Despite Studio's Popularity, P…
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it's the staring means poser art
Well again it depends on the narrative ?? particularly in sequential art.
Many of the so called "3D comics" I see made with Poser/Daz ,suffer from the same Disease as the renders in the single still art galleries
Poor composition, poor lighting.
And from a comic book graphic design perspective, amatureish panel layout and even bad font choices in terms of type face and word balloon placement.
And of course an over abundance of poorly dressed poser vickies not properly dressed for the scenes depicted but only to show off poorly framed head to toe shots of preferred outfits from the artists massive hoard of content
heavily female populated "comics"that only seem to be there to showcase the creators personal female fetishes
( I like skinny blond white girls with perky breasts)
Here is a digital "comic" I did over seven years ago.
https://issuu.com/anabran/docs/rdl7
It is ALL poser figures and sets rendered with a toon filter in maxon Cinema4D.
IMHO the complete absence of gratuitous "Sexy girls" is the reason why people do not immediately know that this comic is 100 percent Poser Content.
Sadly my days of drawing and inking my own scenes by hand are over once I had a workplace injury. I will have to live with the disrespect off others. No biggee.
Given a lot of people here naturally do consider using DAZ/Poser as creating art, and thus are unhappy with comments from so called "Real Artists" that pour scorn on it, I wonder how many would consider the merits of art creation in an even more machine driven manner. I am refering to simply pressing the screen capture button whilst playing a 3D game, and then posting this as "Art" they created. I understand that in some 3D games like second life/fallout/skyrim etc (note I have not actually played any of these) you can upload your own assets, plus manually pose your characters, and thus can require some level of skill. However this is not the case with more traditional action games like GTA, Assassins creed etc. You can customize your characters in these games, and naturally you decide where they go and what they do, but the art creation part is little more than a button press. I guess you could argue that is no different than the art created by a photographer, but at least the photographer had to wander around in the real world and find an interesting scene/moment to snap.
I have seen a number of these game capture still art posted to Deviant Art, and other places, and I am curious as to what others consider to their merits to be called "Art".
A kid's latest fingerpainting masterpiece posted on the fridge is art, so why not?
(Everybody starts somewhere...)
And yes, I'm comparing game captures to kindergarten fingerpainting.
Sounds like a completely different discussion seeing we're talking about Daz/Poser, and CG art in general. Daz/Poser is not quite at the level where you can simply "push a button" and the software does all the work for you. The fact that some skills are required and that there are levels to the skills that people have attained using those programs sets them miles beyond a screen capture. As a newbie, I can follow a tutorial and get a very pleasing image, but let's be real, I didn't really create anything; I followed a template. If you're going to call that art, then you also call a plaguerized book art as well. Sometimes we take things to a ridiculous extreme in order to try to be all inclusive; and you see examples of people making monkeys out of the public all the time because nobody is willing to, or scared to call them on their crap. Everything does not fall under the category of art as much as some people would like it to.
You can even make the distinction between good art and bad art, if the piece in question is, or is not elictiting the response that the creator intended. I've seen really good Daz artists on the deviant art site and I know that I would love my pieces to look like theirs so I can say without shame that their works are better than mine at this stage. If a person who wants to acheive a certain level can't admit that then how are you supposed to get better? A person who thinks everything they do is a masterpiece is never going to grow as an artist -- if that is what they truly want to be. Honestly a lot of people want to be considered artists, but they simply aren't willing to put in the work it takes to become masters at what they wish to do, and we've become a society that makes them feel compfortable with that.
It still isn't considered art by the art community. While 3D has come a long way in terms of realism (and there are very talented folks out there who can make a render look amazingly life-like), the negative stigma is still there. That's because there are maybe 10% of people who can pull off the realism you need to impress with 3D art, and the other 90% of the community puts out volumes of stuff that's badly lit, badly posed and look like window store dummies with shiny nostrils. And (unfortunately) the quantity of the bad overshadows the good.
However, 3D is being seen in a new light by movie studios (just think of all the 3D used in the Marvel movies), and that has helped a bit. I've even started to see articles in art magazines about using 3D as a reference tool for drawing (that's how I use it). Some comic illustrators use it since they can get different reference angles on the same model for different panels, so it saves work (and anything that helps with timelines is bound to become more popular). I have neither the patience nor the talent to do ultra-realistic renders that would impress anyone, but 3D is a great reference tool for artists and a lot of them are using it commercially. They may not fess up to it due to the negativity associated with it in traditional art communities, but it's definitely being used.
It's not the 3D itself isn't considered art, it's that people are at an impasse as to how much input an artist has to have in a project for it to be considered art.
It's interesting that you mention the use of 3D in films. A film is considered art, yet a film (a Hollywood film) is considered art eventhough no one person can take full responsibility for the final work. Look at the end credit of any Pixar film, and you will see hundreds of animators, riggers, texture artists, modelers etc. The public calls them all artists yet a Daz artist in many respects works the exact same way. In fact a typical Daz artist handles more aspects in the creation of any still photo than any single person working on a typical animated film.
And advances in technology have allowed for a individual to have way more control of his creations than any Hollywood artist except for a very few auteurs out there. You can make an animated film entirely by yourself, without necessarily being an expert in all the skills necessary to make that project happen; Similar to the way in which you can now have amazing musicians who while they can not play an instrument can compose and record virtuoso pieces on a keyboard and a computer. In many ways people are going to have to change their definitions of what constitutes an artist; and old school "art communities" are generally the last people to acknowledge changes brought about by technology. I can remember when NLE systems for film weren't even taken seriously by the academy, or the majority of filmmakers, but now nobody cuts film anymore. Software like Final Cut Pro put the ability to edit into the hands of anybody who was willing to learn, just like Daz/Poser puts the ability to learn compostition, texturing, and lighting into the hands of anyone who wants to master it. Some people will, some won't, others will reach a level they are satisfied with and that's a good thing. And if you are one of the few that master it, then you have nothing to be ashamed of, or feel any negative stigma from. You WILL be an artist.
Well, if it's a good picture, they had to wander around the game world and find a good subject and angle for the composition. The real world just has more variety.
A photographer is still a few steps up from there as they consider lens/focus/exposure/etc, and/or set up reflectors to manipulate lighting conditions.
But a good pic is a good pic. Simply pressing screen caputure during a mess of explosions and saying 'look what I did' is different from parking a car on the beach at sunset and waiting 'til a gull lands on it.
I think the surest sign that CGI is art is the fact that people are arguing angrily over whether it's art.
(since that's, like, the hallmark of at least a century of art, possibly several)
#1) You cannot define art. That is the cusp of where this goes. Art is what people make it out to be. If you want to talk about Daz, there are plenty of "Ready to Render" scenes set up by PA's for sale here. Load up your ready to render scene, load up your predefined figure with predefined poses, and hit the render button. How many clicks was that? Daz is indeed getting to that point where it is all one or two clicks away. And that is fine! So the question is...is that art? Well, yes, it still is.
#2) On the subject of screen shots in gaming. All games on PC can have screeshots taken. And pretty much most games on consoles can as well. The ps4 even has a "Share" button specfically for this, and the Xbox One has a similar function. Skyrim and other Besthesda made games have extremely vibrant communities. After all, 25 MILLION people have Skyrim just on PC. That's not counting consoles! And Skyrim has a very dedicated modding community. There are a lot of mods that basically beautify the game, as Bethesda's base is quite ugly (kind of like how Base Victoria 4 is kind of ugly.) You have to install all these improved textures and lighting packs to make the game look better (not unlike Victoria 4!!) Some dedicated modders have even created full camera and posing systems. Taking these screentshots is no simple task. You have to install them, and know how to work them. You have to know the game! You can't just dive in willy nilly and do it. You have to pose your actors, set the lighting (keep in mind the game has an active time system, time is always moving.) It frankly is not so different from Poser once you break it all down. I doubt many people here, even well trained Daz experts, would be able to just jump into the Skyrim scene and create great pictures right away. It takes just as much skill as it does for Poser/Daz. End of story. The only difference is the picture renders instantly. There are some freakishly good Skyrim pictures out there, pictures that can be confused with Poser or something else (sorry, Poser experts.) They certainly don't look like any ordinary game screenshot.
Even the other games you mention still require proper set up. Like GTA. Most pics in GTA require a LOT of planning. After all, it IS a video game, and it is going to take some know how in order to get a game to set things up. GTA is extremely random. If you want to create an interesting scene, you have to create it all. You want to create an explosion, you gotta make that explosion happen and time it just right! Sometimes online, this requires lots of people doing their own part.
Creating art from video games is very quickly becoming a thing. It has become so popular, that Nvidia created special software JUST FOR SCREENSHOTS with the release of its 1000 series. They call it Ansel. It allows you move the camera around and take a picture that vastly exceeds the resolution of your screen. You could even go up to 40,000 pixels. Try doing that with Iray! HA! And as gaming graphics get better and better, more and more people are doing this. You still have to line up your shot and consider the composition, just like you do in standard photography. It still requires planning. The tools are getting easier, yes, but that does not make and less of an art form.
To look down on gaming screenshot art, or XNA art, is no different than having a Maya user look down on Daz. And part of this comes down to ignorance. Neither of these posts are particularly well informed, I mean, the first didn't even play those games. Not trying to insult here, but it is easy to put down what you don't understand. Even as people jump to defend Poser/Daz, I see many posts still all too happy to define what they think is bad art, or a lesser art form. People who want to exclude others from their level. Lets not do that folks. This leads to my next point.
That "Poser Stigma" thing. This is no different than the so called "PC Master Race" of gamers looking down on "Console Peasants." It is Elitism, pure and simple. People who think they are better than somebody else just because of what they use or how they do it. They got the $800 software on the multi-thousand dollar machines. You can list all sorts of other reasons and excuses, from the skimpy clothes and style of art that sometimes defines Poser users, but at the end of the day it comes back to Elitism. Just like jocks might look down at lesser atheletic people, this is the geeky equivilant to that. Most people like to feel that they are better than others at something. Its kind of human nature.
Finally, I'll say that one of the things that drew me to Daz Studio was SKYRIM. That's right, without Skyim the video game, I wouldn't even be here. It was through Skyrim that I became inspired to look for something like this, like Daz. That is also why I believe Daz needs to court people who are doing that kind of art, the screenshot and the XNA crowd. There are people who already use Daz to render their XNA created scenes. These people are potential Daz customers!
Good points, but we're still discussing two difference types of art. Just like nature photograhy is different than studio photograhy. Trying to equate the two simply muddies the water and makes it impossible to have a meaningful discussion since there is not a common basis upon which to compare the two other than that both use a camera.
Interesting as the conversation has become, people are still waffling on the area of Daz being significantly different than Poser, to the point that people are still confusing the two, and what are the users of those software programs either doing or not doing that the average layman can't tell the difference, because I can guarantee that you can take specific pieces of art done on both Daz and Poser, show them to someone who is vaguely familiar with "Poser Art" and they will not associate those pictures with either program in a million years. Similarly you can create something in a high end program like Maya that people would think was done in Poser. It's simply a style that became so ubiquitous that the style and the software became synonomous in peoples minds.
You can define art, but it depends a bit on the genre. The main issue with so called Poser art is that is pretty clearly of a specific genre which is computer generated picture, or a photo in the broader sense, or a painting. As such the rules for what is or is not aesthetic are pretty set. If it were abstract art then there would be more room for interpretation, but again since most Poser/Daz renders are based in either reality or comics, the rules of what is perceived as good or bad art are made.
It's really no different than any other pro vs hobby debate. On one side you have people working professionally as artists who have spent the better part of their lives studying and honing their skills. They are the masters, they know what good art looks like and nobody should really be offended or call them elitists because they don't like something that came out of Daz or Poser. Rather they should accept that their stuff cannot compare to the work of pros and move on. It's not a big deal, it's perfectly normal and it doesn't mean that there is no merrit in their work. A hobby pianist probably never reaches the level of a pro who dedicated his life to playing, yet he can still play nice enough for family or friends or simply just enjoy it for himself, even knowing full well that at a real recital they would laugh him out.
Case in point, look at this image: http://arthurbozonnet.cgsociety.org/art/photoshop-ballisticpublishing-cfe-expose12-atalanta-fantasy-2d-1309891
Now of course you may disagree but to me this is mesmerizing. The art style, the composition, the colors, and just the thought-provoking nature of it all, I can stare at this for a long time. Just like you would be standing for minutes in front of a good picture at an art exhibition. Now in contrast, go to DeviantArt and click on the 3-Dimenional Art category and see what comes up there.
And there's another issue outside of the art debate, and that is realism. As the CG industry today has reached such astounding technical finesse, semi-photorealistic renders out of Poser are simply usually not up there just in terms of pure technical brilliance, even ignoring wether something may be of artistic value or not.
There can be slight differences in finished Poser or Daz work that may give them away as to which render engine created them. But many who can tell the difference have worked with both programs and know just what to look for. Now before I found Studio I was well aware of poser and what it was for, even played with a copy of Poser 3, to me Studio was just another "Poser" program. I really thought all 3d related programs were Poser programs actually, lol. Boy did I get a rude awakening.
And speaking of games I used to take screenshots of my Sims in Sims 2 whenever they did crazy things, I thought one of my toddlers was being adorable, or when they glitched out. Not thinking of it in an artistic sense, just something I thought was neat and wanted to show them off. Yes, yes you can pose Sims, there are poseboxes available so you can take screenshots of whatever you want them to do. ;)
I'd say it's the other way around. The definition of art is in the mind of the beholder. I've mentioned photography as a recognized art form that at it base requires no creation of elements, only the capturing of a particular point of view or moment in time, using a set of tools that the vast majority of photographers would never be able to build on their own. Is a photographer not an artist if they don't grind their own lenses or manufacture their own film? Likewise, Braque and Picasso pioneered the use of collage as a serious medium, and today there are multiple schools of art using found items. Now, I have to admit that I'm hard pressed to consider the recent spate of artists who arrange actual human cadavers and call it art, but they don't seem to be a shortage of galleries willing to host their exhibitions. In the end, if you can get a reasonable number of people to agree that something is a form of art, then it's art, no matter what other people may think.
Now, whether it's GOOD art is another question.
Finally, as to plagerization... if you were to simply copy a book and change the name of the author to your own, that's not art, that's copying. On the other hand, how do you classify something like PRIDE AND PREJUDICE AND ZOMBIES?
A bad movie?
And everybody with a phone, ipad, etc does the same with their kids, cats, whatever and why Facebook came to be...
I can see how my post can come across as being uninformed, as I did not actual state that I did not really agree with the point I was making. I was actually playing a bit of a Devil's Advocate role, as I was wondering if we DAZ/Poser artists might suffer from a similar kind of snobbery from Maya etc users. Like you correctly said, we can not critize those that look down on us, whilst doing the same to others. I was interested in what debate this might raise.
The movie wasn't that bad. But the book was a major bestseller and quite well reviewed.
This.
The quality and any artistic merit of an image are irrelevant. When someone sees computer-generated 3D art posted on a message board or some random image gallery, they think Poser. To them, 3D art is synonymous with Poser.
My word, this is so true. I had the privilege of reading some artists' accounts when cameras were first invented, and some of the comments were quite shocking.
Artists also frowned upon using references and woodblocks for a time too, then became more acceptable...
Exactly... So by Poser Art they actually meant to say Poser Style...
Anyway, no defense needed IMO. Could easily be value judgement neutral, or, 'obvious unoriginal visual style'. Both perspectives are valid...
Visual Style...a timeless and timely topic in a community about 3D art render. Soap box mode...
Yes there's discernable typical user style - Maya Max C4D Blender, or "general" DS users style, even The Sims or GTA styles. Style as in genre style, nothing whatsoever to do with actual visual style quality, which has to do with artistic taste...
Non-artists would claim there's no such thing as good taste or visual standards (!!!) like "musicians" or Idol contestants claiming not important to develop tonal quality, character, and charisma! lol
If artistic standard or taste is arbitrary, Daz store products, grade AAA or grade ZZZ must all be priced the same then? lol
How convenient if aesthetic standards don't exist!
Typically, middleware users output stylistically not as amazing awesome as Eliteware users? Of course...
Generally and generously speaking...ratio is about 1:10.
Hobbyist galleries vs ZBrush/Maya/etc pro galleries, around 3% great style vs 30% great style.
As many have said already, you get out what much you put in. Especially in CG, most demanding art form.
Stylistic excellence is a thing. Very real, universal thing. Some children and cats can detect that !
Stylistic sensitivity can be cultivated. Learning is 1000% faster in pro users areas for obvious reasons.
Stylistic sensitivity would be low and slow where these are frequently overheard, 'no such thing as low brow art', 'good taste is a myth'.
Real artists may not even know their style from day one. But they have Taste from day one. They CAN TELL exceptional style from good-enough.
Real artists get the nuances. They are culture-sensitive, not retro fashion victims. They won't subject their Mila Kunis clone to non-ironic 1989 bar hostess makeup in a day time outdoor shoot.
True artists chase that illusive vision relentlessly. They won't grapple with $500 on a gitar or software or $99 workshops. They view ROI not just in terms of cash or eyeballs.
True artists won't settle at technical mastery. Perfect pitch or photoreal caustics, just another necessity. They know the distinction of craft vs art.
The average CG hobbyists...
Just wanna have fun...(and apparently neverending lycra costumes and retro casino stillettos)
What pro grade CG artists have above the dabblers: humility and discipline. They actively seek opinions - not just on technic, but artistry too! Constructive no-holds-bar feedback happens every minute on every ZBrush/ Polycount/ Mudbox forums. True artists crave positive OSMOSIS, inspiration. They fantasize, but still reality check.
The average hobbyists here, are they ready for such "elitist app user" things?
How frequently you see people SEEK critique of their visual style in Poser/ Daz or iClone or other hobby and game forums?
Who cares! Everyone is beautiful everything is awesome!
Shrug. CG is a high-end intense hobby but hey "it's still just a hobby"?
Right?
Wait. Didn't the same "shrug it's just a hobby" self-admitted hobbyists insist on being giving the "due respect" as "real artists"?
Really?
Me, too, Will.
I stopped worrying about the concept of CG versus natural media art when I was walking through Savannah art galleries a couple of years ago. The same photograph enhanced digitally and printed out in different color schemes on canvas paper, digital "paint" not matching the canvas grain or natural light reflections. Maybe a lot of it was student work from SCAD and I wondered if CG was now part of their curriculum. In any case, it was recognized as worthy of being sold in a gallery. And I'm sure the masses didn't realize it was computer enhanced. So I just do what I enjoy and study composition techniques, lighting principles and other "art" concepts to improve my CG images.
Considering that Dreamworks apparently harvests a fair percentage of their talent from SCAD, I'd say CG is part of the curriculum. :) I have a friend whose son is going to SCAD. I even reccomended DS to him as a way to practice his live drawning skills, going back to Poser's original purpose. :)
I think to some poser is a negative word and I am not talking about art but the term poser.
Hahahaha...so true ;).
Laurie
But in ten years, the younger generations will most likely call it "Daz art."
Oh, that's funny! That's exactly how I started 10 years ago. I was making dolls and wanted to get into polymer clay sculpting. I saw Poser advertised as a live-model artist's tool and thought it be a perfect for sculpting because you can rotate the figure every which way. But i didn't want to spend the money on Poser. That's when I discovered DAZ Studio. I did one tutorial test render with Vicky 3 and was totally hooked. Never went back to doll making or polymer clay.