NOTE: the following is slanted for my needs as a story-teller/film maker. So it is for animation, not primarily modeling or still renders. YMMV.

I have been moving toward translating my 3D work from Poser to a new primary application. The main reason I am moving out of Poser: a) limitations of Posers dynamic hair module; b) seeking better animation tools; c) lighting and render power; d) joining a pro community.

There remains deep respect for Poser. It was intended to be an artist-assist reference application and has grown up tremendously to be nearly a pro application and the entryway to 3D for a zillion people.

I have been looking at 3DSMax quite seriously, but am now more inclined towards LightWave. Cinema with Interposer is still sitting there as an option, certainly.

One of the reasons, quite frankly, that Lightwave is attracting me is price. If my plans go forward, I will need multiple seats. The root license structures for Cinema and Max are in the $2800 - $3400 range by the time you are done. XSI is also 'sitting there" in the same price range. Not only is the street price of Lightwave under $1000, but NewTek's strong license transfer policy means that you can legally and smoothly obtain packages from other users for less than that.

http://www.newtek.com/lightwave/

I am not leaving Poser. I want it as my character setup room. The tremendous asset flow, both free and paid, I would not be without. I can spin and morphbrush my preferred base human mesh, V4, into any character I want in Poser, male or female. Obviously this provides maximum choice of skins, since with the texture transfer tools from DAZ, everything for V3, V4, M3, M4 and more is at my disposal. With the wealth of clothing mesh/texture, also, these assets hopefully will be importable into Lightwave to surround my character and get the native Lightwave ClothFX treatment. Since there is a lo-res version of V4, the "heavy mesh" issue is minimal.

So, how to get content over?

Breaking it into two categories,

"Hosting" which means that you perform most of your work in Poser and then 'get it to open' in Lightwave for lighting and render only. Any changes have to be made in Poser and re-opened in Lightwave.

"Transfer of Assets" which means mesh, textures, rigging and morphs actually end up in Lightwave as Lightwave assets, and you go from there. Mostly, I just am pushing for mesh and texture maps and possibly facial morphs. I believe I will be tossing out any transferred Poser rig and rigging fresh in Lightwave.

I have not yet explored these options directly. I have a big Poser project to finish first. So, all I am doing right now is reading forum threads and product pages. I hope to install Lightwave on a trial basis within 10 days and get serious.

Transfer of assets:

PLK http://www.kurvstudios.com/software/
COLLADA or FBX export/import from DazStudio or PoserPro
T4D Plugin http://www.thomas4d.com/html/t4d_rigging_tools.html
Poser has lightwave export. I have no idea how that works or what "goes over".
Your garden-variety .obj to .obj export/import

"Hosting"

"Point Cloud" transfer via .mdd format http://www.vuescripts.com/_A/index.php?index
PoserFusion, which is part of PoserPro

Comments welcome

::::: Opera :::::

Note: I am quite excited by the free

T4D Plugin http://www.thomas4d.com/html/t4d_rigging_tools.html

It comes with a fully Lightwave-rigged lo-res version of Victoria!

::::: Opera :::::

Lightwave is very good software, I dont have tried now in version 8 or early but using ClothFX or SoftFX in high density meshs was a great problem in the past... but now Lightwave have its internal hair system that is pretty amazing... send news when you tried all this tools togheter. I was a Lightwave user for long time but I like more to create illustration so I decided to use Carrara that can support content in a very easy way now and have a very good and fast render engine.

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Several years ago, I was looking at my first "post-Poser" application so I tried Lightwave. Its interface is...unique. I don't know how much it's changed since then but I thought that dividing the modeller and the animation into two separate programs was counter intuitive. I didn't much care for the way the menu items sat on the screen (rather than the usual method of collapsing under a menubar). I was very impressed with the render quality.

Personally, i would not go the hosting route. I'm a bigger fan of the obj / obj import /export. It's a little more work (usually the rigging will be better) but only needs to be performed once and makes the asset almost native to the app.

I'm glad you mentioned the low res V4. I just got finished rigging her last night and very excited to start some animation tests. Geez, outside of the obvious, I can't understand why lo res characters are slow to get to market (a 40k poly reduced res M3 doesn't qualify as lo res).

The Daz official lo-res V4 is 17K poly and free!.

When you say "i just got finished rigging her" do you mean rigging her in Lightwave?

A lot of people comment about model and animation being two different programs but that is not a detriment for me.

Poser Oro has lightwave export now.. wouldn't that be the best option?

Way too many people take way too many things way too seriously.

"I just got finished rigging her" in Maya. Imported the obj (which is divided into > 100 pieces, then combined), created new skeleton, bound skin to skeleton, painted weight maps. The weight map part is the most time consuming and generally improves on the way shoulder / hip deformations look in Poser. This is all really a test - the "real" version will carry the morphs, a 2K version will be "wrap deformed" to the 17K version (speed the weight painting, animates and updates very quickly in the viewport) custom preset poses and other goodies.

With DAZ studio and the free V4, there are four lo res models; the 17k is the only one with individual toes. Otherwise I really like the 4K model.

Gareee you mean Poser pro, right? PoserPro comes with PoserFusion which is hosting for Poser scenes in Lightwave for lighting and render only.

Is that what you were referring to? I have that in the post.

::::: Opera :::::

replicand yes there are several LOD versions of V4, each a subdivide of the next. So you rigged the 4K version for Maya, wow.

You could probably market that rig to other Maya people.

::::: Opera :::::

Attached Link: http://NikkiSprite.com

I've been a LW user for years and occassioanlly import Poser material. Recently I did an animation in which I used a Poser head. In Poser I created different expressions which I exported as separate LW objects. I ended up with about 20 different LW objects some with different expressions, some with different mouth morphs, some with eye morphs, etc. I loaded the base head into layer 1 of Modeler, then loaded each of the other morphed heads into separate layers. Using the Map/Background to Morph tool, I applied all of the morphs onto the base model in layer 1. I could then dial in and mix the morphs using Lightwave's Morph Mixer tool. It worked great!

I've been eyeing the Kurv Studios converter. Supposedly it will convert geometry, riggs and basic matts. This could be a great tool if it performs as advertised...

Theres Greenbriers plugins too.

You can get Lightwave at student price if you buy it with Dans 3dgarage courseware. You can the upgrade to full license later. If you dont expect to be outputting commercial work in the first 6 months that might be an option for you.

Wow that is a cool pipeline. Once I get my lightwave installed I'll pull down a trial version of PLK and see. I really like the idea of separate "pads" with which to select and manipulate a rig. Poser would be a much nicer animation tool with something like that.

::::: Opera :::::

Geeze, edit closed on the first post.....

Adding Greenbriar plugins to the list of possibilities for content transfer into Lightwave.

http://www.greenbriarstudio.com/3D/index.htm

::::: Opera :::::

Yep.. I've heard good things about poser fusion, with it even supporting animations, but I've never really tinkered with it over just importing one or two things to see if it worked.

(What I was tinkering with worked fine, BTW.)

Way too many people take way too many things way too seriously.

I certainly hope PoserFusion works as advertised, as I had big problems with it when I bought it as "BodyStudio" back in the day.

Important to know, however: PoserFusion is "Hosting". All you can do with it in Lightwave is light the scene and render the still or animation. That's it. No bones, no morphs, etc. Someone correct me if I am mistaken about that.

Now that might be all that is needed if one is going to rig and morph in Lightwave. But do you get groups? Don't know.

::::: Opera :::::

Opera, thanks for starting this thread. Thanks everyone for contributing here. I've learned alot already.

Lightwave looks like a great 'Pro' tool for utilizing DAZ and Poser assets.

Question: What is the importance of low res (low poly count mesh)? I'm a Carrara user so this is new to me. I've always thought higher res gives a more realistic look to figures, especially when posing and animating. So I'm confused as to why low res is preferable in Lightwave.

ironically, when looking into the "Pro" applications such as Max, Maya, Cinema, Lightwave....

that world is accustomed to and leveraged for much lower poly mesh than Poser and Daz!

Why? Well, they grew up over time when computers were not as powerful, and in a professional production setting laggy viewport and render were intolerable. Hence, low poly.

Also, the destination of much of this is to games, where the characters have to react in real time. You can't have high-poly.

So, for anything seeming to call fo hi-res figures, the policy was to subdivide at the last minute. You deploy the low res version (for example the 4K V4 mentioned above) in the viewport, and then just before render you "subdivide". So, IK vickie becomes 4k Vickie becomes 17K vickie becomes 68K vicky.

The poser/daz world has a different focus. HiRes from the start so users don't have to manipulate.

Recently all the pro apps have improved viewport performance and of course computers keep getting more powerful. This consideration is lessening. But not going away!

::::: Opera :::::

That makes sense.

Lightwave it is...time to take the leap.

Suggtest trying before leaping! Trial version available

Quote - ironically, when looking into the "Pro" applications such as Max, Maya, Cinema, Lightwave....

that world is accustomed to and leveraged for much lower poly mesh than Poser and Daz!

Why? Well, they grew up over time when computers were not as powerful, and in a professional production setting laggy viewport and render were intolerable. Hence, low poly.

Also, the destination of much of this is to games, where the characters have to react in real time. You can't have high-poly.

So, for anything seeming to call fo hi-res figures, the policy was to subdivide at the last minute. You deploy the low res version (for example the 4K V4 mentioned above) in the viewport, and then just before render you "subdivide". So, IK vickie becomes 4k Vickie becomes 17K vickie becomes 68K vicky.

The poser/daz world has a different focus. HiRes from the start so users don't have to manipulate.

Recently all the pro apps have improved viewport performance and of course computers keep getting more powerful. This consideration is lessening. But not going away!

::::: Opera :::::

One other reason is rigging. It's much easier and faster to paint weight maps on a figure of say 10k polys than it is one of 80k polys or whatever Poser figures are. You can set up much more complex animation controllers far easier, and get better bending, etc. if you don't have to deal with tens of thousands of vertices in critical areas (like shoulders and hips). Realistic details can be added to the subdivided mesh through displacement or normals mapping. Plus, this allows for much faster communication with whatever renderer you are using, so scenes will arguably render faster too. Zbrush and Mudbox (combined with high end renderers like MentalRay) have allowed studios to take this to a whole other level now.

@ devilsreject- Great argument for low res.

@ Opera.
Good advice...I'll download the trial version and start on the tutorials this weekend, then make a decision.

In response to your earlier post, I wanted to clarify that I rigged V4 17k polys because I want her toes (that sounds so bad), but I would use the 4k poly model as the "control cage". I would prefer to use only the 4K poly model, but as mentioned, it doesn't have toes.

I would also like to clarify that lo poly models aren't just limited to games; they are used quite often in film utilizing PRman's rendertime subD smoothing. This is all severely off-topic.

I do hope, though, that Lightwave works better for you than it did for me. I couldn't wrap my mind around the interface. I would still caution against hosting solutions - import and convert is my mantra.

Yes I am not interested in the hosting solution but some reading this....it might be excellent for their needs.

I don't think your post was too off-topic.

::::: Opera :::::

I would think that just the price and features would make deciding to buy/use Lightwave or Poser Pro a no-brainer.

www.youtube.com/user/ShawnDriscollCG

Just dont go to any Newtek forums looking for alot of help with your poser import scenario
there is still alot of anti-poser sentiment in many of those pro forums.

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Hi wolf I agree there is generally a lot of that out there. I have gotten into it on occasion.

This situation is different, somehow. So far the threads on the NewTek forums have been cordial and matter-of-fact.

:: og ::

Good to hear about the attitudes

I was Newtek lightwaver for a while( Version 6-7.5) but i finally abandoned it to commit fully to Cinema4D
Glad i did now that IPP is here with its full poser runtime/format support

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I spent years painstakingly exprting meshes from Poser to LW.
One full mesh export from Poser for each morph and then creating endomorphs in LW.
I have the base characters set up so that additional morphs can be applied to them as needed.
All clothing and props are separate.
I have a standard rig for each character which doesn't change.
I 'dress' each character in modeler where hidden body geometry is simply deleted.
IMHO this is the only way to go.
Compared to 'hosting' LW does a much better job of deforming the models.

I would never consider 'hosting'.

Alvertt, after you take the character into modeler, fit clothing and delete unseen body geometry, can you stil "clothify" just the clothing and run simulation on it? I am referring to using the new ClothFX in Lightwave 9.5.

There is also a place for a separate model for a piece of clothing that collides with the human and moves around. Loose clothing like a long nightgown.

::::: Opera :::::

I don't know 9.5, but once an object is a generic LW mesh/rig/scene anything is possible ;)

Yes you can use ClothFX even in Vic arms (you can set the breasth to use SoftFX)... at same time you can create proxy objects to collide and not use the Vic body, like Alvett said everything is possible.

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Cool. I am on my way in over the next 2 weeks, especially over Thanksgiving weekend.

Well, if this "Jello" clip is any indication, I'd say that using ClothFX for realistic breast physics should be considered a done deal!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wKH9T1tpt4s

::::: Opera :::::

I have to say that ClothFX, Softbody and hard body in Lightwave works pretty well... I already saw people using clothFX in polygonal hair to take it better move.

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What are the most creative approaches to hair? Sasquatch? What about HairFX I wonder if that is coming? You mention polygonal hair. Can you describe that approach?

Thanks

::::: Opera :::::

IMHO, I have found Kosaburos' hair works out the best. There isn't even a single hair item I have found anywhere that looks anywhere as near realistic. As I don't do animation, it works out OK for me. GKDantas is talking about useing a mesh like from Kosaburo and turning it into a cloth material so that it moves around during an animation.

"MeniThings" first made this technique noteworthy and there is an example on their site.

I am only animation so I am seeking simulated movement. The idea of 'poly' hair put into my head 20,000 poly objects parented to a head, all with physics applied, and shaders.

The subject of taking prop hair like Koz and animating the 'elements' of it? I tried that in Poser with Wild Hair without very realistic results. I'm going to look up MeniThings in the forums to see how far he/she got.

I can't use Koz hair for anything because of the hightlights painted onto the textures.

::::: Opera :::::

http://www.menithings.com/main.php?action=movies&movie_id=9

I am into photorealism, but this is the best example around.

OK, I just watched that again myself and cringe it didn't seem to move around much. It was featured in a Lightwave demo explaining it and it seemed to move around a lot more...

I know C4d + $200 for 'INTERPOSER PRO" is a way more expensive proposition however Im still running An older version of Cinema- 9.5

And i have to say he thing I find most time saving from a work flow perspective is that you get nearly ALL of poser functionality including simply loading and conforming directly from your existing poser runtimes.
as many separate runtimes as you desire.
you get all the poser morph dials and you can import animated PZ2 from carefully tweaked animations youve set up in posers gragh editor or even EXPORTED from Daz studiothat you've made with the aniMate plugin.
I dont have the Hair module for C4D so I cant comment on how wellit works with a
poser asset.
Just be aware the NONE of the pro apps currently transfer poser Shaders
so you will have to substitute with an in app solution for skins.

(Attached pics of the IPP poser interface)

......

........

........

Yes, I did a trial of Cinema, that was before the trial could save so I couldn't get anywhere. Now I understand their trial can save. I also pulled down Interposer trial at that time and saw the potential pipeline.

Yes the shaders will have to be recreated in any app I send Poser content into.

Thanks Wolf, believe me I am still eyeing Cinema, although if I were to figure out how to fund a studio at that price level, I'd proabably go for Max because of my son's involvement in it.

::::: Opera :::::

yep they have a 42 day save enabled trial of R11 Mine just expired ![](../../mod/forumpro/art/emoticons/confused.gif) the GI render is super fast. I still works just no saving now Any ways I hope you find an "out of poser"'rendering solution soon It seems like you've been looking for years now![](../../mod/forumpro/art/emoticons/wink.gif)

anyway here is a full yrigged V4 in the R11 Demo that i imported from Daz studio Via Colladda

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Yes i am slow about these things because: 1) hyper-heavy day job contracts and 2) I keep finding ways to extend Poser!

::::: Opera :::::

Opera, the new HairFX from Lightwave is very powerfull and works almost the same way that Carrara hair (for brush and things like that), Sasquatch is an old fashion hair, but its a post effect so you cant render under certain conditions and is very slow. The new hair system was a plugin for Lightwave in the past and use a new way to add hair to object and its very fantastic job that you can see at Newtek forums.
The Polygonal hair is used in a Manga way: you can make some polys flay away to simulate hair move, and work very well for some cases.

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yes, i clothified some mesh hair in Poser once to drive manga hair, that worked "okay."

So Lightwave has both HairFX and Cloth FX. Cool.

operaguy,

I'm guessing you've already gone through the current cloth issue of 3D World mag. I haven't had time to. Was there any workflow presented in it that you found informative?

www.youtube.com/user/ShawnDriscollCG

No! My subscription ended about 8 months ago and low on cash not renewed. Can you please tell me the issue number?

::::: Opera:::::

Issue 110. In stores now in the US.

www.youtube.com/user/ShawnDriscollCG

A parallel PoserToLightwave thread in the NewTek forum is getting interesting. Not only is there no sign of anti-Poser disdain, but a pro there "SplineGod" is revealing his pipeline and showing pro vids from Animal Planet, etc., with DazPoser assets front and center.

http://www.newtek.com/forums/showthread.php?p=783430#post783430

::::: Opera :::::

I guess Lightwavers can't bring themselves to dis' Poser on principle now that SplineGod, one of Lightwave's best, is using it.

Download my free stuff here: http://www.renderosity.com/homepage.php?page=2&userid=323368

Quote - I guess Lightwavers can't bring themselves to dis' Poser on principle now that SplineGod, one of Lightwave's best, is using it.

You will note that SplineGod is working on a real life production with real deadlines.
those who Disparage poser on principle often are not people who have to meet deadlines involving humanoid figures.
anyway it good to see the maturity over at the newtek pro community.

Cheers

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Wolf I was gong to say the same thing! Long live production!

This look so important that SplineGod developed the plugin so Lightwave can open Poser content now.

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The people I've seen that dis Poser/DAZ content big time have always been the wannabes (mostly wannabe modelers) and denizens of forums. Eventually they move on when they can't get a job at any of the big houses and the smarter ones realize they can make money building Poser content.

Pros (who usually are too busy to frequent forums and don't have the anti-Poser baggage) realize what a time and cost saver it can be and is. After all, they are very affordable OBJ models which can be used in any pro-level program.

I've worked in radio since 1972 and most broadcast professionals would never dream of making their own sound effects, though at one time that was a specialized job in radio. Now that only exists in movies and TV. You can use a library or buy what you don't have. CG is moving in that direction. There's not enough time and money in the production world to re-invent the wheel. The specialists still exist to create something new or something that doesn't exist, but if what's in a library will work, even with some tweaking, that's the way to go, especially if you want to have a life!

The amazing& Ironic thing is ,According to DAZ, they Use Lightwave& Modo for their flagship models (V4 etc.)

If a Daz Employee had posted some wip's and "wires" over at CG society for Example,During the creation of V4, he would have gotten All kinds of praise for his skills with lightwave & Modo.

No you take that SAME LW/Modo mesh and rig it for poser and it instantly becomes "Garbage" in the eyes of some.

Oh well .

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If you look at DAZ3D's gallery compared to what's being rendered for CG Society's gallery, you'll see why there are two standards.

www.youtube.com/user/ShawnDriscollCG

Quote - If a Daz Employee had posted some wip's and "wires" over at CG society for Example,During the creation of V4, he would have gotten All kinds of praise for his skills with lightwave & Modo.

No, he would have gotten dinged for the bad anatomy (arm pit/latissimus dorsi, legs length, wonky face), topology that does not flow all that well in some places (arm pit again) and he would have got dinged on the rigging (arm pit again!) Here's a couple of examples:
http://forums.cgsociety.org/showthread.php?f=43&t=684054
http://forums.cgsociety.org/showthread.php?f=43&t=688666

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Here's a hair animation demo I did with C4D's hair - not that it's very good, but it shows off some hair movement at least.

My Freebies

Wheres the animation?? And people at Daz signed a NDA and they will never show images from Daz products outside before launched.

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Oh, oops.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kmhNXXDCe1U

The actual scene file can be had from my freebies.

My Freebies

Quote -

No, he would have gotten dinged for the bad anatomy (arm pit/latissimus dorsi, legs length, wonky face), topology that does not flow all that well in some places (arm pit again) and he would have got dinged on the rigging (arm pit again!) Here's a couple of examples:
http://forums.cgsociety.org/showthread.php?f=43&t=684054
http://forums.cgsociety.org/showthread.php?f=43&t=688666

But overall the guy was given POSITIVE encouragement on his modeling effort
and yes those micro-crits/complaints will always be given when a human model is being shown .
Perhaps V4 was a bad example
but my point is anytime you post a model from poser the conversation goes WAY beyond nitpicks about topology and quickly turn to harsh admonishments against using poser in the first place. No matter where the mesh itself was modeled

I clearly remember Sanctumart posting images of the "Grim Armor" and the pheno-ype "Drub" creature that he modeled in Autodesk 3DMAX
and he made the FRONT PAGE of CG society.
With all kinds of praise for his 3DMAX skills in the forums.

But if one takes Sanctums poserized versions of those exact same models& textures
render them in Cinema4D with AR or VRay and post
"Software used: Poser & Cinema4D"
You will get a completely Different reaction.
Ive seen it time and time again.

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Well of course, if somebody else takes Sanctum's models and makes a render of them - they are SANCTUM'S MODELS, should you get an A+ from your Creative Writing teacher if you quote 5 pages of Shakespeare? Of course an original work will get more praise (will deserve more praise) than a render of somebody else's modeling and texturing work.

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I also noticed a CGSociety highly praised (and duly merited) thread of a human project photoshop workup....in which the author had used V3 as the base! Not credited, of course, but her armpits and shoulders gave away her secret identity.

prjz the hair animation looks tentalizingly fine. You don't render the ending -- with the head dead still -- long enough to ascertain if it comes to a complete, natural and jitter-free (with collision remaining on) stop. However, I can spot fitter even in moving hair and do not see any. I am sure that is a cool hair engine.

::::: Opera :::::

Shrug, download the scene file and run it as long as you want to.

My Freebies

Shrug, download the scene file and run it as long as you want to.

My Freebies

Quote - Well of course, if somebody else takes Sanctum's models and makes a render of them - they are SANCTUM'S MODELS, should you get an A+ from your Creative Writing teacher if you quote 5 pages of Shakespeare? .

Nope but if you are a Filmmaker who Does a modern day remake of "The Merchant of Venice" is it rational for people to disparage you entire film making/directing /cinematography effort based on their
own blind hatred of shakespeare??..

Not everyone is looking for praise over their modeling skills
Some of us are CG illustrators/artists/animators who use a variety of assets to get a Comission Done.

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Opera, I'm thinking about LW too especially because of the soft body physics. I had hoped this would be a part of the next Carrara, but I doubt it will. I think for me it will be a matter of how much LW will cost.

In the NewTek forums at the bottom there is a section on Buy/Sell and 'pre-owned' licenses go on sale there sometimes, for less than the established price of $895 ($995 with printed manuals).

I don't think you'll find a thread like that at the Autodesk forums!

::::: Opera :::::

Quote - Nope but if you are a Filmmaker who Does a modern day remake of "The Merchant of Venice" is it rational for people to disparage you entire film making/directing /cinematography effort based on their own blind hatred of shakespeare??..

If they enter said film in a scriptwriter-oriented film competition, yeah it would rate some disparagement.

Quote - Not everyone is looking for praise over their modeling skills
Some of us are CG illustrators/artists/animators who use a variety of assets to get a Comission Done.

Then those people should avoid cgSociety, which is very much oriented towards the modeler and texturer and not so much towards the guy who collects a bunch of other people's models and takes a picture of them.

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Wait a minute. This conversation is starting to turn my thread sour. Seriously, I'd ask you guys to cease. I can't demand it of course, but is now threatening to dredge up all sorts of old flame wars. I hope you will stop.

I won't be offering much new fnformation myself until after Thanksgiving weekend, when I dive into the deep end of LightWave. I am getting a lot out of the productive posts here in the meantime.

::::: Opera :::::

Terribly sorry!

My Freebies

Or else I will send RadarCat after you!!

Quote - Wait a minute. This conversation is starting to turn my thread sour. Seriously, I'd ask you guys to cease. I can't demand it of course, but is now threatening to dredge up all sorts of old flame wars. I hope you will stop.
::::: Opera :::::

Agreed John these pointless debate serve no one.

Im sure Sanctumart would agree that Some of us are Glad that those who cant do tend to $$buy$$$ from those of us who can.
(See my Sig banner link)

after all if everyone knew how to model and create morphed character for V4 there would
NO market for alot of our products now would there.

Cheers

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Okay wolf but you didn't really need to get in the last word, did you?

NO sorry for the thread derail man
I really like CG Society
the place for those who only model and texture

www.cgsociety.org

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anyway Im off to the to laundrymat.****

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$900 seems pretty steep right now with the economy the way it is. Hopefully, there will be some improvement to C7 worthwhile.

Well I am in the beta test and just posted an animation of the hair after being fixed, and while now quite good, it is still not in a league with the hair engines in Cinema, Max, Lightwave. You can see that animation at DAZ in the "public beta prelease discussion" thread.

But no dynamic cloth now or in the foreseable future.

::::: Opera :::::

Just wanted to share a bit of pricing info.

There's an authorized LW Dealer selling LW 9 for $718.95 w/ free shipping.

Yet, another site where you can buy a competive upgrade for LightWave 9 Full with PDF Manual $429.99. Must have one of the following: Softimage XSI, Maya, 3ds max, Cinema 4D, Modo, After Effects, Photoshop, Shake, Digital Fusion.

I've heard, but haven't confirmed, if you email Newtek and ask about a competitive upgrade you can get it for $495.

I installed and goofed around with the trial version. I need to spend more time with it.

Hi everyone,

As a Lightwave user, I thought I'd give you my viewpoint of the program. Basically, I love using Lightwave to model my stuff. It lacks some tools that would make the modelling process easier but you can make do with the program and some nifty plugins. But the majority of stuff I do in Lightwave is modelling and things like animation is a rare thing for me.
But, because I like it so much, it doesn't mean I recommend it for everyone. Some people may find an affinity for Max, Maya, Softimage, Modo, etc... Lightwave 'clicked' with me because I felt like I could model more freeform with it.. Zbrush is an excellent accompaniment to Lightwave because you get more organic modelling with it. I honestly could not do as well in my organic work without Zbrush.
The unofficial brother of Lightwave (in my opinion) is Modo, which is incredibly customisable and can mimic interfaces and controls from other programs such as Max and Maya. I've never used it but I've seen it in action and it doesn't disappoint.

The funny thing is that I have seen models made in Lightwave that look like Poser models not because they were using models from Poser but because the modelling work was low grade or maybe because a Poser model was used as reference.

My suggestion is to download the trial version of Lightwave and check out lots of different tutorials to get the feel of how it works. It may take a while for you to like it but, if it doesn't feel right for you then try a different program.

When I started doing 3d in the past, I tried to use Max and I hated it cos I felt like I was modelling with a calculator. I know that things have changed in regards to how Max runs but I prefer the freedom and speed of Lightwave. Also, apparently, the renderer is better then most other 3d programs. I can't really compare because I've been using Lightwave for so long.

Anyway, that's my input on the subject.

Cheers,
Paul
(mix_mash)

Forum: Poser - OFFICIAL

Subject: Considering Lightwave. Still love Poser. Moving asset links......