I use several figures to tell a story, like three or four people which with clothes and hair can add up to twelve characters in a scene. I convert all shoe characters to props. This, with other props, easily exceeds fifty megs. My computer chokes at around fifty, and depending on how frilly things aren't I have rendered up to fifty five megs, but choked on forty five. My computer goes non-responsive and all CPU/Memory is at 100%. What can be done to reduce the file size/render time problem: 1. Eliminate unused morphs (like facial that aren't being used in a particular character)? 2. Lower the resolution and file size of textures? 3. Use textures rather than 3d object for some props? What?

Gordon

• Eliminating morphs would be tedious, and it might not free the RAM until the scene was closed and re-opened.
• Yes, 2 is a big help. A 4000X4000 (hi-res) texture occupies 64 MB of RAM, for example, while a 2000X2000 map only hogs 16 MB.
• If 3 means using backdrops (like Nerd's) rather than props, definitely.
• Another trick is to convert a figure with many morphs to an obj file and use that in your renderer, rather than a cr2 file.
• Turn off un-needed shadow maps or reduce their size to 1024 or even 256 if possible.

Thanks, anything will help ... adding Eve with clothes and conforming hair adds up to over twenty megs. The Millenium Family are megmonsters.

Gordon

Sometimes this might help, but not always possible: First render the people/objects further from the camera, then (using that render as background) render those closer to the camera. On Mac, increasing the RAM available to Poser can increase the number of figures you can render.

Turning off bump maps will also speed up render time and romoving references to them should reduce memory usage if you save and close, then re-open poser afterward. Transparency, bumps and shadows all increase render time. Do without them where you can. I usually composite several renders, using each one as a background for the next and doing a little cutting and pasting if necessary to get the shadows right. Go for low polygon props where you can also. That saves render time and hard disk space.

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What makes the Millenium series so much of a meghog, the resolution/facets? How much can be achieved by morph reduction as so many of the morphs are not needed once a character is created? Eliminating morphs is relatively easy with Morphmanager but facets is a fixed phenomenon. I use simple geometries for props but make up for it, I guess, with lots of bumps and transparencies (to cut holes in things or make parts temporarily disappear.

Gordon

Attached Link: http://www.renderosity.com/viewed.ez?galleryid=93357&Start=1&Artist=Ajax&ByArtist=Yes

Yep, the Millenium figures have about twice as many polygons as the Poser 4 people. That's the main thing that makes them resource hogs. Often the textures used with them are very large, which doesn't help. Their clothes and hair tend to be high resolution as well so that adds more. Additionally, render time is slowed down by the high res bump maps they often have. I don't think the morphs slow down renders but I'm sure they eat up RAM. They are also one of the things that make your pz3s so big, so yeah, get rid of them and see how much it helps. Morphs vary in size according to how many faces they affect. They are smaller than the equivalent amount of geometry because they don't contain the full set of info, but they are still a very substantial proportion of a pz3 or a cr2. Compare the size of Victoria LE with Vicky 2 and you'll see just how much difference those morphs make. Your best bet is to "layer" different renders. Take a look at the link to see a pic in my gallery that has 3 millenium figures, 4 poser people, clothes and hair for all of them, 3 high res robots and a bunch of medium res props. This was done with only 128 Meg of RAM. The final pic was made up of five separate renders, each containing just a few figures. Each pic was imported as a background to the next. To reveal shadows from previous layers, I loaded each render into Photoshop and then cut away parts of the upper layers to reveal the earlier renders beneath. The camera angle was saved so it would be consistent in all renders and the position of a few reference props was used as a guide for placing the figures. Like doozy says, start with the ones at the back and work forward. Also, close absolutely everything except Poser while you work. If you have pretty wallpaper on your computer, get rid of it and use a single colour background. Do everything you can to give Poser all the available RAM.

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Thanks, those are all good recommendations. Poser can be a lot of work. But since I can't draw a straight line.......

Gordon

If you can live without shadows, un-check "Cast Shadows" in the Render Options window.

I'm just getting the knack of using lights. I usually un-check "Cast Shadows" to test render to check textures and transparencies, then recheck, render and re-read "War and Peace".

Gordon