So there's the secrets of the female form thing, which by every description I find of it refers to it as a book for advanced users. There's the Poser 5 Handbook, which by all accounts is missing important steps of stuff, has gaps and is for beginners, but is supposedly badly written. And finally, the one everyone seems to recommend sight unseen is the Poser 5 Visual Quickstart Guide, by Peachpit Press. Why is it sight unseen? Because it was supposed to have published in 2003, and it's still not been released yet.

I've been getting add-ons and plug ins and models and character skins and props and sets over the last two years. I've got a script I really want to adapt as a Poser comic-slideshow with an audio track. But the sommat clunky interface defeats me every time I try to do something as elementary as putting conforming clothes on V3 that were made for her. As soon as I think I'm doing something right, it all ends in frustration.

If I had a proper textbook I could work through with examples and exercises like the promised Peachpit book, I think I'd be okay. I could pick it up. It's how I learned Photoshop years ago when I was learning it on version 4.5. But there's a dearth of learning materials it would seem. Can anyone make a suggestion that isn't, 'Go check out the tutorials on Renderosty?'

No offense to the fine artists and creators of said tutorials. But there's quite a few of those in no partcular order that assume previous knowledge of the program, and fall into jargon or make arcane references that whizz by my head. And that's as useless to me as the reference guide that comes with the program itself. (Which reads like a trigonometry lesson translated badly from the japanese.) And though I have 2 monitors running an expanded desktop, it's infuriating to have to go back and forth between Netscape and that noted memory hog, Poser. A book in my hands would be so much more useful. (YOU HEAR ME PEACHPIT??)

Anyway, consider this a distress call. What can I get to help me learn this program? Blundering about in the program blindly is not working...

-WinterRose