blither blither blither NOW they're working!!! aaaarrrggghhh.... I didn't change any settings since last night....didn't restart windows...didn't restart Poser...just went away and came back.... the darn things imported perfectly - (well, other than I just noticed the wedge sides are slightly bowed) - but.... *** just SHOOT me *** (or better yet - send me a free copy of Poser 5 - okay, just kidding...) no, really - send it anyway... ;)

Ronstuff: You're absolutely right. I've been flying blind and it's been a real pain. I'm going to try the multiple texture sets (far, mid, near) with UVmapped templates and see if that will help with the resolution problem Nance described. Tubaman: My eyesight isn't so hot and I've found that when I use any window smaller than 400x400 I can't see the image clearly enough to pose it. I do render at 320x200 for web use but mostly I work & render at 640x480. Larger than that runs into the hidden tool problem. I usually keep the heirarchy window open but pushed off the side of the screen where I can pull it back as needed. Same for the animation pallet on the opposite side. Rendered animations get ported into Premiere for editing.

Whenever I get text on the body it is because I have tried to put a texture made for a P3 person onto a P4 person. Each 3d figure and model is made up of a unique collection of polygons called a "mesh". The shapes made by the mesh are "projected" onto a 2d surface called template or "UV map" - so your 3d figure appears like a paper doll on the template. Programs like "UV Mapper" let you disect the doll and move the pieces about on the template to get the best use of the space. The piece locations for the P3 figures are different from the piece locations for the P4 figures. So you wind up with P3 text all over the leg (or whatever) of your P4 person. If you really want to see weirdness, try loading people textures onto animals and vice versa. It looks crummy but it demonstrates the situation very clearly. By the way...welcome to Poser...it is both addictive and frustrating - but you're posting in the right place. p.s. (I'm having trouble with textures too!)

Does anybody else do stupid things like pressing "Post a new message" for the third time after typing in excessively long responses to previous messages? (You'd think I'd learn by now...) Nance: Thanks for the heads up on the aspect ratio, that had never occurred to me - I can deal with that one. Umm...the resolution problem is a problem. You've explained it very clearly. I think I can see now why it was proving so intractable. The resolution needed has three "physical" variables: the distance of the camera to the object (in pu's), the camera's focal length (in mm), and the size of the final render (in pixels). I'm not sure if the working window's dimensions count as a significant variable since it's possible to final render to a different size (does anybody really do that?). There may not be a simple solution but I recall in early games there were generally three sizes of sprites: near, mid-range, and far - which would be swapped in and out as needed to create the illusion of depth and distance. Perhaps instead of thinking about creating "a" texture I will start thinking about "texture sets" instead. I'm thinking it may be possible to use Poser's background grid for a quick & dirty guide to the pixel resolution needed for the final render - then load the appropriate texture size indicated and work from there. Ronstuff: Ouch, ouch...you're making my head hurt again (grin). So far I've been trying to do simple tricks like getting Poser to make my painted bricks look the same on the block prop as they do on my texture image - where the texture and the template are essentially the same thing. Thank you for pointing out the next mountain I get to climb - multiple thingies stretching and squishing and warping - all in different directions - all at the same time. ow,ow,ow...

The mystery remains mysterious. After finishing up the render I defrag'd the drives and rebooted. The darn tube.obj imported fine and everything works perfectly. I guess Poser needed to be re-opened to update the data files? ;) Is there a list somewhere of file-types that require a reboot to function? I've read Poser needs to rebuild .rsr files under some circumstances. Anybody collated the proper conditions?

Thanks bloodsong. The problem isn't actual holes in the mesh - I'm pretty sure it's a lighting thing. I'll double check the reflection setting - I was pretty bushed the first time around. Right now Poser is tied up with an animation rendering project so I won't be able to reload the tube.obj until tomorrow.

Go to the utilities section and download Twoface by Maz. It creates normals on the reverse side of props. Use it on hair props also to prevent seeing through the inside of long hair when viewing from the front.