hello ! I have some questions about Creature creator competition. 1: Can I bone the creature, or do I have to use creature as is generated in Creature Creator ? 2: Can I refine the mesh in a modeler - as long as the features are still recognisable and stick with the contest rules ? 3) I can pose it to my hearts content, as well as texture and UV map it, yes ? TIAV J.

Hi Jan :) In brief, yes, yes and yes :) So long as the final mesh is recognisably a derivative of the mesh made in CC there's no problem. As to importing it into (presumably) Poser and texturing etc. you can do whatever you like with it. Kev.

One, CC has a terrible Parent company, very poor customer service. Secondly if you bone something in Poser generated by Creature Creator use can not give it away as a freebie. Read the EULA. Two, I purchased CC as a LightWave plug-in several years ago, so yes you can refine the mesh in a modeler. Three, yes you could pose you little bottom off! You can import the exported object (depend on your Modeling App) into Poser. I suggest using UVMapper.

I purchased CC sometime ago. I emailed the creator and heard back the next day with answers. Thats not poor service if you ask me. The models created by CC are low-ress and not detailed though. But are good to start from.

I have an old max plugin of CC. I never use it for anything but modeling and boning practice, but I generally have a good time when I mess around with it. I dont think CC is meant to be used as is, but as a starting point to refine or redefine the mesh. So, Kev, can the rat chase the cat if you should wish ? ~S

If that is an official statement of the Competition Rules, it seems that the objective is achievable. It's a style of figure I'm interested in, and which I've worked with. I'm familiar with the body of 2-D art on the theme. I would like to try. But, if the demo version is any guide at all, the prizes are not worth winning. The program uses a fixed-size window, which needs a monitor setting of 1280x1024, yet has a non-standard aspect ratio. It breaks many of the standard UI rules for Windows. It keeps missing mouse events. OK, so I doubt I would succeed at modifying the mesh this program can produce. "boning" is one of the dark and secret arts to me. But when I use the program of move or re-scale a part, and the mesh tears, it doesn't look right. Believe me, I have enough problems with bugs and misfeatures in Poser. I do not want to waste my time on another bug-ridden program. And, for the sort of anthropomorphic cat I want to use, I might as well start from Posette as from what Creature Creator produces. Yes, set a difficult target for a competition. But lets have a prixe that seems more worth the effort.

The mesh tears because it's a lo-res creature generator, I think; you are supposed to dense up and sculpt major parts of the mesh yoruself. If you want to give it a go, I suggest you try i.e gmax, wings, gamespace, maybe, or any of the other free modelers out there :-) also - I run on 1024 x 768, and CC seems to behave well. Now, anyway -it rebooted my system when I was doing stuff in Poser and Photoshop, but since poser was involved, I am not taking bets on which app caused the reboot ;-) tweaking the mesh is the fun part - I am sure you can leave out adding bones all together if you want ? ~S