Now when you got around to the laptop part, I did cringe a little, because I only have my laptop to compare to....mine has 4 gig of ram (don't laugh, it's 5 years old, running Win7). Yours has obviously got more juice, so there is no comparison.
Ah... don't feel too bad. The rig I had before getting this laptop? It was a fifteen year old
(no, I'm not joking!) Dell XPS laptop. It had 1 GB of RAM, a 256mb Radeon video card in it, and 300 GB hard drive.
(Yes, I ran with an external runtime back then.. everything was loaded via an external USB hard drive... LOL)
The desktop rig that I had prior to the Dell? That was also fifteen years old. 1 GB of RAM and a 128 MB video card in it. I forget what the size of the HD's were, but I know neither of the HD's were TB drives. I think I had a full TB of space between the two, so I suspect that the HD's might have been 500 GBs a piece, but I don't recall exactly.
Either way - both of my previous rigs were not even dinosaurs anymore - they were fossils! LOL I'm still absolutely amazed that the Dell laptop allowed me to do as much as it did. That was a really sleek machine for it's age. We still have that laptop - my Bear uses it now for less intensive things, and it works very well for him. But it's not up to the task of the kinds of renders I have in my head, though it sure gave it one heck of a try. And until I could afford this Toshiba, it was enough to keep me sane doing simple basic portraits and just making content.
When I set out to get my new machine, my choice was this Satellite with 12 GBs of RAM and no CD/DVD drive, running 8.1, or another laptop with the same core, but only 8 GBs of RAM and WITH a CD/DVD drive. I kind of hesitated on this one with the total lack of a CD/DVD drive... but thinking everything over and knowing what the software needs that we all use... I went for the higher memory. I'm glad now that I did. They do make external USB DVD/CD drives, so that will solve that problem when I need to.
I wanted the higher memory to handle the heavy graphics load that I knew it would have to handle, and it's a very good thing I opted for the higher RAM, now when I think about it - or look at any of the renders I posted above in my last response. 8 GBs would NOT have cut it for those.
As far as laptops running hot... yes, yes they do run a fair bit warmer than a desktop rig. I was well aware of that before I bought this one, since I spent just about a year limping along with DS 4.3 on that old Dell XPS. I don't keep a fan next to my laptop, but I have a cooling pad that is ALWAYS underneath it. The cooling pad plugs into one USB port, and runs the two fans underneath the laptop, and it does a great job of keeping the machine from overheating. If I am running a heavy render, such as the ones I showed up above, then I have a small wooden frame that I custom made out of some of my Bear's scrap lumber. What it does, is it sits over the top of the cooling pad just a little bit - enough to provide some air flow - and the laptop sits within that frame.
This allows the cooling fans to continue doing their job with the laptop, and provides a little extra air flow to assist in keeping the machine cool. No, heat on my laptop is certainly not an issue in this case, though I did indeed check into that as a possibility as well, just in case what I had wasn't keeping it cool
enough.
Breaking it down to possibilities, it was a sorry day when Poser listened to all the younger users who wanted a "cool" interface, with dockable functions....when Poser 7 and older had moveable interface before anybody else even thought of doing it. You use to just drag the elements around, and you didn't have to worry about things springing loose all over the place while working...it wasn't broke, nor was the content library, but they decided to "fix" it anyway, and there have been problems ever since.
You can say that again!! Poser 7's interface was a dream to use. Ever since they went over to the docking garbage, I have
hated, the interface with a passion. I
despise dockers. HATE them!! And the blasted things inside of Poser fly every which way at the slightest touch of the mouse. It's infuriating. LOL It also very much limits the customization that we can do of our interface. I will confess that after being inside of Studio for so long, every time I go into Poser I feel cramped. I feel like I've been jammed into a cell that is too small to hold me, and it's stifling. I can't wait to get out of there again. The interface is too busy, and WAY too cluttered.
That's another thing that for me, personally, I appreciate about DS. I love the tabbed interface. ALL the controls we need are still readily available, once we've set up our UI the way we like. And they're still kept nice and neatly out of the way on the sides in tabs. Beautifully designed UI. Now, I don't - and would never - ask Poser to look like DS. But they could sure come up with a much better UI for the program than this docker crap. LOL
However, it's necessary at least to say....from what I've heard, I'd rather gargle ground glass than try to run Windows 8...and I hope that it's not something about Windows 8 that has contributed to your problem. Your observations of Poser's memory leaks, etc. would certainly flag it for conflict at some point with Microsoft.
I'm actually thinking that this might be part of the issue, to be honest. Aside from the fact that my OS is 64-bit and P10 is a 32-bit program
(and that alone can be enough to cause problems in some cases), Windows 8.1 is a piece of junk. It's horrid. However, there are multiple reasons that I will not upgrade to Windows 10, and I cannot
downgrade to Windows 7 while 8.1 is installed on the HD.
But as far as P10 vs. Win 8.1; yeah, I do think there is something there that's basically making the two programs (the OS and Poser 10) incompatible with each other. I've been doing a LOT of research, and I'm seeing a whole host of all sorts of different issues that Win 8.1 users have had with Poser 10/Pro 2014. Each issue is different, it's never the same problem, but I've seen a lot of threads in various places with Poser 10 vs. Windows 8.1 problems.
So yeah, I do think that's part of what is contributing to my issues here, and that's why when I said I wouldn't try 2014 "at this time," I meant it. When I get my new internal HD, I am hoping to put Windows 7 on it, and I will, honestly, give P10 another try under THAT operating system and see how it goes.
Obviously you must know how to save poses in DS. I'm interested in learning how....and is it possible to convert the poses I've created to DS format? I used to use the DS Poser export utility to create poses, since that's how I started doing it...I was still using DS part of the time then. When I changed over to Poser, I just learned to do them there and never looked back.
Saving poses in DS is not quite as straightforward as it is in Poser. That is definitely a point in Poser's favor, and I will admit that without shame.
It's one of the things that Poser definitely does handle a little better than DS. In Poser, saving a pose without also saving morph options is as simple as making sure the "morphs" option is NOT checked. In DS, you have to manually un-check all those morphs
(and morphorms such as hand grasp etc).
This one is best explained with a proper step-by-step and some screenshots. I will do this separately, probably in a different thread and tag you on it so you can find it.
If there is any other way that I can be of help, let me know. I know you probably have a high standard with the work you create...but would it be possible to release two different versions of your character project, and indicate that the Poser version won't include the poses involving placement or parenting? Just a thought.
I am notoriously nitpicky about the quality of my content, yes. I always have been, even back when I was doing my very first freebies, I would refuse to release the item if it wasn't up to my standards at that time. Over the years, as I've grown more familiar with the software, the ins and outs, and learned more of the nitty gritty, yes, I hold myself to much higher standards than I did back in 2004 with my first freebies.
But that does not mean I'm unwilling to work with someone. I am very,
very willing to work with a Poser user if it will help get my packages released for the Poser artists to use! And yes, I have been thinking very much about doing exactly what you're suggesting insofar as the type of package. I'm pretty sure, in fact, that the best thing I'll be able to do is actually just the materials at this point, if I roll back to Pro2010 to do it.
Thankfully I already have my INJ/REM file for Nataani, so I don't have to worry about trying to do that. It's just the materials at this point. I really would have preferred to be able to give out the poses in both versions of the product, but at the present time, it's just not doable for my system.
What I would need, as far as someone to help, right now, would be someone who knows Poser's material room, and who can set up the material collection files
(the .mc6) for him. Whoever would or could do this, I cannot, for obvious reasons, test the MATs myself, so it's a matter of I will be trusting them to do good quality materials. I am more than willing to go in with them on the product as a joint-vendor item. I can send off the INJ/REM file, and all of the textures needed if someone was able to, and had the time, to do it.
Otherwise, though, it's going to have to wait until I can get a new HD and get myself back onto a reasonable OS... like Windows 7... LOL
I had no idea that DS would still accept Poser content. I'm familiar with replacing mat files...I do it all the time with vehicles. If it can still do OBJ, and even FBX import, it's worth looking into because I do a lot of pose work using free OBJ off ShareCG for the benefit of those on a zero 3D budget.
Yes. Absolutely, it can import all sorts of formats. Here's a quick screenshot of the options when you go to import an object.
(Click the image to enlarge it so you can read the file types...)
OBJ, FBX, no problems at all. The import process can be a might bit fiddly; you really need to know what program the object was originally modeled in, and then select that option on the import window once you've chosen the item from your dialogue box. DS will pop up an Import Options window for you to make that selection from.
If you don't know for sure which program an item was modeled in, then it becomes kind of a guessing game, as you select one option and import, and then another and another until it comes into the screen at the correct scale and orientation
(this is one of the reasons that I always state Blender or Wings, whichever I used to make a prop when I post it for download). Now, sometimes it just doesn't matter which option you select during the import process, you're simply going to have to translate/scale/rotate the object around properly. But usually, so long as you know which program it was modeled in, if you select the correct option on the Import dialogue, it will come into DS properly.
Anyway - this is the screen shot showing the file types that DS is capable of importing. This is reached by clicking on File--> Import from the menu at the top of the DS window.
Also, is it a bad idea to upgrade DS to 4.9 (I think this is the current version)...so much confusion about formats, etc. What version do you use?
Honestly... I am currently running DS 4.8. It's done the job very well for me. I always get a little hesitant about upgrading to the next version, because Daz has a habit of some issues needing to be fixed for the first couple of increments after a new version is released.
That said, though, I'm going to NEED to upgrade to 4.9 myself, because I want to make use of the more advanced dynamic clothing controls plugin, and I was a bad wolf and forgot to download the 4.8 version of that plugin, OR back it up to my external backup drives. That plugin... the version has to match the version of the program. So, I can't use DS 4.8 and use the 4.9 Dynamic controls... it won't work. I have to use DS 4.9 in order to use the 4.9 version of the plugin, and just like they do with the main program itself, Daz overwrites the link in our content libraries to match the versions. Which means... the 4.8 version of that plugin is no longer available to download from the product library.
Other than that... I don't think it's a BAD idea to update to 4.9, though I would suggest you might want to think long and hard about buying any product that is ONLY available with a DazConnect install type, because there is rather limited ability to manually organize those products the way you want. However, if you are NOT buying those items
(I always check to make sure an item has "Manual Install" as an install type before buying), so long as it has a Manual Install or DIM type of download available, then 4.9 is fine I would think, and you can just continue to install things to the places of your choosing.
I believe you will have to do a login once or something to register it or something like that... but after that you can tell the program to work in "offline" mode so it's not constantly trying to roll you into Connect. I'm not really entirely sure how 4.9 works yet, as I haven't updated just yet. That's one of those "after I have Nataani finished" things for me to do.
What I would tell you, is make sure you back up your copy of your 4.7 install, and if you really hate 4.9, then you can always uninstall 4.9 and roll yourself back to 4.7. But make sure you keep a copy of your 4.7 installer backed up, because you can't get it out of your Daz product library at this point. I have kept my copy of 4.5, 4.7, and 4.8 installs for just that reason. LOL I do keep meaning to delete the 4.5 and 4.7 ones, though... 4.8 is really as far back as I would ever need to downgrade to these days.
I'll post up a step-by-step on how to save poses for you on a separate thread. You should get a notification once I do that, as I will kind of "tag" you on the thread when it goes up.
