I have just been cruising through the new stuff here in the galleries and else where. One comment that seems to sound through Poserdom is needs a shadow or you forgot the shadow or something like that. What is the fixation with shadows?? I only started putting them in after so many people said that I need shadaws. Personally I think that the shadows hide a lot of the hard work that people go through to get a scene just right with all the right props and the pose just right, only have most of it lost in the shadows. If you are going for that dark, mysterious look then shadows are great. Otherwise why use shadows? I realized that a goal for a great many people is photo realism and that is why shadows seem to be important. I never got that either but that's for another day.

Butch, actually, besides the photo realism, a complex scene the shadows can be used to highlight a piece of the image, increasing it's importance. like a face glowing in the shadows in a dimly lit booth in a bar, the glass/drink on the table a sugestion of reflections that hints at the rest of the figure. this effect draws the eye to the details in the shading of the shadows, which increases the apreciation for the complete complexity of the image.

I didn't mean that shadows aren't important in some pictures... What I did mean to say, was that it seems that some people are hug up on shadows. If a picture is perfect except that it lacks shadows, that's all that seems to be notice. you forgot the shadows, oh by the way nice pic kinda thing. I realized too that I in a very small minority when it comes to things like shadows or the lack of them and going against the grain when it comes to photo realism.

For me, a missing shadow where one obviously ought to be detracts from the quality of an image. It sticks out like messed up joints Poser is famous for. It's really a matter of attention to detail.

The main problem with the lack of shadows is that the people seem to be floating and not actually on the ground. Emily

Butch, the image is not necessarily lost in the shadows. You have complete control of how intense you want the shadow to be and at what resolution the shadow map is also. I'd suggest you do a search for tutorials on lighting or visit Poser Arcana and you'll learn to have as much control over your shadows as you like.

I agree with Butch, in the sense that lots of gallery comments seem to focus purely on the technical, not on the conceptual. Though often, of course, that's all you can say about a gallery image: look, another Vicky gazing into the middle distance! Nice hair, dude.

will, the dials and big goopey buttons for working in poser are pretty much completely useless for fine detail control. and the click the dial settings and type the numbers is extremely quircky, takes forever for poser to recognise what you are doing and accept it. pan & zoom of camera should be sliders not buttons. add up and down incremental arrow buttons on side, like corel, photoshop, psp, and most other programs use. the joints will always be bad, as long as spherical fall-off zones are used. there is not one joint in the human body with a 360 global rotation capability, yet according to poser they all are. the joints need to have human movement limitations put into them, and that is actually a coding issue, joint editor won't allow the limit to be altered properly.

I agree with Butch. I see a lot of comments about shadows that really seem to rely more on the "popular wisdom" that a shadow will make your model look like it's standing on the ground, than on anything rational or thought out. It seems to be something that just flows out of people's keyboards before they engage their eyes and brain - a sort of default comment people feel a need to make even if it isn't appropriate. I've seen renders where the shadow completely fails to make the model look like it's on the ground but people don't comment on the floating look. I've also seen renders where the model looks very much on the ground despite not having a shadow, and of course half a dozen people jump in and say "needs a shadow". Next time you're outside on a cloudy day, take a look at the ground. How obvious is your shadow? Does it look like you're floating just because there isn't one? Often shadows DO help make a model look like it's on the ground, but it's not automatic and it isn't always necessary. Wheter or not you use shadows really depends on what you're trying to do. I use them in most of my renders, but not all.

"Who knows what evil lurks in the minds of mem?"