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Post by lobb on Aug 13, 2021 12:19:37 GMT -5
I've been asking a lot of question in the DG discord but I'm afraid of annoying everyone there xD I figured I'd post here instead and give them a break. First up, Raffles. It's really hard to get him to pose and to stay properly aligned. Other people have tried and confirmed this I've spent ages looking over the various guides and I do the thing where you hold down the space bar, etc..
Here's his profile pose: The first one was taken by Thor, the second one was taken by me. As you can see, they're not perfect and it's the closest with Raffles. If anyone could give me some advice on how to align him better, that would be helpful. Should I go by toe or wrist/ankle alignment? Also, how much space should there be between his tail and body? This is the closest he seems to get to a Dali pose. :/ One issue with it is that it's not super clear to me when he's about to pose, and even taking pictures of each frame seems to have mixed results. It's like there's a limit to how pose-y he can get before switching to a profile pose AND without closing his eyes. I realise that (besides his behaviour and his tendency to jump around and out of alignment) it's probably related to his body type and breed! He's a VPZ Shelter Dog if that matters.
(I also know there are easier breeds to pose but honestly... I'm a lot more motivated to spend ages trying to pose him, since he's my favourite.) Now, onto poodle poses!
I think the last one might be the best one? An issue I'm having with him is keeping his head centered rather than tilted. :/ And how are his legs/paws looking?
Finally, I'm having the hardest time getting a profile pose where his nose looks straight and the eye on the other side isn't visible. I understand that with poodles they've got to be unaligned so they'll look aligned after posing but does anyone have any tips or advice on how to get that right?
Thank you if you had the patience to read all this!
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Post by zan on Aug 13, 2021 12:47:59 GMT -5
Okay, I love talking about showing/posing so I'm glad you posted XD
For Raffles, I've never posed this breed before, but I can give you my thoughts just looking visually at the poses you have for him (he's really cute, btw!). Personally, I prefer the second profile pose. It's pretty hard to tell exactly when he is aligned by the wrists, because his wrist area is kind of lengthened/angled, if that makes sense? But my suspicion is that in the first pose he is just ever so slighty turned too far away from the camera. In the second pose, there's an overall more balanced look to it; the level toes definitely help with that, so that's what I would aim for - though if he is capable of a 1 pixel offset instead of two I'd be tempted to try that and see how it looks.
To talk about his head as well, again in the first pose it looks like he's just slightly turning it too far away from the camera. That's not related to the alignment of his legs, though, as all dogs will vary how far they turn their head in a profile pose, which is what makes it so hard to get a good one. I like the second one better because I feel it has a better outline, plus a slightly higher head carriage, though if I were to be really picky I'd say the way to improve it would be to work on ensuring that no pixels of the far eye are visible at all (if it's possible for his file).
Other reasons I like the second pic more - it looks like it might be at a slightly better/higher breathing point? His body looks prouder with the chest slightly bigger but the body overall more compact, and I wonder if that explains the difference in his tail? In the original breeds, at the highest breathing point the tail will be at its most curled, perhaps his tail has a similar effect where it tightens up at the highest breathing point. I also like the level topline in this picture (not that you can see much of his back) and the fact that his chest fuzz is more even.
For the dali pose - it might be hard for him to excel in dali shows, since it doesn't look like he can achieve level eyes and he only has one noseshine so it won't make that desirable heart shape and it's hard to tell if his nose is level. Again I'd align by the back toes and you may find that his face looks more central. You want to get the alignment right first then pick the frame where he's close to the highest breathing point and looking directly at the camera, right before his gaze starts to look away. All dogs (I believe) will go from dali pose moving into profile when posing, so you'll only get one opportunity per posing action to get that ideal shot.
I do think there's some worth in going frame by frame as it will give you the best idea of which frame is correct as you'll be able to compare. Try dropping him into alignment and holding the spacebar until he poses, if you keep holding it through the entire pose action you'll have every frame. You may have to try this many times (and keep clearing out the Petzpix folder as it fills up). (By the way, apologies if I'm telling you things you already know, I just want to try to cover everything!)
Personally I think he's likely to do better in profile pose as opposed to dali pose, but there's no reason you can't show him in both and I definitely think there's room for improvement on that dali pose that will help him move up the placements!
For the poodle poses, have a look at the helpful alignment chart Amanda made (available on the Cargo website here). Obviously, the degree to which you need to turn your dog away from the camera varies depending on that dog's features - dogs with non-poodle heads may need to be turned further away in profile pose in order to avoid showing both eyes - that's the case with the dog you've pictured here. For front-facing poodle poses, my personal preference is that they are looking directly at the camera (as with regular dali poses). So in that case your first picture is closest, in the other two he's looking too far to his right. I like to see the nose directly between the eyes, ideally with a bit of both noseshines visible and as level as possible. (Just to note, the ideal angle is likely to be different for profile and front-facing, as can be seen from the results in that chart I linked to!)
It's most trial and error and learning what works for a particular dog, so unfortunately all you can do is be prepared to take a lot of pictures and figure out which angle/pose looks best. Luckily, poodle personality dogs seem to pose quite regularly, even if they often have an attitude about it!
Anyway, I really hope some of this helps and if there's any other questions you have, feel free to ask and I'll do my best to answer!
Edit: Ah man, I keep looking and honestly I really can't tell whether the tail gap or tail curled is the top of the breathing point. Definitely worth some frame-by-frame investigation!
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Post by lobb on Aug 14, 2021 17:26:15 GMT -5
zan Thank you so much! Your comment was very detailed and helpful <3 I'm glad my picture wasn't so bad! It took me forever to get that one. I usually do the thing where I take pictures of every frame by holding down space, but it's ridiculously hard -- he's constantly jumping out of alignment, or he'll pose but the alignment is off, etc..
I think you're right about wrist alignment, his arms/legs slope weirdly. I checked and I'm not sure if the far eye can ever be invisible at the highest breathing point or not. Here's a snippet of a sequence:
I'm not really sure if 2, 3, or 4 is the highest breathing point. I think you're right about his tail, though, it's one of the things I try to look like... when he's at the highest part of a pose, he seems to sort of tuck it against his back.
One thing I find super hard about aligning him are his toes. They never seem to have one paw snug against the other (if that makes sense), so the closer they seem to be pixel-wise, the bigger the gap between them.
I've tried again with the dali pose but the result is much the same. Let's call this #2.
This is the bit immediately before, so #1.
And immediately after, #3.
So, I think that's the highest breathing point based on his chest and tail, but I could be wrong.
I don't really mind if I can't enter him into front-facing shows. Just being getting some nice profile poses from him would be a big achievement to me! Thank you for encouraging me, though, because I think I'll keep trying just in case
And thank you for the poodle advice! That guide helps SO MUCH. I couldn't figure out the proper angle so I think that now I'll just have to practice those a bit more. Poodle poses are so weird!
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Post by zan on Aug 20, 2021 14:51:47 GMT -5
I forgot to reply to this before, but your frame sequence of him posing confirms that the highest breathing point is where his tail is really closely curled - you can see how the length of his body shortens/tightens up in the middle of those pics, whereas if you look at the first and last picture, there's more space visible everywhere, like in his tail and also between his front legs. In dog poses where they are at a lower breathing point than is ideal, you can usually tell by looking at the elbow area - the legs will be less aligned there, with the leg closest to the camera lagging behind. As the dog moves towards the highest breathing point, the front legs will reduce that gap.
I think pose 3 looks best in that sequence, though of course his head is held lower than would be ideal. But just talking about leg alignment and breathing point, it's really good!
For the dali poses, #2 looks best; he's standing taller and tighter, and his tail is the closest curled (in #3 you can see a little pixel of a gap in his tail). Ideally you want him looking directly at the camera (actually one frame before the true highest breathing point in dali pose) for the best expression - his dali pose in your first post has the best expression, though his leg alignment is better here.
Anyway I can tell you've put in a lot of work with him, so congratulations on your results and his show success!
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Post by lobb on Aug 22, 2021 15:58:53 GMT -5
Thank you so much! I'm really proud of what he's accomplished so far. I had no idea about looking at the elbow area for breathing points so that's a really good tip. I think I'll still keep working on Dali poses with him because it sounds like there's a lot of room for improvement, namely combining the nicer alignment with the nicer expression. I probably still won't join dali shows with him because it sounds like he's not suitable for them but it'll be good practice
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