On using content I didn't make myself...

[Starbase1]

I've never been particularly comfortable in general with using models or content I didn't make myself...

Somehow the resulting images often don't feel like they are really "mine", the process feels more like flower arranging, where any beauty in the result was there before I got started.

I'm particularly thinking of using Poser and/or Daz here, which tend to be heavily based on bought content. I've used it in the past, (and am doing so now), but it often felt like "apply pose a to figure b, with props c,d, and e..."

I've never been 100% happy with this position though - I've always been happy to use other people's textures for planets, so what's the difference?

Plus, I really like it when other people take models I have uploaded, and make a great image with them. Particularly if its like nothing I could have come up with.

I have looked at learning to make my own figures, but frankly it looks like a huge effort, and I'd much rather spend my time making good models of space hardware than bad models of people. But towards the end of last year I found a site with loads of covers from classic SF magazines, and it became painfully obvious to me that they almost all had figures in them, (if you include robots and humanoid aliens anyway). My own efforts began to look really sterile in comparison.

And even my beloved realistic space scenes sometimes need a good astronaut or cosmonaut in them. So I started looking at exporting figures to LW, where I felt I had more control, (particularly with lighting, and adding the modelled bits). Bought an astronaut figure and had it rigged.

And got very interested with the free Daz software, and their huge march sale, which has given me a LOT more stuff to muck about with. I particularly like the Genesis system, which is great for the mix and match of figures. For those unfamiliar, you can blend entire figures, including non human ones, and the results are generally pretty good to my eyes. It's flexible enough that when I use blends from several figures, the result feels very much like its mine - its not at all obvious in most cases what went into the mix, unlike the 4th generation Victoria and Michael figures, where I felt the source was really obvious 9 times out of 10.

It also makes for much better value - if (for example) the morphs for body builder detail, or expressions work with ALL genesis figures rather than being tied to one, its a lot more tempting to buy.

I like very much being able to go from an idea to a finished image in an evening, rather than spending a month doing the modelling. I like that I can produce images now which I think don't immediately show the bought elements in them, and that go a bit beyond what the creators of that content had in mind.

I feel I am ready to go past the 'experiment and move on' stage, to attempting quality images which really focus on a character idea.

But it does still feel like cheating.
A bit.

So how do other people feel? I think its a bit daft of me - as I said, particularly when I love what other people do with my models.

Nick