A big list of Poser freebies

BlackRaven3d has a big list of sites hosting free stuff for Poser and a few other 3d programs. As with any such large list, some of the links are dead, but most aren't and provide a lot of useful stuff.

Autumn Lakes background images for renders and art

Available through Renderosity.

The English Lake District is one of the most beautiful places in the world. The reds, browns and golds of autumn bring out a different character.

24 1200 by 1600 pixel background photos of lakes, hills, valleys and streams for use in renders and artwork.

2D Comic Art in Poser: Line Renders tutorial

Does exactly what it says in the title. Get basic line art, the author likes to think of it as finished pencils rather than full inks, with Poser and Photoshop.

Spinneyhead Alley Backgrounds

Another product from Spinneyhead for use in the background of 3D backgrounds. The Alley Backgrounds set consists of 25 images, at 1600 by 1200 pixels, of back streets and alleyways around Manchester. Ideal for shortcuts, chases and secret meetings.

This, of course, has come out too early to be included in my vowed one product per month minimum target for 2007. However, I have a couple more of these sets planned for teh New Year.

Amazon affiliate links-

The photos were taken with a Canon Powershot A620, a top quality camera. The backgrounds are intended primarily for use in Poser from Creative Labs. Poser 6 for Windows. Poser 6 for Mac.

Technorati tag: Poser, Render, Background

Post Industrial backgrounds 2

Spinneyhead's tail grows a little more. The original Post Industrial backgrounds set was popular, so I went out and took some more pictures of decaying Manchester for you to use in the backgrounds of renders. (May require Animotions membership to view.)



Technorati tag: Background, Render, 3d, Long Tail

Post Industrial backgrounds

Post Industrial backgrounds for renders and art. Another product from Spinneyhead at Renderosity (where I go under the name of IanP).

Woodland Backgrounds for renders

I've got my first product listed on Renderosity. It's a selection of woodland and park background photos for Poser renders and other images. There are fourteen images at 1600 by 1200 pixels, each in three versions- the image and two levels of blur to simulate depth of field.

Poser 6 allows you to set depth of field in renders and will blur the foreground and background for you but, after waiting nearly fourteen hours for a scene to render, I figured that it's sometimes simpler to cheat. So the depth of field images can be set as the background for portraits and headshots, and could be useful for keeping attention focussed on the action in a comic strip.


IanP's English Woodland backgrounds

Poser conforming clothing tutorial

I've been having some problems with the cloth room in Poser 6, but hopefully this tutorial can make things a bit clearer for me.

Crystal Render

Another interesting way to get your 3D models into the real world. Crystal Render will take a 3D file and, using a focussed laser, turn it into a bubble image within a piece of crystal. There is currently a special offer discount for Poser owners.

About the CrystalRender process:

1. First, your 3D model is converted into a "pointcloud" with special 3D conversion software. A "pointcloud" is simply a collection of points that represent the original geometry surface. Think of it as "dusting for fingerprints" all over your model. Then, by removing the original 3D object, what is left behind is the sparkling dust pointcloud in the shape of your original model.

2. Next, a very powerful laser beam is focused at a specific point within the crystal and a brief burst of high energy is released. This concentrated energy heats the crystal and creates a tiny "stress crack" at this exact location. The points are very small (about 1/10 of a millimeter).

The crystal must be optically perfect, completely transparent and the structure must also be rendered from back to front, so that previously created points don't interfere with the laser drawing the new ones.

To draw more points, the laser is pulsed on and off and the beam is redirected with a mirror. The mirror is moved by computer-controlled motors between points. It is this way that the many thousands of points in a typical pointcloud model can be drawn with such incredible speed and accuracy.

Holodeck for the Cyclorama

I'm considering a virtual reality tale done in Poser. Obviously it would have to start on a holodeck or blank VR domain, so I knocked up a grey and green texture for the DAZ Cyclorama as a starting point. (This is one of the many items that's available at $1.99 if you sign up for Platinum Club membership. I'm an affiliate, so I'll get money if you do, but I wouldn't recommend it if it wasn't a very useful service.)

Download holodeck.zip, unpack it into the appropriate folder then set it as the texture for the Cyclorama.

Next up I may put together some floating, semi-transparent control panels.

Hair Styling

I've just discovered the tutorial section on e-frontiers site. Tomorrow I'm going to have a go at hair blowing in the wind using Poser 6's dynamic hair.

Lost in Space

I'm working on a new webcomic to be illustrated primarily with Poser. I've used the program before, on Deputised Experts, but then it was a tool for, well, posing the characters before drawing them.

With my purchase of Poser 6 I decided to do at least one comic predominantly in rendered images. That comic is Mongrels, as tory of post-humans policing the divide between homo sapiens and the AIs.

Adrift is the first Mongrels tale, set at an unspecified point in the series' continuity. It is, the sub header proclaims "The adventures of a dead man in a aspace suit". As our protagonist is floating in empty space and can't move his arms or legas it was an easy one to set up. poses and lighting don't change for most of the story, only the camera changes position. I'm using all this to learn a little more about textures, MAT files and other stuff.

Adrift was created using the products below from DAZ3d.

Michael 3.0 Base	Everyday Male	Michael 3.0 Head & Body Morphs
M3 Space Suit	Explorer Unit

Reading Matter

A couple of books for the Poser 6 beginner.

3d image to 3d reality

Here's an interesting thing to do with your Poser figures. You can export them as OBJ files to Shader and from there export them as STL files for a company such as Tekpro to make a prototype model of.

Or you could shell out a few thousand dollars to get a 3d printer of your own.

Welcome to Render

Welcome to Render, where I will share 3d modelling news, hints and tips. I recently purchased the new version of Curious Labs' Poser and am determined to get the most out of it. I have found DAZ products useful in helping me with this. They have some cool products and I've become an affiliate to try and persuade others to use their quality products.

I have purchased the following from DAZ and found them useful-


Cyclorama: Woodland Coast Backgrounds

Platinum Club Annual Membership

Woodland Realm Playset Two

Woodland Realm Playset One

If you are interested in making money through the DAZ affiliate program like I do, please click here for more information.

If you have questions about anything, please let me know by emailing me at: Ian@spinneyhead.co.uk