Is Poser any good?

Am considering getting a copy of Poser 5. How easy/difficult is it to use (for making SL-friendly animations)? I have some computer modeling/animation experience,* but I've never animated a realistic human figure. Would I be in over my head?

Also I hear horror stories about the program being a chronic crasher. True? (I know it takes a big slab of memory.)


Thanks ahead of time to any replies


Olympia


*got a AA degree in computer animation years ago and understand basic modeling/animation concepts: keyframe, squash n' streach, walk cycles, euler(xyz) positions and so on.

With your background it will probably be pretty good.

As a novice, it is fairly intimidating program to me. I have not spent a lot of time with it, but it looks like a powerful program.

I have heard some people claim Poser is difficult. I had several years of frame based proggy's like Flash and others. I picked up Poser pretty quickly although I'm still no expert. You can get into it fast and get the poses or gestures you want as long as you pay attention to detail. (It's always bad to have your arm come shooting thru your head while dancing)

Pick it up and you will be able to learn it. If your comp runs SL you can use it. If you don't get bored with human movement, you can have alot of enjoyment from it.

Enjoy.

Poser's VERY easy to use. I actually highly reccomend it to a beginner.

Follows Angels sentiment...its all in your ability to comprehend the computer. If you pick up on programs rather quickly then you will do well. If you have a problem finding the on switch to the PC it may be very difficult to grasp.

Shadow.

In the past I've played with various 3d programs -- From Sculpt 4d on the Amiga to Maya.... I've never been *great* at them, but I found Poser really easy to start using.

I'm using Poser 4, and I've not had it crash yet - I even run it at the same time as Second Life.

I had my first couple of basic animations in a day or two - and the more I play with it the easier it becomes.

Siggy.

I strongly recommend getting your hands on an older version of Poser. P5 needs awfully lot of system resources and you'll only need the basic features anyway.

If youre only animating for SL, get P4.
Curious Labs are re-selling P4 as "Poser Artist" for ~$109, or you may get the older release cheaper somewhere.

Oh, and I've seen Poser 3 on a couple of 3d magazine coverdiscs (but I don't think it's freeware). If it has BVH exporting it would be enough, as the models you'll be working with are P2 era.

I would not call poser "good."

My poser beats up excel, smokes, and takes the lunch money from smaller applications.

But I do find it easy to use, powerful, and reliable.

(edit: dang I can't spell)

iT'S BETTER THEN SEX! ~

No it isnt sensual Only sex is better then sex.

lol

Then you must be doing something wrong!

Haha Sensual i take my poser to bed hehe

I'm a non-animator (although I am a geek) and I find it OK to use. The interface takes a little getting used to but if you have any kind of talent, you should be bale to generate decent content if you follow the guidelines published in the various forums.

I do have on problem tho - I have some poses and I'm trying to build an animation with the poses as key frames. The key frames are correct, but the interpolation sends the limbs all over the place. Anybody know why?

Yes.

It's because Poser uses splines to interpolate between the keyframes. You can either break the splines or convert them to linear interpolation.

This can be done by clicking on the key-shaped button down in the lower right corner of the Poser window and then selecting regions of green squares and clicking on the "break spline" or "linear" buttons.

A better way to do it is to open up an animation graph. From there you can see a green line (the spline) which smoothly varies between keyframes, which are represented as black plus signs. Again, from here you can break the spline, convert to linear, or even add additional keyframes on a per-limb basis to tack down the spline. I use a combination of all three depending on the motion required.

If you're doing a long animation, I recommend saving the fixing 'o the splines until the end. Sometimes the addition of extra intermediate keyframes can complicate things if the animation requires tweaking.

~Ulrika~

Thanks Ulrika, I'll go try that tonight