Ho Ho Ho! Poser 6 for all...
by BrokeAss Games · 12/17/2008 (6:17 pm) · 13 comments
Happy Holidays from BAG!
A couple of months ago, we began a dialog with Smith/Micro, owners of the Poser brand of graphics software. We've been big fans of the Poser product line since it launched. Like many other developers, we felt it had far more potential than being simply a visualization tool. For the past couple of years we have been developing a process for getting our character animation work out of Poser and into Torque. Turns out, the folks that run the Poser brand are pretty cool and are more indie-minded than you might think. An example of that is their inclusion of open source Poser figures in the latest Poser release, Poser Pro. These figures are open for use in any way/shape or form, including making games and character/figure products.
During our discussions with smith/micro, we repeatedly urged them to "keep it indie!", basically prodding them to re-release an older build of Poser at a reduced price and make it available to more indie devs. I guess they listened... you can now purchase Poser 6 for $29.95 until December 31st. Here.
"Why would I want an old version of Poser?" You ask.
Using the Poser 5 & 6 to Torque - Character Workflow resource we just released you can now "easily" get your character and animation work from Poser to Torque. It's a multiple program, multiple click process but it works, and its inexpensive.
We hope you enjoy the result of two years of research, trial and error, and shoulder rubbing... we definitely have.
No lumps of coal from BAG this year,
PS. We have a major announcement coming soon regarding a Poser plugin we are co-developing that will speed up the Poser to Torque Character Workflow. This plugin will eliminate the need for a few of the listed applications, as well as drastically lower the amount of steps involved.
Stay Tuned!
BrokeAss Games Team
A couple of months ago, we began a dialog with Smith/Micro, owners of the Poser brand of graphics software. We've been big fans of the Poser product line since it launched. Like many other developers, we felt it had far more potential than being simply a visualization tool. For the past couple of years we have been developing a process for getting our character animation work out of Poser and into Torque. Turns out, the folks that run the Poser brand are pretty cool and are more indie-minded than you might think. An example of that is their inclusion of open source Poser figures in the latest Poser release, Poser Pro. These figures are open for use in any way/shape or form, including making games and character/figure products.
During our discussions with smith/micro, we repeatedly urged them to "keep it indie!", basically prodding them to re-release an older build of Poser at a reduced price and make it available to more indie devs. I guess they listened... you can now purchase Poser 6 for $29.95 until December 31st. Here.
"Why would I want an old version of Poser?" You ask.
Using the Poser 5 & 6 to Torque - Character Workflow resource we just released you can now "easily" get your character and animation work from Poser to Torque. It's a multiple program, multiple click process but it works, and its inexpensive.
We hope you enjoy the result of two years of research, trial and error, and shoulder rubbing... we definitely have.
No lumps of coal from BAG this year,
PS. We have a major announcement coming soon regarding a Poser plugin we are co-developing that will speed up the Poser to Torque Character Workflow. This plugin will eliminate the need for a few of the listed applications, as well as drastically lower the amount of steps involved.
Stay Tuned!
BrokeAss Games Team
About the author
http://www.youtube.com/user/BrokeAssGames
#2
12/17/2008 (6:33 pm)
Unbelievable. This is just the sort of magic I expected from a group of ninjas. You guys totally rock.
#3
We need to wait for the open source ones to come out to have legally usable characters?
12/17/2008 (6:37 pm)
I guess I forgot to ask the big one: where does the issue of using poser characters stand?We need to wait for the open source ones to come out to have legally usable characters?
#4
12/17/2008 (6:41 pm)
Just approved the resource for all to see in the resources page of What's New. Great work on dealing with the Smith/Micro folks. In the past both they and Daz3D have been extremely generous in approving use of their models as long as precautions for redistribution were in place. But that was on a case-by-case basis. Hopefully this trend continues.
#5
my.smithmicro.com/mac/poserpro/index.html
Poser Pro comes with a set of four re-distributable 3D characters to help users save production time. This set includes a male and female figure in both medium and low resolutions. These professionally modeled 3D characters include facial morph targets to create expressions and visemes to synch with imported sound files in the Talk Designer, plus they are Face Room ready.
Use these four figures as a starting point and customize them to create your own real-time 3D or game characters. Modify these fully-rigged characters with Poser Pros powerful magnet deformers or sculpt detail using the Morphing Tool. Import them into the Face Room and modify their geometry and texture to match your imported facial photographs. When youre finished, these four figures can be exported via Poser Pros many geometry export options including COLLADA, or hosted via PoserFusion plug-ins, and redistributed for royalty free use in your project.
Distributable Content Includes:
2 Male Figure Versions (LowResMale, MedResMale).
2 Female Figure Versions (LowResFemale, MedResFemale).
Developmental OBJ geometry files for all for figures.
Figures are Face Room ready.
Figures include facial morphs for expressions and synthesizing speech.
For details refer to the Content License section of the Poser Pro EULA.
12/17/2008 (6:43 pm)
Answering my own question, from here:my.smithmicro.com/mac/poserpro/index.html
Poser Pro comes with a set of four re-distributable 3D characters to help users save production time. This set includes a male and female figure in both medium and low resolutions. These professionally modeled 3D characters include facial morph targets to create expressions and visemes to synch with imported sound files in the Talk Designer, plus they are Face Room ready.
Use these four figures as a starting point and customize them to create your own real-time 3D or game characters. Modify these fully-rigged characters with Poser Pros powerful magnet deformers or sculpt detail using the Morphing Tool. Import them into the Face Room and modify their geometry and texture to match your imported facial photographs. When youre finished, these four figures can be exported via Poser Pros many geometry export options including COLLADA, or hosted via PoserFusion plug-ins, and redistributed for royalty free use in your project.
Distributable Content Includes:
2 Male Figure Versions (LowResMale, MedResMale).
2 Female Figure Versions (LowResFemale, MedResFemale).
Developmental OBJ geometry files for all for figures.
Figures are Face Room ready.
Figures include facial morphs for expressions and synthesizing speech.
For details refer to the Content License section of the Poser Pro EULA.
#6
Also, what's an easy way for someone 3D-artistically challenged - such as myself - to cut back on the high tri-count that can be expected with these characters? Is this something evident?
Edit: Oops, just read Dave's reply about the tri-count. Great news.
12/17/2008 (6:45 pm)
I'm curious about the open source characters - is there a way to get them for Poser 6? Or do I need to get Pro if I want the open source chars? Also, what's an easy way for someone 3D-artistically challenged - such as myself - to cut back on the high tri-count that can be expected with these characters? Is this something evident?
Edit: Oops, just read Dave's reply about the tri-count. Great news.
#7
Thanks a ton for approving these so quickly. I think we'll see more indie-love coming our way from the Poser peeps. These are really exciting times.
@ Dave
I know you answered most of your own question but on the point of "legally usable characters"... People forget to separate the tool from the art. The Poser tools are epic on their own (the art is epic too). In my e-pinion, its the best tool for hand-animating figures, and the best tool for working with mo-cap sequences. Nearly any character mesh/textures can be brought into Poser and you can use your own skeleton too (as long as it follows BVH naming). That's what we were rambling on about 2 years ago. :) There's lots of sweet poser ready art out there, some of it has game creation covered in the license, but always be sure to check. When in doubt contact the artist.
@ Konrad
No problem to get those characters into Poser 6 (from Poser Pro). However... you would need to own a Poser Pro license to take advantage of the 'included' Distributable Content.
Jondo
12/17/2008 (8:40 pm)
@ DavidThanks a ton for approving these so quickly. I think we'll see more indie-love coming our way from the Poser peeps. These are really exciting times.
@ Dave
I know you answered most of your own question but on the point of "legally usable characters"... People forget to separate the tool from the art. The Poser tools are epic on their own (the art is epic too). In my e-pinion, its the best tool for hand-animating figures, and the best tool for working with mo-cap sequences. Nearly any character mesh/textures can be brought into Poser and you can use your own skeleton too (as long as it follows BVH naming). That's what we were rambling on about 2 years ago. :) There's lots of sweet poser ready art out there, some of it has game creation covered in the license, but always be sure to check. When in doubt contact the artist.
@ Konrad
No problem to get those characters into Poser 6 (from Poser Pro). However... you would need to own a Poser Pro license to take advantage of the 'included' Distributable Content.
Jondo
#8
http://my.smithmicro.com/dr/poser-99special.html
12/17/2008 (9:01 pm)
You can also get Poser 7 for $99 http://my.smithmicro.com/dr/poser-99special.html
#9
12/18/2008 (3:12 am)
"Why would I want an old version of Poser?" You (usually) also qualify for newer version upgrade prices as was the case for me with the once free poser 5! Can't get any more indie-friendly then that.
#10
12/18/2008 (5:59 am)
I am just looking into it now, but there might be a cheaper path to pro (based on what Leroy said) You can get 6 for $25 now and there is a $250 upgrade to poser pro from 6. Cheaper than the $500 full price. 
#11
The pipeline, when established, was tooling under those particular builds of those particular platforms... Since that time, both U3D and fragMOTION have undergone major revisions; while Ms3d maintained a slower rate of feature enhancement/support[bugFix]. I maintain builds of both programs, at those versions, as a 'standard'; and to correct any subversion errors I come across as I tinker....as well as maintaining current builds of all 3 lowEnd programs listed to continue R/D on the pipeline and to 'beat the grass down' in front of the main army of artists, generating the raw data, behind me....
With my last working version of U3Dpro[3.10]; I began to notice some bad weight parsing to the Ms3d[1.8.4] format. I passed this observation along to the U3D author, and was pretty much told I didn't know what I was talking about, and it was the latest version of Milkshape that wasn't reading the U3D parse correctly. I'm paraphrasing, but that is the understanding I walked away with, from the communication. Perhaps if some other developers whom use UltimateUnwrap3Dpro[v3.10+], could parse a file to Ms3d[1.8.3/4+] and check any weight assignments beyond two[influencers] and if the weights are still distributed as before[not defaulting all weight to highest contributor @ 1.0], we might know more and approach Brad B. with multiple observations...that might then be addressed. I have found the 'triumvirate' of U3D,fragMOTION, and Ms3d to be a continued viable portion of the pipeline..
I've tried to assist in getting this U3D-Ms3d::'bug' acknowledged and corrected, and when no acknowledgment forth came; I took matters into my own, grubby, Indy hands and found a workaround to get my mesh data parsed into fragMOTION. At the moment it's not the most 'elegant' solution, but one 'DrFrankenRex' and any rigger could accomplish. Please remember; this is for the weight data parsing correctly, not motion data....which is why any 'cleanup' is tolerable, since it's done basically once to the base Scene.
With the emergence of what is a trend to encapsulate the 3D data-share between programs is seeing the adoption of some form of 'standard' format. This rush to streamline the 3D community has focused, in my opinion, between two formats: FBX and Collada. This statement will undoubtedly ignite the platform/format flame war that serves no true purpose, except to reinforce an inflexible position. If you are a 3D graphic artist[again, my opinion], you can take any 3D graphics program and make it do what you want/need. I wear no 'rose' colored glasses.... The workaround I described earlier is to utilize the FBX format parse of U3D instead of utilizing the 'broken' Ms3d parse for correct weighting data. The current build of fragMOTION[0.95], oh btw, notice it is not even at a major RC of 1.0 yet. Yes, it's perhaps in a 'beta' state, don't let that kill your spirit; this 'beta' program is now able to read/write FBX quite well! If some 'Demo' programs followed Dave's example of keeping software properly in a 'beta' state and not puffing it up beyond what it's capable of, it'd be real nice...;), and really helpful.....lol, I digress.
This workaround with the FBX parse would have been tedious to do by hand. It consisted of removing a few nodes at the base of the chain[with NO ill affects to stored animation! HA], renaming the nodes[made oh-so-much easier with a LUA script! HA] which changed my UI schema to include a new button which was scripted to step thru each node in the Scene and rename string components of the node[IE, rename] however I script it. For example: the FBX parse from U3D prefixes each Scene node with a Model:: string and converted all 'whiteSpace' to an underscore. My script removes the "Model::" component, and replaces all underscores with whiteSpace. Cool huh? Simple huh? I also had to remove/delete some 'empty' mesh groups...that contained no primitives, easy-peasy....of course, I couldn't complete the script on my own, and a big Thank You! goes out to Indy Developer, Dale Harper[Pelgar], for walking me thru what was necessary to get this script working. We are currently working with Dale on an interesting side project/product and are still in negotiations for distribution...stay tuned, kiddies!
I hope I've shed some light on the latest developments in the pipeline, I'll be more than happy to assist Indy Developers in working this system. Getting POSERx at any of these latest prices is just insane and an opportunity not to be missed!
Happy Modeling out there, work safe!
Rex
12/18/2008 (8:40 am)
@DAVE & all whom follow:The pipeline, when established, was tooling under those particular builds of those particular platforms... Since that time, both U3D and fragMOTION have undergone major revisions; while Ms3d maintained a slower rate of feature enhancement/support[bugFix]. I maintain builds of both programs, at those versions, as a 'standard'; and to correct any subversion errors I come across as I tinker....as well as maintaining current builds of all 3 lowEnd programs listed to continue R/D on the pipeline and to 'beat the grass down' in front of the main army of artists, generating the raw data, behind me....
With my last working version of U3Dpro[3.10]; I began to notice some bad weight parsing to the Ms3d[1.8.4] format. I passed this observation along to the U3D author, and was pretty much told I didn't know what I was talking about, and it was the latest version of Milkshape that wasn't reading the U3D parse correctly. I'm paraphrasing, but that is the understanding I walked away with, from the communication. Perhaps if some other developers whom use UltimateUnwrap3Dpro[v3.10+], could parse a file to Ms3d[1.8.3/4+] and check any weight assignments beyond two[influencers] and if the weights are still distributed as before[not defaulting all weight to highest contributor @ 1.0], we might know more and approach Brad B. with multiple observations...that might then be addressed. I have found the 'triumvirate' of U3D,fragMOTION, and Ms3d to be a continued viable portion of the pipeline..
I've tried to assist in getting this U3D-Ms3d::'bug' acknowledged and corrected, and when no acknowledgment forth came; I took matters into my own, grubby, Indy hands and found a workaround to get my mesh data parsed into fragMOTION. At the moment it's not the most 'elegant' solution, but one 'DrFrankenRex' and any rigger could accomplish. Please remember; this is for the weight data parsing correctly, not motion data....which is why any 'cleanup' is tolerable, since it's done basically once to the base Scene.
With the emergence of what is a trend to encapsulate the 3D data-share between programs is seeing the adoption of some form of 'standard' format. This rush to streamline the 3D community has focused, in my opinion, between two formats: FBX and Collada. This statement will undoubtedly ignite the platform/format flame war that serves no true purpose, except to reinforce an inflexible position. If you are a 3D graphic artist[again, my opinion], you can take any 3D graphics program and make it do what you want/need. I wear no 'rose' colored glasses.... The workaround I described earlier is to utilize the FBX format parse of U3D instead of utilizing the 'broken' Ms3d parse for correct weighting data. The current build of fragMOTION[0.95], oh btw, notice it is not even at a major RC of 1.0 yet. Yes, it's perhaps in a 'beta' state, don't let that kill your spirit; this 'beta' program is now able to read/write FBX quite well! If some 'Demo' programs followed Dave's example of keeping software properly in a 'beta' state and not puffing it up beyond what it's capable of, it'd be real nice...;), and really helpful.....lol, I digress.
This workaround with the FBX parse would have been tedious to do by hand. It consisted of removing a few nodes at the base of the chain[with NO ill affects to stored animation! HA], renaming the nodes[made oh-so-much easier with a LUA script! HA] which changed my UI schema to include a new button which was scripted to step thru each node in the Scene and rename string components of the node[IE, rename] however I script it. For example: the FBX parse from U3D prefixes each Scene node with a Model:: string and converted all 'whiteSpace' to an underscore. My script removes the "Model::" component, and replaces all underscores with whiteSpace. Cool huh? Simple huh? I also had to remove/delete some 'empty' mesh groups...that contained no primitives, easy-peasy....of course, I couldn't complete the script on my own, and a big Thank You! goes out to Indy Developer, Dale Harper[Pelgar], for walking me thru what was necessary to get this script working. We are currently working with Dale on an interesting side project/product and are still in negotiations for distribution...stay tuned, kiddies!
I hope I've shed some light on the latest developments in the pipeline, I'll be more than happy to assist Indy Developers in working this system. Getting POSERx at any of these latest prices is just insane and an opportunity not to be missed!
Happy Modeling out there, work safe!
Rex
#12
Smith Micro changed their store (ALL NEW YAY!), so my downloads are all gone (We sent an email...) It seems they only guaranteed their downloads for 30 days from the store change over. Since it is past that I can no longer get my Poser 6 I paid for. The CD backup I made at the time won't read properly (gotta love CRC errors.) As far as Smith Micro is concerned they are not responsible and so far have been unwilling to do much about it.
If anyone here managed to snag a copy of Poser 6 and would be willing to arrange digital transportation (I will pay for a CD and shipping if anyone is willing.) I need a working installation file(s.)
As I said, I have my key and activation email, but can no longer download it electronically from their site.
Thanks to anyone who can help out! (Should it be necessary I can also forward my purchase email showing I own Poser 6)
08/06/2009 (8:15 pm)
It seems that I fell into a rather strange set of circumstances. I am reloading my PC with some of the various bits of software I use during development and encountered some problems trying to load Poser.Smith Micro changed their store (ALL NEW YAY!), so my downloads are all gone (We sent an email...) It seems they only guaranteed their downloads for 30 days from the store change over. Since it is past that I can no longer get my Poser 6 I paid for. The CD backup I made at the time won't read properly (gotta love CRC errors.) As far as Smith Micro is concerned they are not responsible and so far have been unwilling to do much about it.
If anyone here managed to snag a copy of Poser 6 and would be willing to arrange digital transportation (I will pay for a CD and shipping if anyone is willing.) I need a working installation file(s.)
As I said, I have my key and activation email, but can no longer download it electronically from their site.
Thanks to anyone who can help out! (Should it be necessary I can also forward my purchase email showing I own Poser 6)
#13
Poser Pro and Torque 3D supports COLLADA which is a collaborative 3D data standard initially established by Sony Computer Entertainment America and currently administered by the Khronos Group. COLLADA enables the interchange of 3D data between a number of third party 3D authoring applications, permitting software tools to be combined into a powerful production pipeline.
03/05/2010 (3:24 pm)
I own Poser 4, 6, 7 & 7 Pro with all the service releases if you can prove you own it too I can transfer it to you without the key via online storage servicePoser Pro and Torque 3D supports COLLADA which is a collaborative 3D data standard initially established by Sony Computer Entertainment America and currently administered by the Khronos Group. COLLADA enables the interchange of 3D data between a number of third party 3D authoring applications, permitting software tools to be combined into a powerful production pipeline.
Torque Owner wiseman2
This is an awesome development......thanks for the news...