Hey guys and gals,

we've recently been in contact with Smith Micro and they've shown interest in Look at my Hair being ported to Poser (here is our Blog site with information and examples about the Studio plugin currently available: www.furrythings.com).

However, we need to know... Are YOU interested?
Let us know, thanks.

yep, definitively :biggrin:

Absolutely...I'd never pass up a useful tool. Some of those critter renders are fantastic!

It's an interesting question, as Poser has a hair room.  It certainly looks like a nice product, escpecially on the animal furs!  Great job!

It makes one wonder if the expression of interest is indicative of a desire of Smith Micro to focus on other improvements internally (versus the hair room)...while allowing 3rd parties use the new API to improve upon those things that they may not have time to update (which is fine)

If I knew they were not improving the hair room, then I would say, yes.  If I knew they were improving the hair room....then I would probably wait to compare.  Without knowing either way, it is hard to say.

It would be nice to hear some feedback from SM about their future product roadmap, or even in respect to this particular room.

I'd be interested in knowing more about what the planned implementation of a poser port would be.  In general I would be interested in tools that added more styling and control options for hair.

from what I can see, "LAMH" is nothing more than the Poser Hair Room for Daz. 

Does it really do anything different or better?

If it's Old Boss = New Boss than not interested.

We already have pretty good animal fur in Poser, so unless "Look at my hair" will one day be able to create truly convincing photorealistic human hair, nope, no interrest in yet another "plugin" at all.

Yes, we definitely could need a replacement for transmapped human hair, but only if that replacement is at least as realistic as "Joe Alters Shave and Haircut" for Maya is.

(See demo pic)

Anything inferior would be a waste of time and resources IMHO.

Can anyone explain how this differs from the hair room? 

From what I've heard, it's not truly dynamic.  It doesn't do collisions.

What are the advantages?  Faster, easier, quicker rendering? 

I'd love to be able to do feathered dinosaurs like in example on your web page.  You can do it with the hair room, but it's kind of a pain.  The Poser hair room has some quirks that make full body fur difficult.  If your plugin is a better solution, I'd be interested.

I like the styling tools. Will dwnl the manual. 

Quote - Can anyone explain how this differs from the hair room? 

From what I've heard, it's not truly dynamic.  It doesn't do collisions.

What are the advantages?  Faster, easier, quicker rendering? 

I'd love to be able to do feathered dinosaurs like in example on your web page.  You can do it with the hair room, but it's kind of a pain.  The Poser hair room has some quirks that make full body fur difficult.  If your plugin is a better solution, I'd be interested.

Yet.  I'm adding new things all the time. :-)

Kendall

Is it dynamic?

Will it flop about when a character moves their head in an animation?

Will it blow around in an animation using wind force?

If "yes", very interested.

If "no", no interest.

(Did I ever mention that I only do animations?)

Upon looking at your site, I'm intrigued at the hair and how it seems much easier to style than poser's hair room.  My reservations come in where I don't see any hair that is fine. Most seem wiry. Is this a case of "Look at my hair can't do fine hair" or "we need to keep it course to fully cover the head without taking up every single byte available so you can't even have a figure in the scene"?  There also doesn't seem to be any sample images of hair that sophisticated heavily styled and sprayed hair that has every strand in place.  Kind of like here media-cache-ec4.pinterest.com/upload/71987294015398002_J5dkUysw_c.jpg  and can it do curls? If it can do fine, precise and curls, great I'm all for it. If not, then no thanks we've got that. Also, it needs to be dynamic. Dynamic in the clothroom might work.

If it's a plugin who will work in Poser without any other "help" (read DSON) it would be very interesting.

I say this in addition to what's already said.

Looks interesting on the surface, however if it doesn't do animation. proper dynamics.......if it sells for £50 dollars for what is essentially a free application ie Daz Studio, are Poser users (who already spend more on the initial purchase of the software) going to be expected to pay more/less/the same.

Odds are the next Poser Version is going to cost more in any event, and already has a hair room, allbeit with limitations, I'd like to see it improved at source without the need for a plug in.

Oh yes and if it is going to create massively bloated files like Dson does, then for me personally it's a no thankyou.

Finally the promo image http://www.furrythings.com/genesis-extra-long-hair-preset-available/  doesn't do anything to make me want to buy it even for Studio, it honestly looks like someone has slapped a badly skinned bear on her head, just my opinion....also just my take, using a bikini mapped skin texture doesn't enhance the image.....

Yes.

OK, looked at he video"s, read the manual.

I like the styling tools and the technology behind them.

Unfortunately, the realistic hair results are not there yet.

For 50$ , you might sell a 100 or so.
Not that many hair builders are out there.

For 10$, some realistic development, and the right promotion, you might sell thousands to the huge hobby-end user market that wants to experiment, but can not get around the current Poser hair room. (That has seen few improvements since Poser5.) 

But these hobby-end users are certainly not going to invest 50$.

The human hair doesn't look that great.  I think I'd stick with the Hair Room for that.

But the animal fur looks very nice.  I'd buy the plugin for that alone.  If, as others have said, it works better in Poser than DSON does.

And animal fur doesn't really need collisions. 

Short animal furr can be done with a noice node in displacement.
And control the furr surface with a mask if needed.

Long furr would require a hair room or equivalent.

No, I want real fur.  That can blow in the breeze and such.  Alessandro has some nice examples done in the Hair Room, as does Tiny.  You don't need collisions, because it's short enough that it's not going to pass through the animal's body (and there's so much of it Poser would choke trying to do collisions, anyway).  You run the sim with collisions unchecked, and the fur moves, but doesn't collide with anything.

I've tried doing it myself, but it's a headache in the Hair Room.  The Poser Hair Room has some annoying quirks.  The hair density depends on the number of polys, so on the typical animal figure, which has some areas with lots of polys and some with less, the hair density varies very unnaturally.  You have to place each group carefully and adjust it separately to try to get them to look similar, which is a pain.  Plus, there's an occasional weird poly that produces a wild hair, much longer than the rest.  I have not been able to fix those, though Tiny figured out a way. 

Thanks for all the response so far guys.

I'll try to answer in a unique post to the comments received.

First of all let me state that current development status, leading towards version 1.1, has consistently improved the features available in the initial release.

Besides improving styling tools and ease of use, we have integrated a human hair shader based on the Marschner model (as you pointed out the current version is good for animal fur, but it lacks a shader accounting for multiple scattering, and so here it comes) and we are working on a physics engine that will provide a dynamic hair environment. Animation capabilities obviously as well.

This is all in the works and will see the light in next plugin updates for Studio (1.1 is not too far from being released BTW).

On Poser, we would like to provide a complete solution that works seemlessly (thus not DSON-based), that can bring the same features and capabilities mentioned above (and so, again, beyond 1.0 initial release).

We are not looking to create a duplicate of the Poser Hair Room but rather bring a new and alternative solution to it, with different tools and features.

Hi Saxon3D, about the presets, please understand that those are donated and shared (renders as well) by LAMH's users.

Quote - Looks interesting on the surface, however if it doesn't do animation. proper dynamics.......if it sells for £50 dollars for what is essentially a free application ie Daz Studio, are Poser users (who already spend more on the initial purchase of the software) going to be expected to pay more/less/the same.

Odds are the next Poser Version is going to cost more in any event, and already has a hair room, allbeit with limitations, I'd like to see it improved at source without the need for a plug in.

Oh yes and if it is going to create massively bloated files like Dson does, then for me personally it's a no thankyou.

Finally the promo image http://www.furrythings.com/genesis-extra-long-hair-preset-available/  doesn't do anything to make me want to buy it even for Studio, it honestly looks like someone has slapped a badly skinned bear on her head, just my opinion....also just my take, using a bikini mapped skin texture doesn't enhance the image.....

Well, as I wrote earlier, starting from 1.1 for Studio we'll have an integrated "humar hair fiber" shader based on the Marschner model, which will bring more realistic results.

Quote -  

We already have pretty good animal fur in Poser, so unless "Look at my hair" will one day be able to create truly convincing photorealistic human hair, nope, no interrest in yet another "plugin" at all.

Yes, we definitely could need a replacement for transmapped human hair, but only if that replacement is at least as realistic as "Joe Alters Shave and Haircut" for Maya is.

(See demo pic)

 

Anything inferior would be a waste of time and resources IMHO.

Quote - Absolutely...I'd never pass up a useful tool. Some of those critter renders are fantastic!

Thank you very much! :)

my only one additional comment would be this, if it cant produce realistic looking hair, not fur, which from the promo images it doesnt seem to do very well, what would be my advantage in buying in?, not trying to be an ass here or demean your product, but if you read any of the kazillions of threads in here related to the hair room, hair figures, hair props etc etc, what people want is "realistic hair", can you provide that ?........... from what you have stated so far, it's in the pipeline, please show me again when it is a finished product.....

Again, it's just my opinion..............

Quote - not trying to be an ass here or demean your product

Saxon, of course you are not, and instead I do appreciate your opinion and comments. We think we will definitely be able to provide a realistic hair solution and will certainly post images and renders with the new human hair shader as they will be available.

In that case Dear Sir, I shall watch with interest the evolution of said Hair product ;)

Dynamic Hair from hair room in Poser is already something dreadful for me to use !

I create mesh hair using Shade3D, which also produces the textures for the hair, export as OBJ, and then prep it inside Poser.

If LAMH can add more value to my workflow than these alternatives, I'd take a closer look.

The animal fur does look really great....I think the sofware has promise and I'll be watching with interest ;). Sure, some things don't look all that great, but neither does the Poser hair room frankly, and the reason I never use it...heh.

Laurie

Hell yeah!

I was looking at your DS produday just yesterday wishing it had a Poser version.

It's fur (and body hair) I really need it for. Although, if it could also make better human hair, that'd be utterly fantastic.

Please make it happen! :)

Whilst I do have ZBrush... and am in the process of learning how to make my own FibreMesh hair... I would definitely like to have something more equivalent to that, than the current hair room, working within Poser.

Quote -  

We already have pretty good animal fur in Poser, so unless "Look at my hair" will one day be able to create truly convincing photorealistic human hair, nope, no interrest in yet another "plugin" at all.

Yes, we definitely could need a replacement for transmapped human hair, but only if that replacement is at least as realistic as "Joe Alters Shave and Haircut" for Maya is.

(See demo pic)

 

Anything inferior would be a waste of time and resources IMHO.

Are you serious ?

You want in Poser the equivalent of Joe plugin for Maya ?

Well... You can also imagine the next release of "King Kong" made by Poser :biggrin:

I'd echo what others have said about performance needing a kick up the rear, if the DSON Importer plugin's anything to go by... and if the performance there is anything to do with the current version of the new plugin framework within Poser.

However, with Reality 3 shaping up for release, and SM's clear focus on encouraging new Poser add-on development... this thread now further demonstrates this I think... I can't imagine our seeing improvement on the performance front, with forthcoming iterations of Poser, isn't likely?

I will wait and watch the progress,if it produces realistic human hair that can be used in still and animation and is easy to use i will buy it.only question im gonna ask,what sort of time frame for release are you looking at?

Sincerely,

Bill

Quote - Since I tend to render characters like the one depicted here using Poser, yes, I am intrigued by this news.  To be able to give her an actual "pelt" that won't look like a "Chia Pet" would be fantastic!

Sincerely,

Bill

OT:  What is that little jacket from?

That's the "Lotus" jacket from the vintage Plat' Club ensemble of the same same.  Since it was modeled for A3, naturally, it fits Melody, the anthro' figure by LittleFox depicted here.

Sincerely,

Bill

OK thanks, I think this is it (50% off right now  :)  )

DAZ is blocked at work, so I can't verify, but the name of the product link sounds right.  So it's just 99 cents or a dollar at the moment?  Perfect time to grab it!

Sincerely,

Bill

Yes. Always interested in new tools for my 3D toolkit. :)

Yeah... below is my first attempt at a centaur.

I'm planning to go down the FibreMesh hair route, using ZBrush, for further explorations on this theme... and similar... just now...

But this was what I really wished I could have had something like "Look at my hair" in Poser, for.

I ended up using a combination of transmapped head hair, displacement map-based body hair (Draagonstorm's) and Poser dynamic hair... along with a velvet shader from Kobaltkween, and some further displacement, on the horse body.

But I just find Poser's dynamic hair a real fiddle to try to work with...

...my current avatar uses the displacement technique too. But this is pretty limited really...

..something more intuitive, that can run performantly, within Poser, would be a real boost I think...

From what I've seen, your tool is easier to use than Poser's own hair room. It would be a great leap forward if we could create good hairstyles within Poser.

So, I would definitely be interested, if:

1. hair realism is improved (will be watching for your updates);

2. dynamic draping is better than the hair room;

3. the cost is reasonable

I've been watching LAMH since it was initially in development, and I can say I'd love to have it natively in Poser. I think a lot of what people have been saying about realistic hair is a matter of finding the right shaders; get Bagginsbill on it and I'm sure that won't be a problem. ;)

The truly furry animals are great. If it were in Poser, there's a good chance I'd have bought it already.

Which is to say, I hope a Poser version is coming very soon.

I would love to see it in poser.

I am currently updating alot of my furry genesis sets to use this system, and to be able to get as cool (if not cooler) results in poser would be AMAZING!

Rawn

For me, Poser's already got a Hair room, so not really interested. However, if you can make it do something like grow thick blades of grass on a ground plane, I might reconsider.

Having a hair room is fine.

But Having products made with specific presets that can be used is even better.

Click on a preset and have the hair or fur you want.

That will work in both d/s and poser.

Sounds like a good deal all around to me.

If it only can do animal fur, I won't buy it, because the Poser hair room can do that just fine.

(Picture is Tiny's furry cat)

Only exception would be if the performance would be a lot better, i.e. a fully furred LAMH animal would render in a fraction of the time of a fully furred hair room animal.

I'm all for improvements, but it should be real improvements like a new way to do photorealistic human hair, not just mere alternatives like another way to do animal fur for a tiny market that is already much too fractioned for it's own good.

Otherwise it'll end up like the DAZ dynamic cloth plugin which is practically useless because it has zero market penetration.

Sorry, but from what I've seen so far my reaction is "Might have potential, but still needs a lot more work."

I'd buy it.

Yeah, Poser has a hair room.  So what?  It isn't like it has been improved since Poser 5.

I'd much rather have a dedicated module with some dedicated software programmars.

What's $50?  2 or 3 outfits?

I'm in.

Thanks folks, I'm happy to see that there is someone interested indeed.

Someone?

More like several, myself among them.

Sincerely,

Bill

better hair = interested.

Same Same = Not