Hi,

A few weeks ago I uploaded a model of a corridor/hallway to my freestuff area. It's been downloaded quite a few times now, but I had hoped that I would get some feedback as to what people like about the model and what they don't like. Unfortunately, this hasn't happened, so I thought I'd post here to see what people think.

The model is a wavefront obj file (with no textures, but with UV coordinates), which it should be possible to load into most 3D apps. However, I believe that although Poser will load the file, it may not render all that well or be very Poser friendly. I'm also not sure whether the file is Mac compatible.

The reason why I am after feedback is that eventually I would like to produce a collection of models for sale. However, for the moment I would like to know how things could be improved to make a product people would really like.

You can get the model from:
http://www.renderosity.com/freestuff.ez?Form.Contrib=Dr+Max&Topsectionid=0

A rendered, untextured image of the model can be found in my gallery:

http://www.renderosity.com/viewed.ez?galleryid=542952&Start=1&Artist=Dr+Max&ByArtist=Yes

Thanks for taking the time to read this,

Max

It looks like an exceptional job of modeling it would look good textured for a victorian hallway or a 40's "film noir" scene. For a commercial product, though I'd strongly recommend making a textured and/or "Poser-ready" version of each scene you do. You'll find the appeal and demand for such would be tremendously stronger than in OBJ format. Just my 2 cents worth.

Thanks for the feedback leather-guy. These are just the kind of comments I was looking for. I had always felt that a Poser ready product was where the strongest appeal was. It is unfortunate that Poser has such a strange way of rendering objects. However, I'll investigate what is required to create a Poser ready / friendly product. Out of interest though, how do you think it is best to handle the scene in Poser. Should one side/wall be removed to make positioning the camera easy? Also, should the model be imported as a prop or as a 'poseable figure'? Any ideas? Regards, Max

Just a few random thoughts - these are the possibilities I'd consider if I were constructing a Market place set for greatest appeal to average poser users... I'd think making floor and walls separate and/or in sections would have positive appeal, that way the width of the hall could be controlled by the users. They could also choose to have doors down both sides, windows down both sides, one of each, or even blank walls as they choose. A couple of extra walls to place beyond open doors to simulate rooms would be good. I'd think a morphable prop format would be best - just a couple of dials for opening and closing doors and windows. Add the option of either an intersecting hall at the end, a blank wall, a window, a room door, french doors, dead end with laundry chute, or fire exit for added versatility. If you texture the walls, floor, and molding/trim separately it would help increase the variations possible, so it cloud appear as wood paneling, painted walls, or victorian cut-velvet wallpaper. Perhaps "grunge" or grimy texture variants could be included as well for a seedy atmosphere. A couple variations of light-fixtures would be good, Victorian gas-fixtures, old-style light-bulb sconces, and sleek upward-pointing "fan" lights are the three possibilities suggest themselves to me. And always include one or three pre-assembled setups for customers who have no interest taking the time to "do-it-yourself" with a new product they've paid for. Remember - there's 8-10 times more people who'd pay to have pizza delivered ready-to-eat, than to cook one from scratch. ..Just my 2 cents worth.....

Thanks once again leather-guy. These ideas are great - it's also good to know that you feel a prop is the way to go. There are a number of elements missing from my models at the moment that I would need to add, including door and window handles and light fittings (as you suggest). In actual fact, the way the model is textured and built at the moment requires separate texture maps for the floor, ceiling, walls, coving, skirting, etc. So that will come for 'free'. I just need to work out how to overcome Poser's weird shading of flat polygons. I seem to recall that if they are split into separate parts, Poser handles them much better. The idea of creating interchangeable elements is also interesting. However, I need to find out how this can be done. Thanks once again for all your help. Regards, Max

I think the oddness of the poygon shading is caused by Poser's default rounding/smoothing settings - Poser assumes every form is organic and tries to round it out. I believe the technique for correcting that to maintain sharp edges is called "splitting the vertices" - you can do a search in the Poser forum for the preferred techniques. On importing the hallway into Poser, I also noticed a lot of reversed normals - Unless a facet has vertices numbered clockwise, Poser assumes the facet is facing the other way and the back-sides are invisible. For the pic I posted, I did a quick "cheat" of selecting all the poly's of the hall in the Poser Grouping Tool, spawning a new prop from it, then reversing the normals of all, and leaving the two reversed props superimposed on each other. Kind of a klunky fix, but it worked for a quick render. Good luck! Jerry

Hi Jerry, Thanks once again for the tips. I've finally loaded Poser 4 onto my main machine and have been experimenting with the hallway file. It appears that splitting the verticies does overcome the shading problem. However, the next step requires me to get to grips with producing a poseable figure. Regards, Max