Late to the game here, but felt the need to add my own "in memorial" post. Like attileus I was feeling a bit nostalgic at the news. Having started using Vue with Vue d'Esprit 3, one of Vue's strongest strengths was community. Personally I think that the emphasis swung too much to professional/production house use and away from those that really drove the program forward - the serious hobbyist. This isnt a criticism of the program or features added that were geared to professional use (as they were great features), but the fact that its main demographic was left behind.

Maybe the writing was on the wall when Nicholas Phelps sold E-on Software, maybe it was the issues with Cornucopia3D, but without a doubt the subscription model moved the program away from many hobbyists who had cherished the program for years previously. Lets not forget, that for many, Vue was their initial introduction into 3D. The program, for me, lost its sense of community with its sale to Bentley. I look back fondly to those earlier days of E-on Software and the community that was built up around it. Even the little things - who can forget Picture of the Day?

I was very fortunate that I was invited to write tutorials for Vue in 3D World and Renderosity magazines in the past. It saddens me to see the programs state at this stage. I guess the World moves on. Tools and technology changes. I still can't think of a program that can do as well, as what Vue could do.

Thank you to everyone for the memories.

Lets face it, every Poser figure there has ever been  has had it's problems, upto and including V4 it was joint and the odd proportional scaling issue, with Gen 1 and 2, the fact it wasn't Poser native amongst other things. The thing with V4 though, is that she was given enough time to evolve through 3rd party fixes and improvements. The customer base was and is huge, and so is the 3rd party support.

Now if Dawn fixes the issues that were present in V4 and is built with the new tech available in Poser kept in mind, then she could very well be jumping ahead of V4 in the runtime. My only doubt is that she won't look any better than a V4 with fixes or WM...she will just look different. I'm not saying that a different looking high quality figure isn't needed, just that I'm not sure that it will look any better when rendered. Lets face it, figures may change, but we are still using the same hair (for example), that we've been using for the last decade or so.

Zev0, I actually love your products, and your attitude towards customers. You seem to take a pro-active approach towards supporting your products and engaging in the community.

On the other hand, I have seen a change at DAZ3D over recent years. Once upon a time I remember when DAZ use to be humbled by the community and pro-active, now they just seem arrogant and aloof. Maybe that isn't their intention, but that is the result.

For me it's not just Gen 1 or 2 that I have no interest in, but Daz's percieved attitude. It's just not the same "nice company to do business with", like it was a few years ago.

There is only one reason why DAZ Studio is free, and that is to push content sales. Content sales then push further development in DS, thus attracting more users of DS, who then have to purchase more content for their Genesis figure...and so the trend continues.

Theres a reason why apps like Bryce and Hexagon (and Carrara to some extent), either have a slow or non existant development cycle - they have no content sales to drive development.

I imagine DAZ3D originally had a vision (seeings that they had the Poser content market tied up to all intent and purposes), that Poser users would see this new Genesis figure, swoon over the advanced tech, and follow religiously into DAZ Studio's clutches. I suspect that they missread the Poser community who previously had just tripped over themselves to get the next version of Micheal and Vicky, and do the same thing this time. The problem was, the Poser community actually loved Poser a LOT more than the new Genesis figures, and two: DAZ3D shot themselves in the foot with Vicky 4 and made it too good with people (end user and content producers) not willing to let their investment, just gather dust. V4 wasn't broken (well it was, but with fixes and WM, why change).

...oh let us not forget, DSON. The straw that broke the Camels back.

Now Gen 2 is out and, well, it seems that DAZ3D feels that Gen 1 sales were good enough to continue with ther vision. That means, either DAZ aren't as silly as they look, or just plain arrogant and stubborn.

The only thing that DAZ has that will draw new customers to them is a free DAZ Studio. Established users, have already made their choice. I know many people use both Poser and DS, but I suspect I'm one of many who thinks why should I have two tools to do the same thing. Yes I have DAZStudio installed, but I dont think I've ever used it. I certainly don't desire Gen 1 or 2 enough to start using it...

Quote - That is really nice.  Very encouraging, as well.  Do you think it would look at all similar rendered in Poser?

Great question!

Certainly with the newer versions of Poser (PP2012  +), I'm a lot happier with the rendered output. For simple studio type portraiture I honestly believe staying within Poser is probably the best option. I still think that Poser scenes within Vue has an advantage when you are after landscape settings for you Poser figures.

I'm old school, in that I still remember the Poser 4 and 6 days, when it was easy to find a renderer better than Posers to finish your projects in.  Every project in Poser finished with an export or save, so that  you could render it in Cinema 4D, Vue or any application of your choice...as long as it wasn't Poser.

That still lives with me a little, but credit where credit is due - Poser's Firefly engine is a different beast compared to back then, and highly capable now. Yes, it still needs a little work, but for portraits I like the results.

So, to answer your question, I would be surprised if Poser couldn't produce similiar, or even better results, than I achieved there.

A Poser scene dropped into Vue, without any fiddling of Poser materials...just the usual fiddling with Vue lighting.

Poser Scene rendered in Vue

The last time I used anything like Skin Vue in Vue, was about 6 years ago.

ShawnDriscoll makes a good and important point with his wording...calculations in the render engine are made from the "camera" (rendered frame) out. This is one door in the process in which optimization is utilized in the code.

Quote - I simply turn off gamma correction, which imo can make the image look flat, dull, washed out, and it kills highlights/shadows. GC can look nice if you take all the required steps as mentioned by other posters above, and set up the materials properly, but imo simply too much work for the results. If you're a photoshop person like me, just tick it off and apply it as needed in PS. Also if you're losing a bit of photorealism due to turning GC off, theres many softening techniques and hdr-toning that will really make your image pop out and realistic. It works for me since my images are 40% poser 60% photoshop. If you don't use photoshop, then IDL will give that realistic look, and most IDL sets i've seen actually require you to turn off GC.

There is no doubt for me that Gamma on and set to 2.2 is the way to go. As mentioned above, scene fixer will correct anything wrong in the materials. What I have found that with gamma off, reflection maps (especially), don't act as they should.

If IDL is being used, and it's using an HDRI, then the gamma for the HDRI should be set to 1.0 in the materials editor.

In fear of repeating myself though, Scene Fixer is a must have item. If your not going into the material room to set-up bump, displacement, reflection or trans-maps correctly, or using Scene Fixer, then the materials are not being shown as intended...period!

Well Laurie, we can see where and what scaling you gave priority to, in the before and after pics...cough, cough! ;) LOL!

In all serious, the one on the right looks far better, the hip and head improvements very noticable...can't fault the texture either.

I made a figure flag pole that had 2. It took me ages to perfect!

Well, being  a Brit in Texas, I wouldn't even mind paying the 8% sales tax over the 20% VAT you have to pay back in ole blighty :P

I'm gonna hold off on buying anyway...have till the end of next month to take advantage of the intro price.

Quote - Waiting impatiently for World of Darkness

 

~Shane

I think you'll be waiting a long time after the big shake up at CCP a couple of years ago. I know they have people still at the Atlanta office, but the amount of developers working on WoD can be counted on one hand. CCP realised they couldn't have their thumbs in too many pies, were losing subscriptions from their main stable revenue, while they used it as a test bed for WOD technologies. I'm sure that CCP are still comitted to WoD in some form...I'm just not sure that in these economic climates, that the money is there.

From what I can make out, 99% of development is on EVE and Dust514.

Anyway, I'm a long time EVE player. Yep, it has a high learning curve, but when you're in a 1000+ man fleet fight, it's memorable!

As already mentioned, SSD's are OK for faster OS startup and swap file usage, but for main data storage, a definate no-no!

Quote - ....I'd go for a SSS skin nowadays rather than one without, I know I can add this myself with EZskin but to be honest if I had an amount of money to spend I'd rather have the vendor do that job than me....

That use to be my view, but generally I've been a bit unhappy with the quality of store purchased SSS Skin textures (not just here, but everywhere).I'm not saying anything is wrong with them, just that they haven't been to my taste.

I wager most SSS mats have been been set up with EZSkin anyway, by the vendors. I will still buy SSS skin textures, but only if there is the option of non-SSS version with it. I will then use EZSkin2  to make my own SSS textures, which I've been happier with.

Maybe I'm wrong, but I'm making an observation as a user and not a content producer, but even as a user I find myself editing pose and mat files directly, ever since Poser 4. As a content producer, the ability to read, understand and edit those files would seam as important as owning every Poser.

It's not until you start reading and understanding those files (which is pretty easy in itself), do you realise just how many errors can be written into them, that would have had you hitting your head up against a brick wall if you had not opened them up in a text editor.