Curious Labs Poser 4

The '3D character animation and figure design tool' is back after a brief corporate hiatus, now published by Curious Labs, a company set up by the people who created the software in the first place.

Version 4 is a fairly extensive revision, and it includes a number of new facilities for adding clothes, rendering animations as cartoons and sketches, and for more detailed model sculpting. The interface has been tweaked, but thankfully retains its exceptional elegance, making this one of the most pleasant graphics packages to use.

As in earlier versions, to create a character you begin with a preset figure from a library. There is a selection of basic sizes, shapes and species to get you started. Human characters can be clad in a variety of clothes (not all of which fit that well). There are libraries of hairstyles, facial expressions, hand positions, props and preset poses.

Figures are split into body parts, each with appropriate parameters that can be adjusted either interactively or using a series of dials. For example, on the face you can alter the height of eyebrows, the shape of the chin, the pucker of the lips, even the amount of 'worry' in the expression. The female chest is fully adjustable for breast size, cleavage, droop and 'hi-nipple'.

Once you have found the required level of worry and nipple elevation for your character, you can get it to move. Poser has a 'Walk Designer' to help achieve what is a formidably complex animation job. There is a selection of preset walks, each of which can be tweaked by adjusting such parameters as 'head bounce' and 'hip swing', with a preview window giving you an idea of the results. There are also various 'blends', such as the 'power walk', with a slider allowing adjustment from a pantomime mince to a 'look-at-me-I'm-master-of-the-universe' stride.

Even more powerful is the ability to import motion files created using motion-capture systems. Several of these files are included with Poser's second 'Content' CD-ROM, and when applied to a figure they really bring it to life.

The lighting controls are improved and very easy to use, as are the rendering tools. Single frames and animations can be rendered photorealistically, as a cartoon or even 'painted' as a series of brushstrokes. The latter is achieved using the new 'Sketch Designer', which has a variety of parameters for picking brushes and colours, and presets so you can choose styles from 'soft charcoal' to 'JacksonP' (as in Jackson Pollock).

Poser 4 is enormous fun to use, but with its slick interface and amusing parameters it's easy to forget that it is trying to achieve a formidably complex task. Creating and animating believable characters, be they talking humans, marauding robots or dancing cows, is perhaps the most challenging task in 3D graphics. Poser helps, but you cannot hope to produce professional results without a lot of hard work and access to other resources. For example, the tools for building and texturing models have been improved, but are still quite basic. Most users will probably find they need to use specialist 3D modelling software to create realistic characters from scratch.

There is an entire CD-ROM devoted to sample models and animations, but the range is sparse and mostly aimed at marketing third-party products.

A readme file in the CD's root folder promises a host of samples that are not even on the disk. However, there was an entire folder of motion-capture files featuring a range of dance moves.

Another concern is the lack of context-sensitive help - almost essential for a product of this complexity. When you invoke help through the Help menu, all you get is a pdf version of the manual.

Such shortcomings are partially alleviated by Poser's exceptional third-party support. There is a busy, almost fanatical community of enthusiasts that users can draw upon for tutorials, resources and advice. There is also a growing number of companies that sell content online.

Whatever its limitations, Poser is great fun, thoughtfully designed and good value for such a powerful 3D tool.

ContactComputers Unlimited: 020 8358 5857; www.curiouslabs.com SYSTEM REQUIREMENTS Pentium or higher processor, Windows 95, 98, NT (SP3) or later, 64MB of RAM, 400MB hard disk space, 24bit colour display PROS Wonderful interface; powerful controls; good third-party support CONS Basic modelling and texturing tools; sparse content; poor online help OVERALL Makes one of the most challenging jobs in 3D graphics enormous fun.

See also:

Discreet 3D Studio Max 5

A much improved, feature-packed rendering and animation package.  05 Dec 2002

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