp. It helps it blend better. Only do one or two pixels, and don't blur too much, but it really does work wonders in helping realism.

Here is me, the person who buys this stuff... I don't like having textures in any folder OTHER than my textures folder. I don't like having readme's in my textures folder. I don't like having readme's anywhere but a readme folder where I can FIND them. I don't like readmes that contain no info! I don't like readmes that are named readme.txt. I don't like products I have to unzip then copy into places where they should be. (i.e. xyzproductruntime....) I don't like Mat or Pose files in my Cameras folder. I don't like hardcoded bits in my files. I don't like products where I can't identify which figure they are for. I don't like additional object files that vanish into places unknown and which I then can never find again. (/objects/prodname !! How difficult is that?) I don't like morphs that vanish the same way (/morphs/prodname) I don't like blank thumbnails. I don't like P4 & P4PP/P5 files mixed in one folder I don't like V3/V2 (M2/M3) mixed in one folder. I absolutely positively DETEST ! & ++ etc naming of folders So there you have it. Make it easy for me to work with stuff. Granted, even if it's not done this way, if I like what I see, I will likely buy it no matter how it's organized. To be honest, I would even prefer textures to go into a PRODUCT folder, rather than a merchantname folder or just into the textures folder. That way I would know exactly where to look if I have to find something. But I won't like having to shift stuff around and think twice about it.

Quote - If you can't figure that one out. You have no business using a computer in the first place.

I hate to say it, ScottA, but that comment makes me want to slap you, and slap you HARD. If you sell something, you make it as EASY as possible for people to use and find stuff. Especially if you have to assume that people who buy it may not be as computer literate / proficient as you would like them to be. It has nothing whatsoever to do whether I can or can't "figure that out". I can find anything I bloody well want to find, and then some. I just CHOOSE not to want to go searching all over the place for textures that may be in a geometries folder where no one in their right mind would look when there is the OBVIOUS place called gasp TEXTURES!!

Ya know... if there was a way that Poser would delete a file out of the interface - or let me rephrase that... I don't need the P4 folders / files that come with most packages. I need to use the PP folders / files (P4/PP & P5 here) So I tend to narrow stuff down by deleting the actual folder / file out of my Pose / Figures list in Poser. However, that will obviously not remove it out of Poser. I wish it would... Will P-Uninstall let me remove items selectively? i.e. Remove just parts of a package if they are mixed in a folder? (My guess is not) Anything to whittle down my Poser directory... it's got so many freebies in there, it's turned into a monster.

Thanks guys :) I've also pulled down Ockham's scripts to try out later.

Ok shedding light on the light.... If I delete the default lights first (now why didn't I ever try that???) and then apply the lights (Setup 1 0 in this case) - whammo, I can render. If I then change my mind and try a different set (Setup 1 in this case) without deleting all the existing lights first - whammo, loading textures and stuck. I'm assuming that going from Setup 1 0 to Setup 1 results in some null lights (lights turned off) but not sure. Gonna test some more, but Poser 5 just hates lights. (Which really REALLY pi$$es me off to be honest.) I bought the darn thing so I'm gonna use it, but to be honest... Poser4 is way more reliable. Gonna gripe at CL a bit about the null light stuff.

Rendered fine with the blank Vicky. Gonna see what's causing this if it kills me! :P

N1ppon, I hate to tell ya.... I tried using your lights on two renders today. Each setup consisted of V3, one piece of clothing, one with hair, one without, pose applied. P5 (just in case) Both of them rendered fine with the default lights, P4 renderer, new window, default settings. Both of them crashed when I applied yours. Different lights each time, just stuck on "Loading Textures" and not going anywhere for an hour (I went and watched TV). Setup for the renderer was exactly the same as for the default lights. I had saved (and copied, I have grown wise to this...) the setup on both files with the default lights, applied a different light and they rendered both fine. Applied yours to the saved file with default lights - and I had "Loading textures". I can't tell you what went wrong, or where it's going wrong, but that's what was happening here. I'm going to give it another try with just a blank Vicky now... will report back on that. It may not be your lights, I get this with some other lights too.

DUH.... I shoulda searched lol. I just asked the very same question. Well almost. I was kind of wondering if it can be an external folder (i.e. h:/runtime) which I think it can - but not sure.