Others say...

"Poser 7"
Having cut my teeth on Poser 4 and then went straight to 5 shortly afterwards I was hesitant of version 6 when it arrived and had similar misgivings about version 7 as there were always quirks, bugs and things to work around every time. Well, the latest version after 3 months of testing and trying to break it is showing that it has a solid interface and does play well with others. Specifically the older content from 4 years ago.
The beauty of multiple runtimes is a godsend no more having one runtime and searching through in my case over 20 gig of content, now I have sorted my runtime into specific categories and not only does Poser load quicker but I can find what I want for a style of picture easily. The multiple undo feature works quite well and has saved a couple of pics, however be careful for if you apply a conforming pose to an item and then undo it, it returns the current character to its default position. And the other godsend is the duplicate feature, no more haviong to load mulitple items one at a time, granted it is still a one at a time process but I have noticed that it is much more rapid then loading from the runtime. The other new feature in the program is the addition of HDRI lights and can we say a whole new level of realism? Yes, you can and it does add so much more and all that with a click.
So am I happy with the latest version yes I am. Would I recommend it to other Yes I do.

"Crash baby crash"
I've been working with Poser 6 for a while, I finally decided to make the leap to Poser 7.

Intalled it. Started the program. And CRASH! I don't mean an application "not responding" message. I mean a total system crash. My PC needed a hard reboot (cut the power reboot). I found the service pack 1 on the efrontiers website. Installed it. Opened the program again. CRASH.

After spending $180 for the program, I decided it was worth one more try. Started the program. This time I figured out the system seizure happened when I moved the mouse cursor over the document window. Reboot again. Avoiding the document, I ran my mouse cursor over the top menu, Deleted Figure. The default loaded Simon. Once Simon was gone, I was able to work for a little while.

Addendum 4/18/2007

Other disappointments with the program:

One of Poser's Features is the Face Room.
The kids' figures are not compatible with the face room, which is a total shame.

The Cloth room is very complicated to learn how to use. Using the program's documentation, plus buying two User Guides, I haven't been able to make cloth. But I could be exceptionally dense.

Head paramater dials don't include ears. Only Judy, carried forward from Poser 5, lets you shape elf ears.

Action poses and their back geometries. I loaded James into my project, and posed him with one of his action presets. Something really unnatural looking happens to his back.


Addendum May 25, 2007:
I worked for several hours without crashing. The new feature in Poser7 is the Undo option. By default, the software sets the Undo level to 100. After changing the Undo level preference to 3, so far so good!


Addendum June 26, 2007:
Service Pack 2 is now available for the program. I've been able to work without a PC crash, I'm feeling better about having spent the money for the software.

The community supporting this software is surprisingly friendly, and global. I've posted numerous questions on the Content Paradise Forum website, and almost always received an answer, if not a friendly bit of encouragement.

It's like playing with paperdolls. You can buy shoes, dress, lingerie, sets, and scenery, props, etc.

To achieve commercial grade results, you'll need to read the Poser Manual from cover to cover. Plus, Poser doesn't include a modeller or UV Mapper, you'll need extra software if you want to tailor results to your needs.

Cheers,
Lara

"Poser 7"
This is an absolutely great product. I am very pleased with my purchase.

"to the next level"
the ability that are allowed in this program really make it possable for inviduallys to produce believeable animation. such as the sync tool. the creativity it opens up is like day and night form the pervious version. version 6 was great this is levels above that. spend time and learn from this program and you'll be able to do so much. its not a poser program its an animation solution.

"It has expanded my working space"
Poser 7 is not that much different from Poser 6. It is true sometimes is too slow because of the new so claimed by the poser comunity undo feature. Poses sometimes slow to apply because of the new universal poses feature you can easily disable in the general prefferences. I am a Poser Content creator. Poser 7 does not crashes in the firefly renderer at full power like Poser 6 always did the "not enough memory to continue". It has a better render engine and the magnifficent new morphing tool. Renders look more sharper and better, and some runtime enviroments work very good. The new G2 Characters Sydney and Simon (jessi, james, koji, kelvin) are a new evolution of the fabric of Poser content. I have worked with them developing clothes and it has been a good experience.

I still think now that Poser Sr1 is released it can be better. I think Poser can be more improved.

Warning: Poser 7 does not work fully on Windows Vista. It crashes too much, sometimes it;s features stop working and it becomes a head ache. I hope soon a release to fix these issues on Vista.

Poser 7 is a more expanded and advanced way to manage my creations/animations and some features like morphing. I can do a lot more in my products than with the previous versions. But I still use Poser 6 for the working space (more faster) and using my creations in Poser 7, rendering, etc.

Yanelis3D