Posing Conventions For Products

dan.shivedan.shive Posts: 0
edited December 1969 in The Commons

I've noticed some annoying trends in purchased poses, and I can't help but think there should be some rules that sellers of poses follow. I've made a list of what I think some of those should be. I can't think of any way to present this without sounding demanding, but I really think these make sense from a workflow perspective:

1. Name the poses with a prefix that will most likely group it with other poses from the set. For example, instead of "01 A5 Pose", use "A5 01 Pose". Not doing this results in several poses from several products getting mixed together when viewing poses by function, and it becomes more difficult to sort them out.

2. Leave actor shape and scale alone. Just because a pose was designed for 100% Victoria 5 does not necessarily mean I will be using it with 100% Victoria 5, and changing scales can mess all sorts of things up. One should not have to lock shapes to use poses.

3. Do not reposition the actor to the center of the scene. I can't think of any reason why someone would want this to be the case short of a pose specifically designed for this purpose.

4. Rotate X and Z at the hip. For one example of why, a sitting pose that adjusts the X rotation by using the actor value instead of the hip results in a scenario where you cannot rotate the actor on the Y axis without messing up the pose.

5. Make expressions separate. Lots of different faces can go with a lot of different poses. Preset expressions are great, but they're most useful when separated from poses that affect the rest of the body.

6. Don't rotate on the Y axis without a good reason. I'm not sure why an otherwise good walking pose would arbitrarily rotate the actor to be walking in a different direction than they were facing, but I have poses that do just that.

Anyone disagree, agree, or have their own thoughts on rules people selling poses should probably stick to?

Comments

  • DaWaterRatDaWaterRat Posts: 2,885
    edited December 1969

    I have one thing to say...

    Amen.

    Except for #1 (I don't use smart content for poses, so they don't get that mixed up for me), I've expressed every one of those somewhere on the forums in the past. :)

  • wancowwancow Posts: 2,708
    edited December 1969

    I have one thing to say...

    Amen.

    Except for #1 (I don't use smart content for poses, so they don't get that mixed up for me), I've expressed every one of those somewhere on the forums in the past. :)

    Ditto. I don't use smart content at all... so that no matter to me.

    Everything else is extremely important!

  • KickAir 8PKickAir 8P Posts: 1,865
    edited December 1969

    I have one thing to say...

    Amen.

    Except for #1 (I don't use smart content for poses, so they don't get that mixed up for me), I've expressed every one of those somewhere on the forums in the past. :)


    I use Smart Content -- ditto'ng that one (and all the others) bigtime.
  • MBuschMBusch Posts: 547
    edited December 1969

    I have one thing to say...

    Amen.

    Except for #1 (I don't use smart content for poses, so they don't get that mixed up for me), I've expressed every one of those somewhere on the forums in the past. :)


    I use Smart Content -- dittoing that one (and all the others) bigtime.

    I also use Smart Content, but even so I not use it, all your concerns are valid. It is very tiring to be fixing such issues.

  • MistaraMistara Posts: 38,675
    edited December 1969

    omg, the #3, how annoying are those

  • FSMCDesignsFSMCDesigns Posts: 12,754
    edited December 1969

    I have one thing to say...

    Amen.

    Except for #1 (I don't use smart content for poses, so they don't get that mixed up for me), I've expressed every one of those somewhere on the forums in the past. :)

    Same here, no smart content for me. I don't usually find the issues posted about and I have lots of pose sets. When i do find issues like the ones posted about, I skip buying from that vendor again, simple as that.

  • MattymanxMattymanx Posts: 6,902
    edited December 1969

    dan.shive said:
    1. Name the poses with a prefix that will most likely group it with other poses from the set. For example, instead of "01 A5 Pose", use "A5 01 Pose". Not doing this results in several poses from several products getting mixed together when viewing poses by function, and it becomes more difficult to sort them out.

    2. Leave actor shape and scale alone. Just because a pose was designed for 100% Victoria 5 does not necessarily mean I will be using it with 100% Victoria 5, and changing scales can mess all sorts of things up. One should not have to lock shapes to use poses.

    3. Do not reposition the actor to the center of the scene. I can't think of any reason why someone would want this to be the case short of a pose specifically designed for this purpose.

    4. Rotate X and Z at the hip. For one example of why, a sitting pose that adjusts the X rotation by using the actor value instead of the hip results in a scenario where you cannot rotate the actor on the Y axis without messing up the pose.

    5. Make expressions separate. Lots of different faces can go with a lot of different poses. Preset expressions are great, but they're most useful when separated from poses that affect the rest of the body.

    6. Don't rotate on the Y axis without a good reason. I'm not sure why an otherwise good walking pose would arbitrarily rotate the actor to be walking in a different direction than they were facing, but I have poses that do just that.

    1. I dont use Smart Content so I dont notice this. I always see it from a folder tree view so its all seperated into their own folders. But naming in general is upto whos doing it. I have seen weirder naming pratices for folders of the same product where none of them match

    2. Yeah, the pose should not apply the character scale and shape.

    3. When doing two people together its very important to have the XYZ trans right where it needs to be. Other then that, its habit in my case since I do mainly couples poses and I really dislike having someone end up below the floor when I apply a pose all cause the XYZ trans was not recorded. In my own defence of recording the XYZ trans all the time, I dont use other peoples poses unless I am testing something so all my poses from one scene to the next are made by me for that scene and as a result, its really never crossed my mind as being an issue.

    3a. As a work around in DS, if you have a character postioned elsewhere in your scene and you dont want them to shoot back to center, then create a NULL, match the XYZ Rotation and Trans of the character and then parent the cahrater to the null. The character will remain as is yet their XYZ Trans will now show 0 or close to it. Then you can play with additional poses and when you are done, unparent them from the Null and continue with your scene

    4.Rotate the hip, translate the body.

    5. Yup.

    6. Makes sense too.

  • SickleYieldSickleYield Posts: 7,634
    edited December 1969

    That null trick is a great idea! I'm'a try it.

  • MattymanxMattymanx Posts: 6,902
    edited December 1969

    That null trick is a great idea! I'm'a try it.


    Nulls are very handy. You can even use them to adjust the rotation and trans of an items even after its been moved and twisted on its own axis.

  • SickleYieldSickleYield Posts: 7,634
    edited December 1969

    Mattymanx said:
    That null trick is a great idea! I'm'a try it.


    Nulls are very handy. You can even use them to adjust the rotation and trans of an items even after its been moved and twisted on its own axis.

    Neat! All this time I've been using them just for eye movement. :D

  • DaWaterRatDaWaterRat Posts: 2,885
    edited December 1969

    Mattymanx said:
    That null trick is a great idea! I'm'a try it.


    Nulls are very handy. You can even use them to adjust the rotation and trans of an items even after its been moved and twisted on its own axis.

    I agree, but I also had a glitch for a while in DS (late version 3) where a scene saved with a null would crash DS when I tried to re-open it. It's been fixed, but I still end up a little gun-shy about them.

  • DaWaterRatDaWaterRat Posts: 2,885
    edited December 1969

    Mattymanx said:
    That null trick is a great idea! I'm'a try it.


    Nulls are very handy. You can even use them to adjust the rotation and trans of an items even after its been moved and twisted on its own axis.

    Neat! All this time I've been using them just for eye movement. :D

    Another option, if the pose is in a DS native format, is to CTRL+left click and just tell it to ignore translations. I find it faster (Apply pose, grumble, undo, re-apply pose with CTRL+click) than nulls.

  • SickleYieldSickleYield Posts: 7,634
    edited December 1969

    Mattymanx said:
    That null trick is a great idea! I'm'a try it.


    Nulls are very handy. You can even use them to adjust the rotation and trans of an items even after its been moved and twisted on its own axis.

    Neat! All this time I've been using them just for eye movement. :D

    Another option, if the pose is in a DS native format, is to CTRL+left click and just tell it to ignore translations. I find it faster (Apply pose, grumble, undo, re-apply pose with CTRL+click) than nulls.

    I am learning all kinds of fun stuff tonight. I knew you could ctrl click with shaders, but not with poses!

  • dan.shivedan.shive Posts: 0
    edited February 2013

    ...*Blinks* I DIDN'T KNOW CTRL+CLICK WAS A THING *cries forever*

    (oh, and thank you thank you thank you)

    Post edited by dan.shive on
  • MattymanxMattymanx Posts: 6,902
    edited December 1969

    Mattymanx said:
    That null trick is a great idea! I'm'a try it.


    Nulls are very handy. You can even use them to adjust the rotation and trans of an items even after its been moved and twisted on its own axis.

    Neat! All this time I've been using them just for eye movement. :D

    Another option, if the pose is in a DS native format, is to CTRL+left click and just tell it to ignore translations. I find it faster (Apply pose, grumble, undo, re-apply pose with CTRL+click) than nulls.


    Point. I know enough to do Ctrl+Click with mat poses in Ds but I always forget i an do it with other DS native files too. I am so use to using poser content in DS that I forget about certain things.

  • SpitSpit Posts: 2,342
    edited December 1969

    It took years to 'train' poser pose makers into some kind of discipline but it seems much of that knowledge hasn't been passed down totally but they're much 'better' at discipline than the Studio native pose makers. The upshot being if I have a choice between Poser and Studio versions of a pose set I choose the Poser version. Of course that leads to less flexibility (ie, CTRL-Click for example). And lately with Genesis much of that choice is lost.

    So awareness of these 'rules'/suggestions/demands is sorely needed.

    BTW, I've decided to both use and not use Smart Content when it comes to Poses. I'm planning to 'double-up' my pose sets. IOW, maintain original for DIM and Smart Content use, but copy the poses into another folder which I organize my way. The additional harddrive space isn't exhorbitant and the work involved is quite minor: Copy pose folder, change name.

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