Warning: Do not buy Poser 6 yet

Poser 6 creates incompatible BVH exports. These can be corrected with simple poses by editing the BVH file, but for more complex animations, it is very difficult. Until a solution is found for cleanly exporting BVH files, I would advise sticking with Poser 5.

If you do have a simple pose, remove this section from the BVH file in a text editor:

ROOT GoalCenterOfMass
{
OFFSET 0.00 0.00 0.00
CHANNELS 6 Xposition Yposition Zposition Zrotation Xrotation Yrotation
JOINT CenterOfMass
{
OFFSET 0.000000 0.000000 0.000000
CHANNELS 3 Zrotation Xrotation Yrotation
End Site
{
OFFSET 0.000000 0.000000 -13.610587
}
}
}

Also, you need to remove the even frames in the frame data, for example:

(I am leaving off the full frame data because each frame is quite long)
MOTION
Frames: 2
Frame Time: 0.033333
0.000000 46.176777 0.000000 0.000000 0.000000 0.000000 -0.341797
0.000000 0.000000 0.000000 0.000000 0.000000 0.000000 0.000000
0.000000 46.176777 0.000000 0.000000 0.000000 0.000000 -0.584744
0.000000 0.000000 0.000000 0.000000 0.000000 0.000000 0.000000

You need to remove the two even frames that are all zeroes, so it looks like this:

MOTION
Frames: 2
Frame Time: 0.033333
0.000000 46.176777 0.000000 0.000000 0.000000 0.000000 -0.341797
0.000000 46.176777 0.000000 0.000000 0.000000 0.000000 -0.584744

Thank you Cristiano for posting what it will take to make it work! Sound way to hard to do for every pose. Even simple ones. The more advanced ones would be horid to try to fix!

I have lots of Hard drive spce so I will leave Poser 6 there. I hope someday someone will make a fix for it. I doubt LL or curious labs will anytime soon if at all.

I can get Poser Artist Fourth Edition or Poser 5 @ Amazon.com for $92 or 1$49 for Poser 5

Sometimes paying more to not have to edit files like this is worth it. I am just not happy I have to.

Thank you to everyone here for the help.

My gosh, Ano -- how inconvenient. Is this technically a bug that needs to be fixed by Curious Labs? Well I'm no animator but I appreciate the heads-up so I can warn others too.

Hey Coos... hope to see you in Brigadoon soon, or inworld in general.

Torley,

Techinically it is not a bug - it is a change in the bone structure that Poser 6 exports - it has an extra section that is used by the auto-balancing feature. Unfortunately, its presence renders the file incompatible not just with SL, but other tools that import BVH. I imagine it will be patched pretty quickly by Curious Lab in some way. I have a support ticket open with them on it so hopefully I will hear something soon.

Cristiano,

Thanks for the heads up on this. I'm in the early stages of learning Poser Artist, and was wondering whether I should upgrade to the shiny new version -- you've definitely settled that one for now.

I do have one question, though. What's your initial impression of the program: Is the interface better? Are there any new features that are useful for SL animations? Have you played with 6 enough to tell yet?

Obviously, it doesn't matter until they fix the BVHs, but I was just wondering for down the road.

Thanks,

sw

does this apply to the PC version, Mac version or both???

Ive found that files created in Poser6 will open in P Artist. One small workaround.

The primary advantages to P6 over P Artist for me is the multiple views and the direct manipulation tool.

http://www.curiouslabs.com/article/articleview/1393/1/596/

That page has a python script that will strip the data with a few clicks. I havent tried it yet but apparently it should work with animations as well as poses and is pretty quick and foolproof.

Just tried it and the script seems to work ok. I have not tired on anything complex yet. Just a simple arms flap.