This may constitute and annoying newbee question, but Im curious just how far one can go with poser 5. Ive played with photoshop for years, I can do editing on photos like changing my girl friends hair style, breast size... making myself fatter or more built, adding tattoos, etc. What level of Poser is needed to build body types, skins, etc? Or to build a person from scratch would a large set of applications? Any thoughts would great help me decide if this is a hobby I can afford!

Poser's not a modelling program, so you can't build a person from scratch. To do that you need something decent like LightWave, Cinema 4D, Maya, etc etc. The list goes on and some of them are very expensive. Also, building a human from scratch is not an overnight project. It's probably the toughest modelling job you can tackle. As far as creating different shaped bodies from existing figures, people with more Poser experience than me can tell you how easy or difficult that is. Creating skin textures from scratch can be very involved and quite a painstaking process. There are bucket loads of tutorials on the web for doing just about anything in Poser. Do a Google search and you should come up with plenty to keep you going for months. I hope that's at least some help and gives you some ideas, but as with most things CGI related, there's a lot more to it than that.

re: *"Poser's not a modelling program, so you can't build a person from scratch."* Unless his name is "Robox." ;=] Sorry, couldn't resist. cheers, dr geep ;=]

Remember ... "With Poser, all things are possible, and poseable!"

cheers,

dr geep ... :o]

edited 10/5/2019

Ok, so for instance, with some practice morphing an existing character to look SOMETHING like myself might be possible with poser? But to build a digital me would cost a lot of money to even attempt? I assume poser will also not deal with hair, custom textures, etc?

Making a replica of yourself in Poser is feasible, depending on the base model you use. I used Mike 2 from DAZ to recreate myself, and it's a pretty good likeness, too. My gallery has several examples. Hair isn't created in Poser, unless you use the P5 Hair Room (which I haven't tried), and you can load custom textures created with a paint package. If you're adept with Photoshop, creating a custom texture should be relatively easy, if time consuming.

Coppula eam se non posit acceptera jocularum.

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Hehe, that's funny geep. whoopy, yes you can have hair and custom textures. Look at the back room resources here (link at top of page) or in the Renderosity Marketplace. More hair than you can poke a stick at! As far as modelling yourself from scratch, if you've never modelled anything, be prepared for a lot of hard, frustrating work after you fork out your cash for a modelling program with the toolset to enable you to do that. The reason there are relatively few decent, original 3d people available is that it's complex and time consuming to do.

Ok, its not so much a fascination with recreating myself, but I didnt really get into photoshop until I had a compelling reason to, in this case, what would I look like with short blonde hair? Just seems like a similar goal would be helpful in learning the software. Not to mention, as perfect as most of the models look, it makes me want to do real people all the more.

Poser's strength is in posing and animating figures and props. It can build simple props directly using it's primitives (box, cylinder, etc...) but isn't really a modeler. It can apply predefined morphs to create variations on a model, or use it's magnets to modify the shape of existing figures/props. P5's Face room can take photos of your face and approximately fit them to a model's face shape to create a 3D model with your face. P5's Hair room can grow hair on a figure, with many controllable variations, but be aware it is very slow and has a learning curve. The Material room allows you to apply textures to models/props. You can paint or composite photos in a paint program and make your own textures. Many models have texture templates to speed that up, or with a freeware UV mapper program you can make your own templates. P5's Cloth room lets you drape cloth and soft clothing over figures, and make it move in animations. The Setup room allows you to add or adjust the "bone" structure of figures, which controls how they move when posed. To create or modify the "meshes" (the 3D shapes) beyond the basic built in controls or magnets will require you to use an external modeler program. Those range between free and outragiously expensive. Creating a realistic human figure from scratch is beyond the skill of the average Poser user, but not impossible. There are many who do it. Modifying an existing mesh, such as the ones that come with Poser (or ones you can buy) is a bit easier, but still involves skill. Of course you can't modify somebody else's mesh and sell it, but you can use it in your own renders. The main point of using Poser is the renders. The renders are the final output from Poser, either as still frames or animations. Of course if money is no object, then you can afford not only a high end modeler, but also high end animation and rendering programs. Poser is a better value because it is very powerful, creates good results, and is still quite reasonably priced. But it's main use is what it's name implies. It is mostly for posing.

So That's what a rendered Robox looks like..a coupla tweaks here and there, and you could make Gumby..;)

I wish I'd said that.. The Staircase Wit

anahl nathrak uth vas betude doth yel dyenvey..;)