Me195
Extraordinary
I certainly didn't intend my post as a criticism of either the figure or the creator. I've only seen renders of the figure, and I don't care enough for what I've seen to invest in the figure ... however well made it may be. Not when the HiveWire 3D line of figures are nowhere near end of life and are still being supported by their creators. Which was and is not the case with V4.
I absolutely don't expect anyone else to feel the same, and have no problem if others want to use or support new figures. But ... as with most of us, my money is limited, and at this point, I can no longer toss money away frivolously as I did when I first stumbled onto DAZ.
I did visit Smith Micro several months ago when I was told about Project E, and I spent time reading through the comments. I came away from that rather frustrated and ... annoyed. I just don't understand some of the people who raved over yet another figure in development that they have never even touched ... when those same people dismissed Dawn as a flawed figure ... without ever touching her either. I'm sure the frustration and annoyance I still feel made it into my post.
Dawn had her own set of problems ... which had nothing to do with the figure and everything to do with a handful of people who put in tremendous effort in sabotaging HiveWire3D and Dawn on every forum ... all without ever touching Dawn either. I haven't seen those people going after any other figure in development since ... with the same viciousness they went after Dawn.
What attracted me sight unseen to Dawn was Chris. Not only did he have experience with developing successful (and commercially successful) figures, but also with starting, building, and running a rather successful company. I was more than willing to "put up" with a figure that would not match V4 in the number of morphs and clothing/accessories on release, because I trusted Dawn wouldn't be dropped by its creator and that morphs and clothing and what not would come along. As I learned of the other people who were involved with HiveWire 3D, I became even more convinced that HiveWire 3D wasn't going to let me down.
Over the years, several figures have been in development ... generally by a single person. Which is not to say a figure requires a company and staff like DAZ or HiveWire 3D. There are some really cool figures out there like Nursoda's and Tate's, and I wish I had the money to pick up every single one. But they wouldn't be go to figures for me. And that's my criteria when I'm told about a new figure that's in development. Can it be my go to figure and can I trust the developer will continue to support the figure. Of less concern to me is whether content providers will support the figure because odds are ... most won't.
I definitely do consider you to be a prominent member of the 3D community, but I didn't see any criticism in any of your posts. In fact I've only seen constructive criticism here for PE here in general. I can definitely understand your frustration at SM forums. People bad mouthing Dawn without ever even trying her is a quick way to get under my skin too. I tend to be long winded in my comments so I'll wrap it up by saying that I hope my comments haven't made you or anybody else feel like I was singling anyone out or bad mouthing anyone's comments. That wasn't my intention.