I said this earlier today n another thread, but here it is again... I think photorealism is the Holy grail in CG art, but it has never been my goal. For the most part, I've always shied away from it.

So what is your goal with Poser art? Comics, CG, or photo realistic? And why?

I've never tried to get too comic-like in my art either. It always seemed to be as out of my reach as the Photo-realistic stuff. I originally got into using Poser for storyboarding purposes. That's what my Android and Cricket comics have been about.

It's late, I'm tired, but here we go...I've always felt "realism" is too limited to be, well, realistic. Realism is the surface. What is beneath the surface is what is important. Too much concentration on surface misses the point

Think of quantum mechanics. ..the reality that lies beneath reality..

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I tried that out when I first started, gave up when I realized the limitations of the software and my inability coupled with lack of interest in buying something expensive that could achieve it with a lot of work and know how that I didn't then or even now possess..

If I had a nickle for ever time a woman told me to get lost, I could buy Manhattan.

It impressed me at first, and still does, but personally I prefer the painted and comic styles, preferably a blend of the two.

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What Paul said.

Depends on what I'm doing tho really. But for the most part if I want realism, I have a pretty nice canon dslr. For this kind of work, I mostly prefer the painterly look.

I am always impressed when I see a render and have to look hard to see if it is a photo or a render but it is never my aim. With renders involving people it is very difficult to get realism without it looking somewhat freakish or un-nerving.

I came to 3D from photography, a hobby I still enjoy (although maybe not as much as I no longer finish up in a dark room with trays of smelly chemicals) so perhaps that has a bearing. In 3D I don't see much point in trying to create and field, building or person that I can capture with my camera. Much of my 'art' is based in Sci-Fi or fantasy and so the aim is to try and make the image believeable without being scary, unless I am aiming to scare a little.

I can't see I will ever have time to learn the skills needed, or the inclination to start producing photo realistic renders.

I use Poser 13 on Windows 11 - For Scene set up I use a Geekcom A5 - Ryzen 9 5900HX, with 64 gig ram and 3 TB storage, mini PC with final rendering done on normal sized desktop using an AMD Ryzen Threadipper 1950X CPU, Corsair Hydro H100i CPU cooler, 3XS EVGA GTX 1080i SC with 11g Ram, 4 X 16gig Corsair DDR4 Ram and a Corsair RM 100 PSU . The desktop is in a remote location with rendering done via Queue Manager which gives me a clearer desktop and quieter computer room.

As a visual artist, graphic designer and for a lot of years a freelance illustrator, yes I go for photo realism. Why? Because if I want Tinkerbell fairies at the bottom of the garden type images I can do those with pencil and watercolour much better than I can do it in Poser and Photoshop. Poser can give me images that I cannot do any other way, and comic style is NOT one of those...

No. Art, whether manual or digital, shouldn't be wasting its effort on photorealism. Cameras do that job.

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> Quote - No. Art, whether manual or digital, shouldn't be wasting its effort on photorealism. Cameras do that job.

Well now, I wouldn't go that far. This girl for example, at only 18 can draw photo real images.

This image is a drawing. And to prove it, here's her time-lapse:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4U4sANp1-f8#t=20

Many words can describe this kind of talent, but waste definitely is not one of them.

Absolutely amazing.

Here are some more of her drawings:

http://randommization.com/2011/10/11/young-artist-makes-incredibly-life-like-celebrity-sketches-awesome/

The cool part of CG is you can (theoreticly at least) have "photos" of things you can't take real pictures of. Having a CG "photo" -a photo real render- of a fairy in your garden or a dragon fighting a shaceship is more doable than it is with a camera.

That being said, I don't always strive for that. Sometimes I try but mostly I go for simply fairly realistic. Well, as realistic as elves and dragons and intergalactic spaceships can be.

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Quote - ...Well, as realistic as elves and dragons and intergalactic spaceships can be.

And let's not forget my personal favorite: the superhero. Can't fly in real life, but sure can in CG...

If I had a nickle for ever time a woman told me to get lost, I could buy Manhattan.

Yes, I'd like to be as photoreal as I can get. The renderstyle and the models have to look completly real.

As far as I know myself, once I've reached that goal, I might go for more comic book style renders.

my primary focus is the illusion of z-depth.

usually, the lighting shadow and camera framing more important than the subject.

the grail, capturing the nuance of expression, human or non-human. topical for both renders and photography.

Photography takes as much talent as technical skill.

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"
This image is a drawing. And to prove it, here's her time-lapse:"

To be honest I don't actually need to see the time-lapse
the crown on her head is clearly a drawing
, but she is very talented nevertheless!!

As the the O.P.'s Question: IMHO "photorealism" is only useful for Architectual visualization and Visual effects in Movies.

I tend to prefer the painterly look for my personal renders
but it is nice to have a good ,fast GI engine (Vray etc) when the task Calls for one

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When I first got into 3D there didn't really seem to be any sort of race for realism. Then I started seeing software get Radiosity-equipped renderers, started drooling, and that in turn got me a bit fanatical about wanting to create something so real it would be indistinguishable from reality (what a tit).

I messed around a few years, gained some pretty decent skills at "realism" but gained practically nothing from an artistic point of view (and that annoys me, big-time). Realism in CG bores me now, but in traditional art it always impresses me. The girl who drew that image posted above gets way more respect from me than any realism brought about by a renderer.

I think you're only ever in complete control of your art when you can do stuff like that and not have to rely on feature X being made available in your favourite 3D program. Pretty much like the conversation RorrKonn and I had back in that other thread about statuesque women. She doesn't have to worry about software upgrades, manipulative OS developers, program and file compatibility or anything else.

The only thing she has to concern herself with is sharpening her pencil now and then.

So in a nutshell, me presonally, I've lost all interest in CG realism because it seems to suck-up my time just to achieve something that is best done with a camera anyway. It felt like there there was a challenge in the early days, and it was fun to have at it and see what could be dragged out of a renderer, but now, in the days of Octane and it's instant realism, what is there to do?

What is going to seperate the men from the boys in the image stakes?

I think the only thing that remains is true artisticness, because now that anyone can render a realistic image in seconds, there is nothing but artistic flair and individuality that will distinguish one artist from another.

These days I'm more interested in real cameras and cinematics, and to be able to pick up a pencil and do realism when it comes to art. Things are too difficult for me to pursue any of those things right now, but I look forward to doing so in the future.

What's absolutely certain is that CG realism couldn't possibly be of any less interest to me than it is right now. Been there, done that, wasted a lot of my life playing with it and to be honest I regret most of it. I regret most of it because all the time I spent on it would have been better spent learning to use a real pencil properly. I can use a pencil but I'd be aheck of a lot better by now if I'd spent those "CG Years" improving my relatively poor pencil craft.

That does not mean I've gone off CG. CG is every bit as useful as it's always been and always will be, but if I were to use it on a project it would be strictly for artistic purpose or a form of utility, not any attempt at realism.

Surrealism - yes.
Realism - no.

Here's a little test for everyone then. I downloaded the following photo after visiting both CGI AND real photo websites. I just chose the one. Which site did it come from? Real or Photoreal?

You know this thread subject reminds me of something I was ruminating about to myself a few days ago

This is just my opinion but I think the way human eye sight processes
Data is in a decidedly analog& 2D Fashion thus the human brain is programmed to receive analog images.

Similar to Pumeco's experience I was once a render engine junkie
but now as incredible as it may sound I think imaging technology in general
is now EXCEEDING the human brains actual needs for image data.

Have you ever seen one of those "cutting edge"
4K TV's playing a big VFX movie like "transformers" in 3D??
perhaps its just me but I found the effect jarring and a distraction
and too "clean"

But getting back to our renderings
one of the things that do not look right in CG is when things are too
Perfect this is why a modeling program has an edge bevel.

I find it ironic that a companies like weta digital , ILM etc, have developed such amazing technology that allows us to by pass film altogether
while seamlessly inserting those digital characters ,

only to have the guys in post production
"Dirty up" the final shot up by adding Digital "Film Grain" to simulate
Classic Analog film stock to make it look more "real".

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"Here's a little test for everyone then. I downloaded the following photo after visiting both CGI AND real photo websites. I just chose the one. Which site did it come from? Real or Photoreal?"

Not to be dismissive honestly, but in today's world , does it matter??
what if the technician use actual photos of morgan freeman or a similar
skin type and just UV mapped it onto a well modeled head mesh.
and used Mental Ray ,Vray ,IBL, Maya Blah Blah Blah...

..at which point he should have just contacted Mr Freeman's Publicist
an like gotten a Free headshot of the actual Man.

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**
@Clarkie**
Well, I suppose I could visit the link shown on the image and find out the answer by cheating, but I'll play fair.

Hmmm, tricky, there's something about the hair that looks seperate in luminance from the rest of it, so for that reason (and that reason alone) I suspect it might be CG. That said, I see stuff that are real photographs and it has that same effect, and there's nothing to say that if it's a photo, that the levels weren't tweaked in some way.

This is the hardest one I've come across so I think that by default I'd say it was a photo because that can only be an extremely deserved compliment if it turns out not to be. I hope I'm wrong because I've never been wrong yet on these things (and I've been waiting years hoping to be wrong). If that's a render then it's far and away the most convincing CG human I've ever seen, totally incredible!

So my opinion: it's either a photo with tweaked levels or it's absolutley the best I've ever seen in CG

@Wolf
Yup, that perfect, too clean stuff isn't very nice unless it's something specifically suited to it. Cameras are already way above what I want from resolution. No matter what camera I've had I always find myself mashing it up, doing my best to give it that analogue feel (I really enjoy doing that though, it's one of my favourite passtimes - lol).

The Hag movie I'm going to be watching tonight was shot at 15FPS using a resolution of 320x240, and I'm guessing if anything, it'll just add to the enjoyment of it - make it more sort of raw.

Quote - "Here's a little test for everyone then. I downloaded the following photo after visiting both CGI AND real photo websites. I just chose the one. Which site did it come from? Real or Photoreal?"

Not to be dismissive honestly, but in today's world , does it matter??
what if the technician use actual photos of morgan freeman or a similar
skin type and just UV mapped it onto a well modeled head mesh.
and used Mental Ray ,Vray ,IBL, Maya Blah Blah Blah...

..at which point he should have just contacted Mr Freeman's Publicist
an like gotten a Free headshot of the actual Man.

Well, as I said earlier, for me the whole point of doing Photorealism is the actual challenge to do it and do it convincingly. Otherwise, as someone else points out, you may as well just use a camera.

Yes I'll just get on the phone and call my buddy Morgan Freeman and tell him to come over here for a beer and let me photograph him.

snort

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Also, it shouldn't be that difficult to have a group of people in spacesuits equipped with energy weapons fighting off that cyborg dinosaur stand still just for a moment so I can ge the focus right on the camera.

Clarkie, but there is no challenge now, especially if that image you posted turns out to be a render, because in that case it only goes to prove the point further. It's as photo-real as it gets so how can there be a challenge left?

There is no challenge for "artistic" licence because it is without limit. The challenge of photo-realism could have been met, so even if you could click your fingers and magically render something as realistic as that, what did you achieve that has not already been achieved?

Nothing, cause someone already beat you to it with something that was already completely convincing. You can't get more convinging than 'completely convincing' so people would say wow, well done, but while you created a totally convincing render, so have others already. I suppose it's a challenge for your skills, but in the end all you'd end up with is photorealism, something we get in an instant using our eyes and cameras.

Render or not, it's a picture of Morgan Freeman so it's "artistic" value is whatever value is put upon a photo of Morgan Freeman.

We know when photorealism has been achieved because we have true reality to campare it to. That's where artisticness and none photographic stuff differs. Artistic stuff is entirely a result of an individuals imagination. If that's a render though, it's not the result of the creators artistic imagination. It's a demonstration of the skill of the person that recreated it in CG and rendered it. If Morgan turns out to be a render it is totally incredible, but considering the realm of non-photoreal art is infinite, what is left unturned in the race for photorealism?

Baggins' wisecrack makes at least some sense because to me the only point in this photorealism lark is where the use of a human is needed but not practical. But your own question is kinda dumb, Clarkie. If you already know you want it to develop your skills, what's the point of the question?

:-D

If that's what you really want, go develop those skills man, and when you get there, don't forget to cringe when you relise it's "individuality" and "artistic licence" that counts, not skill. I suppose there needs to be a basic amount of skill to get by in your tool of choice, but no great art, no animation, no movie was ever dismissed on the grounds of it's lack of technical slickness - providing it was good enough where it actually matters.

I greatly prefer photorealism to the other styles. I'm not there yet and like the challenge of it.

Quote - Clarkie, but there is no challenge now, especially if that image you posted turns out to be a render, because in that case it only goes to prove the point further. It's as photo-real as it gets so how can there be a challenge left?

There's no rule that says you have to guess, P. It's just a little guessing game. No harder than the one you play with SM when you find a bug, then demand they read your mind to determine where it is and what it looks like instead of just filing a report like normal people.

But the challenge isn't about whether or not photo realism is attainable. I think it is. The challenge, at least for me, is whether or not I can do it... on purpose. Meaning that it's a repeatable occurrence.

Snapping a portrait shot of Morgan Freeman may not be likely, but it is in the realm of possiblity. Snapping a shot of two spacemen in suits firing ray guns probably isn't going to happen any time this year so I don't know how "realistic" that's gonna be.

I fail to see the analogy between that and how I choose to deal with SM.

I have nothing against filing a bug report with any company that has a fair system in place. I've done it with DAZ numerous times and have no reason to stop. I also do it for numerous audio products I'm on alpha and beta teams for. Like I pointed out before, I'm not SM's dogsbody, you either stand for jumping through loops with systems like theirs or you don't. I'm just one that doesn't. I like Poser the product, and I appreciate the effort the developers put in, I just don't like SM the distributor, the way they handle things.

I'm entitled not to like something Clarkie, seriously, just forget about it, I already had!
What an odd thing to bring up :mellow:

You sounded like you posted to get us to guess at whether the image was real or not so I just gave my opinion; that it's either a photo with tweaked levels or it's the best CG human I've ever seen. I was perfectly polite so I'm buggered if know where the SM comment came from :-D

Anyway, so is it a render? Has the Holy Grail been met? ... or can we expect Clarkie to step into those shoes in the not so distant future once he's perfected his skills?

It's surely cool to have that level of skill and I bloody wish I had it, but even so, all I'm saying is that personally, I don't think it's something that would make you as happy as you would be with "super-artistic" talents - sort of like a signature look that can only be attributed to you. That's what counts these days Clarkie, because as time goes on and technology gets smarter and smarter, those people out there with no talent whatsoever can come along and still make you look like an amateur unless you have your own "thing".

Be honest, if you could bring one one of the famous painters back to life and show them a "painting" you did autoimatically in Corel Painter, wouldn't you feel a fraud if he shook your hand vigerously in appreciation for what you'd done?

Of course you would, and the situation is no different when you compare these masterpieces of realism with a pencil drawing. No matter how good that photo/render is, the girl with the pencil will always have the most respect because her's is a direct skill, not a passive one where a computer did the math.

The classical artists are famous because they were either good at what they did or they had a signature style that is theirs, so ask yourself, or maybe make yourself aware of how hard it is to use a product like Poser and have a signature style which, if a person looked at the render, they would say, ah yes, that's definitely a Clarkie that is, I can tell by the way he did this and did that and whatever else.

That sort of thing is missing in the vast majority of CG art, and the smarter technology gets, the harder it gets to shake it off. Photorealism in a render is even worse, because not only are you using identical creation methods, you're also intentionally aiming to 'mimic' something perfectly by using them.

If that image was a render and you were responsible for creating it, you'd rightfully be euphoric about it (and so would I). But then what? You can't do better than you already have, you achieved perfection and a massive thumbs up to you for that, but what are you going to do with it? Did you get any practice in getting "art" to flow from your imagination all those years you were surgically analysing a photo to recreate something that already exists?

Will you sell it as art? - Photographers already do that.
Bloody hell, I have got to shorten my posts.

I can't stand it anymore. The image is neither a render nor a photo. So whichever side of that position/reaction you were on, you missed.

IMO it is craft (admirable, and beautifully done with great skill), but not art. (I would not hang it on my wall. I would not pay to go see it.)

Nevertheless, I enjoyed seeing it more than just about anything in the gallery here. I enjoyed watching it being made even more.

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I'm going to pick up on two things said so far;

it's a challenge. My earlier comment on fairies was that is 'easier for me'. Poser realism is my present challenge.

BB's comment that it is craft, not art. True to a point. Craft is the knowledge base needed to create art. The more you understand your medium, the less you are constrained by it, and the more you can realise your visions. Back to the challenge... I have so much more to learn in this medium. I know paint pretty well.

The art/craft debate is a pretty endless one, but the example I use is to look at the early modernist/abstract painters' work books. They all had good drafting skills, good compositional skills. They could do 'lifelike'. So when they did abstract, it was because they CHOSE to use that approach, rather than because it was all they could do. They knew their craft, and applied it to create their own visions.

You are right Wolf - I didn't pay a lot of attention to the crown when I posted the image. There are better examples of her work on the site link. I was just drawn to that image as an example as I love the GaGa (and all her ArtPop) and the time-lapse youtube vid matched.

But the point is there are a handful of artists in the world that can draw and paint photo real, or so close to it that one really has to look for the flaws that give it away.

It's also interesting that many of these artists with such unique talents are often autistic to some degree. Some to a very severe degree that cripples them from functioning normally in most other ways. But that's a different subject.

I disagree that craft is not art. Any form of craft that a person has a passion for or drive to develop is art, from cooking to writing to playing a violin. We place different labels on them to help us define the medium, like author or poet or musician or chef or carpenter, but in the end it is all art.

it's a photo of Morgan Freeman tweaked in a photoshop .

my turn

Who drew it ?

Who collored it ?

============================================================

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Even if you never know their name ,your know their Art.
Dark Sphere Mage Vengeance

dang ,it's who drew it and how did they draw it ?

============================================================

The Artist that will fight for decades to conquer their media.
Even if you never know their name ,your know their Art.
Dark Sphere Mage Vengeance

Attached Link: http://www.kylelambert.co.uk/gallery/morgan-freeman/

Anyway, for those who are still wondering, the Morgan Freeman pic is not a render, but a digital finger painting done by Kyle Lambert of the UK on his IPad.

"Can't stand it anymore."*

Seriously, Baggins, are you talking/referring to me?

Would you like me to roll out the red carpet for your greatness right now or do you have more pressing business?

"Here's a little test for everyone then. I downloaded the following photo after visiting both CGI AND real photo websites. I just chose the one. Which site did it come from? Real or Photoreal?"

If it's neither a render or a photo, what is it then?

That's the question I was replying to. It's not like I'm going to go searching for it when I thought we were supposed to be guessing whether it was a photo or a render. I guessed that it's a photo and said so, but your comment makes it sound as if that's a dumb conclusion cause you already know what it is.

Good for you, only I don't know what it is, where it exists, haven't checked, and had no intention of checking when we were supposed to be guessing!

Can't stand it anymore?
Poser Dude, believe me, you're ain't the only one!

:-D

**
@Clarkie**
So it's not real either way then, and kinda pointless in asking the way you did :sneaky:

Technically it's still cheating and the artist still doesn't get the respect the girl with the pencil does. It's still incredible work, but it's not as hard to work with painting apps as it is to work with real media.

The biggest bummer of all is that the masterpiece is totally worthless because no 'original' exists and never will. That's what you get when you cheat. Put in the effort and work with real 'tangible' products and you get a real 'tangible' and sellable product out of it. If that were real media it would be worth quite a bit of money, but being digital, it's absolutely worthless unless you're doing it on comission or stuff like that.

So anyway, as you've jumped from 3D to 2D all of a sudden, I'd say things are looking up for you as an artist - wise choice. The only thing you need to decide now is whether wasting your time on a digital device would as wise as doing it in real media.

You shouldn't need to ask that one though

Quote - Anyway, for those who are still wondering, the Morgan Freeman pic is not a render, but a digital finger painting done by Kyle Lambert of the UK on his IPad.

By definition it's still a render. Very good work tho.

seriously ,no one knows who drew the Girl ?
That's just sad ,sniff sniff

============================================================

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Even if you never know their name ,your know their Art.
Dark Sphere Mage Vengeance

The following is taken from Kyle Lambert's Info page at his website about the Morgan Freeman painting...

"The world's most realistic finger-painting.

I recently discovered that it was possible to create incredibly high resolution (4k) paintings using only my iPad, and I wanted to see just how far I could push digital artwork and paint a true photorealistic portrait.

I started with a blank white screen and began capturing Morgan Freeman’s likeness, quickly painting the broad strokes with my finger. I then reduced the brush size to a few pixels, pinched to zoom and carefully painted in the fine detail.

Finger painting in the extreme

The finished painting is made up of around 285,000 brush strokes and took more than 200 hours to complete. The entire process was captured as a time-lapse video by Procreate, allowing you to watch over 200 hours of painting in just 3 minutes.

Inspiration

One of the big reasons I decided to do this painting was to inspire other budding artists to embrace digital art. A friend of mine who is a school teacher explained to me recently that whenever he plays one of my painting videos in class, his students become noticeably more engaged and excited about creating art. The idea that more people are engaging in art because of something that I have created is amazing to me."

Quote - #### Inspiration

One of the big reasons I decided to do this painting was to inspire other budding artists to embrace digital art. A friend of mine who is a school teacher explained to me recently that whenever he plays one of my painting videos in class, his students become noticeably more engaged and excited about creating art. The idea that more people are engaging in art because of something that I have created is amazing to me."

That's a good thing. :)

Hobbit's realistic CGI was helpful to the video.Smaug's killer.
The movie made millions.

Pablo Picasso about as far as ya can get from realism.
Pablo's stuff is extremely expensive.

Most will do what they do to make $$$

I think most would do realistic if they could
but for DAZ Poser Hobbyist.200 hours on one render ,That's a lot of time.
Post 2D app's would be helpful also but not every one uses them.

Even for Pro's realistic is a reach.
200 hours on one face , who has that amount of time ?
And I like the black and white drawings but realistic is a lot harder to do in color.

In the end with any medium realistic is a matter of time.
but
Time is $$$.

============================================================

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Even if you never know their name ,your know their Art.
Dark Sphere Mage Vengeance

**
@RorrKonn**
Don't know who drew the girl but she's a babe, she looks great!

I don't agree that inspiring people to use digital art is good thing, though. I think people need to be brought back down to earth and realise that 'tangible' is the way to go. Create in digital and there will never be an original, but create in traditional media and you automatically have an original, and from that original, you can have as many digital copies and prints as you like.

But anyway, that's sort of OT.

Great artist, but if it's one of those 'praise for the digital age' things - I won't be listening.

"Also, it shouldn't be that difficult to have a group of people in spacesuits equipped with energy weapons fighting off that cyborg dinosaur stand still just for a moment so I can ge the focus right on the camera."

Point taken but as I said earlier in the thread, photorealism or photographic simulation has very valid purposes.
such a visualization of a 90 million dollar
office complex that has yet to be built
or when need you an older gentleman like morgan freeman's head tracked onto a stunt players body like the Ian McDiarmid's was in revenge of the sith
or an amazing film like Benjamin Button
or even( finally!!) a proper big screen realization of a comic book character like the "Hulk"

But I can tell you as a person who has
in his tool set:
Maxwell Render from Nextlimit
Vray for C4D by Chaos group
Kray For Lightwave
as well as the native renderers for both Lightwave and C4D,

that Photorealism for its own sake gets very boring very quickly IMHO,
unless you have an artistic reason to emulate actual photography,

And no offense to poser merchants
as they produce content made for posers firefly
and standard poser lighting
but truth of the matter is ,that by my estimate,
90% of the content released for poser today
doe NOT even come close to looking "photorealistic" when placed in the unforgiving clarity of a modern GI engine Like Vray or maxwell...especially skin textures.

My website

YouTube Channel

"Quote - "Anyway, for those who are still wondering, the Morgan Freeman pic is not a render, but a digital finger painting done by Kyle Lambert of the UK on his IPad."

Excellent work indeed!!!

but waaay off the topic of : "Is Photorealism your goal in Poser?"

My website

YouTube Channel

Luis Royo drew the girl.

Luis Royo & Boris Vallejo are worth a google .

don't know if there photo realistic but I know they're cool

============================================================

The Artist that will fight for decades to conquer their media.
Even if you never know their name ,your know their Art.
Dark Sphere Mage Vengeance

Quote - it's a photo of Morgan Freeman tweaked in a photoshop .

my turn

Who drew it ?

Who collored it ?

luis royo

late again

(my 1st tat was one of his works, my 2nd will be one of myne)

Since EClark1894 was being tricky ,I was too ;)

It's a Royo's drawing but I converted it to black and white and repainted it.

The one on the left is 100% Royo's

============================================================

The Artist that will fight for decades to conquer their media.
Even if you never know their name ,your know their Art.
Dark Sphere Mage Vengeance

I wouldn't have known it was one of his anyway, so for me, the sneakiness didn't exist.

Ya average Artist Art looks like average Artist Art because theres no certain style to them.
10 diffrent Artist Art will look a like.
You wount be able to tell who made the Art with out looking at the name.
but
The best Artist will always have a undeniable style to them.
So ya never half to look at the name ,ya know whos Art it is buy just looking at the Art.

============================================================

The Artist that will fight for decades to conquer their media.
Even if you never know their name ,your know their Art.
Dark Sphere Mage Vengeance

Absolutely true and I agree, but I'm kinda weird like that.

It's surely the holy grail for an artist to have a stlye identity, and Royo does I suppose, but to me I saw a nice drawing of a girl, not a nice peice of work by Royo. In other words, I see 'girl' not 'Royo'. Like if I had to decide between an art book of Girls and an art book or Royo, I'd choose the art book of Girls even though girls is what Royo does.

Just as with music, I tend to latch onto something I like, but not the creator of it. I can listen to to Blues, Jazz, whatever, yet recently I've even found myself listening to some Brutal Death Metal!

Other than almost blowing the cones from my speakers, the contrast was surprisingly likeable :biggrin:

Before the invention of photography, artists had a whole bag of tricks to make objects and materials look realistic. With the invention of photography in the 19th century that whole bag became obsolete because there was a easier way to achieve realism. So realism wasn't any longer a goal for artists.

It's no surprise that around the same time when the first photo's appeared, impressionisme as a painting style occured, which was a predecessor for all the modern styles like cubism, abstract and so on. Artists had to find other goals to impress people (and their customers.) Still there were painters who tried to achieve realism, but that became a style on it's own, together with it's branches like magic realism and surrealism (salvador dali).

The urge for (photo) realism in CGI isn't probably caused by artistic reasons, but commercial ones: advertising and to cut the costs of special effects. In advertising you can show a product before it's made or built. And the results in movies today are astonishing. (when was the last time disney made a hand-drawn movie?)

But to stay on topic, the question was: is my goal photorealism in poser? My answer is no, I want to tell a story with my pictures and it does't have to look absolutely perfect as long the story is clear. But I will always try to make it as realistic as possible.

best regards,

Bopper.

-How can you improve things when you don't make mistakes?

I'll offer my two cents. My goal in Poser is not photorealism. It's believability.

However, I believe the goal of producing photorealistic images in Poser specifically is still an important goal because it challenges us and the software creators in a way that improves the software's (and our own) ability to produce that very "believability" that I (and most of us, from the looks of it) are after.

As an example, if people such as Bagginsbill were not constantly pushing the realism envelope, we'd still be using P4 materials. And, great as P4 was when it first appeared, our standards have changed to the benefit of everyone who uses the software, whether for toons, painterly illustration, or photorealism.

Edit: I find that the more photorealistic my test renders become, the easier it is for me to create illustration styled renders because my options have been widened.

Looking at drawings Picaso did as an adolescent, you can see that he was wholly capable of creating very realistic images, if he chose to. But in the age of color photography, he didn't see the point beyond honing his own skills. I agree. For users, it's a very good exercise to strive for photorealism. It sharpens your skills. But it doesn't have to be an overriding goal. However, I'm thankful that it is the main point for some people, as they are the driving force behind continued technological improvement.

PoserPro 2014, PS CS5.5 Ext, Nikon D300. Win 8, i7-4770 @ 3.4 GHz, AMD Radeon 8570, 12 GB RAM.

If I like a song then I like it what ever genre it is :)

Luis Royo ,Boris Vallejo ,Paolo Eleuteri Serpieri ,Olivia De Berardinis ,Victoria Frances.

All have girls and all have a certain style.
All have some kind of book ,calanders ,cards ,something.
Paolo has comics think ya would like.

Still Art I tend to like most is.
1 Has to reach me somehow ,Has to provoke an emotion.
2 Is 100% awesome.
3 Undeniable Style.
4 I want more then just a photo or picture.I want Killer.

Boris Vallejo.
Ya could never copy He's Art with a photo.
He goes beyond realistic.

============================================================

The Artist that will fight for decades to conquer their media.
Even if you never know their name ,your know their Art.
Dark Sphere Mage Vengeance

I enjoy stylized art and surrealism. Like toons too - suppose that might be obvious. Photorealism is not my personal goal but I think it's a fine one to go after, if that's what you are looking for.

.

I'd like to be able to do a photorealistic render whenever I wanted to, but it's not my goal in Poser.

I have never looked at it from the point of view that those aiming for photorealistic are pushing the envelope for the rest of us but clearly that is true. I love Sub Surface Scattering and use it all the time, as it makes my characters more believable, yet I guess the introduction was another step towards the aim of producing photorealistic renders.

Photorealistic is not my aim but a glad it is the aim for others.

I use Poser 13 on Windows 11 - For Scene set up I use a Geekcom A5 - Ryzen 9 5900HX, with 64 gig ram and 3 TB storage, mini PC with final rendering done on normal sized desktop using an AMD Ryzen Threadipper 1950X CPU, Corsair Hydro H100i CPU cooler, 3XS EVGA GTX 1080i SC with 11g Ram, 4 X 16gig Corsair DDR4 Ram and a Corsair RM 100 PSU . The desktop is in a remote location with rendering done via Queue Manager which gives me a clearer desktop and quieter computer room.

**
@All**
Just to be clear, I'm not knocking anyone who strives for photorealism or even helps others to strive for it. And yes indeed, it can and does help improve your skills and understanding of things.

For example, until I read about Radiosity renderers I don't recall I even considered the facts about indirect light. That's something so major yet it's something I didn't really absorb until I got curious with it through 3D and rendering.

All I'm saying is that I see photorealism in 3D more as a skill, not art. I'm a big fan of Gothic art, and other than real photographs taken by talented photographers, there's no Gothic images out there that appeal to me as 'art" that are photrealistic, if they don't have at least some sort of artisticness to them. It's always the drawings and paintings that are art. If it looks real, it just feels like the everyday norm to me, boring, and I find it difficult (if not impossible) to see such things as art.

I could take a photo of a vase on a shelf or I could render one as realistic as possible. But either way, neither of those things will look like "art" compared to even a poor quality drawing of that same vase. That's probably the best way to describe why I can't put photorealism in the same realm as "art".

To me it's skill, not art.

Art is about the imagination of the individual creating it, who then, whether skilled or not, puts that imagination into something everyone else can observe.

@Moriador
Is it really you? - Can you believe I've actually missed you

There's been a whole mass of topics I expected to see you in, all guns blazing, but nope, no Moriador to be seen. I was gonna leave it about another month and then ask, WTF happened to Moriador!

(Click to enlarge) Roxie, some morphing and mat room work, still the same texture.

Poser 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 7, P8 and PPro2010, P9 and PP2012, P10 and PP2014 Game Dev
"Do not drive faster then your angel can fly"!

(Click to enlarge)

This is what I made out of LauriA's free teapot.

The teapot and textures are LauriA's.

The material room setup is mine.

Poser 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 7, P8 and PPro2010, P9 and PP2012, P10 and PP2014 Game Dev
"Do not drive faster then your angel can fly"!

(Click to enlarge)

And this is what I did to her eggs.
You can clearly see the difference.

Poser 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 7, P8 and PPro2010, P9 and PP2012, P10 and PP2014 Game Dev
"Do not drive faster then your angel can fly"!

Quote - And the results in movies today are astonishing. (when was the last time disney made a hand-drawn movie?)

I assume you mean mostly hand-drawn and allow a few CG elements?

The Princess and the Frog, 2009

Quote - I could take a photo of a vase on a shelf or I could render one as realistic as possible. But either way, neither of those things will look like "art" compared to even a poor quality drawing of that same vase. That's probably the best way to describe why I can't put photorealism in the same realm as "art".
To me it's skill, not art.

You're looking at it one way only from the point of view of reproduction, not composition.

Give you an example. Consider Yousuf Karsh, one of the most renowned portrait photographers ever, or Ansel Adams, famous for his landscapes. If someone wanted to reproduce what they photographed, easy: find out what the settings on their cameras were, reproduce the lighting, and you're done. Art? No, not really.

But to come up with the original photographs, the recognition of what would make a great photograph, having a vision of what they want to record, and the manipulation of their tools to do so, that is art by any measure. To recognize that vase on the shelf can be interesting in itself and composing your photo to make it so, that's art.

Good point actually, sort of, I'll have to change my take on it a bit.

I see Zen as an artform, and a photograph that is of a Zen-like scene is artistic to me when it's done right. I suppose then, what makes something art is whether what I'm looking at is different enough to warrant me assuming the creator used their imagination or not. That would have to apply equally to a render of a Zen scene even if it's photorealistic.

You can't just make a Zen scene, you have to use your brain, so even a perfectly real photgraph is art depending on what it is.

... but even after what I just said there, it still boils down to me not seeing it as art. I don't feel any different really, I will always see something drawn or painted as being more artistic than a careful reproduction of the same thing, which is essentially what photorealism is.

So no, I still don't see photorealism as art - even if it's of a scene of Zen - because it's the exact reproduction part I don't like about calling it art. You're spot on in that respect, you sort of cleared that up for me but nothing has changed.

It's not art because it's an attempt at exact reproduction. A painter or pencil artist sets out to capture a scene in their own artistic fashion, not to reproduce it faithfully. I know some do, like the Freeman artist did, but like I said, I see that as skill, not art. And those that achive photorealism in traditional media can only be considered a true artist because there is no way for them to cheat.

So there's that cheating aspect to it as well.

Photorealism isn't my goal, more Realism since I don't have the skill or time to accomplish photorealism. I usually only do scenes filled with boring everything things and people with boring every day clothing in boring every day situations. If I do something else it's going to be sci-fi/horror-ish but I'm still not going to have women fighting monsters in stupid slut wear that are smiling at a camera. It may get 1 comment in five years vs 364598346537845 comments of "love this, great work" "amazing render!" for a V4 image in a tpose with a gstring but it's what I enjoy working on.

Quote -
... but even after what I just said there, it still boils down to me not seeing it as art. I don't feel any different really, I will always see something drawn or painted as being more artistic than a careful reproduction of the same thing, which is essentially what photorealism is.

So no, I still don't see photorealism as art - even if it's of a scene of Zen - because it's the exact reproduction part I don't like about calling it art. You're spot on in that respect, you sort of cleared that up for me but nothing has changed.

It's not art because it's an attempt at exact reproduction. A painter or pencil artist sets out to capture a scene in their own artistic fashion, not to reproduce it faithfully. I know some do, like the Freeman artist did, but like I said, I see that as skill, not art. And those that achive photorealism in traditional media can only be considered a true artist because there is no way for them to cheat.

So there's that cheating aspect to it as well.

Well, I do see art as a skill. It doesn't have to be a faithful reproduction, but in my mind at least you should at least be able to recognize what you're looking at, otherwise you could slap a paintbrush in a monkey's hands and call the result art. I'm sure some people have done that or something like it.

Some call a Picasso "art".

Poser 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 7, P8 and PPro2010, P9 and PP2012, P10 and PP2014 Game Dev
"Do not drive faster then your angel can fly"!

He also did "prints" if I'm not mistaken.

How did he do that?
Pour some paint on a canvas and sit on it? LOL.
Yeah, art.

Rubens, that is art.

Poser 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 7, P8 and PPro2010, P9 and PP2012, P10 and PP2014 Game Dev
"Do not drive faster then your angel can fly"!

There's a lot of different genre of music.

Guess photos , producer or director ,lighting ,render settings ,photoshop
,oils ,acrylics ,pencil ,clay ,zBrush ,etc etc
Would all be considered diffrent categories of Art also ?

So I guess there's a lot of different definitions of "ART".

The lead gutarist practice he's hole life and can tear a guitar up.
The lead singer in a band can't play any musical instruments.
but he'll get the most atenchen and cridit even thou he didn't half to work for it.
don't half to wounder why bands never stay togeather.
but no matter what the guitarist still has his guitar

any one could do picasso abstract stuff.but he was one of the richest of them all.
even thou he didn't half to work for it.
but no matter what can't take Royo ,Boris ,etc etc magic away.

============================================================

The Artist that will fight for decades to conquer their media.
Even if you never know their name ,your know their Art.
Dark Sphere Mage Vengeance

Music?
That was something they made in the 60-70's.
LOL.

Poser 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 7, P8 and PPro2010, P9 and PP2012, P10 and PP2014 Game Dev
"Do not drive faster then your angel can fly"!

there's alway andy warhol piss stuff ,oxidized metal.

they or picasso made a big deal about grad school think it was second graders where automaticaly the best artist.
so picasso stuff is copying a scecond grader or something like that.not all that sure about it all.
also I think picasso was very politcail during a civil war maybe spain and think some still want to destroy his stuff.

it's all on google I guess

============================================================

The Artist that will fight for decades to conquer their media.
Even if you never know their name ,your know their Art.
Dark Sphere Mage Vengeance

"The lead gutarist practice he's hole life and can tear a guitar up.***
The lead singer in a band can't play any musical instruments.
but he'll get the most atenchen and cridit even thou he didn't half to work for it.
don't half to wounder why bands never stay togeather.
but no matter what the guitarist still has his guitar"

I think the analogy there is a first class one - perfect.

A few years back there was a thread and some Metal bands were posted for me to check out. My reply was that some of them sounded ok (at least melodic), but the others were just a mass of noise. I basically saw those Death Metal guys as crazy noisehounds, and that the wall of noise they were putting out was just one big excuse to hide a lack of talent.

I couldn't have been more wrong if I tried. I got into watching a documentary about it and started to realise the immense talent that goes into playing that stuff. Blast beats that are so fast you'd assume they'd used a sequencer (even though they didn't), and like you said, they really tear those guitars up.

And the thing is, I could (and will be) playing around with such music without even being able to play the guitar or drums. I'm a cheat. Anyone can fire-up Cubase and produce blastbeats that would have even the worlds fastest drummer wanting to curl-up and die, but those people would have to be cheating because only the world's fastest drummer can truly drum faster than anyone else.

So it's clear I would be a cheat if I were to knock-out some kickass Death in Cubase without even being able to play the real instruments - agreed?

But what about the "artist" part of it? Will I be able to call myself an "artist" when I've done what even I see as cheating?

Yes, I would be an artist. I would be an artist because although I cheated, I still wrote and engineered the music that would result. I would not have copied another song, it would be from my own imagination so therefore it would still count as art. I cheated, but it's still art because art is what comes from an individuals imagination, it makes no difference how it got there.

Which brings us to this whole iPad thing; are we artists if we use an iPad?
Yes! - As long as what we produce is from our own imagination, not someone elses. The Morgan Freeman protrait is purely skill because it demonstrates no imagination of the person that drew it. What you see is what the original photographer saw, it's their imagination, not that of the artisrt that copied it.

Are we cheating?
Yes! - Because a thousand deletes would burn a hole in a real piece of paper. Real media is not as forgiving as data that is undone from the memory of a computer. You can't draw an eye on a peice of paper and then grab it and move it around, rotate, and rescale it. You can't reach the final step and start tweaking your levels to polish it off, layer by layer - like you can on an iPad.

Wouldn't mind an iPad myself, strictly for playing around with drawing. But there's a massive difference and there has to be a line drawn where respect for the real media and real instrument artists should never fall below the respect given to the cheats. I often see posts from real instrument artists on YouTube, they'll visit an electronic version and get pissed-off that some kid can come along and put-out cheating stuff and get all the views. Meanwhile they were working their bollocks off in a real band, developing real skills.

Next time you see one of those people complain, you should listen to them, not hate them. Those are the minority that have a first-hand understanding of why the others are cheating, and for the most part, what they say is usually spot-on. They're right if they say you're cheating, but wrong when they say you're not an artist (as long as it's an original piece of work).

Good artists copy; great artists steal; and there is no such thing as cheating. -- Picasso (mostly). ;)

I see nothing sacred about analog tools, any more than I believe a Stradivarius sounds better than the highest quality violins made today, or that art music development ended with the death of Shostakovich, or Dvorak, or Brahms, or Beethoven, or Bach, or Palestrina, for that matter. It's all just pulses of sound hitting our eardrums at varying frequencies.

Back in the day, real music didn't have to be played by the composer to be considered valid. Beethoven was a pianist, not a violinist, but his violin concerto is still very much real music. Mozart was a violinist and pianist, but his greatest contribution to the music canon is opera. I don't think he had much of a voice, though. But musicians, composers, and conductors are all artists, and what they create is all art and real, whether they write on parchment with a quill or a computer monitor with notation software.

[Bach's organ fugues are freakin' awesome when played on wine glasses. They're also pretty decent in midi form, and that's saying something. :)]

Picasso is, in my opinion, brilliant almost beyond compare. But then I don't, myself, prize realism. Many people disagree, of course. Eye of beholder, philosophy of art, personal taste, and all that stuff that doesn't need to be rehashed.

Some people have always been more (and others less) conservative in their adoption of new technology and new styles. But it's a big world. Room for everyone.

I prefer to be inclusive with my definitions of what's valid or good or real. If nothing else, makes the party much more lively. :) But there's nothing wrong with a narrow view, and there are no doubt some very specific benefits to be gained from holding one.

PoserPro 2014, PS CS5.5 Ext, Nikon D300. Win 8, i7-4770 @ 3.4 GHz, AMD Radeon 8570, 12 GB RAM.

But, Pumeco, I do see your point. One of Jeremy Soule's Skyrim pieces sounds lightyears better when performed by the London Philharmonic. The music ascends to a different league.

You can compose great music all by yourself in your basement on electronics. But there is something magical and awe inspiring that seems to happen when a group of musicians performs the miracle of collaborating simultaneously and perfectly -- at a set of extraordinarily difficult tasks. There are times that I think this ability is humanity's greatest accomplishment. :)

PoserPro 2014, PS CS5.5 Ext, Nikon D300. Win 8, i7-4770 @ 3.4 GHz, AMD Radeon 8570, 12 GB RAM.

Apart from a smaller sized orchestra at a concert, the only time I've ever seen and heard a live orchestra was as a kid in school, they brought one in as a treat before the Christmas holiday.

They packed a full orchestra into the hall so that they had one half, and we squeezed into the other half. I've never heard anything like it. It's so vivid even now I can vaguely remember the faces of some of the musicians, who at the time, I thought looked really funny playing their instruments. A school hall is nothing like the size of venue a full orchestra would play in, so you can imagine the volume!

I've loved orchestras ever since, and I agree, it's just a magical thing when you hear music like that - I'll certainly never forget the experience. I challenge anyone, no matter what style of music they're into, to listen to a real full orchestra, live and up-close in a good hall, and not be blown away by it!

Anyway, as usual it's getting a bit OT again, but yup, I don't care what anyone says, a fake equivalent can never be better than the real thing (the natural thing). And for me that applies to everything: art, audio, food, everything.

That's pretty much true of just about any live performance. Gordon Lightfoot performed at the Tennessee Theatre a few years back (the Tennessee was an -old- theater from the glory days of theater that was saved and restored. The interior accoustics are magnificent). Even at the end of his career and the occasional 70+ year quiver in that deep voice, there was magic in that live performance no CD or DVD could possibly capture. And some of that magic was synergistic. He performed 'If You Could Read My Mind', and you could feel all the audience who had been teens in the 60's just melting back to the times they made out to that song on the radio. It wasn't nostalgia; it was like time melted away for those few minutes (and yes, there =was= more than a little tonsil hockey occurring...and it didn't detract from the experience).

I don't think the Poser user base is shrinking so much as aging. And with age comes a lot of accumulated assets. How many people here have a multi gigabyte runtime? Multiple runtimes of that nature? I haven't bought much lately because I'm in the process of medically retiring from the store (aaaaah, the wonderful things 35 years 6 days a week does to the knees). But there is also the gap where its been more fun to slam anything not V4 than look at it and help it become something, like we did with V1,V2,V3, etc. So there's been a good shovel of online ego behind the gunshyness we see today.

I also tend to be very careful in how I use the word 'cheat'. A tool is not a cheat. A process is not a cheat. These are options. Using a tool doesn't make you good at it (all the bad Photoshops out there, please raise your hands!). Using that tool doesn't make you a cheater (that gets into that 'If you didn't make your own brushes, grind your own pigments. etc, then your art is not TRUE ART!!! nonsense). Cubase and Cakewalk are like Poser; yeah, you can get output, but if you do not understand how things go together and comprehend the rules of the road, it is obvious in the output. I animate and, to quote Monty Oum, I cheat like a motherfucker. Because that is the only way you can possibly do animation, since you are trying to convince flesh and blood viewers that your output is enough like real life that it doesn't trip the Uncanny Valley response.

The tool doesn't matter, and never really has. Art comes from within the artist, and evokes feelings in the viewer. Most of what' done in the Poserverse can't be called art simply because the makers have never tried to evoke more than likes in the galleries.

Poser has also shyed away from chasing the latest fad. It's still a tool that can stand alone or integrate into a serious pipeline with little to no hassle. A lot of pro's use the tool for things its good at, and for the speed it can have over other tools. But being pro's, they tend to not waste time on boards, having things like bills to pay and deadlines to meet. The Poser community has fractured and split, but it is still here.

Ach the modern definition of art is pretty simple.
Weld 2 coke cans together and call it art.
Sell it on e-bay for a grand.
Some clown might even buy it. LOL.

Poser 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 7, P8 and PPro2010, P9 and PP2012, P10 and PP2014 Game Dev
"Do not drive faster then your angel can fly"!

Yeah, this Dale character sounds like he has some cool ideas!!!

I've used a hockey stick a few times but never on their tonsils, I usually go in for the shin first, then whack them on the head as they bend over in agony. Tonsil Hockey is something I never thought about but I'll consider it next time I spot a Vickie on the loose!!!

Later,
Roxie - Girl With Blade

Roxie, that's not what he meant by "Tonsil Hockey" - and if you Tonsil Hockey a Vickie, people will talk!

@Dale
But that's why I try to seperate what is/isn't art from what is/isn't cheating.

Are you saying that if I knocked-out a blastbeat right now and asked you to listen to it, you wouldn't think I had cheated if I'd just drew a rapid beat into Cubase rather than actually performed it that fast?

Surely that is cheating by any length of the imagination? Don't get me wrong, I'd love to be convinced that it isn't cheating because I love my DAW and I'd feel better about myself if I could be convinced it doesn't involve cheating. I know for a fact it doesn't stop me being an "artist" but I can't get my head around that 'not cheating' part no matter how hard I try.

Like I said though, would love to be convinced otherwise!

@Vilters
Some people put a pile of bricks in the middle of a room and call it art, so it's a very subjective thing. Maybe if your Coke cans were connected in an imaginative way, you could sell them as well :-P

Ssssst, or someone is gonna try it with Pepsi cans.

But??
They"ll be photorealistic LOL.

Poser 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 7, P8 and PPro2010, P9 and PP2012, P10 and PP2014 Game Dev
"Do not drive faster then your angel can fly"!

Interesting thought though, Vilters, being desperate for cash as I am, I have to ask, has anyone ever done that successfully?

Has anyone ever slapped a big pile of crap together, advertised it as art, and successfully sold it for millions on ebay?

The word "Art" is a lot like the word "Love." So many different things are called Love--Hey, I love my car, or my kids, or the blue sky in the morning, or the erotic love for a girlfriend, love of my puppy. I love making things in Poser. Wow. I once saw a pile of detritus brought up from the beach and dumped in the center of an art gallery. Is that the same "art" as a painting by Goya? I saw the pile as political "art." Warhol's soupcans are sociological art. A lot of "art" only makes sense if it is explained, so it is conceptual art. A local art group produces what I call weekend art. So we really need a lot of different words for art, with lots of nuances, like the Innuit words for snow.

Meanwhile, hey, I love this discussion. Er, it's arty.

Poser Pro 2014

My personal website: Novels, photos, video, sculptures and more
Evidence of a Lost City: An animated movie and novel, in progress
Hag: A novel and live-action movie

Quote -
Interesting thought though, Vilters, being desperate for cash as I am, I have to ask, has anyone ever done that successfully?

Has anyone ever slapped a big pile of crap together, advertised it as art, and successfully sold it for millions on ebay?

Not sure about the ebay part but looking at the price on an un made bed and a tent with a list of all your past lovers proving you were a ......... The answer has to be a resounding YES.

I use Poser 13 on Windows 11 - For Scene set up I use a Geekcom A5 - Ryzen 9 5900HX, with 64 gig ram and 3 TB storage, mini PC with final rendering done on normal sized desktop using an AMD Ryzen Threadipper 1950X CPU, Corsair Hydro H100i CPU cooler, 3XS EVGA GTX 1080i SC with 11g Ram, 4 X 16gig Corsair DDR4 Ram and a Corsair RM 100 PSU . The desktop is in a remote location with rendering done via Queue Manager which gives me a clearer desktop and quieter computer room.

Quote -
Yeah, this Dale character sounds like he has some cool ideas!!!

I've used a hockey stick a few times but never on their tonsils, I usually go in for the shin first, then whack them on the head as they bend over in agony. Tonsil Hockey is something I never thought about but I'll consider it next time I spot a Vickie on the loose!!!

Later,
Roxie - Girl With Blade

Roxie, that's not what he meant by "Tonsil Hockey" - and if you Tonsil Hockey a Vickie, people will talk!

You mean someone -finally- made a tonsil add on for the old girl? Wow, I've waited ages! Wherewherewherewherewherewhere??????! :P

Quote -

@Dale
But that's why I try to seperate what is/isn't art from what is/isn't cheating. Are you saying that if I knocked-out a blastbeat right now and asked you to listen to it, you wouldn't think I had cheated if I'd just drew a rapid beat into Cubase rather than actually performed it that fast?

Surely that is cheating by any length of the imagination? Don't get me wrong, I'd love to be convinced that it isn't cheating because I love my DAW and I'd feel better about myself if I could be convinced it doesn't involve cheating. I know for a fact it doesn't stop me being an "artist" but I can't get my head around that 'not cheating' part no matter how hard I try.

Like I said though, would love to be convinced otherwise!

It would depend on -how- you presented it. If you merely laid out the tracks and offered them for a listen, no I wouldn't consider it cheating. I -would- probably ask if you performed it as a courtesy, if you didn't indicate otherwise. If you claimed that you -had- performed the selection, when you actually used Cubase, -then- I would be more inclined to call that cheating, as you would be claiming to have done something you didn't do. But laying down that beat in an original comp, and then just mentioning that Cubase was used in the composing in the metadata is nowhere near cheating.

I have kind of a production mindset about this. If I credit whatever resources I use to their creators, then in no way have I 'cheated'. I did the equivalent of contracting out parts to other individuals. Outsourcing. The parts I credit to others are the resources I used; otherwise, the work is mine. Claiming you actually performed all of the assembled material in a Cubase or Cakewalk music output would be cheating if you didn't. But just using a DAW and sequencer is not cheating, as you have to =know= how music goes together and interacts to get anything that sounds better than a $3 wind up Taiwanese music box from 50 years ago. Just like with photorealism, you have to know all the things people expect and how to produce them before you can achieve even a beginning of 'photorealism'. That includes the artifacts and errors that simply do not exist in the real world, but that people have seen so many times that they accept it as 'right' (Lens flare and active underlighting being the two most egregious examples of things that either do not, or almost never, exist in nature).

Plus there's the fact that every electronic musician I know of spends disproportionate amounts of time tweaking timing and rise/fall and attack to scrape the rigid computerized precision off of their compositions.

pumeco :

In this world where competing against others ,they will cheat lie steal kill do any thing to win.sports are cheating with steroids just to keep up. but if there all doing steroids who's cheating ?

you don't have millions like the band KISS ,you can't buy a place in the middle of nowhere not to bother ya neighbors with loud music. buy marshal amps and top quality guitars and drums & have 20 years to learn them all.
How is it fare for one broke dude to compete with millionaires ?
do you think if ya made a killer song it matters to the ones that like the song how you made it ?
Do you half to tell them how you made it ?
They didn't tell us about band Boston at first.

Royo,Boris paints over a photo more or less .there's looks better then those that don't

One dude kill another for a cig. was he right or wrong ,did he cheat ?
Does it matter ? He got the cig ,so he won didn't he ?
In a pack of animals witch ones eat and survives ?
In this world Gold is God and if ya competing against others that will cheat lie steal kill ,
moraless animals that live buy no rules other then to win.
& If you play buy rules .Who do you think will win ?

============================================================

The Artist that will fight for decades to conquer their media.
Even if you never know their name ,your know their Art.
Dark Sphere Mage Vengeance

Yes

"Royo,Boris paints over a photo more or less .there's looks better then those that don't"

For the time spent Their's looks better

A word is not the same with one writer as with another. One tears it from his guts. The other pulls it out of his overcoat pocket
Charles Péguy

Heat and animosity, contest and conflict, may sharpen the wits, although they rarely do;they never strengthen the understanding, clear the perspicacity, guide the judgment, or improve the heart
Walter Savage Landor

So is that TTFN or TANSTAAFL?

DaleB is right, I think. You're cheating if you claim to have done something that you didn't actually do.

Unless you're a magician, I suppose. :D

And there are elements of the illusionist in more traditional art. Nothing wrong with giving the impression that you did one thing (like take a photo or paint in oils) when you did something else (like a render or an iPad finger painting) -- as long as you don't falsely claim that you did something. -- Unless being deceptive is frowned upon in the venue where you share your stuff. Uploading electronic music to a forum where people usually upload analog performances, for instance. Or uploading a render to a photography site.

People are often too quick, I think, to judge others' work as less because simply how it was made it doesn't fit their own notions of how it should have been. I don't know if this is prejudice, envy, a need to bolster their own egos -- or what. And RorrKonn is quite right. How can the guy in the basement compete with the multimillionaires who have all the assets?

When it comes to music, one part of the art is in the composition. The notes and how they are combined. And how it is performed is really quite irrelevant to the artistry and value of the composition. And it doesn't matter if it the music was created using samples or written in notation. If it can be written in a notation that is understandable to other musicians, they can also perform it (or some may do it by ear). And anything that could be performed by someone else is real music, regardless of the method used to compose it.

Again... only cheating if you use electronic means and pretend they were analog. Or use a sample and claim you created it.

Same thing with using 3rd party content when posting to higher end galleries, like CG society. The assumption at those galleries is that, when you post a render of a model, you made the model. So if you didn't, you need to say so, otherwise you're cheating. But if you're honest about where the assets came from right at the start (and don't let people assume otherwise), they have no problem with with what you've done. It's the letting people think you did something that you didn't do. Even if you're willing to be honest when asked, it can still be cheating if you're a bit deceptive by not being honest when you describe your work when you upload it.

And I can see how that would apply to all varieties of music too. If the assumptions are that what you share is what you performed, and you don't say right off that you used a sample or software, that's cheating. But if you list your assets and procedures with the proper credits, there's no cheating at all. You simply used the tools available to you.

Dunno if that's convincing enough, Pumeco. :) But I have to say, I do agree with Dale on this.

As for "what is art" that's a big question that has been debated over and over. Some people in the forums don't like the debate, but I always find it interesting.

Myself, I have a very generous view of what is art. I think it requires a few things:

A sentient mind behind its creation (natural beauty -- like a waterfall or a flower -- isn't art, but an elephant painting might be.)
Intentional placement of at least some of the elements. If it's entirely random, like paint thrown at a wall, with no thought going into how it's thrown, or where it's thrown, or how different angles of projection will affect the final outcome, or how different colors combined in certain ways have particular neurological effects in the beholder -- if it's truly random and thoughtless, it's not art. But if there's intention there, it's art. It just might not be very good art.
A genuine attempt to offer the beholder some reason to view it beyond a desire to deceive them into spending money. One or more of the following:

a. aesthetic value -- the thing is pleasurable to look at

b. conceptual value -- the thing makes you really think or ask questions that you wouldn't otherwise ask (Is this thing actually art? doesn't really count all by itself because it's an obvious question. There has to be more to it, else you could put anything in a gallery to evoke that question.)

c. political/social value -- it makes a statement that challenges your social/political notions or confirms your social/political beliefs

d. spiritual or religious value -- it evokes a sense of something greater than yourself

e. philosphical value -- it questions or attempts to answer or demonstrate philosophical ideas

f. optical value -- it makes you question how your mind perceives and processes what it sees (beyond mere simple optical illusions)

g. pedagogical value -- it teaches you something that you could not learn in any other way (not just diagrams, which could be presented in many ways, but perhaps a diagram that is so well presented, so clear, so perfect in the way it demonstrates whatever concept it is demonstrating that it becomes a cultural classic that people can't help sharing because it is the BEST way they've found to show you this idea)

h. psychological value -- it intentionally evokes a specific emotional response (disgust or contempt ("This is crap!! not art!!) might well count -- but I think it would need something else from this list as well to really make it); fear, horror definitely count; sexual excitement might count too, but again, like anger, that is such an easy emotion to evoke, it would need something additional to count; and of course, love counts. So your 1st grade fingerpainting that your mother still keeps -- it's art (the ones she didn't keep for whatever reason clearly didn't evoke that emotion strongly enough), so not EVERY pic you did as a kid counts -- unless your mom is a hoarder. ;) ;)

There may be other "values" that I'm missing, but those are the ones I can think of now.

PoserPro 2014, PS CS5.5 Ext, Nikon D300. Win 8, i7-4770 @ 3.4 GHz, AMD Radeon 8570, 12 GB RAM.

Not a big fan of photorealism with my renders. My imagination is too wild to be confinded to photorealism. With that said I do enjoy learning about how to make Poser renders more realistic. I may want an anime style character in a boat that is floating on realistic water. I don't think I've ever tried to have a render that was 100% realistic.

Well, some interseting stuff.

It boils down to mainly two things then; the real-world dog eats dog take that RorrKonn has on it, and the stuff by Dale and Moriador point out which pretty much boils down to it not being cheating as long as you're honest about it.

**
Ragards RorrKonn's take:**
I feel a lot like you do, and believe me, if I'm put in situations I need to fight dishonesty with dishonesty I'm perfectly capable and willing to do so. If there were a competition to produce the best mix of a song I want to enter, I'd win it, wipe the floor with the competition, and would enjoy every minute of doing so. I wouldn't feel bad about using a DAW as long as the rest in the competition are doing the same - so they're fair game.

I'd screw 'em over so badly with awesomness they'd wonder what hit 'em.

So I agree, but the only problem with it is that I can only have that attitude if it's something where it's warranted. If I went into a competition to produce some Death Metal without even being able to play the instruments and won, I'd be a cheat - and I'd still be a cheat even if I'd told them I did it using a DAW. Telling them you cheated doesn't get you out of being a cheat.

But using a DAW to compete with a real band and calling it fair, is like saying a man with a gun doesn't have anything over a man without one. It's that aspect where the cheating is. It's not the DAW V DAW that is wrong, that's not cheating at all.

It's the DAW V Human that is the cheating. There's a lot more to music than the person playing the instrument, I know that, but then I'm not talking about the other stuff, I'm just talking about the direct comparison between something that was actually played and something that was drawn in to the DAW. I could record a piano piece into a DAW and it wouldn't be cheating. But the moment I go back over it and change thew velocity of even one note, then I'm cheating compared to the musician that didn't use that luxury, because that's not what I really did - I altered what I was really capable of.

So yeah, I know what you're saying and I have exactly the same dog-eats-dog take on it where the competition is involved.

Regards Dale's and Moriador's take:
Again, very similar to what I just said to RorrKonn. I don't see how admitting you cheated changes the fact that you cheated. You both make a very valid distinction that as long as what you're doing is 'fitting' to where you're doing it, then it's not cheating. One thing I do like about what you said is that it does reinforce the fact that DAW Vs Human is a valid thing and has every right to be there. People choose to use DAW's for different reasons, and I for one certainly didn't choose to use one to cheat. I'm glad I have the ability to become a one-man-band if ever I wanted to.

So I agree to an extent, but as with RorrKon, I think you're lumping my take under one very big hammer. Of course I agree it's not cheating as long as you're playing fair and everyone around you is doing the same, it cannot be cheating.

... so, the Morgan Freeman painting is not cheating in an iPad v iPad context, but it absolutely is cheating in an iPad V Traditional context.

Quote -
... so, the Morgan Freeman painting is not cheating in an iPad v iPad context, but it absolutely is cheating in an iPad V Traditional context.

It's cheating if you claim or imply that you did it one way but did it another.

Photographic example: when someone produces an HDR image, they use a camera and Photoshop (or similar software). If they produced it by taking multiple exposures to get the full dynamic range and combining them, that one thing, but if they claim to have done it when really what they did was take a single image and manipulate it to imitate the effect, that's cheating. And of course, that works in reverse: if someone claims to demonstrate their skill at image manipulation when what actually happened is that they're good with a camera and not so good with the software, that's cheating too.

In both cases you are using exactly the same tools.

But even if you are using different tools, it isn't necessarily "cheating". Let's suppose there's a contest to draw the most lifelike picture of Morgan Freeman. If both a digital artist and someone with a pencil started with a blank canvas, then one or the other isn't cheating in the least compared to the other. They're both going to the same place where they can be compared, they just have different ways of getting there. The computer artist could cheat by manipulating an existing image of Freeman, but then again, the traditional artist could trace the same image as well.

apples and oranges.

if you make Art,Music etc etc with apples or oranges doesn't matter.
If you lie and say a apple is a orange.don't know if I would call that cheating ,
Think I would would be more app to say ya foolishly attempting to be deceitful.
Cause every one knows the diffrence between apples and oranges.

What's the diffrence then just looking at a Morgan Freeman photo,using grids or tracing ?
end the end ya just a copy machine.

I don't think DAZ Poser meshes ,textures ,shaders etc etc are good enought to make photo realistick human .jpgs .
If they where then at least most of the gallery would be photo realistick.

============================================================

The Artist that will fight for decades to conquer their media.
Even if you never know their name ,your know their Art.
Dark Sphere Mage Vengeance

Quote - I don't think DAZ Poser meshes ,textures ,shaders etc etc are good enought to make photo realistick human .jpgs .
If they where then at least most of the gallery would be photo realistick.

Not "out of the box", they're not -- which is why the gallery isn't full of photorealistic images.

With a lot of work -- and the human figures would need extensive morphs and/or displacement to mimic the collision of flesh with environment and the realistic movement of muscle, skin, fat; the hair would probably have to be painted; and the skin texture would need to be free of baked in specularity/shadows -- they can be pretty damned close.

But we're still a long way from load-click-photorealism. :)

PoserPro 2014, PS CS5.5 Ext, Nikon D300. Win 8, i7-4770 @ 3.4 GHz, AMD Radeon 8570, 12 GB RAM.

Quote - apples and oranges.

if you make Art,Music etc etc with apples or oranges doesn't matter.
If you lie and say a apple is a orange.don't know if I would call that cheating ,
Think I would would be more app to say ya foolishly attempting to be deceitful.
Cause every one knows the diffrence between apples and oranges.

What's the diffrence then just looking at a Morgan Freeman photo,using grids or tracing ?
end the end ya just a copy machine.

Still takes skill or else anybody would be able to do it. That's the thing about art. Not everybody can pull it off.

would not argue it takes skill & Kyle Lambert has some mad skills .
pretty much what most of the best Artist do.
Is use a photo as a refreance.
I'm not saying useing a photo is a sin .
and for the Art works that the ratios are all off ,I wish they used a photo.
Does it matter how "looking,layers,grid,tracing" they paint over a photo ?
As long as it looks good.
but if it makes the Art beter then buy all means use a Photo or what ever referances ya need.

Think it would have been fun if Kyle Lambert had painted Morgan Freeman in a spaceship with all the stars and planets behind him.

============================================================

The Artist that will fight for decades to conquer their media.
Even if you never know their name ,your know their Art.
Dark Sphere Mage Vengeance

What's the big deal about using a phot reference? How iw that any worse that using a real life reference. I once had a book that taught me how to draw with pencils. They provided the pictures in the book and I had to recreate what I saw. Did I copy what I saw? Yes. Did I trace what I did? No. So why is that considered less artful?

Quote - What's the big deal about using a phot reference? How iw that any worse that using a real life reference. I once had a book that taught me how to draw with pencils. They provided the pictures in the book and I had to recreate what I saw. Did I copy what I saw? Yes. Did I trace what I did? No. So why is that considered less artful?

EClark1894 : You seem some what agravated with me ,I'm not trying to agravate anyone.

lett me try saying it this way.

Birds can fly cause the Gods gave them wings.
Humans half to build flying macheans to fly.
Is it cheating ? who cares if it is or not ,we fly.

Some Musicians touched buy the Gods can play by ear & sings in key and knows tones.
Some Musicians can not play buy ear.so they read sheet music & use software to stay in key.
Is it cheating ? who cares if it is or not .They still make music.

Some Artist touched buy the Gods can draw,paint anything just buy looking with ease ,
Some Artist can not they half to use photo,grid,trace.
Is it cheating ? who cares if it is or not .They still make Art.

The Artist,Musicians touched buy the Gods are giffted and can fly grasefully with ease.
The Godless Artist,Musicians half to build there flying macheans.

In the end to me all that really matters is they all make there Music and Art.

============================================================

The Artist that will fight for decades to conquer their media.
Even if you never know their name ,your know their Art.
Dark Sphere Mage Vengeance

Quote: "I don't think DAZ Poser meshes ,textures ,shaders etc etc are good enought to make photo realistick human .jpgs .
If they where then at least most of the gallery would be photo realistick."

Complete disaggree here. I havn't never seen better meshes and textures available for sale. Not shure about shaders though. And there are a lot of impressive Poser and DAZ studio renders out there.

Quote: "

Not "out of the box", they're not -- which is why the gallery isn't full of photorealistic images.

With a lot of work -- and the human figures would need extensive morphs and/or displacement to mimic the collision of flesh with environment and the realistic movement of muscle, skin, fat; the hair would probably have to be painted; and the skin texture would need to be free of baked in specularity/shadows -- they can be pretty damned close.

But we're still a long way from load-click-photorealism. :)"

It's all said with this one . I aggree here.

I've thought about it a fair bit, and despite wanting to be convinced otherwise, my personal opinion hasn't changed that iPad V iPad is not cheating, and DAW V DAW is not cheating. But iPad V traditional media is cheating, and a manually input performance from a DAW V a real performance is cheating.

I will never accept that admitting you manually input a bunch of musical notes is not cheating when you directly compare that to the musician that required the skill to perform it live. Even of you were best of friends and said, hey mate, cool performance but I gotta come clean and admit I did it in a DAW.

Telling them that, doesn't change the way you did it, so in direct comparison, I will always see that as cheating. At the very least, if not cheating then let's just say I think the artist with the DAW or the iPad had the upper hand in the matter.

There is "one-click" photorealism possible for Poser, but not with the currently available figures:

https://secure.axyz-design.com/

**"Quote: "I don't think DAZ Poser meshes ,textures ,shaders etc etc are good enought to make photo realistick human .jpgs .** **If they where then at least most of the gallery would be photo realistick."**

At this point DAZ meshes are not really the problem.. not sure about the SM natives.

"and the skin texture would need to be free of baked in specularity/shadows -- they can be pretty damned close.
But we're still a long way from load-click-photorealism. :)"

And the render engine used does matter

example: in this render I clicked on and loaded the Default DAZ M4 in C4D via the interposer pro content importer.

I clicked onand loaded the "sol" elite human surface mat shader from DAZ via the interposer runtime explorer

I clicked on a Smart IBL environment for Vray which loaded a GI envrionment& backdrop and autoset all my Vray GI render settings

then I clicked "render"
and six minutes later this is the result .

NO... it wont fool any of you here into believing that this is an actual Photo of some random shaved head caucasian male as we all recognize the DAZ M4 figure.

But not too shabby for four lazy mouse clicks.

My website

YouTube Channel

Quote - There is "one-click" photorealism possible for Poser, but not with the currently available figures:

https://secure.axyz-design.com/

The kids shown give me the creeps

children of the corn ;)

============================================================

The Artist that will fight for decades to conquer their media.
Even if you never know their name ,your know their Art.
Dark Sphere Mage Vengeance

Of course, anyone can load a photo onto a plane and then render it. It will look very convincing. lol.

Wolf, it's not the model and the fact that we recognize it that makes it look like a render. It's the way the model looks like a flat image pasted onto a flat background. There's something seriously wrong with the lighting because the human appears to have a sharp outline. And the resolution of the background doesn't match the resolution of the skin texture.

Plus, he's naked, bald, and expressionless -- a sure fire indication that it's not even a photoshop cut out job.

Not bad at all for a few clicks, though. But as I said, you still have to do extensive fiddling to get a convincing image. :)

PoserPro 2014, PS CS5.5 Ext, Nikon D300. Win 8, i7-4770 @ 3.4 GHz, AMD Radeon 8570, 12 GB RAM.

"Of course, anyone can load a photo onto a plane and then render it. It will look very convincing. lol."

If you're referring to the Axyz figures by that comment, these new figures are not simple "billboard" type "photographs", but actual 3D sculpts like the DAZ and Poser figures are.

The difference is simply that they are created via a process called photogrammetry instead of being manually sculpted.

moriador was refering to wolf359 render of M4 not the secure.axyz-design.com.

secure.axyz-design.com characters look as good as any others .
might want to make there eyes look alive thou.
since there not rigged for Poser and coast more then $5.00.
and not a barbie doll that ya can dress how ya want.
doubt many Poser users would be interested.

============================================================

The Artist that will fight for decades to conquer their media.
Even if you never know their name ,your know their Art.
Dark Sphere Mage Vengeance

Quote -

"Of course, anyone can load a photo onto a plane and then render it. It will look very convincing. lol."

If you're referring to the Axyz figures by that comment, these new figures are not simple "billboard" type "photographs", but actual 3D sculpts like the DAZ and Poser figures are.

The difference is simply that they are created via a process called photogrammetry instead of being manually sculpted.

I was referring simply to the fact that you can use all sorts of complicated techniques, but in the end, the simplest is the easiest. Wasn't actually referring to those particular figures.

But they DO have a sort of billboard look to them, as though the texture is not being affected by light in the scene (it's also a very low res texture). Perhaps the texture has a massive amount of baked in specular and shadow?

The clay renders look very good. But I'm guessing that they are not posable.

PoserPro 2014, PS CS5.5 Ext, Nikon D300. Win 8, i7-4770 @ 3.4 GHz, AMD Radeon 8570, 12 GB RAM.

And that's why we can't have nice things in Poser.

(Or at least not as nice things as the other kids have)

;-)

Anyway, my point was simply to demonstrate that the only thing preventing Poser from being a "one-click Photorealism" tool is it's lack of "one-click photorealism" figures.

The technology is out there, that's all what I'm saying.

BTW, the girl used here is just one of Azyx' static props. There is only one material zone, so the texture is just plugged into diffuse.

If you want a poseable figure, you'd have to buy one of the pre-rigged MAX versions and rig it yourself in Poser.

Of course as long as the community has a general "I'll wishlist it until there is a 50% sale" and "Realism is overrated anyway" attitude, no professional company will bother creating figures that use cutting edge technology just for Poser. Not for $500 and especially not for $5.

But if we really wanted, yes, we could have that coveted "Photorealism" thing easily.

:-)

"Anyway, my point was simply to demonstrate that the only thing preventing Poser from being a "one-click Photorealism" tool is it's lack of "one-click photorealism" figures."

There is no such thing as a general use
*** "one click photorealism figure"***

'Photo realism" is NOT achieved soley by a 3D objects modeling details and textures.
it is a combination of those factors along with a proper GI lighting model ( biased or unbiased)
along with A skilled user who understands photographic principles(real world lighting)
and of course purpose built Shaders and hair for a specific render engine.

"Of course as long as the community has a general "I'll wishlist it until there is a 50% sale" and "Realism is overrated anyway" attitude, no professional company will bother creating figures that use cutting edge technology just for Poser. Not for $500 and especially not for $5".

why would one expect any "professional Company"
to create "creating figures that use cutting edge technology just for....... Poser"??

is that not Smith micro's responsibility??
Have a look at this model 16,000 polygon here:

[no direct links to commercial sites please]

Read about all the meticulous effort and features
that make this purpose built model render specifically in Autodesk MAX with mental ray shaders etc.

Say what you want about DAZ but they appear to have followed same"purpose built " for D/S idealology with genesis .

As long as SM delivers CRAP figures like Alison& Ryan
while hoping some third party produces a miracle figure
for poser........well you know the rest.

My website

YouTube Channel

Let's not forget that DAZ was that third party for Poser before they built their own software.

And despite everyone's trepidation, Hivewire is making some pretty good strides towards making Dawn a viable Poser figure. Depending on which way Poser goes with their tech, will determine which way Dawn goes, I think.

"Of course as long as the community has a general "I'll wishlist it until there is a 50% sale" and "Realism is overrated anyway" attitude, no professional company will bother creating figures that use cutting edge technology just for Poser. Not for $500 and especially not for $5".

why would one expect any "professional Company"
to create "creating figures that use cutting edge technology just for....... Poser"??

Why would anyone expect a user whos aim is not to produce photorealistic renders to pay full price for anything on the basis it may somehow result an improvement that they probably would not use anyway. Added to that is the fact that a large number of Poser users are hobbyists and could/would not dream of being able to buy photorealisc products at 'professional company' prices.

Bit like saying I will not buy my Ford at a sale price in the hope that Ferrari will build a better car.

I use Poser 13 on Windows 11 - For Scene set up I use a Geekcom A5 - Ryzen 9 5900HX, with 64 gig ram and 3 TB storage, mini PC with final rendering done on normal sized desktop using an AMD Ryzen Threadipper 1950X CPU, Corsair Hydro H100i CPU cooler, 3XS EVGA GTX 1080i SC with 11g Ram, 4 X 16gig Corsair DDR4 Ram and a Corsair RM 100 PSU . The desktop is in a remote location with rendering done via Queue Manager which gives me a clearer desktop and quieter computer room.

Andor Kollar character is a fine character.It can't morph & dress like M5 but it's a fine character.

funny thing is the same mesh
if it's a
Character.Max ya can ask $600.00 what ever ya want thousands even.
Character .DAZ Poser $50.00
Character.Blender $10.00
All for the same mesh.
So where ya going to sell your characters ?

Why would Andor Kollar sell his character here for $550.00 less & have to make morphs and put up with every one complaining about every little nip pick thing ?

I like HiveWire3D and Dawn just fine.
They don't seem to be in any kind of hurry thou.

============================================================

The Artist that will fight for decades to conquer their media.
Even if you never know their name ,your know their Art.
Dark Sphere Mage Vengeance

Quote - Bit like saying I will not buy my Ford at a sale price in the hope that Ferrari will build a better car.

I have a very nice Ferrari,Lamborghini,Viper & a 55 Chevy etc etc Hot Wheels collection :)

Drive a FORD thou ;)

============================================================

The Artist that will fight for decades to conquer their media.
Even if you never know their name ,your know their Art.
Dark Sphere Mage Vengeance

Quote - > Quote - Bit like saying I will not buy my Ford at a sale price in the hope that Ferrari will build a better car.

I have a very nice Ferrari,Lamborghini,Viper & a 55 Chevy etc etc Hot Wheels collection :)

Drive a FORD thou ;)

Nice collection ...I'm jealous, no hot wheels at all this end and I drive a 14 year old Honda.

I use Poser 13 on Windows 11 - For Scene set up I use a Geekcom A5 - Ryzen 9 5900HX, with 64 gig ram and 3 TB storage, mini PC with final rendering done on normal sized desktop using an AMD Ryzen Threadipper 1950X CPU, Corsair Hydro H100i CPU cooler, 3XS EVGA GTX 1080i SC with 11g Ram, 4 X 16gig Corsair DDR4 Ram and a Corsair RM 100 PSU . The desktop is in a remote location with rendering done via Queue Manager which gives me a clearer desktop and quieter computer room.

Both my brothers drive Chevy and Dodge.

I drive a 12 yr old Toyota Tacoma 4x4, because I prefer spending more time in my truck than I do under it. lol. 130K miles and still purs as smooth as the day I bought it and I've driven it cross-country twice. Sure, it kills 10 dinosaurs every time I start it, but I wouldn't trade it for anything. Except maybe a newer one that only kills about 8.

Anyway, nice renders. Yes that would be nice to have in Poser, but I'm not one that strives for photorealism, so I don't really mind that it takes other software to produce those kind of results. Poser can get pretty close with enough patience and practice if that's what you really need. For me, like I said before, I have a nice Canon that I can use for photo real, so it doesn't bother me. If it did I would just get the reality plug-in or something similar. I might even invest in KeyShot for ZBrush when it comes out in the next several weeks. That way I can send all my Poser content there if I want to render realism. Haven't decided yet tho. Will wait and see.

"And despite everyone's trepidation, Hivewire is making some pretty good strides towards making Dawn a viable Poser figure. Depending on which way Poser goes with their tech, will determine which way Dawn goes, I think."

IMHO the above quote is the same old problem.
Poser has always promoted itself as "the ultimate Figure design & animation tool"

OK.. hyperbole or not poser is primarily a Figure based Tool and a good one at that overall.

Unlike Autodesk Max etc.,poser is not (nor should it attempt to be)
A full CG visual Effects solution.

Now if your primary purpose is figures why would you sit around and wait for some third party to produce the very thing that is the core of your programs purpose....."a viable Poser figure."

Not a very good business model IMHO.

I mean even assuming Hivewire ,or whomever , is on the verge of creating a
"killer figure" one unfortunate round of an improperly refrigerated shrimp salad at the hivewire annual picnic and SM is left hanging.

"funny thing is the same mesh
if it's a Character.Max ya can ask $600.00 what ever ya want thousands even.
Character .DAZ Poser $50.00
Character.Blender $10.00
All for the same mesh.
So where ya going to sell your characters ?"

Rorrkorn it is not just a Matter of it being the "same" Collection of polygons/vertices

That Andor Kollar character ,on Turbosquid, is purpose built& rigged to animate and render in a $3000+ USD CG /VFX solution with the NATIVE Shaders of the default mental ray render engine of that platform.

Someone using Autodesk Max and needing a realistic CG stand-in for a VFX shot in some multi-Million Dollar Summer blockbuster or even a well funded indie project, is not going to balk at its $600 price.

it is a Different user market at that level.

just like the steak fries at Celebrity Chef Ramsey's Manhattan Restaurant
will cost ALOT more than your order of large fries at McDonald's Despite the fact
they used the exact same raw potatoes.

My website

YouTube Channel

I drive a biped (legs), can't afford a car :-(

Quote -
I drive a biped (legs), can't afford a car :-(

I have them as well (legs) and use them in preference to the car when I can which includes when I am out with the dog. My dog gives the impression he would walk 24/7, the longest walk yet was close to three hours. After three hours I was fit for nothing while he did another 20 odd circuits of our garden at full pelt just to prove he had plenty left in him.

I use the car three times a week on average, twice to take my dog to an enclosed field where he can show just how fast he is. I have to do this as he chases cats if he is not on the lead so all walks are on the lead. I know most dogs chase cats but as he is a five year old lurcher he is fast enough to catch them. The other trip is the weekly shop for food.

Mind you the dog was adopted with the idea of making me walk more as otherwise I may never move away from my Poser screen.

I use Poser 13 on Windows 11 - For Scene set up I use a Geekcom A5 - Ryzen 9 5900HX, with 64 gig ram and 3 TB storage, mini PC with final rendering done on normal sized desktop using an AMD Ryzen Threadipper 1950X CPU, Corsair Hydro H100i CPU cooler, 3XS EVGA GTX 1080i SC with 11g Ram, 4 X 16gig Corsair DDR4 Ram and a Corsair RM 100 PSU . The desktop is in a remote location with rendering done via Queue Manager which gives me a clearer desktop and quieter computer room.

First, photorealism. I'm spoiled, don't even show me a 35mm shot, because none of them can stand up to a 4 x 5 Graphic. Even with an old lens. In 3d, forget it, not really possible. Whether the figures would support it, as it's a digital medium with limited resolution, it wouldn't make any difference. Close enough for most uses, but the argument will no doubt continue until people forget that there once were cameras that used film and chemical processsing.

3d figures, as in dawn. First impression, and I bought the whole package, sorry, you don't get a second chance. Period.

Cars. I'd look at any Jap car only after I had both thighs and both arms broken and the American automakers were gone. Now driving a 2009 PT Cruiser and love it. 1979 MG Midget in the garage, if you want to know what a maintenence headache is. Fun to drive when it's running right, but Doug's Auto Repair loves it too.

Doric.

The "I" in Doric is Silent.

Hehe, well Doric - my Tacoma was built in Kentucky, while my brother's Dodge - which is two years newer than my Tacoma - was built in Mexico. And he's already had to rebuild the engine, and is about to have to rebuild the transmission - which is another thing I hate - I will never drive an automatic. My truck is 5-speed manual, 4.3L V6, extend cab (not a double cab cause I hate those too) TRD offroad w/ towing package and and power everything. And everything on it, except the tail gate and tires, is still factory. The only major repairs I've ever had to do was replace the O2 sensors. The guy that had it before me busted up the tailgate somehow (from inside the bed, it wasn't a wreck), so that had to be replaced but was done by the dealer I bought it from. I paid $16K for it, and its trade-in value is still over $10K, private sale is around $12K, but I could actually get a good bit more than that if I tried, cause the body style is huge among Tacoma enthusiasts. The newer styles aren't so popular. Meanwhile, my brother's Dakota has a trade-in value of about $3K, in much better condition than his is in and his doesn't even have but just over 100K miles on it now. Tacomas are solid trucks and their engines last forever. I'm planning on putting a lift kit on it and some nice custom bumpers when I can afford it. It does need some new paint but nothin major.

As for walking vs driving, I would do that if I didn't live so far out in the country, but it would take me half a day to walk to the nearest grocery store, and I'd have to walk through some pretty rough neighborhoods to get there. Where I live you have to get on the interstate to go just about anywhere important, and you couldn't pay me to live in the city limits, where they want to tax you to death for every little thing and tell you what you can do with your own house and yard. No thanks. If I could live further out than where I live now then I would cause I don't like living in a neighborhood where everybody knows your business. I like my privacy.

I am in the process of restoring one of my old moutain bikes tho. I used to bike everywhere when I was younger and miss it quite a lot.

Anyway, not tryin to derail.

wolf359 your going to half to work on ya mind reading skills ;)
or eather I'm going to half to get better at writting ,wich is never going to happen. :(

Anyways what I'm trying to say is.
If your good enought to make realistic characters.
Then chances are your going to sell ya mesh for Max.
If ya good enought to sell $2000.00 meshes for Max."Nikola Dechev"
Then why would you sell meshes here for $50.00 ?

So I wouldn't hold my breath for out of the box,one click renders realistic characters for Poser

============================================================

The Artist that will fight for decades to conquer their media.
Even if you never know their name ,your know their Art.
Dark Sphere Mage Vengeance

Quote - And that's why we can't have nice things in Poser.

(Or at least not as nice things as the other kids have)

;-)

Anyway, my point was simply to demonstrate that the only thing preventing Poser from being a "one-click Photorealism" tool is it's lack of "one-click photorealism" figures.

The technology is out there, that's all what I'm saying.

BTW, the girl used here is just one of Azyx' static props. There is only one material zone, so the texture is just plugged into diffuse.

If you want a poseable figure, you'd have to buy one of the pre-rigged MAX versions and rig it yourself in Poser.

Of course as long as the community has a general "I'll wishlist it until there is a 50% sale" and "Realism is overrated anyway" attitude, no professional company will bother creating figures that use cutting edge technology just for Poser. Not for $500 and especially not for $5.

But if we really wanted, yes, we could have that coveted "Photorealism" thing easily.

:-)

Sorry. Figure still looks like a cutout. The light doesn't match the scene. As I said, baked in spec and shadows.

If you're suggesting that we can't have "nice things" because we're too critical, I'd say it's the exact opposite. We don't get photorealism because we regularly settle for less and tend to react badly to people who point out flaws.

I do think there is far too much criticism of people's figure creations. But when you suggest that something really is PHOTOREALISTIC, that's a remarkable claim that deserves to be examined in detail.

As for wishlisting until sale, when the marketplaces put items on sale every other day, you'd be throwing money away if you paid full price -- unless you need them immediately.

Mind you, I fully expect that people who are purchasing something they feel they NEED for a specific render (for a client, say), then they may full price because they're on deadline. But if it's just a WANT, because this is a hobby, there's no deadline beyond your personal patience because everything does go on sale eventually. And almost all your purchases are a matter of choice. They are 'luxury' items, no necessities.

If the marketplace wants people to stop waiting for sales, they should stop putting things on sale and just price them at the price they expect to sell them for.

Obviously, however, most MPs do have sales (even Adobe -- I bought photoshop CS5 on a 24 hour educational discount for everyone sale) -- because it increases revenue. So it's kinda silly to complain about it, doncha think?

PoserPro 2014, PS CS5.5 Ext, Nikon D300. Win 8, i7-4770 @ 3.4 GHz, AMD Radeon 8570, 12 GB RAM.

"Cars. I'd look at any Jap car only after I had both thighs and both arms broken and the American automakers were gone..."*

Bet you'd be glad of one if your life depended in it's reliability. I'd totally buy a Toyota, they're the most respected car maker in the world. Whenever I look into different countries for relocation it's amazing that whenever it comes to buying a car there, it's pretty much always the same "Just buy a Toyota and don't even think about anything else".

Click to discover why a certain Mod spends more time in his Toyota than under it

And if that's not convincing, here's part 2
And if that's not convincing, here's part 3

:woot:

I find it odd that the poll for the most repected/best car company is based on trade ins. If it was such a good car, why did they trade it in? And who did they actually ask? The dealers... Sort of makes it biased right off the bat.

The most reliable vehicle I ever owned was a 64 Dodge W200. It still ran fine when I got rid of it, but the body would have made swiss cheese jealous.

I had a 84 Honda Civic for years that I put about 400k on, and I bought it used. It rusted to pieces as well.

My 96 Lumina just recently expired, at 180k.

My 05 StI is on engine rebuild number 4, but that happens when you run 35+ psi of boost... Engines don't last long when run that much boost. (GT4088r turbo) It's my play toy... The rest of the car puts up with it, which says a lot about Subaru in general. Not to many drivetrains are designed to put up with all but 3 times the factory power output.

How long a car lasts has isn't just who built it.

Luck, how you drive it, and servicing it have a lot to do with it.

Some things are easy to explain, other things are not........ <- Store -> <-Freebies->

Quote - *
"Cars. I'd look at any Jap car only after I had both thighs and both arms broken and the American automakers were gone..."*

Bet you'd be glad of one if your life depended in it's reliability. I'd totally buy a Toyota, they're the most respected car maker in the world. Whenever I look into different countries for relocation it's amazing that whenever it comes to buying a car there, it's pretty much always the same "Just buy a Toyota and don't even think about anything else".

Click to discover why a certain Mod spends more time in his Toyota than under it

And if that's not convincing, here's part 2
And if that's not convincing, here's part 3

:woot:

Heh. One of my boyfriends in university drove a 1981 Datsun that I think he bought for about $500. And he literally drove it into the ground. He drove for a year without a functioning clutch. Getting up hills was difficult. He would sometimes have to open the door and stick his leg out to push the car over the hill. For steeper hills, if he was unlucky enough to have to stop at a light, he'd jump out of his car and ask the guy behind to push him through the light. Engine kept running despite all sorts of abuse of this sort. Eventually, he grabbed the user manual and fixed the thing himself. Took him about a month to figure it out. It wouldn't surprise me to find that he still drove it. Toyotas are like that -- only even more so.

PoserPro 2014, PS CS5.5 Ext, Nikon D300. Win 8, i7-4770 @ 3.4 GHz, AMD Radeon 8570, 12 GB RAM.

**
@David**
Sorry, can't agree on that, Toyota are the goto maker if you want reliability, it's nothing to do with luck and everything to do with reliable engineering - they've earned their reputation across the world. It's because of their reputation that they chose to try and kill a Toyota.

@Moriador
I agree, and as they say ... "The Car in Front is a Toyota".
It's a sight David has often experienced while having his Dodge towed by one!

Haha, just kidding, David :biggrin:

Yeah, that Toyota is badass cool. It would make a wicked getaway car and it's perfect for carrying lots of headless Vickies in the back after a culling trip!!!

Later,
Roxie - Girl With Blade

Something Pumeco and I can actually agree on. LOL.

That video made me all misty-eyed. No joke. I'm tellin ya, Toyota trucks are beasts and they just don't know how to quit. If you've never owned one then you just won't understand until you do. After watchin that vid, and after the customs that I'm wantin to do to mine (check out tacoma world forums for some sweet custom mods), I know I'll be ready for whenever the zombie apocalypse gets here. LOL.

(Click for a picture of my baby - from back when I was livin in FL for animation school)

I can't say the same for their cars tho. They just don't seem to have the same longevity that the trucks do. And with all these BS regulations requiring the electronic crap be added to them, those are the parts that cause the most problems. Like my O2 sensors, that the engine doesn't actually need to run, but the feds want them in there, and when they go bad they can cause a lot of other problems. And no, you couldn't pay me to even ride in a Prius, much less buy one. Electricity is for blenders and toaster ovens. Gas is for cars and trucks. I won't even use an electric mower. Maybe when they get some real power under their hoods and can run for more than 2 hours, I'll reconsider it. But probably not.

And yes, I'm one of them rednecks that wants some trucknutz (google it) just cause they're hilarious to see, and cause I hate-hate-hate when people refer to their trucks as 'she'. lol. But I haven't been brave enough for that yet cause they can get you tickets. There's a case going right now about an old woman who took it to court over free speech violations, when she got a ticket for $400. Case is still pending.

As for trade-ins, Tacomas are pretty hard to find used, at least around here. And when you do, it's likely at a Toyota dealer, from someone who traded for a newer model, cause many these days are all about the bling-bling, shiny and new. Pretty sure that was the case with mine. It took me a few weeks to find mine at a price I could afford and in a condition that I was happy with. You can check Kelley Blue Book and compaire their values with any other truck in the same age and class - Tacomas will always be the highest rated and highest valued, and KBB is known for being pretty accurate. My county uses it as one of their guages for annual property taxes (which is still around $225/yr for my 12 yr old truck).

Oh, and my insurance is $29 a month - due in large part to it's safety rating. It's just liability but even full coverage would only cost me about $60.

Hey Pumeco - you could always get a Robin! LOLOL

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QQh56geU0X8

I about died laughing watching that craziness. I didn't even realize this was a real car at first - if you can even call it a car. I thought it was some kind of experimental thing they did for that show, but nope, no experiment at all - just mental. At least folks in the US have enough common sense to make this special brand of stupid illegal in most places. Do you even have to wonder why? not to mention the designers obviously haven't grasped the basic laws of physics that deal with balance. But I must thank them for the high levels of humor learning about this wonder of design has brought to my day.

A 1980 Datson station wagon was my first car. My uncle gave it to me after he drove it for proly 15 years. It did run good but boy was it ugly as hell and embarrassing to drive. LOL. It's still parked in my parents backyard under another 10+ years of pine straw and who knows what living in it.

Actually my very first car was a 71 (or 2) 3-speed Rally Sport Camero, but I never got to drive it. When I got it, the gas tank was in the trunk and the mufler and some other parts in the back seat. It was white and rust. My dad got it for me as one of those father-son projects when I turned 15 and got my permit. But we never could get it to run for more than 5 or 10 minutes and even then it wasn't all that safe. And my dad is a mechanic most of his life. His front yard looks like a parking lot. Back when he was in his mid 20s, the county actually sent him a notice that if he bought and sold another vehicle he'd have to apply for a dealer's license.

ANYWAY... now that this thread has been thuroughly hi-jacked. Sorry. Don't even know how it got side-tracked to cars but I'm just as guilty here for that one.

I did want to say tho, back on topic - that one thing, which I meant to mention in a previous post - that bugs me about all the photo-realism and hi-res textures and such, is this:

http://www.renderosity.com/mod/forumpro/media/folder_11/file_507223.jpg

This example, from Wolf, isn't too bad, but it's not just the burned-in highlights that bug me (I don't see much of that in this image), but also the burned-in wrinkles and folds that wind up looking like scars or magic markers most of the time because they're just not natural-looking at all. I'm pointing specifically to the wrinkles in the forehead, and under the chin. Too many texture artists try using these lines instead of blending them out and creating displacement maps to create the folds in the skin, the way it should be done if you're aiming for realism. Those lines are created by the lighting in real life and how that light passes through the skin (sub-surface scatter), not the skin color itself. The skin will sometimes blend into a bit of a darker area around those wrinkles, but if you look in a mirror, and stretch out the wrinkles in your own forehead, you will usually see that the creases themselves, when flattened, are whiter than the rest of the skin around them.

You see this especially right along the creases of butt cheeks and thighs. Someone just posted a render of a Dawn character in another thread recently, where those butt-crease lines look like really bad surgery scars. They don't even follow the bends of the model in different poses, because those creases in real life are more shadow than anything else. It's horrible when used in textures and takes away from the realism in any image, regardless of how realistic the rest of the lighting and scene might look.

And I think also this is one of the big reasons why older characters aren't seen very often, cause the few who do try doing older people, want to fill the faces and bodies with wrinkles, which wind up looking like the Carver (from Nip-Tuck) got hold of them. It's just bad looking. Let the wrinkles be created by displacement maps and lighting, not the texture itself.

This is especially apparent in hand/finger textures, where the skin on the knuckles show all the wrinkles from the photo. Makes the hands look dirty like they've been diggin in things and places they shouldn't be diggin in.

You can't just clone a skin from 3d.sk over a UV map and pass it off as photo real. Those skin photos need a lot of prep work to blend out highlights AND shadows, along with the specs of dirt and hairs and bits that are often found.

That and these extremely flat, plastic doll ears. No two ears look exactly alike in real life - they are as unique as finger prints and irises, and yet every figure has the same perfect, volumeless ears that look more like deformed cookies stuck to the sides of a head. For those that do custom head sculpts, they should really pay more attention to the ears.

Anyway, thats my rant on psuedo-photo real. Why I almost never buy pre-made skin textures/character sets cause it's so hard to find the ones that are done well with attention to detail.

Hey Pumeco - you could always get a Robin! LOLOL***https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QQh56geU0X8***

I about died laughing watching that craziness...

LMFAO, I'm not kidding, I almost bust a gut watching that :lol: :lol: :lol:

I can tell you're jealous, you saw that sexy Starsky and Hutch custom and desperately want to swap it for your Toyota. Nah, never saw that episode before, but that really was a real vehicle you could actually buy, there used to be quite a few of them. The advantages were that they were made out of GRP so they never rusted, and because they had three wheels you could drive them on a bike licence. Even a complete idiot could maintain and fix one, and they were cheap to insure as well.

That said, don't underesimate the British humour, it's Top Gear and you know what they're like for laying on the hunmour and exaggerating it!

That was super-funny but to be honest they didn't really roll that easy, they were surprisingly sturdy and people even track race them. And I tell you what, if they really were so powerful they could do wheelies like that, they'd be getting stolen non stop. The reality is you'd get locked in a mental institute if you stole one for that sort of thing :biggrin:

Nice beastie you have there, but shame on you for not giving her a name. I thought all men do that with their cars, just like they do with boats etc. People (including me) even do it with electrical gear sometimes, refering to it as a she. But yup, that three-wheeler is very real, and if you were to search Robin, Rialto, or Reliant you'll see all the owners clubs appear, they have a cult following these days.

Ok, back On topic or Clarkie will get mad.

BTW, Shane, check this one out as well:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dJfSS0ZXYdo

Ok, I'll shut-up now.

While I agree that there are textures floating around that have too much burned in specularity and shadows, I completely disagree that textures used for Poser (Or Studio) should be sanitized of all highlights or photographic detail to be useful.

There is a limit what displacement can do, that's why DAZ developed the HD morphing system.

But there is also a limit what the native render engines in Poser (Or Studio, for that matter) can do.

So going "all displacement" or "all sculpting" won't give you the 100% perfect Photorealism you're after. Maybe with a high end render engine, but not using Firefly.

You "pay" with a lot of additional work and render time (High res displacement maps or very high res subdivision), while getting little back in return.

And if you want to edit out all what makes a photographic texture an actual photograph, why bother with taking a photograph in the first place ?

If I follow your logic, given that every detail is physically there, a pink floodfill texture (maybe with a clever procedural shader) would be all what's needed to create a photorealistic looking render of a human being.

You "theoretically" might be right, but I doubt this approach would be practical in any way - Especially when we're talking "One click" photorealism.

Quote -
I did want to say tho, back on topic - that one thing, which I meant to mention in a previous post - that bugs me about all the photo-realism and hi-res textures and such, is this:

http://www.renderosity.com/mod/forumpro/media/folder_11/file_507223.jpg

This example, from Wolf, isn't too bad, but it's not just the burned-in highlights that bug me (I don't see much of that in this image), but also the burned-in wrinkles and folds that wind up looking like scars or magic markers most of the time because they're just not natural-looking at all. I'm pointing specifically to the wrinkles in the forehead, and under the chin. Too many texture artists try using these lines instead of blending them out and creating displacement maps to create the folds in the skin, the way it should be done if you're aiming for realism. Those lines are created by the lighting in real life and how that light passes through the skin (sub-surface scatter), not the skin color itself. The skin will sometimes blend into a bit of a darker area around those wrinkles, but if you look in a mirror, and stretch out the wrinkles in your own forehead, you will usually see that the creases themselves, when flattened, are whiter than the rest of the skin around them.

You see this especially right along the creases of butt cheeks and thighs. Someone just posted a render of a Dawn character in another thread recently, where those butt-crease lines look like really bad surgery scars. They don't even follow the bends of the model in different poses, because those creases in real life are more shadow than anything else. It's horrible when used in textures and takes away from the realism in any image, regardless of how realistic the rest of the lighting and scene might look.

And I think also this is one of the big reasons why older characters aren't seen very often, cause the few who do try doing older people, want to fill the faces and bodies with wrinkles, which wind up looking like the Carver (from Nip-Tuck) got hold of them. It's just bad looking. Let the wrinkles be created by displacement maps and lighting, not the texture itself.

This is especially apparent in hand/finger textures, where the skin on the knuckles show all the wrinkles from the photo. Makes the hands look dirty like they've been diggin in things and places they shouldn't be diggin in.

You can't just clone a skin from 3d.sk over a UV map and pass it off as photo real. Those skin photos need a lot of prep work to blend out highlights AND shadows, along with the specs of dirt and hairs and bits that are often found.

I do agree with this. I think texturing is an artform (At least that's what I tell the guy I do characters with). You have to know what to take out and what to keep in to strike a balance. Sometimes taking out something wipes out detail, so some of has to stay. And it does depend on what render engine you use as well. And as you texture, you have to render it in the target engine--not the one in the texturing program to see how it looks. The forehead wrinkle are annoying as is forgetting to take out the eye creases so when you close the model's eyes theres not this big line going across. I've also had to go back and clean the spec around the sides of the mouth as well. I think the more non-biased renders (such as Octane and Luxrender) need a cleaner texture for more realistic results because you aren't faking the lighting so you don't need as much tricks in the skin detail.

Quote - That and these extremely flat, plastic doll ears. No two ears look exactly alike in real life - they are as unique as finger prints and irises, and yet every figure has the same perfect, volumeless ears that look more like deformed cookies stuck to the sides of a head. For those that do custom head sculpts, they should really pay more attention to the ears.

I try to play with ears shapes as well on my morphs... and hands, feet, back, nostrils, and glutes too ;)

You don't have to take out all the detail, but a lot of it does need to be knocked back a good bit in the wrinkles and such. Otherwise it looks like dirt. And the splotchiness. Oh my gawd the splotchiness. It's very easy to spot a skin that was cobbled together in photoshop, most of the time. Skin texturing is very much an art form, yes. And there are artists that can air brush skin textures in zbrush that looks just as real as any photo. I understand artists who are just starting out and don't have a lot of resources to put into their software, that's fine. I'm not pointing at them. But for those artists who have been at this a long time and are making a living from it, there's no excuse for them to not have the proper tools (software) to do the job the way it needs to be done. And displacement maps are not that taxing on a machine these days, if the machine is worth using.

Quote - Hehe, well Doric - my Tacoma was built in Kentucky,

You say built, you mean assembled. Engine, transmission, suspension, the expensive parts, all made outside the U.S. Bodywork is cheap, punch presses and forming presses, there's less than half a minute actual work time on any body panel. Body panels then assembled and welded by robots. I'm not certain any of the body parts were manufactured in the US either, probably came by boat from the orient.

My 2004 Dakota finally needed engine work a couple of months ago, replaced one spark plug. Granted, it has less than 38000 miles, but those are not the good kind of miles, I don't drive out of town without a very good reason, so that's 99% town miles. 2 miles from my home to the bank, and that's about as far as I drive normally.

Enough car crap, if you like your Atoyot, continue, but I'll never drive any jap car. Dodge and Chrysler have always been a good choice for me, I'll stick with what I know works.

Doric.

The "I" in Doric is Silent.

Forum: Poser - OFFICIAL

Subject: Is Photorealism your goal in Poser?

The following is taken from Kyle Lambert's Info page at his website about the Morgan Freeman painting...

"The world's most realistic finger-painting.

Finger painting in the extreme

Inspiration