Need "Line up" of Michael 1, 2, 3, 4 thru ???
mmitchell_houston
Posts: 2,490
I'm writing an introductory article about 3D art, and I want to provide a quick visual to show how the Michael figure has evolved over the years.
I seem to recall an illustration that showed all of the base Michael figures standing next to each other (David and Hiro may have been in there, too).
Can someone point me to such an illustration? I could create one, of course, but I always ask... why reinvent the wheel if it's already out there?
Thanks in advance for any help you can provide.
BTW: Yes, it would be nice to have Michael 1 thru 6 lined up, but since M6 is so new, I can pass on him for this article.
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Comments
if you pass M6 and Gianni, then you've already outdated your article. imo.
I don't know of a current image, no.
I do know that M1 and M2 are essentially the same figure (in the same way that M4 and M4 with Morphs+ are the same figure), so you wouldn't need to show them both if you make your own image. David has incarnations in generations 3 and 5; Hiro has versions in 3, 4, and 5.
And why wouldn't you make your own image? You'd need to worry about licensing issues if you use someone else's image in your article.
I don't recall seeing an image that has all of them, but I agree- you need Gen 6 or your article isn't very up to date.
It shouldn't take very long to put them all in a scene. Just put short hair on them so it doesn't take forever to render!
I don't have M1 through 3, but I put M4-6HD in line.
I wouldn't include Gianni in the list, though: he's still generation 6, parallel to rather than successive to M6.
Wow, seeing them like that, the improvement is already impressive!
Thanks. Guess I'll have to hunker down and create a quick M1 thru M5 image (and yeah, I'll include G1 and G2). Might even include Poser 4 Dork model. The article is for non-3D people who need a general, quick history of how figure has improved over the years. And I mention M6 in the article, and if space allows I'll include an official Daz promo illustration of him (though I doubt there's room -- this is a print article with limited space).
And, I'm probably going to incite a firestorm by saying this, but I have not purchased M6 and have no plans to do so in the near future. To be honest, it's too expensive for what you get. Another new male figure that is backward compatible with other figures I already have? I'm not seeing the value here. And a higher poly count is nice, but I almost never do photo-realistic renders, so that feature isn't really a strong selling point for me.
I'm not trying to badmouth the M6 development team -- it sure sounds like they put a lot of hard work into this figure and if I were just getting into Daz Studio, I would grab this guy in a heartbeat. But it comes down to the fact that I already have enough base male figures at this time (Michael 1 - 5, David 3 - 5, Hiro 3 - 5, numerous other characters, including Rex, G1 & G2 characters... and that's just the guys -- I've got plenty of gals , too) and I've decided to focus on using what I've got, rather than rushing out to buy the next big thing that really won't have any noticeable improvement on line art and toon renders. I will probably get M6 in a year or so when there is more content available for him and the price comes down.
Anyway, thanks for the assistance (and the line-up illustration). I appreciate it.
Mike
robkelk: Thanks for reminding me of that info about M1 & M2. I'd forgotten it.
This illustration is going to be relatively small, so it might only include key figures in the lineup, like P4, M1, M3, M4, G1, G2, M5...
Again, this is for non-3D artists. The goal is to show them how the models have improved and to get them interested enough to come look at the material on their own. The more I think about it (and the amount of space I have for the illustration), I might just include silhouettes of the male forms standing next to each other, and then do an illustration with three or four heads, most likely P4, M3, M4, M5 (or maybe G2). I might even do it in Poser so I can output a wireframe or hidden line illustration to demonstrate the polygon density improvements.
Again, this is primarily for a PRINT article, so space is limited.
Fortunately, after it appears in print, I will be able to reprint it on my blog, and there I can have some larger images.
Thanks for the image. That is something like what I was looking for.
I was mainly asking because i recalled there being an old Daz promo illustration that lined them all up, kind of like this.
Wow, it is cool to see the way they have improved things over the years. Did you consider putting the name under the figure? That would have been helpful.
You could go back to P2 man; he’s kind of the prehistoric man in the DAZ/Poser world. (The green square six foot tall)
Heh. If I had more space, I would go back that far. I think that would be amusing to dig up our ancient digital ancestors.
But I'm going to cut off at P4 since he was kind of the beginning of the modern era in terms of clothes and hair.
The more I think about the details of this article, the more I want to focus on the importance of morphs and textures, so the less space I have to spend on Michael's version history. I need to hit the big points in about 300-400 words.
Thanks for the image. That is something like what I was looking for.
I was mainly asking because i recalled there being an old Daz promo illustration that lined them all up, kind of like this.
Wow, it is cool to see the way they have improved things over the years. Did you consider putting the name under the figure? That would have been helpful.
Well, since I didn't know if this was what you were looking for, I didn't really go into postwork... It's not really good res for printing it, though.
They are, from left to right, M4, M5, M6 and M6HD.
M4 uses the High Res skin, M5 the Sheperd character skin, and M6 the high res standard M6 skin. It's rendered in DAZ Studio using 3Delight, and is lighted by two AOA distant lights.
Thanks for the info. I was pretty sure that's who they were.
The magazine illustration will be relatively small, so I'll probably only need to do about 3000 pixels across (that's for 600 dpi print -- if i only go 300 dpi I can get by with about 1500 pixels).
I really need to finish the article this week, and I've still got a few small illustrations to finish, and finish writing the text for the last section (the article will be printed in three parts). I have found from experience that I need to write all of it at once, otherwise something invariably comes up and delays one of the sections.
Thanks again, one and all!
I do not own M5 or M6, but I have quite a few of the elder ones here for you. This is literally just a very fast, throw-them-all-in render. If you want a better quality image, I can put one together and pose it properly for you. Click for full size image. The differences really are interesting!
Left to right : Poser 2 male, Poser 4 male, Michael 2, Michael 3, and Michael 4.
I don't have any textures for the P4 male's skin, and those badly fitting jeans are all I had left to cover his bits and pieces with.
Michael 2, I have lots of clothing items for, but no shorts... the greek skirt there is the only thing I could really use that wouldn't completely hide everything from the waist to the ankle.
I don't have any fancy height-chart thingies here... but these are the previous males I've got. Does this help any?
Yes, this is a great help. Wow, it's amazing to see the progression in quality as you line them up like this.
Thank you VERY MUCH! Do you mind if I use this? I'll include your info (and copyright) on the image and thank you in the article. Plus, I can get you a PDF of it when it's finally published, if you're interested. If you want to use your real name, you can PM it to me, along with your email address so I can send this on.
If not, I fully understand.
AND, by the way, I love that you included P2. His clothes were built in, right? He really does serve as a launching-off point for these guys.
And, to keep things modern, I can include an M5 and M6 image (I'm sure I can scare up a comparison image somewhere),
Thanks!
Mike
Mike,
I do not mind at all if you use it, but I would prefer to put together a more professional looking render for you to use. It's not you - it's me - I'm a bit of a perfectionist about the work I put out. This was literally a very, very rough slap-together just to get it up here for you to look at them all.
Everyone in the community knows me as either Seliah, or Childe of Fyre (or both, the second one is my brand, I guess you could call it), so I can't see the sense in putting my legal name down. (Especially as I go by Seliah even when offline. I only sign my legal name on government forms!)
I will put together a better lit and posed one (Mike 2's hand, for instance, is going through the Greek skirt in this one... yes, that bugs me!), and I will post up the finalized one with my branding for you to use.
I'll send you a PM here with my email address, and yes, I would be interested to see the article when it's finished.
As far as the P2 male goes. Yes, that is one solid mesh object. The clothing was 'built in' on that particular figure. That was the "Casual" P2 male. I did not use the nude version, because frankly, I no longer have ANYTHING left in my Runtimes for him to wear for the line-up. There was a "business" P2 male as well, wearing a business suit. The various parts of the clothing, and the skin, were separate material zones that could be individually textured. Incidentally, the P2 hands were not even poseable. There was geometry switching that would allow you to choose between 15 different pre-defined hand "positions" other than the default you see here, and that was it.
Give me a few minutes to put together a properly lit/posed scene, and I'll post a render that you can use. I'll send you a PM shortly.
Here are Mikes 2 through 6, from left to right. I posed them and applied the best quality default skins I had for them, no additional morphs or shader tweakings.
Another such render, in descending order and with slightly more pose/outfit variety.
Can anyone provide the dates at which the various generations first appeared?
I invested in Genesis / M5 and am disappointed in how quickly it was superseded. There is little content available for Genesis with all the attention now on Genesis 2. Did I miss some announcement or warning?
I wrote a short history of DAZ's human figures...you can find it here. The thread also has some information on using content made for one figure on another figure that you might find interesting if you're looking for ways to use Genesis 2 content on Genesis characters.