The material system of Poser 5 makes techniques possible, that are standard for high end character texturing but impossible in Poser 4. I am thinking of specularity and translucently maps as well as may be combination of displacement and bump mapping (great for creatures, if the documentations to the LOTR movies are right).
I am not a good texture artist, but I am interested in experimenting with this things. Therefore my question: Is there any texture set available (preferably for M3 or V3, but I will consider other models, too) that uses some or all of : Secularity maps, translucenty maps, the combination of displacment (for adding detail) and bump mapping (for surface structure) or any other advanced material features?

Stefan

I use displacement maps instead of Poser 4 bump maps and have used the blender nodes too. I don't think I have seen freestuff textures using Poser 5 capabilities or even for sale which is sad. Poser 5 has a wealth of new features but sadly is still ridden with bugs, its memory management is horrendous and most important Curious Labs shoot itself in the foot by not going over their way to get compatibility with DAZ models. If Poser 5 would have catered to DAZ figures instead of ignoring them, even buggy as it still is now it would have enjoyed a lot more support by the community since DAZ would have probably have supported it too.

I think it is really time that the merchants start to support Poser 5. Poser 5 is by far not what I am dreaming of, and it has a lot of problems. But in my Opinion it is much better than Poser 4, especially if you use its strength, instead just expect it to act like P4. Bump maps are a good example: it is possible to use a bump map as a displacement map. But a map designed as displacement map works better. There a differences between bump and displacement maps: A bump map has an effect only where its density changes, while a displacement effect is based on the absolute density value. If you make a bump map uniformly darker or lighter that will have no effect, if you do the same with a displacement map the effect will be very visible.

I hope E-Frontier can change a lot of the bad blood created in this last release of Poser. They could start by following Kaydara's example and trying to make the CR2 file format universally accepted by all the major 3D software vendors like the FBX format. I think the only way they might be able to compete with DAZ now is by taking advantage of their format and the thousand of models already rigged and vertex weighted with their format. After all plugins for the major 3D applications was something that was promised for Poser 5 and never delivered. It made a lot of weight in my purchase decision that those plugins were coming. If they would take this unfulfilled promise and make it even more appealing by making CR2 files readable inside professional applications and offer it for free plus strengthen their software with better functionality & stability they might be able to survive.

A lot of time when merchants look to support a product or a platform one has to ask themself, "WILL IT SELL?" Namely the $ drives the product. At this point the demand is not high for P5 stuff, but if you will note, it is growning. As the market grows, so will the marketplace! That being said, the majority of the users, hence the market are still using P4, and that is where the market is today. Tomorrow it will change, albeit slowly. For those that have ask or said that V2 is not dead. That is true, however, the market is very soft for generation 2 products. Unless you product will work on P4 and V3 or M3 then its limiting the market! Most merchants are just playing the numbers. However you will see a slow but steady grown in P5 products.

There must be quite a few P5 users by now. I agree that it is a shame that P5 is not supported a well as it should be - it is actually a pretty powerful prog. I love the material room and it really has a lot of potential.