Quote - Then I want to be able to go back into first person view, equip a weapon, and kill all the monsters in my runtime. 

I'd rather kill all of the bugs in Poser and Windows... :lol:

1. I wouldn't mind the instancing at all.  Sounds like a good idea to me. :)
2. I don't mind the post-Posette Poser figures.  I didn't care for Alyson.  I did like Sydney and the G2s.  Don't really care for the figures with embedded magnets too much, in general (think it's extraneous at this point) but it doesn't make me run for the hills.  Won't really get into it (again).
3. Don't look at the gallieries as often as others do so I'm not one to comment.  I make the stuff I enjoy making without (serious) regard to what the other guy over there is making.
4. Don't really agree because of the hitching oneself to another company thing.  Not really getting into it yet again. ;)

Really don't like generalizations about vendors "do this or that".  Everyone makes their choices based on their capabilities, what they enjoy doing and certainly what they feel will sell also works its way into that.  I have stuck with Poser 9+ and my lights are still on.  I feel, even though it might be some kind of a niche, that customers DO want to see products and tools that use the capabilities of recent versions of Poser to underline what they bought new versions of Poser FOR.  I think it's more than fair to support the current version of Poser and one version back (and further back, if possible, without having to make lots of concessions).
There is certainly, obviously, a market in grabbing the largest pool possible but it's not the end all, be all, period.

Quote - I have stuck with Poser 9+ and my lights are still on. 

Yes, but consider what you're selling. A lot of it is script based and utilities, so you'll get the money from those wanting to upgrade. However, I was speaking of those making figures and clothing. All of those that tried have been shut down by customers and have gone back to the older figures. Only weight mapped figure that has content consistenly made is the Genesis figures, a quick view through rendo and runtimedna stores will show that.

Quote - > Quote - I have stuck with Poser 9+ and my lights are still on. 

Yes, but consider what you're selling. A lot of it is script based and utilities, so you'll get the money from those wanting to upgrade. However, I was speaking of those making figures and clothing. All of those that tried have been shut down by customers and have gone back to the older figures. Only weight mapped figure that has content consistenly made is the Genesis figures, a quick view through rendo and runtimedna stores will show that.

I can see what you are saying but even with scripts and utliltes there have been advances.  I have recently peucased two utilities created by Netherwork, one full and one upgrade, but did so mainly on the basis that are 'addons' which I think is a much cleaner way of delivering utlilties and scripts.

Quote - > Quote - > Quote - Part of the "creativity", part of the "fun and personal satisfaction", is to build the content yourself.

That's what YOU say!

All teasing aside, Tony, I've spent over $1500 on modeling softwares that ***I can't begin to understand! ***And before everyone starts berating my intelligence, I'm not a dummy. I have degrees in mass communications and film, electrical engineering, and psychology. I've written books. I'm good enough at Poser that people hire me to illustrate for them.

I'm not an idiot, (contrary to popular opinion) but no tutorial I've run across has made Wings understandable to me. Sculptris... Blender... ZBrush... they all make no sense to me! All I wind up with after spending the money and hours and hours of grief is a shapeless nothing!

For my purposes, I can either buy content or go do something other than Poser. 

I doubt I am alone.

 

Nope, you are not alone.  I have tried some of the Digital Tailor tutorials and that has been the best for me, that and Silo.  However the most I have done so far is to modify items purchased for my own use.  On the whole I purchase content and then modify the materials either within Poser or, for figures, I use Paint Shop Pro and layers.  I have added scars, tattoos and freckles that way and I enjoy it, good as Silo is I don't get the same buzz from that.

I just cannot see me spending the time to build something that could take me a week (plus the year gaining the skills) and yet I could buy of $10.

 ****************************************************************

Wheatpenny -

When Poser 5 came out Creative Labs or Efrontier, or whatever the dominant company name for Poser was had a partnership with a software program called Shade. Shade is kind of like Hexagon, and is oriented for gamers. It also has a poser fusion that allows you to bring Poser Characters into it.

Mirye Shade 7 and Shade 8 had a fantastic set of printed literature and there was a step by step tutorial that got me started. It went through how to make a basic table and vase and then set up a room and stepped you through the cameras to go through it. 

If you can get a copy of this tutorial, it would still be applicable to their current version which is 14.

I like it for creating *.objs and I have learned a lot. I am still not good at editing polygons and manipulating them. In fact I have what I thought was a simple task of creating a chamfer on a cylinder that has me stumped for the moment. But that's probasbly because I haven't had the manual for the latest version (it came out in Feb and I just ordered it today - its free but you have to register for it)  and some of the command buttons have been relocated and changed.

I think that is what some of these software packages are missing: A good basic tutorial that gets you started making the basic stuff. The fun startswhen you begin to spend more time creating than you do looking up commands to se if the software can do what you want it to do.

Going through that Shade7 / Shade8 tutorial is what got me over the hump of just buying stuff and creating scenes. I still buy, but I also add and am beginning to create more of my own. 

Quote - > Quote - > Quote - I have stuck with Poser 9+ and my lights are still on. 

Yes, but consider what you're selling. A lot of it is script based and utilities, so you'll get the money from those wanting to upgrade. However, I was speaking of those making figures and clothing. All of those that tried have been shut down by customers and have gone back to the older figures. Only weight mapped figure that has content consistenly made is the Genesis figures, a quick view through rendo and runtimedna stores will show that.

 

I can see what you are saying but even with scripts and utliltes there have been advances.  I have recently peucased two utilities created by Netherwork, one full and one upgrade, but did so mainly on the basis that are 'addons' which I think is a much cleaner way of delivering utlilties and scripts.

Well netherworks' utilities are good and take a lot of headache out of doing some things in Poser. Matwriter panel is my favorite and saves me from pulling my hair out when making materials though it's still far longer to make materials for products than it does with DS. Hopefully the new version can default to relative pathnames when saving rather than absolute; I had to pull out one of Dimension3D's utilities to change the paths in a lot of files because it was writing absolute pathnames when I was saving because the runtime existed in a different runtime which was necessary for my products when they're sharing the texture files for different programs.

Certainly SM could benefit from actually speaking to actual content developers of figures to figure out what to include or make easier for them, there's far too much hand coding and editing files by hand to make content when it should be done from within the program.

Well again you make it sound like a union that all vendors are part of (and you're the official spokesman).  You most certainly do not know what "all" vendors have done.  You're welcome to make your best guess though. ;)  I just think it's some of the wording, M3dia.

I've done a variety of different things and don't have a specific focus of any type of product.  I enjoy creating utilities when I feel that I have something to contribute that I feel would make Poser more fun and interesting to use and that advance on what I've done prior.

Apart from that I released a toon bear in December, which did very well.  Suzy and Dude did very well (and continue to have residuals), of which I was the rigger and polisher and that I also accessorized.

I have done some V4 works but (of late) those were part of a team effort and in that situation it was my job to rig/morph so that was being there to support a team concept.  But as far as Joe solo goes, I don't think I've made completely self-published content (clothing, skins and what you would consider standard fare) for any of the older generation figures in well over 4 years.  And that's not a V4-hater statement, it's just that its not the "end all" of anything for me. ;)

Back to OT, I don't really have much to contribute except that I do like the instancing idea and stewer has suggested that it likely feasable to do, by saying that other requests have been done (but that doesn't mean it's easy, just might not require the code base rewrite that is perceived to need to happen).

On the Genesis and all that, I think we know everyone's opinion already.  I don't think either company should feel they must shack up with the other, no matter who's foot the shoe is on.  If it could be done in some way that both could meet at a middle ground and each take a step forward, I think that would be the best route without anyone having to make sacrfices.  Maybe SM could move more towards a Genesis-type system (but keep the Poser ideals intact) and DAZ could move towards producing a native Poser file to work within that system.  Don't you think that sounds better than just "adopt someone else's technology natively" in your own program?

I'm not in the mood to be lambasted over the whole genesis thing this week but I'm actually very neutral on the whole thing.  It it winds up working natively, great!  Something to look forward to.  If it doesn't... I'll still be moving forward doing whatever I do :)  Sorry that I'm sickenly positive but that's how I gotta roll.

Poser saves materials with relative paths

Do a simple test: Load a texture from your texture folder and apply it to andy. Then save that material and look at the mt5 file. It is saved as: file ":Runtime:Textures:YourTexture.jpg"

WHAT I WOULD LIKE TO SEE IN POSER 2016:

(1) Some form of instancing would be nice. When making a crowd scene it would be nice to be able to replicate things like seats or signs or tables or trees or bushes or whatever without it hogging memory.

(2) I have already reached the same conclusion you have regarding low poly figures. I have purchased some of predatrons and Greenpots (for his gymnasium) and would like to see some more development along those lines. 

(3) ROPE ROOM I like ships, dinghys, in particular sailing. I would like to see development of something called a "Rope Room" which could set the modeling of ropes and knots. Rope is a unique figure with unique properties.  I don't think this is that difficult; I could almost do it myself, and that's not saying much.

Basically I'd like to be able to pick two -or more- points in 3D space and have it return the distance between any of the two points. For that nominal distance I would have the opportunity of entering a diameter and I would have a dial that would increase the distance. When the dial is spun, the rope length would then droop or sag between the two points as the distance is increased beyond the nominal returned initially. I should be able to rotate the peak/trough of the loop about its axis between the two points.

Somehow I'd like it to be parented at both ends, like a real rope would, but I haven't figured out how to do that.

I'd also like to have a button in this fictional rope room that would ask me how many segments and then automatically convert my rope into an easy pose figure.

For animations the easy pose figure could have a dial that allows elasticity, so that in a bungee cord scenario it could stretch.

My rope should also be able to drape like dynamic cloth does, but still hold its diameter. I suppose the way you could do this is have the path settle and then map the easy pose rope to the path.  Jewelry necklaces should be easier to model and could conform dynamically if a Rope Room existed.

In poser physics I still haven't figured out how to make and animate a tire swing. That is, To have the rope anchored at one end and be able to drop or push a tire at the end of it. It's just not easy to do. I'd like to be able to set this up in my ficitonal rope room.

In my fictional rope room there would also be a knot tying utility that would, as a first pass, enable you to trace a path and then be able to create a knot in obj. As a second pass, I'd like to be able to convert this to an easy pose figure.

The first pass of a knot tying utility has already been done.

There is a UK piece of free software that is called 'KnotTyer3D"  by Steve Abbot of the UK that is pretty awesome, but horribly out of date. I use it on my old XP machine but haven't tried it on newer platforms. It needs to be written in Python (Steve - if you google your name and this comes up are you paying attention?). The windows to do operations in are small and not up to snuff, but the darn things works really well and can export to an obj which can then be scaled and have materials added in Poser:

Link: 

http://www.stevenabbott.co.uk/Knots/knottyer3d.html

(4) I would like to see continued improvements in poser Physics. In particular I'd like to be able to "Pin" a character or part of a character in a scene and then let gravity do the animation.  You can take my tire swing example above, but also the one I am primarily thinking about is having a character hold on to a parapit with one hand while trying to climb up, or hold on to a tiller as a boat rocks. In this example the hand would be 'pinned' to the parapit. We can almost do this now.

(5) I 'd like to see some kind of integration of the face room with a 3D Hand scanning device such as the one put out recently (November 2013) for $399 by 3D Systems.  I saw it in operation at a recent trade show and would love to somehow convert what it scans into a poser character. From what I saw, it does a really good job of scanning heads and boots and things.

Link:

http://www.3dsystems.com/press-releases/3d-systems-delivers-sense-consumer-3d-scanner

I'd include I couple of images, but am not sure how to do it.

(6) This is probably asking more of Poser than it can deliver, but I think I would like to hafve some sort of nurbs capablity. Maybe I should ask this of Mirye shade. I like how Cinema 4D can model an airplane the way balsa wood models are built. You model the bulkheads and then add the stringers along the sides. This converts an exterior to polygons. Having this capability allows you to intuitively model things like airplanes and boats.  Given the choice, though, I'd like to see the ROPE ROOM first because I think it is easier and more in line with what people use poser for.

That's more than a mouthfull, but it is some of what I would want to use in Poser 2016.

Quote - Poser saves materials with relative paths

Do a simple test: Load a texture from your texture folder and apply it to andy. Then save that material and look at the mt5 file. It is saved as: file ":Runtime:Textures:YourTexture.jpg"

I was speaking of matwriter panel. If the material is not in the current runtime, it saves it as absolute, not relative.

Also I don't believe without the tool you can save materials from particualar surfaces... such as if i'm saving a partial material consisting of only the torso and arm for a tattoo, or copying the settings from one body part to mulitple parts.

Quote - > Quote - Poser saves materials with relative paths

Do a simple test: Load a texture from your texture folder and apply it to andy. Then save that material and look at the mt5 file. It is saved as: file ":Runtime:Textures:YourTexture.jpg"

I was speaking of matwriter panel. If the material is not in the current runtime, it saves it as absolute, not relative.

Also I don't believe without the tool you can save materials from particualar surfaces... such as if i'm saving a partial material consisting of only the torso and arm for a tattoo, or copying the settings from one body part to mulitple parts.

So not a poser problem

And yes, you can save partial materials and materials for selected body parts

3dstor, if they don't add rope room, one can use cage's free extruder script, as shown below.

http://www.renderosity.com/mod/forumpro/showthread.php?thread_id=2798819&page=13#message_3772172

No, I simply proposed another way to do it.  I said could, not should.

Many years ago, when folks were asking why doesn't DAZ produce a Genesis figure that works in Poser, a large list was produced as to why that isn't possible.  Because Poser doesn't have certain inherent abilities that DS has.  On the list were things like autoloading morphs in a folder, no way to apply geo-grafting, UV swapping, etc.  What I illustrated is that perhaps if Poser designed more to meet things on that list, but keeping its own technologies in order to do so, then perhaps DAZ would be more keen on producing a native figure to work into that.

For the record I don't feel entitled at all.  I think I made it very clear that I'm indifferent.  My work isn't figure-centric because I chose that road.  Nobody is forced to do anything, no matter how you want to coat it.

Regardless if folks want to agree with the "adopt tech" angle or not, you have to look the ramifications of doing that.  As soon as you slave to someone else's tech then you are at the mercy of their design cycles, revisions, and all of that.  You're basically left at the whims of the other company.  Is that not precisely one of the reasons why DAZ studio has its own figure tech instead of using Poser's?  I don't think that DAZ wanted to be grafted to what SM is doing for the entirety of its life.  However, DS needed to do that in the beginning, which is really where the "SM should make stuff for DS too" kind of argument falls flat.  DS had no choice during the early editions (1, 2, etc) but to use Poser tech because it wanted to compete with Poser in the market that existed at the time.  There were DAZ scene files but nobody (most, not all) really used that format, so DS just opened cr2s and so on natively.

On the fitting room, not every single teeny bit of Poser needs to be 100% geared to facilitating content made for distribution.  Perhaps it is more geared to end users.  As a vendor, however, I've found a lot of use for it.  For one, it can produce a basic clothing cr2, virtually error-free very quickly.  I'm not talking about using it to shrink-wrap, I'm saying you can use it to set up a grouped obj quickly as an alternative to the Setup room.  There are lots of clever ways to use things if you keep your mind open concerning them.

I don't have the final answer on the genesis/figure/whatever dilemma.  It's not my call to make regardless.  I have a stance outside of the equation, again, because that's my choice.  As it stands now, nobody is prevented from using DSON or using DS directly too.  There's no reason why someone can't have a mind to enjoy Poser and DS.  I'm on a one-road highway but it's completely okay if others want to walk a different path.  Maybe that doesn't work for everyone (obviously).

BTW, thank you and hornet3d  for the kudos on my utilities.  It is appreciated.  I have no problem with whether or not we see eye to eye otherwise.

"But are you a vendor, especially one that make figure products? Didn't think so, so this really isn't anything you could shed any background on. Point still stands that the vendors haven't used the fitting room to make products for multiple characters. Only thing you see are props and hair."

From what I remember of the video discussing the new features of Poser this was not SM thinking when the fitting room was developed.  It was promoted as a way for 3rd part figures to be successful as the dependance on content was reduced.  Also the investment in previous figures was not lost irrespective of if that previous figure orginnated from Daz Poser or elsewhere. 

I am less concerned with vendors using the new features as I can always convert the lighting and add SSS to whatever figure I want.  I am slightly annoyed that I still have to look in the Pose folder for materials but once again a Netherworks script takes care of that.  Each vendor must decide waht it right for them and I can decide who I support accordingly.

@Netherworks

"BTW, thank you and hornet3d  for the kudos on my utilities.  It is appreciated.  I have no problem with whether or not we see eye to eye otherwise."

No need to thank me for any Kudos, you deserve it and you are welcome.  I have a number of scripts created by you.  The Camera Plus Panel being one of my favorites but I also use the Batch Material Converter on a regular basis.  Light Dots, Render Dots and Pose Dots are all part of my Poser load up screen.  They are all small utilities but have a large impact on the way I use Poser.  It makes Poser, easier to use and a lot more fun.  It isn't until I buy and install an upgrade to Poser that a realise how much difference they make.  For example I use the Slim Parameters Panel all the time and tend to think it is part of Poser, which says a lot about the way you intergrate your utilities, making it a shock when the panel reverts after an Poser upgrade.  So the process is always update Poser then quickly add all the Netherwork Panels before I start to use Poser in any shape or form.

So I am more than happy to promote your scripts as I have found them to be useful, easy to use and value for money.

Quote - From what I remember of the video discussing the new features of Poser this was not SM thinking when the fitting room was developed.  It was promoted as a way for 3rd part figures to be successful as the dependance on content was reduced.  Also the investment in previous figures was not lost irrespective of if that previous figure orginnated from Daz Poser or elsewhere. 

I am less concerned with vendors using the new features as I can always convert the lighting and add SSS to whatever figure I want.  I am slightly annoyed that I still have to look in the Pose folder for materials but once again a Netherworks script takes care of that.  Each vendor must decide waht it right for them and I can decide who I support accordingly.

Yes, like I said, Fitting room is a feature touted under "figure independence" that content developers don't use.  It's interesting as the end user is using it more, but it's in the pro version of the software. If you look at the various stores, you'll quickly see its benefits have not been realized as content developers are still only developing for one figure and it's the same one they've been using. If SM had spoken to the content developers, they would have seen that it wasn't a feature they really wanted... they're not interested in making items for multiple figures and the general population that buys content doesn't want to spend their time converting individual pieces of content either. It's fine for those power users that like to convert items, but you're not going to get a ton of buyers with the promise they can spend their time converting items they're seeing for other figures.

The next post I have to delete gets the thread locked and warnings issued. 

~Shane

[quote

Yes, like I said, Fitting room is a feature touted under "figure independence" that content developers don't use.  It's interesting as the end user is using it more, but it's in the pro version of the software. If you look at the various stores, you'll quickly see its benefits have not been realized as content developers are still only developing for one figure and it's the same one they've been using. If SM had spoken to the content developers, they would have seen that it wasn't a feature they really wanted... they're not interested in making items for multiple figures and the general population that buys content doesn't want to spend their time converting individual pieces of content either. It's fine for those power users that like to convert items, but you're not going to get a ton of buyers with the promise they can spend their time converting items they're seeing for other figures.

Looking in the stores might be the wrong place to find if the FItting room is being used or not, it's being used because of what is NOT in the stores.  The content developers are a tiny percentage of all Poser users, not really a representative of anything except developers.

"Power users" are the only ones using it?  If so, that makes me a power user, which there can be no doubt I definitely am NOT.

I am tempted to respond to the one of the latest comments but there would be little point and I take heed of what AmbientShade has already said.  I hope it does not get locked and I will continue to monitor but for now I will move into lurk mode.

If I didn't love using Poser, I wouldn't post frustration purge posts about it. My apologies for being abrasive though.

Thanks all for your honest feedback.

Quote - > Quote - Yes, like I said, Fitting room is a feature touted under "figure independence" that content developers don't use.  It's interesting as the end user is using it more, but it's in the pro version of the software. If you look at the various stores, you'll quickly see its benefits have not been realized as content developers are still only developing for one figure and it's the same one they've been using. If SM had spoken to the content developers, they would have seen that it wasn't a feature they really wanted... they're not interested in making items for multiple figures and the general population that buys content doesn't want to spend their time converting individual pieces of content either. It's fine for those power users that like to convert items, but you're not going to get a ton of buyers with the promise they can spend their time converting items they're seeing for other figures.

Looking in the stores might be the wrong place to find if the FItting room is being used or not, it's being used because of what is NOT in the stores.  The content developers are a tiny percentage of all Poser users, not really a representative of anything except developers.

"Power users" are the only ones using it?  If so, that makes me a power user, which there can be no doubt I definitely am NOT.

But if you look at the Poser Pro 2014 product page, this is what you'll read right at the top:

Quote - New Poser Pro 2014 Only Features Productivity tools designed for Professional Poser Content Developers

Fitting Room Interactively fit clothing and props to any Poser figure and create new conforming clothing using five intelligent modes that automatically loosen, tighten, smooth and preserve soft and rigid features. Paint maps on the mesh to control the exact areas that you want to modify. Use pre-fit tools to direct the mesh around the goal figure's shapes. With a single button, generate a new conforming item using the goal figure's rig, complete with full morph transfer

So yes, it was designed by Smith Micro for content developers; so if it was useful to them, then you would see clothing for multiple figures including their own figures, which makes sense as historically they get very little support. However since you don't see products for multiple figures, it's not a feature that those developers find useful, thus my previous comments.

Quote - > Quote - > Quote - Yes, like I said, Fitting room is a feature touted under "figure independence" that content developers don't use.  It's interesting as the end user is using it more, but it's in the pro version of the software. If you look at the various stores, you'll quickly see its benefits have not been realized as content developers are still only developing for one figure and it's the same one they've been using. If SM had spoken to the content developers, they would have seen that it wasn't a feature they really wanted... they're not interested in making items for multiple figures and the general population that buys content doesn't want to spend their time converting individual pieces of content either. It's fine for those power users that like to convert items, but you're not going to get a ton of buyers with the promise they can spend their time converting items they're seeing for other figures.

Looking in the stores might be the wrong place to find if the FItting room is being used or not, it's being used because of what is NOT in the stores.  The content developers are a tiny percentage of all Poser users, not really a representative of anything except developers.

"Power users" are the only ones using it?  If so, that makes me a power user, which there can be no doubt I definitely am NOT.

But if you look at the Poser Pro 2014 product page, this is what you'll read right at the top:

Quote - New Poser Pro 2014 Only Features Productivity tools designed for Professional Poser Content Developers

Fitting Room Interactively fit clothing and props to any Poser figure and create new conforming clothing using five intelligent modes that automatically loosen, tighten, smooth and preserve soft and rigid features. Paint maps on the mesh to control the exact areas that you want to modify. Use pre-fit tools to direct the mesh around the goal figure's shapes. With a single button, generate a new conforming item using the goal figure's rig, complete with full morph transfer

So yes, it was designed by Smith Micro for content developers; so if it was useful to them, then you would see clothing for multiple figures including their own figures, which makes sense as historically they get very little support. However since you don't see products for multiple figures, it's not a feature that those developers find useful, thus my previous comments.

That could very well just be marketing. Like calling a 64 bit version "Pro". You certainly don't have to be a pro to need the additional memory just to render. Neither do you have to be a "professional content developer" to want to use the fitting room. But it's clever wording. Perhaps it feeds some people's egos to think of themselves as a "pro." Perhaps, at the same time, it makes those who buy the 32 bit version not feel as though they are getting something lesser. After all, the other version is for "pros."

In any case, you are right in observing that we're not seeing vendors offering much multi-figure support (except for texture/character sets). But that's nothing new. Perhaps there's a reluctance to use any sort of "automated" conversion utility in a commerical product where the expectation of the market is that everything be "hand crafted"? Perhaps they don't see the point of taking the extra effort to convert something for people who can buy the software themselves and do it? Perhaps not that many vendors have even bought the latest version of Poser?

I don't necessarily use the Fitting Room, but I do use and enjoy the new "Copy Morphs" Command feature regularly. Don't know if that's just in the Pro version or not though.

I do have one complaint about that feature though. And I may have to start a thread over at RDNA to address it. Some of the "Morphs" listed in the hierarchy window that pops up are not morphs at all, but scales and they don't transfer or work. It's extremely frustrasting, because I have to figure it out through trial and error what will transfer and what won't.

Quote - That could very well just be marketing. 

Yes, and from that they're marketing the feature set to Professional Content Developers. It doesn't mean other's aren't going to use it (ie Power Users that don't create content for others), but that's how the official marketing was set up.

Quote - In any case, you are right in observing that we're not seeing vendors offering much multi-figure support (except for texture/character sets). But that's nothing new. Perhaps there's a reluctance to use any sort of "automated" conversion utility in a commerical product where the expectation of the market is that everything be "hand crafted"? Perhaps they don't see the point of taking the extra effort to convert something for people who can buy the software themselves and do it? Perhaps not that many vendors have even bought the latest version of Poser?

It's not reluctance; to understand you have to figure that a vendor will spend weeks or months on something: building, textures, morphs, making sure it moves and functions properly for that figure. They're seeing the same dress or figure day after day after day after day. By the time they get to the end and ready to submit to a store, the vendor generally is tired of looking at that project and ready for something new to work on. When they use tools, they want them to increase their productivity to finish a project, not set it up do to it again. So you'll people asking for the same product for X figure and generally the vendor has moved on to something else so you almost never see a vendor make an outfit for another figure. Making a tool to help make the outfit for another figure holds no value if it's not economically feasible to do so; even if they did, they'll still have to go through another round of testing, promos, etc and run the chance of not recouping their investment  for that work if it only sells 10 copies. Vendors generally want tools to increase productivity in bringing that one project to market so offering a tool like this won't help them accomplish that goal.

Quote - > Quote - That could very well just be marketing. 

Yes, and from that they're marketing the feature set to Professional Content Developers. It doesn't mean other's aren't going to use it (ie Power Users that don't create content for others), but that's how the official marketing was set up.

 

Quote - In any case, you are right in observing that we're not seeing vendors offering much multi-figure support (except for texture/character sets). But that's nothing new. Perhaps there's a reluctance to use any sort of "automated" conversion utility in a commerical product where the expectation of the market is that everything be "hand crafted"? Perhaps they don't see the point of taking the extra effort to convert something for people who can buy the software themselves and do it? Perhaps not that many vendors have even bought the latest version of Poser?

It's not reluctance; to understand you have to figure that a vendor will spend weeks or months on something: building, textures, morphs, making sure it moves and functions properly for that figure. They're seeing the same dress or figure day after day after day after day. By the time they get to the end and ready to submit to a store, the vendor generally is tired of looking at that project and ready for something new to work on. When they use tools, they want them to increase their productivity to finish a project, not set it up do to it again. So you'll people asking for the same product for X figure and generally the vendor has moved on to something else so you almost never see a vendor make an outfit for another figure. Making a tool to help make the outfit for another figure holds no value if it's not economically feasible to do so; even if they did, they'll still have to go through another round of testing, promos, etc and run the chance of not recouping their investment  for that work if it only sells 10 copies. Vendors generally want tools to increase productivity in bringing that one project to market so offering a tool like this won't help them accomplish that goal.

What do you consider economically feasible and how do you figure it out?  I don't think most vendors do try to figure it out. They may make something for a figure (just for arguments sake say Miki 4) and they make the same outfit for another figure (Roxie). The outfit for Miki 4 sells as expected, but the one for Roxie doesn't. So the vendor assumes that  things for Roxie don't sell well. The problem with that argument is that it's almost a self fullfilling argument. People don't expect to see anything for Roxie so they're not looking. And if they're not looking they won't buy. You have to give the figure time to prove itself. Something most vendors don't really want to do.

Quote -  

What do you consider economically feasible and how do you figure it out?  I don't think most vendors do try to figure it out. They may make something for a figure (just for arguments sake say Miki 4) and they make the same outfit for another figure (Roxie). The outfit for Miki 4 sells as expected, but the one for Roxie doesn't. So the vendor assumes that  things for Roxie don't sell well. The problem with that argument is that it's almost a self fullfilling argument. People don't expect to see anything for Roxie so they're not looking. And if they're not looking they won't buy. You have to give the figure time to prove itself. Something most vendors don't really want to do.

However, that would be a decent enough gauge of interest. If a vendor is making things for a living, you can usually tell by the first or second product what the market is for a figure, since the customer is determining what they're willing to purchase. Most vendors, especially those that do content for a living, can't afford to try 3 or four times with a particular figure to see if it's popular increases if their sales are bad. But then they are also asking other vendors if they are having decent sales with a figure.

A more recent example would be Dawn; there was a lot of hype surrounding the release, but quite a few vendors lost money in that initial rush, which is why you barely see items for her now. Now it could also be the fact that the release wasn't handled properly since dumping a bunch of product out at the same time without properly spacing them out means someone one wins and some people lose in the rush for customers purchasing product; but to have support die off and have Gen 4 items dominate again pretty much means a lot more people lost than won; probably the winners in this case were the ones that made the utilities to convert v4's skin and clothing. But the customers in general dictated the demand so there must have not been many interested in the figure for one reason or another, so the vendors haven't produced much for her. Looking at the placement of the community bundle in the hot list when it released here was pretty telling as well; I went through 20+ pages and all the new releases placed way higher and I couldn't actually see where the product placed. I stopped looking when I saw clearance items placing higher than the bundle.

Quote - It's not reluctance; to understand you have to figure that a vendor will spend weeks or months on something: building, textures, morphs, making sure it moves and functions properly for that figure.

Oh, I'm not saying the reluctance isn't reasonable. It's entirely reasonable for those who actually depend on the sales to pay the bills. Or for anyone who knows their work is worth being paid for. I'm certainly not out to bash vendors. That would be silly, given how much I spent this month. :)

it would be kewl if morph brush or group tool could unweld verts.

it would be nice to not have to transmap all the time to fake a tear for flesh wound, ripped shirts.

and also, you know morphs stretch the uv texture, if poser could calculate the stretch across the material zone when needed.

Altering a mesh in such a way - unweld verts - would make all the existing morphs for that object invalid.  Unwelding would add points.

Quote - A more recent example would be Dawn; there was a lot of hype surrounding the release, but quite a few vendors lost money in that initial rush, which is why you barely see items for her now. Now it could also be the fact that the release wasn't handled properly since dumping a bunch of product out at the same time without properly spacing them out means someone one wins and some people lose in the rush for customers purchasing product

The dawn question is pretty easy to figure out, first, she's butt ugly as she comes, she came with a morph pack that barely rated the name, and too limited clothing styles available at the time she was released.  Plus, more expecnsive if you bought additional items and most people weren't going to go back into dumping large amounts of money for her after they already had for the V things. Not different enough to warrant spending the bucks.  I bought the whole package, don't have any of it left in my machines.  Not going that route again, did it once, learned.

Doric

Quote - > Quote - A more recent example would be Dawn; there was a lot of hype surrounding the release, but quite a few vendors lost money in that initial rush, which is why you barely see items for her now. Now it could also be the fact that the release wasn't handled properly since dumping a bunch of product out at the same time without properly spacing them out means someone one wins and some people lose in the rush for customers purchasing product

The dawn question is pretty easy to figure out, first, she's butt ugly as she comes, she came with a morph pack that barely rated the name, and too limited clothing styles available at the time she was released.  Plus, more expecnsive if you bought additional items and most people weren't going to go back into dumping large amounts of money for her after they already had for the V things. Not different enough to warrant spending the bucks.  I bought the whole package, don't have any of it left in my machines.  Not going that route again, did it once, learned.

Doric

I don't necessarily believe in any figure being butt ugly. Look, if you can make men look like good looking women, there's no reason you can't do the same for actual women.  For the most part most women wear make up any way. As for clothing, I seem to recall that Genesis had so few clothes when it came out that DAZ had to create autofit. That's why I do like the fitting room. I think Poser has gone autofit one better.

And both autofit and the fitting room are better than the previous solution which was to put V4's head on V3's body. But as I've said, I don't really use the fitting room because I make all my clothes now and they're all for the native poser figures.

I don't think Dawn is at all ugly. But I think this is one of those "eye of the beholder" things. No figure is universally adored. Ol' Sam used to say V4's default face looked like a bucket of "smashed crabs" or something like that. :D 

Yes, a set of high quality and versatile head and body morphs, though, should be the first thing that's released with a new figure. Ditto with a high quality selection of textures/character morphs, including darker skin and Asian. Even if she has very limited clothing -- let's face it -- a lot of users are going to be happy for quite some time rendering her nude/semi-nude. But not if they can't easily transform her the way they envision.

I've played with her. She bends very smoothly. She's dead easy to pose. I do hope that she eventually meets with real success. She has a few flaws, but I think, as a base figure, she's far, far, far superior to V4.2.

Quote - > Quote - > Quote - A more recent example would be Dawn; there was a lot of hype surrounding the release, but quite a few vendors lost money in that initial rush, which is why you barely see items for her now. Now it could also be the fact that the release wasn't handled properly since dumping a bunch of product out at the same time without properly spacing them out means someone one wins and some people lose in the rush for customers purchasing product

The dawn question is pretty easy to figure out, first, she's butt ugly as she comes, she came with a morph pack that barely rated the name, and too limited clothing styles available at the time she was released.  Plus, more expecnsive if you bought additional items and most people weren't going to go back into dumping large amounts of money for her after they already had for the V things. Not different enough to warrant spending the bucks.  I bought the whole package, don't have any of it left in my machines.  Not going that route again, did it once, learned.

Doric

I don't necessarily believe in any figure being butt ugly. Look, if you can make men look like good looking women, there's no reason you can't do the same for actual women.  For the most part most women wear make up any way. As for clothing, I seem to recall that Genesis had so few clothes when it came out that DAZ had to create autofit. That's why I do like the fitting room. I think Poser has gone autofit one better.

And both autofit and the fitting room are better than the previous solution which was to put V4's head on V3's body. But as I've said, I don't really use the fitting room because I make all my clothes now and they're all for the native poser figures.

Actually autofit was one of the features of genesis, not created afterward; and it was to smooth transition to the figure as it was a big departure. However, people still invested in the new content, which allowed content developers to continue to make stuff for it.

Additionally, when people select a new figure to use, the bottom line comes down to "can this figure do the same or more than what I have now?"

That's where a lot of the other figures fail. And I'm not speaking of "can it use stuff from my runtime already?" A figure has to stand on its own. No one happily trades in their BMW for a bicycle and have the company that made it think they should be happy with that choice because that's the only new solution. They'll stay with what they have; and that's basically what happened.

Dawn isn't butt ugly, however in it's current state, it can't be a replacement as it can't do everything V4 did, beyond bend better. I don't think just having something weightmapped is incentive for switching to a new figure; no one is just going to make renders with Dawn contorting in weird poses, they want her to vary in her appearance for use in renders. Unless you have a sculpting tool, that is hard to accomplish; so that's why the content using her morphs don't compare to what they have with the older figures.

Also fact that the figure uses a common set of base features in both programs doesn't help it innovate as well. It may be better that she become solely a poser figure since that's where most of her content is made for and Hivewire and SM work on their figure creation platform so that it's easier to create content that uses Poser features. Not much is happening on the DS side considering how V6 and her sister Olympia selling and new shapes are regularly entering the Genesis genepool such as the new guy, big ol' Gianni. ;) That's not to say DS users aren't using her but new PAs like Nikisatez aren't making it easy after her debut yesterday with all those sexy clothes and hair.

Quote -
Actually autofit was one of the features of genesis, not created afterward; and it was to smooth transition to the figure as it was a big departure. However, people still invested in the new content, which allowed content developers to continue to make stuff for it.

Additionally, when people select a new figure to use, the bottom line comes down to "can this figure do the same or more than what I have now?"

That's where a lot of the other figures fail. And I'm not speaking of "can it use stuff from my runtime already?" A figure has to stand on its own. No one happily trades in their BMW for a bicycle and have the company that made it think they should be happy with that choice because that's the only new solution. They'll stay with what they have; and that's basically what happened.

Dawn isn't butt ugly, however in it's current state, it can't be a replacement as it can't do everything V4 did, beyond bend better. I don't think just having something weightmapped is incentive for switching to a new figure; no one is just going to make renders with Dawn contorting in weird poses, they want her to vary in her appearance for use in renders. Unless you have a sculpting tool, that is hard to accomplish; so that's why the content using her morphs don't compare to what they have with the older figures.

Also fact that the figure uses a common set of base features in both programs doesn't help it innovate as well. It may be better that she become solely a poser figure since that's where most of her content is made for and Hivewire and SM work on their figure creation platform so that it's easier to create content that uses Poser features. Not much is happening on the DS side considering how V6 and her sister Olympia selling and new shapes are regularly entering the Genesis genepool such as the new guy, big ol' Gianni. ;) That's not to say DS users aren't using her but new PAs like Nikisatez aren't making it easy after her debut yesterday with all those sexy clothes and hair.

I have to agree. You do ask, "What does this figure do better than what I already have?" Absolutely. 

Also, having tried M6 and V6 in Poser -- fully clothed, the HD versions move like molasses, but they look amazing -- I can't see why a Daz user would be interested in third party figures.

Perhaps it's a matter of philosophy with Hivewire -- perhaps they want to continue the tradition of dual compatibility, even when it may not be the most perfectly efficient use of time and energy. 

I guess it's unfortunate that philosophy don't pay the bills. Naturally vendors will gravitate where they feel they can accomplish the most, whether that's sales, popularity, supporting the community, or simply feeling appreciated by their customers.

Quote - Perhaps it's a matter of philosophy with Hivewire -- perhaps they want to continue the tradition of dual compatibility, even when it may not be the most perfectly efficient use of time and energy. 

I guess it's unfortunate that philosophy don't pay the bills. Naturally vendors will gravitate where they feel they can accomplish the most, whether that's sales, popularity, supporting the community, or simply feeling appreciated by their customers.

I think it was well intentioned, however the philosophy of "Separate but Equal" has never really worked in the past. Someone always loses out as some things won't be available for purchase because of the platform they use. And if the burden of getting products to market involves vendors doing things two different ways to get the same result for two programs, for the same amount of income, they won't do it for long... especially when the programs have two different sets of features that you may or may not be able to take advantage of in their products.

Quote - > Quote - Perhaps it's a matter of philosophy with Hivewire -- perhaps they want to continue the tradition of dual compatibility, even when it may not be the most perfectly efficient use of time and energy. 

I guess it's unfortunate that philosophy don't pay the bills. Naturally vendors will gravitate where they feel they can accomplish the most, whether that's sales, popularity, supporting the community, or simply feeling appreciated by their customers.

I think it was well intentioned, however the philosophy of "Separate but Equal" has never really worked in the past. Someone always loses out as some things won't be available for purchase because of the platform they use. And if the burden of getting products to market involves vendors doing things two different ways to get the same result for two programs, for the same amount of income, they won't do it for long... especially when the programs have two different sets of features that you may or may not be able to take advantage of in their products.

Well, I believe Hivewire's offering a conversion service which does take some of the burden off vendors. And as development on Dawn continues, truth is, she may lure enough trait-, uhm, DS converts back to Poser to make the whole thing worthwile for Hivewire.

Quote - > Quote - > Quote - Perhaps it's a matter of philosophy with Hivewire -- perhaps they want to continue the tradition of dual compatibility, even when it may not be the most perfectly efficient use of time and energy. 

I guess it's unfortunate that philosophy don't pay the bills. Naturally vendors will gravitate where they feel they can accomplish the most, whether that's sales, popularity, supporting the community, or simply feeling appreciated by their customers.

I think it was well intentioned, however the philosophy of "Separate but Equal" has never really worked in the past. Someone always loses out as some things won't be available for purchase because of the platform they use. And if the burden of getting products to market involves vendors doing things two different ways to get the same result for two programs, for the same amount of income, they won't do it for long... especially when the programs have two different sets of features that you may or may not be able to take advantage of in their products.

Well, I believe Hivewire's offering a conversion service which does take some of the burden off vendors. And as development on Dawn continues, truth is, she may lure enough trait-, uhm, DS converts back to Poser to make the whole thing worthwile for Hivewire.

Now, now, what did TinaK saw about the personal comments? ;) Vendors pay bills with sales, not philosophy.

But I do find it interesting that even though the service has been in place for a while, no one takes them up on their offer.

Quote - > Quote - > Quote - > Quote - Perhaps it's a matter of philosophy with Hivewire -- perhaps they want to continue the tradition of dual compatibility, even when it may not be the most perfectly efficient use of time and energy. 

I guess it's unfortunate that philosophy don't pay the bills. Naturally vendors will gravitate where they feel they can accomplish the most, whether that's sales, popularity, supporting the community, or simply feeling appreciated by their customers.

I think it was well intentioned, however the philosophy of "Separate but Equal" has never really worked in the past. Someone always loses out as some things won't be available for purchase because of the platform they use. And if the burden of getting products to market involves vendors doing things two different ways to get the same result for two programs, for the same amount of income, they won't do it for long... especially when the programs have two different sets of features that you may or may not be able to take advantage of in their products.

Well, I believe Hivewire's offering a conversion service which does take some of the burden off vendors. And as development on Dawn continues, truth is, she may lure enough trait-, uhm, DS converts back to Poser to make the whole thing worthwile for Hivewire.

Now, now, what did TinaK saw about the personal comments? ;) Vendors pay bills with sales, not philosophy.

Who me?

Quote - > Quote - Hopefully the new version can default to relative pathnames when saving rather than absolute; I had to pull out one of Dimension3D's utilities to change the paths in a lot of files because it was writing absolute pathnames when I was saving because the runtime existed in a different runtime which was necessary for my products when they're sharing the texture files for different programs

Sorry, I missed this.  How far back are we going in regards to the version of MATWriter?

I do know that in MWP 2014 it works fine.  The only time you'd get absolute paths would be if you used a non-runtime structure (i.e. texture is in C:Downloads).  I just loaded a texture from a different runtime and saved to an entirely new runtime and all was fine.  The 2012 version should be good too.  Further back than that, entirely possible (though not intended, of course).  We all get better as skill gets better.

Quote - Sorry, I missed this.  How far back are we going in regards to the version of MATWriter?

I do know that in MWP 2014 it works fine.  The only time you'd get absolute paths would be if you used a non-runtime structure (i.e. texture is in C:Downloads).  I just loaded a texture from a different runtime and saved to an entirely new runtime and all was fine.  The 2012 version should be good too.  Further back than that, entirely possible (though not intended, of course).  We all get better as skill gets better.

It's the 2012 version that does this.

If that's the case then the fault was with the version of Poser used or a combination of something that caused an absolute path to be written.  To write a MAT, it piggy-backs an MC6.

Edit: Does not happen in 2014.  I had explicitly had to write something to do it in the current version because it happens when image maps are swapped out (not in Poser, per se, but via python).  If I had known at the time, it would have been fixed in the previous version but I never experienced that by the way that my content is organized.  Need to know to fix it ;)

remember Kez?  wmapped for poser and everything.

Quote - remember Kez?  wmapped for poser and everything.

Yes. I do. She and Dawn live together in the same runtime. :)

for a long time i wondered what the big difference was tween poser wm and ds wm.  so it looks like the triax wmapping is a wm for each rotation axis.

lucky there's only 3 axis-eez.

if your point is traveling in time though, would prolly need a couple more axiseez

Quote - remember Kez?  wmapped for poser and everything.

Don't forget Koz.

Quote - > Quote - remember Kez?  wmapped for poser and everything.

Don't forget Koz.

Belongs in the "most used freebies ever" thread. :)

Everything this first post states - YES, yes, and YES!

I don't know how many NEW buyers they might attract with whatever to retain existing Buyers they need to ditch the DLM thing and the guy that set it up along with the deactivation non feature I'm pissed my pro app plugins are in effect vaporware and will not be a purchase

While a agree with you that the deactivation needs to go, Jim, I find the DLM works very well to get the latest version downloaded and installed...

WandW posted at 10:24AM Mon, 07 September 2015 - #4226880

While a agree with you that the deactivation needs to go, Jim, I find the DLM works very well to get the latest version downloaded and installed...that's your anecdote