Attached Link: Exotique 6 at Ballistic

I note from Ballistic Publishing/CG Society's website that "Exotique 6" is due out soon.  For those who don't know, the Exotique series are books that act as a showcase for the best CG art around.  Just leafing through them is enough to make you drool at the talent on display, and #6 is no exception.

However, I just had a leaf through the preview of #6, and was struck by an odd fact.  I've had a few bottles of Henney's Dry English Cider, so my maths might be slightly out, but out of what appears to be more than 300 individual images (each one of which makes my efforts look pathetic), only about 50-60 aren't in fact a picture of a female lead or sole character, a "hot chick", if you will....

Does this mean that pictures of females in various states of undress, either with or without big weapons are all that sells, or are these sorts of images what serious artists overwhelmingly concentrate on?  I ask as someone who has probably produced an excess of pictures of female characters himself.

It struck me as funny, as the books have a strong association with the CG Society site, where if you dare to post a Poser image, the negative comments you WILL attract (most often from posters with no art of their own on display) usually refer to a perception that Poser artists only produce endless derivative Vickies (or other pneumatic female characters) with swords.  This is despite the site taking advertising for Pro 2010 and a Poser artist currently being featured on their front page.

Have I stumbled upon some previously unknown facts i.e. that Poser is unfairly denigrated in the CG community, or that images of sexy girls with Big Weapons sell?

Sex sells...even in the 3D world..

That's a pretty tiny selection, and it boils down to "the editors picked these".  Watch the cgTalk galleries over time, "hot chick" pics appear but they don't dominate by any means.  The subtitle of that particular book is "the world's most beautiful CG characters" after all, not "the best models" or "the most amazing landscapes".  It's just a narrow selection of "hot chick" images because that's the topic of the book.

CG Society is a bit of an elitist club that pride themselves on using high-end software and - to them - sophisticated techniques to create their images. They are always right. Just ask them. If you bring up questions or points that they consider immaterial or something they hadn't thought of, you are either politely ignored or told that you aren't making sense. In that behaviour, they don't differ much from any other established artist group with set-in-stone workflow. You see shades of that here and at Daz.

Re: the pre-disposition of artists to create images portraying scantily-clad females brandishing large weapons: that does seem to be something many artists and viewers enjoy, hence the proliferation. Personally, I think it's all been done to death - there are LOTS of other scenes just begging to be conceptualised and realised - but then, the idea of the female in the temple with a sword seems to strike a responsive chord in neophyte Poser artists when they see such an image - and such images abound on here! - and they think: "ooo, I can do that!" and so they multiply like rabbits.

The female form is beautiful - it is my favourite subject too - but why in fight mode? I guess psychologists and psychiatrists and all those brain-cobweb analyists could have a field day on this topic. I rather not go there.

I too find the fact that some of these sites that fly Poser ads and then turn around and view anything Poser related something akin to a sexually transmitted disease irritating and funny at the same time (no offense to those with std's).

Regardless if the entire scene was modeled by hand except for the figure, the image is often quickly denounced. I say stay true to your inner voice that bekons, full steam ahead and damn the torpedos.

Personally the last book that I thought was worth anything at all was Ballistics Character Modeling 2, since then nothing has really grabbed my attention.

Quote - I too find the fact that some of these sites that fly Poser ads and then turn around and view anything Poser related something akin to a sexually transmitted disease irritating and funny at the same time (no offense to those with std's).

 

The people that Decide what Ads get Accepted  At CG society are not the ones in the forums bashing poser renders.
It has always been a matter of: Did you model  rig and texture that  naked booby chick yourself
or did you buy,install, load canned pose load canned,textures,hair load canned lights load canned puffed pouty lip face morph and render.

Those who did the latter will NEVER get the respect of the former at CG society ..get over it
now one can regurgitate the usual tired arguments about wether Picasso "ground his own pigments" or "forged  his own brushes' blah blah blah and in the end  no ones attitude/opinion about DAZ's ubiquitous V-clone  will change over there( CGS)

Cheers

"but why in fight mode"

There's the sex and death connection. Eros & Thanatos - the two primary human drives - at least according to Freud. The French metaphor for orgasm is le petit mort,' the little death after all.

Also, many men find powerful women attractive - at least in the safe context of fantasy, and nothing says power like wielding a huge head lopper or packing a big pair of guns, (pun intended) i.e. Lara Croft. The more powerful the man, the greater the need to be dominated by a woman - or so say the high priced ladies of pleasure who cater to such.

Next week, we'll cover the Madonna/Whore syndrome.

Not to disagree with RobynsVeil - and in truth, I can only recall this one instance - but there was an image, not rendered in Poser but using Poser characters to some extent, that went over quite well at CGTalk. It was an image where office workers were in packaging like the second generation of G.I. Joe figures were.  There was a fair amount of post work and morphing, etc. but the artist Proudly stated Poser's use. It was a really cool pic and a great use of Poser and people at CGTALK actually liked that image.

So I don't think it's Poser that's the problem so much as the way some users present Poser characters there. I mean, there are always going to be those folks who will rag on Poser users anyway - these are usually NOT people who work in the field for a living. Usually they are hobbyists or students. Most pros will use whatever they can and many of the animators there recognize that the models they use for work aren't always models they made themselves (in studios, it's not uncommon for animators to NOT be modelers). I think it's when folks don't mention Poser but use Poser characters or when they do little to alter the obvious sameness a lot of Poser renders tend to have - that's when you see pitchforks. Good or ill.

Also, many Poser users don't seem to understand what the word modeled or modeling means. This may be because of a language barrier but it's obvious that they don't understand the term. Just look at the 3D Modeling gallery here at Renderosity - there's always three or four pics of Poser renders where nothing in the image was modeled by the person posting, yet they'll use the phrase modeled in Poser or this is my latest model (meaning they bought the thing). So some of that plays into the problem also at other sites where folks don't seem to consider not everyone speaks english well.

 

Anyway, that's my take on it.

"So some of that plays into the problem also at other sites where folks don't seem to consider not everyone speaks english well."

 

Good insight.