Renderotica

I still see things for V4 pop up in the store at '*deleted*from time to time, but you have to keep in mind that the figure is now four generations old. She was the last of the DAZ figures to be designed just for Poser, and Smith Micro has done a terrible job at putting out good base figures of their own. DAZ has kept on developing theirs, to the point that they are light years ahead of V4 in flexibility, morphability, and cross-figure compatibility, just to name a few things. Say what you will about DAZ's business practices, they are on their A game with the figure creation. If you were a vendor intending to make money, which figures would you focus your time and effort towards, the ones that are popular and will generate a lot of sales, or a figure that's been out for 13 years and is severely limited compared to the current generation? That's a rhetorical question, you don't have to answer it. ;)

I get your frustration, I really do. I started with Poser using version 4 back in 2000. I upgraded when new versions came out, bought the latest figures when they came out, and continued to enjoy it for 16 years. When Genesis was introduced, with all the DSON bullshit that went along with it to get it into Poser, I gave up on adding new figures and continued using V4/M4. I was fine with that for a while, the market for new V4 content was still strong for some time. And, I railed at DAZ for abandoning the community that had given rise to their very existence. But I also realized that if I was going to continue in this hobby, I was going to have to adapt and learn something new, which for someone like myself that's very set in their ways, isn't always easy. But new and useful V4 content started to show up less and less. The DAZ Studio Iray images that were showing up in the galleries made my work like like a week old dumpster fire.

So, I decided to get over myself and learn to use Studio. I've been using it exclusively for this hobby since 2016. I do not regret that I took the leap, but I can understand your reluctance to do so. I have spent thousands of dollars on new content, and many hours learning the software. YouTube tutorials helped a lot, as well as asking questions here and elsewhere. But, you're almost starting over, and that's a hard pill to swallow. I don't know how long you've been using Poser, but if you were invested over a decade and a half into it like I was, the change is rather daunting.

Having said all of that, if you are a diehard Poser user and wish to continue to use it with V4, just know that you're going to be working with a vintage figure that will have limited if any support from here on out. Believe me, I'd love to see DAZ and SM work together again like they used to, I'd love to see SM address what I see as the shortcomings in Poser, I'd love to see them go all in on figure creation, and to create their own versions of the technology that DS uses, i.e. autofit, geografting, cross-figure compatibility, and so on. I'll be honest though, I don't see any of that happening, and that's really a shame to me. 

On a side note, if you want to use Poser and want a better female figure, look at Erogenesis' Project Evolution. The content creators haven't latched onto her like I had hoped they would, Ero put his heart and soul into her for several years. But she's way ahead of V4.

I fault no one for making and selling what they wish.  It would kind of be like faulting Ford for not making a Toyota.  I was just simply wondering if vendors did not see any market any more for V4 and poser and were going to just stick with Daz Studio.  I've got a lot of "stuff" in poser and V4 and didn't want to start over.  It seems like Daz is putting out newer versions of Genesis every other day (I know not really but you get the point) and don't know if I want to play the keep up game.  I will eventually pull the Daz Studio trigger, but am in no hurry.  Got lots of poser and V4 stuff to play with for a long time.  The new SASHA-16 by Karina at *deleted* is great and my new V4 base.  I agree with the fact that Daz does no longer supports a figure that made them so successful in the first place.  I too, feel abandoned by them, but unfortunately all good things must come to an end.  Understandably you can't keep selling the same thing forever.  At some pint you have to move forward, as will I.  For the time being, though, I still but a lot ov V4 for poser items from those that create them.

Edited by user Sunday, January 20, 2019 2:16:36 PM(UTC)  | Reason: Not specified

Originally Posted by: dieterderblau

DAZ fucked us

Blame Smith Micro. I can understand they wanted to be cautious about supporting the new generation way back in 2011, but they have not moved a finger to correct that mistake in almost a decade. It´s their job only.

DAZ has it´s own software, content and users, everything constantly growing and it´s not their responsibility to keep the competition floating or being limited by abandonware. This is a bussiness, not charity.

DAZ STUDIO USER SINCE 2006

To say that Daz doesn't support V4 isn't telling the whole story. I mean they do still sell V4/M4, even though they probably don't bring in a ton of money. Daz doesn't make any new clothes/accessories for V4/M4, but, then again, they don't make most of the stuff that's for sale in the store. It's up to the published artists. Daz doesn't tell their PAs what to make, they're all free to do what they want, and they're probably going to do what's most profitable.

V4/M4 support (and Poser support in general) is falling for a few reasons. Some artists are switching over to DS because it's easier to work with. Some artists are quitting the hobby altogether or dying, unfortunately. New people coming into the hobby are more likely to chose DS, with it's bright shiny interface and tons of characters to sell content for. As the two programs grow farther apart, feature-wise, it gets harder for an artist to make content for both.

You can't blame Daz for wanting to make a profit. They sank a lot of money into Genesis 1-8 and Daz Studio in general. That's where the money is, and that's where they focus. There's nothing stopping a PA from making V4/M4 content and selling it in Daz's store. Most PAs sell on *deleted* because they know that's where V4/M4 buyers expect to find their content.

I don't often defend Daz, but most of the blame here goes to Smith Micro(and E-frontier and CuriousLabs.) They decided not to update Poser with the new features Daz wanted. They also decided to focus mostly on maintaining Poser while ignoring their content store. Now, most of the money is in content and people expect to get the software for free. I'd say Smith Micro's best move would be to partner with Erogenesis and promote Project Evolution as their main character(plus make a male to match).

Sorry for the wall of text. TL/DR: Can't blame Daz for wanting to make money. Blame Poser for not updating with the times.

Originally Posted by: dieterderblau

Fucking industry wouldn't even EXIST without the software no one wants to support anymore.

 

I second that.

Poser is the most abused or rather mis-used/used not in intention of designer - even above Flash.

Poser started as a 'virtual artist dummy' sold in comic book/magazine back pages - for the legion of wanna-be comics artists during the "Comic book boom".

It flopped, dying with the comics boom and got given away in computer CD-Rom magazines.  Then enough 3d enthusiasts who didn't want to spend $6K for MAYA, $2K for classes, $40K for a computer setup that'd run the stupid bloatware and render a single image at old school CRT quality in less than a week - OR they could use Poser, buy some props, use photoshop or other edit programs and make images.  So the market developed.

DAZ tried to take control, making an analogue program that ran stuff for 'free' kinda ok...

Frankly any Renderotica user should hate DAZ - they originaly didn't allow or want any 'genitals' - just look at the 'naughty bits' section to the way back - ways to get around deliberate 'smoothness' in meshes that made it hard to just morph genitals in.  Ironically DAZ is used for stuff that'd make TOS go explodey - check out Pixiv - coz when you do spend a few hundered for their stuff you can put the bits and outfits on ANY size of girl...  However they have some kind of "DRM" software that gives them an open door.  On the surface its to make sure you didn't pirate the stuff, which is also a big issue - but I'd love to be forced to pay for the Troll again coz I got him on a CDRom I might not be able to find years ago and then wait for a human to maybe respond...  Also I've heard it gives them the right to view all screenshots and transmit/use them any way they feel like.  IMO when the first person gets busted and convicted for 100% "Virtual ..." with no other association like real illegal stuff they'll instantly turn in all the users rendering stuff.  Poser software doesn't seem to transmit data back save crash reports with permission.

Some ideas for Poser to come back:

1 - Daz absorber - easy to make scripts/programs to run Daz stuff out of the box

2 - Easy converter.  The poser artists betraying poser to go to DAZ coz its easier?  Uh, why do we PAY them for anything...?  So make something that can get almost any Z-brush atrocity (versus professional scaled object) to convert into an easy bone/easy morph thing that people could do without knowing MAYA and 99% of what they are doing.

3 - "AutoSKin" - the morph tool does work, but be nice to get an outfit and skin it - then drag or pull if something doesn't fit right.

4 - Hyper Render.  There are things called "Raspberri Pi" - cheap small computers.  Make a program that works for them that can split a render to help with hyper real renders and long complex animations that can be transmitted to their OS via wifi.  Not run Poser on it, split a big render program into bits they help with...  Then we could buy, 5, 10, 100...  And have a super-computer option.  Like MAYA 10 years ago with a $300,000+ system to run the thing but not needing the classes, etc.

5. Easy motion grab/machinima.  I'd really love to have V4 walk through a maze and see through her eyes/see her 3rd person, working in "Jiggle" and NPCs like Tentacle monsters, etc. as a crude DIY game or practice/machinima.

Originally Posted by: Sutut

  Also I've heard it gives them the right to view all screenshots and transmit/use them any way they feel like.....

I'm not buying that for a second. I've read the TOS for Studio, top to bottom. There isn't any mention of that anywhere. And it would likely be illegal for them to snoop like that. Also consider the logistics. How many people are using Studio? Hundreds of thousands, if not millions. The manpower required to view screengrabs of all of those users looking for 'illicit' images would be staggering. DAZ does not care what their users are rendering, only that they continue to buy content.

Originally Posted by: ProtocolZero

What's being referred to here might be that any images uploaded to DAZ's gallery are considered to be DAZ's property, to be used as they see fit -- which is why I've NEVER uploaded anything there and never will.

In that context, sure. If you upload an image to a website, DAZ or here or anywhere really, they can certainly say they have rights to it. But, Sutut specifically said screenshots, which to me implies that they are looking at what you're doing. I doubt DAZ has the time, manpower, or interest in doing that. Plus they'd be on shaky legal ground if they did.

Originally Posted by: ProtocolZero

And I agree: I don't think DAZ's current management really gives a rat's ass exactly what their products are being used for, just so long as customers keep buying those products. Sure, they'd probably rather have people use their products to make games instead of porn (which is why DAZ launched Morph3D a few years -- to supply the games development market with games-ready assets -- even tho' that idea seems to have flopped like the 3D printing venture) but if people are using DAZ assets to make porn, that means they're probably buying those assets, which means that DAZ is still making money. I think the idea that DAZ might be "snooping" at user activity dates back to the encrypted content debates, but only in the context of users using pirated/unlicensed assets, not in the context of what kind of images they were actually creating -- that WOULD be a bit much.

Exactly. DAZ only cares about revenue, not the end result of what we make with it. They can certainly say what we can and can't upload to their gallery, just like here. And they certainly have the right to take reasonable measures to keep their content from being stolen or uploaded to torrent sites or wherever. I just laughed at the idea that they were looking at our private renders in order to report us to law enforcement. Imagine having THAT job.....

Originally Posted by: terrancew_hod

But do you both see what happened? Someone that's needlessly bitter at the WRONG company derailed a conversation again with falsehoods and foolishness not based on any real facts. And rather than talk about the issues that need to be resolved, they have you disproving nonsense about DAZ!  Meanwhile, they just let SM skate by with doing nothing for their customers. This is why there's nothing exciting for poser coming out, and other companies are putting out the desired content you want. Stop being worried about what DAZ did/or what you **think** Daz did, and talk about the software you've paid for is supposed to be doing. 

Yeah, this thread got pulled off topic pretty quick, but it's good to at least have this discussion once in a while. I just hate to see people bash Daz for making money and moving the hobby forward while Poser sits in the corner and plays the victim card. I mean, do people really wish Daz had never created DS or the Genesis line? Should we all still be using Vicky&Mike 4? How happy would we all be if Poser was the only choice for this type of rendering? Or should Daz slow down and give Poser a chance to catch up? That would be nice, but it's not how business works. I hate to see one company dominate the market and not give anyone else a chance. But I also hated to see Poser own the entire market and sit on their hands doing nothing for years. At least now Daz has to innovate to stay ahead of competitors.

Getting back to the original question, vendor support for V4/M4 is dropping because the user base is dropping. The VAST majority of people are using Genesis or maybe Hivewire's stuff. Plus, look at how much stuff there already is for V4, there isn't a lot more to make without rehashing someone else's product. Personally I switched to Genesis because loading V4 feels like a train wreck. It opens up a bunch of dialogs about which base model to use and which morphs to load. Genesis hides all that, but makes it easy to find when I need it. Hey I kept this post short!  :)

Edit: just a quick screengrab from *deleted* and Daz store. I'd say Vicky is holding up pretty well for a 12 year old figure. She has more results than any other figure except Genesis 3 at Daz.

Edited by user Tuesday, January 22, 2019 6:30:16 AM(UTC)  | Reason: Not specified

Zaavaleta attached the following image(s):

Originally Posted by: matt

Originally Posted by: Sutut

  Also I've heard it gives them the right to view all screenshots and transmit/use them any way they feel like.....

I'm not buying that for a second. I've read the TOS for Studio, top to bottom. There isn't any mention of that anywhere. And it would likely be illegal for them to snoop like that. Also consider the logistics. How many people are using Studio? Hundreds of thousands, if not millions. The manpower required to view screengrabs of all of those users looking for 'illicit' images would be staggering. DAZ does not care what their users are rendering, only that they continue to buy content.

I think there's a healthy degree of Paranoia advised with "Big Data"

Case in point  - a few serial rapists/serial killers have been caught by mass genetic testing.  NOT coz they had a legit suspect and checked the sperm in the headless lady.  But because some relative of the person did a "DNA Ancestry test" and the police comparing samples realized there were nearby relatives.  Then got search warrants, etc.  No one will cry for a serial rapist being caught despite very serious questions of privacy - so then the foot is in the door to test the soda pop can you tossed to the side of the road and you get a $200 littering fine in the mail plus a $4000 "Research" fee for the levels of DNA testing and going around checking camera record archives everywhere - and with the foot in the door and the door wide open its futile to even call a lawyer to try to protest it.

A human Genome is like 4+ Gigabytes which seemed incredible until recently.  Still a lot of data to compare across huge swaths of population but nothing for a modern data center.

Let's see - DNA tests are really cheap.  Now they aren't THAT cheap.  Someone pays the $ coz they want to sell access to the data.  Insurance companies for reasons to deny coverage.  Law enforcement for cold case cracking.  People buy for $30 some "Ancestry kit" that's heavily advertised, they are then a commodity in ways that make Facebook look amateurish.

DAZ gives away their flagship product.  "It's free" means "Can't argue with the price". 

It'd take maybe a paragraph worth of lines in code to send thumbnail size screenshots regularly + system data and wouldn't show up on any bandwidth monitoring as any unusual pattern (coz we are looking for crypto currency miners and hidden encrypted data shufflers) but then could pull full screenshots and more access to data.  Since its officially installed it bypasses almost any computer security with permission already.

For the record I think for now DAZ does just want to make sure you paid for this or that figure since there is rampant piracy of poser/daz figures - way too easy to copy and share.  Pixiv argues this - you oughta check how their stuff is used to make stuff that'd not be TOS here - and I don't just mean a non-centaur Horsey - it is FAR more advanced than Poser in that regard... BUT - if they become "The only game in town" and some Porcine representative of authority comes squealing with a gun and a warrant in one hand and a paper promising "Government Subsidies" in the other coz they want to speculate on easy convictions for "Virtual ...." issues... what do you think their lawyer will advise? 

Right now there is Poser.  So if they did that once and someone ended up with prison even if he/she didn't have a single image of real .... on them - well there'd be a mass deleting of DAZ - so their lawyer would say "F*ck you!  See you in court!" and Poser would make a rebound "We'll fight, we'll do jail time, we'll protect your privacy - come to us for a free 'basement dungeon' kit with a new/upgrade Poser package!"

But if Poser is gone - and then it becomes "Want realistic 3d figures?  Sure.  Study MAYA/Cinema 4d, pay HUGE fees, take classes, the few figures avaiable start at $200 each...  OR use DAZ if you are just an artist who wants figure bases not some college kid wanting to work in 3D..."  Well then they'll have a trapped market base so yeah, take the law enforcement money and give them anything they shout for.

I made my statements upthread - which were mocked or ignored after the first one.

Hey, if Poser works a way to instantly use a DAZ thing it wouldn't be admitting DAZ was better it'd be "Only Fair" - that's how DAZ started out, using Poser products to let people cheat Poser by not buying the software.

The rest would be ways to catch up or exceed which should be quite possible with modern tech.  Especially the last - work out some multi-processor program that can use Raspberri Pi units and/or android units - so we can get piles of cheap "Computer on a chip" things and do a mini super computer without the hyper bad electricity waste of 10+ old 500mhz/1ghz full computer systems stacked and plugged in to run for them a relatively simple program.

I am on the side of Poser - but I prefer an open market and free competition - as long as one side doesn't totally win.  Then we get complacent monarchies.

For the record, some recent Chocolate products I paid $ to get made - BUT despite my reservations I allowed both a Poser and a DAZ version.