I think I saw someone mention recently that Poser Pro 2012 was forgetting their displacement bounds settings.  This is now happening to me.  Poser will not leave my prop's displacement bounds set at 2.0, even with lock actor turned on.  Usually it just resets back to zero, but one time after a render it had the mysterious value of 21.  Something is definitely wrong with it.

I do remember running into this problem a year or two ago...
There was something about Poser calculating displacement bounds based on the materials displacement value.
Your value of 21 could be the materials displacement value times 12.

Funny thing was, Poser did change values when using a prop with multiple materials, but did not change values when using a prop with preview material only (e.g. box).

Looks like this has not been adressed in one of the Service Releases.

wuh oh.  what does this mean for vascular displacement maps?

Quote - wuh oh.  what does this mean for vascular displacement maps?

My guess is, it won't matter.

So far I haven't had a situation where this caused any problems.
I stumbled upon this when playing with displacement, trying everything shown in the manual :-)

Quote - I do remember running into this problem a year or two ago...
There was something about Poser calculating displacement bounds based on the materials displacement value.
Your value of 21 could be the materials displacement value times 12.

Yes, my material displacement is set for 1.75.  But how did you come up with that?  Where is the x12 coming from?

I thought bounds should be a value equal to (or higher than) the highest amount of displacement in use by a material.

Quote - Yes, my material displacement is set for 1.75.  But how did you come up with that?  Where is the x12 coming from? I thought bounds should be a value equal to (or higher than) the highest amount of displacement in use by a material.

following is the information I got from SM support back in Nov. 2011

Quote - What you should see is that the value for your Displacement Bounds property will be your Displacement value from the Materials Room multiplied by 12.

This factor of 12 is a universal minimum bound factor. You cannot dial below this reset value or else the displacement you set in the Materials Room will not be displayed at all. While you cannot go below this minimum, you can use the Displacement Bounds dial to set the value higher.

Why 12? I am not sure where this value came from; however, it seems that if you use a Math node to make your texture more dense, then this value should decrease. (I am not sure about this and we are currently looking into it more, but this relation should hold true.)

So the quick answer is that the dial exists in the Properties because you can use it to create a higher value (not a smaller value). I hope this explanation makes sense, but if you do have any questions, please let me know!

This makes you wonder, why there is a Displacement Bounds dial in properties, when Poser calculates a value no matter what you've dialed in.
I've tried entering values in Displ.Bounds higher than 12 times displ.value and Poser did reset the value as well.
It gets even more confusing, when changing units within a project.

I just would like to undertstand when it will change it to zero, and when it will change it ot the multiple of 12.  The next time it goes up I'm just going to leave it alone, as I can't seem to get it to hold a value above the material's property. 

If it is indeed working correctly, it is certainly not very intuitive.

Quote - I just would like to undertstand when it will change it to zero, and when it will change it ot the multiple of 12.  The next time it goes up I'm just going to leave it alone, as I can't seem to get it to hold a value above the material's property. 

If it is indeed working correctly, it is certainly not very intuitive.

I've never been able to figure out when and why it will change bounds to zero.

Just take a figure with multiple body parts and multiple material zones.
Usually a material zone covers multiple body parts and a body part may have different material zones.
Now each material may have a different displacement value, each body part could have a different bounds setting.
Also, there is the bounds value from your render settings.
And everything may be related to bucket size which is another value that may change during rendering.

Finally, there may be a bug relating to units set in preferences.
 

Quote - > Quote - I just would like to undertstand when it will change it to zero, and when it will change it ot the multiple of 12.  The next time it goes up I'm just going to leave it alone, as I can't seem to get it to hold a value above the material's property. 

If it is indeed working correctly, it is certainly not very intuitive.

I've never been able to figure out when and why it will change bounds to zero.

Just take a figure with multiple body parts and multiple material zones.
Usually a material zone covers multiple body parts and a body part may have different material zones.
Now each material may have a different displacement value, each body part could have a different bounds setting.
Also, there is the bounds value from your render settings.
And everything may be related to bucket size which is another value that may change during rendering.

Finally, there may be a bug relating to units set in preferences.
 

My work in progress scene contains two props created in Wings.  Both have just two materials including preview.