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Creating a Complex Scene in Poser 4
This tutorial is designed to help set up a complex scene in Poser 4 and it assumes you have a basic working knowledge of conforming clothing, posing figures and using the various cameras and focal settings in Poser.
Figures/Models used in this tutorial:
Forest Mysteria by chrisjol and judith [Renderosity Marketplace]
Victoria 1 [DAZ3D] with my Maria Character/Texture package [Renderosity Marketplace]
Jim Burton's French Maid Costume and MAB's Fairytale Package [DAZ3D]
Michael 1 [DAZ3D] with Kane Character/Texture package by Syyd Raven [Renderosity Marketplace]
Michael's Changing Fantasy Suit by Anton Kisiel with Symphony Textures [DAZ3D]
Wonder Wedge and MW Flip Hair [DAZ3D]
Charger and Charger Tack [DAZ3D]
Charger Texture by Daio [Free]
Lighting Project "Soft Contrast" lights by Anton Kisiel [Free]
I don't have any *one* method of setting up an image but tend to experiment with different things for each image. I'm sure there are many methods to achieving the same goal and this tutorial is not meant to say that my methods are the right way or the only way, just that these are the steps I took to arrive at my finished render.
When using Poser I tend to enable Fast Tracking. The more that is added to the scene, the slower more erratic moving the camera becomes. This method utilizes the "Import Poser Document or Prop" feature of Poser by creating each figure in a separate Poser document and then Importing them into your scene. This method is most effective when there are several figures in a scene as it allows you to fine tune each figure separately.
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I began by zooming around Forest Mysteria with different cameras to get a feel for the camera angle that would work the best for this scene. I settled on "Front Right", one of the Camera Presets included in the Forest Mysteria package.
I then played with the rotate camera dials, the focus and scale to set up the point of view you see here. I saved my camera setting as a new camera.
I did not change the position of the forest Mysteria prop itself. I left it in its default position and used the cameras to change views.
I saved the scene as forestempty.pz3
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In a new Poser document, I loaded Maria, the Snow White outfit, and the MW Flip Hair. I then applied the Sleeping Princess pose from MAB's Fairytale package.
Using the posing camera and the face camera, I zoomed in on Snow White to adjust the fit of the dress and the posing of her hands and face. I also used the morphs in the dress to lengthen and flatten it closer to her body -- as a dress would be in the lying position.
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I then loaded the Glass Case and made a few minor adjustments in the position of the figure in the case.
I turned the transparency off on the MW Flip Hair (Render>Materials>Hair -- slide the transparency slider down to "0") so that I could adjust the way the hair laid against the pillow. Once satisfied, I turned the transparency for the hair back on and rendered a test.
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Since I was going to import this into my forestempty.pz3 and wanted to be able to move the case and the figure inside as one figure, I parented the case to Snow White by selecting the case, then from the "Object" menu "Change Parent" and selecting the Snow White figure from the "Choose Parent" Window.
Now the case and the figure inside will move as one figure.
I saved this scene as snowwhiteincase.pz3.
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I created another new poser document and loaded the Charger and Charger Tack. I applied one the the many free horse poses available and spent a little time tweaking the legs, feet and neck (turn "Use Inverse Kinematics" off) so the horse looks like he's beginning to graze.
I had a hard time posing the reins until I realized they also load with Inverse Kinematics on. Once I turned it off, the reins were a breeze to pose.
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I wanted my horse to load into my empty forest scene in the proper place. Rather than push my hardware limits by trying to manipulate several figures in one scene, I set the position of the horse in this scene.
To do this, I loaded Forest Mysteria from the Figures Library and the using the Camera Preset I had saved, the Posing camera and the Top camera, I positioned the horse toward the rear of the scene. His legs needed a bit of tweaking where his feet sunk into the ground.
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Going back to my saved Camera Preset I can see that the horse is exactly where I want him to be. I saved this scene as horse.pz3 then deleted the Forest Mysteria prop and saved again.
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In a new poser document I loaded Kane and the Changing Fantasy Suit. Once satisfied with the textures I was using, I loaded the Wonder Wedge. Once again, I turned off the transparency for the hair, adjusted the hair morph settings until I was happy with the style, then turned transparency back on.
I knew I wanted Prince Charming on the steps of the Forest Mysteria prop, so I began posing him as though he were descending the steps.
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Once again, to save me manipulating a fully populated scene to get the pose of Prince Charming just right, I loaded the Forest Mysteria prop from the Figures Library again.
Using my saved Preset Camera, Posing and Top cameras, I moved Prince Charming to the back of the scene and positioned his legs and feet on the stairs.
Once satisifed with the pose, I saved this scene as knight.pz3, deleted the Forest Mysteria prop and saved again.
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At this point I was ready to assemble all of my saved .pz3's into one scene. I re-opened my foresempty.pz3 and then from the File menu, Imported the other .pz3's
File>Import>PoserDocument or Prop--
then select.pz3 from the file types drop down list.
I started with Snow White in her case ...
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Then imported the knight.pz3 ....
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and finally the horse.pz3
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I selected Snow White's "hip" and using "Z" and "Y" trans moved her (and the case) back and up in the scene so the case rested in the center of the stone platform.
I used the Main Camera with my saved camera preset and the Top camera to fine tune the position of the case.
At this point I also decided to move the horse a bit to the left.
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Here is the view from my Main Camera. I made a few lighting adjustments and then rendered the scene.
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I like to render my images large and then size them down, so I chose a vertical measurement of 1500 pixels for this one.
My lighting utilized Global Illumination and soft shadows so I turned the "Cast Shadows" on.
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And here is the rendered image.
I always save my renders as TIF format images because the TIF format will save the Alpha Channel. This image will not utilize Alpha Channels but I save as TIF anyway. :)
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Tutorials
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Go on to Step 2 - Postwork
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