Thanks to everyone for your thoughtful comments.  I don't do this full time, what little creative time I have to work on Poser has been sucked-up the past two weeks by this infinite rendering do-loop:

Read forum => Tweak settings => Render => Come back later => Render still sucks

Repeat until insane! LOL

The tip about setting GC to 1.0 in the custom IBL settings is a new one I'm trying out now.  Perhaps when I get this figured out I'll start a thread entitled 'Successful PP 2010 Lighting/Render Settings", and make a record of my successes, encouraging others to contribute theirs.

Thanks again...

Danborn

FWIW, I had this very same problem and was able to deduce a solution starting from the clues provided here.  First go to the CMD prompt, and ping the localhost ip address:

C:Usersdanborn>ping 127.0.0.1 

Pinging 127.0.0.1 with 32 bytes of data:
Reply from 127.0.0.1: bytes=32 time<1ms TTL=128
Reply from 127.0.0.1: bytes=32 time<1ms TTL=128
Reply from 127.0.0.1: bytes=32 time<1ms TTL=128
Reply from 127.0.0.1: bytes=32 time<1ms TTL=128

Ping statistics for 127.0.0.1:
Packets: Sent = 4, Received = 4, Lost = 0 (0% loss),
Approximate round trip times in milli-seconds:
Minimum = 0ms, Maximum = 0ms, Average = 0ms

You should get results similar to above, else read no further...you've got other issues to solve first!  Next, ping the localhost by name:

C:Usersdanborn>ping localhost

Pinging CANOPUS [::1] with 32 bytes of data:
Reply from ::1: time<1ms
Reply from ::1: time<1ms
Reply from ::1: time<1ms
Reply from ::1: time<1ms

Ping statistics for ::1:
Packets: Sent = 4, Received = 4, Lost = 0 (0% loss),
Approximate round trip times in milli-seconds:
Minimum = 0ms, Maximum = 0ms, Average = 0ms

If you get a reply address that is anything different than 127.0.0.1, like I did in the example above, you need to edit your local hosts file, usually located in:

C:WindowsSystem32driversetc>dir hosts
Volume in drive C is Canopus_C
Volume Serial Number is 6CA5-F5A0

 Directory of C:WindowsSystem32driversetc

01/22/2011 01:47 AM             824 hosts
      1 File(s) 824 bytes
      0 Dir(s) 6,119,591,936 bytes free
 
Note that there is no file extension.  Following is the contents of my hosts file, with the #-sign comment-character you need to edit removed on the second-to last line:

Copyright (c) 1993-2009 Microsoft Corp.

This is a sample HOSTS file used by Microsoft TCP/IP for Windows.

This file contains the mappings of IP addresses to host  names. Each

entry should be kept on an individual line. The IP address should

be placed in the first column followed by the corresponding  host name.

The IP address and the host name should be separated by at least one

space.

Additionally, comments (such as these) may be inserted on  individual

lines or following the machine name denoted by a '#' symbol.

For example:

102.54.94.97 rhino.acme.com # source server

38.25.63.10 x.acme.com # x client host

localhost name resolution is handled within DNS itself.

    127.0.0.1    localhost

 ::1             localhost

Then save the file, restart Queue Manager (it may be necessary to restart Poser or your computer if FFRender is hanging in memory) and see if that doesn't toast your muffin...it most satisfactorily did for me!

Have been working with PC's and networks close to 25 years and this '::1' address for localhost is a new wrinkle to me....and evidently also to the authors of Queue Manager.

Danborn

The more the merrier...!

Let me try to shine a ray of light or two into my thinking, and perhaps that will spur some insights from a coding perspective:

1. Like a situation comedy, the comics re-use the same set, with the same actors and props, over and over.

2. To press on with the 'set' paradigm, I build a 'virtual set' with all the needed 'locales' in the .pz3 file ... for example, if it were 'Seinfeld', the pz3 file contains Jerry's apartment, the Soup Nazi's kitchen, Kramer's apartment, etc.  but all sharing common walls between them.

3. If the comic needs a new locale, I just build it into the set and move forward with that pz3 file, keeping the existing locales fixed for compatibility with saved poses and cameras.

4. Some expanded thinking on the 'self-indexing' feature...

• Each frame of a comic episode uses the keyframes sequentially, and each pz3 file contains one comic episode.
• The folder names within each Library collection correspond to the originating comic episode's name.
• The pose and camera names in each Library collection folder correspond to the originating keyframe's number.

Thus the proposed script should greatly simplify the task of FINDING the poses and camera setups used in previous episodes, for utilization in new episodes.  Because restoring the pose or camera info is easy... but FINDING the right info to restore is the hard part!

So I haven't noodled with example script provided just yet, but will start cracking on it this weekend.

Regards & Thanks!

Danborn

Thanks a bunch, I see a loop in one of your routines that looks promising, I will post my pseudocode over in the Poser Python forum.

Danborn