Quote -  Im trying to do this in Poser7 SR3 and when I try to raise my shadowcam I end up staring at nothing. everything but her heels are cut off. so I have no idea when im actually at her head or not.

I don't know why that would be the case. It works fine in all versions of Poser. Are you moving the shadow cam using the parameter dials? If you change your preview to the shadow cam, and also select that camera in the parameters, and then move the dials slowly you should have no trouble tracking where the camera is going.

Remember, though that the camera is not in its true initial position until you do at least one render. You don't have to let it finish - just get one started and then cancel it. Then switch to the shadow cam in preview and parameters, and move the dials. As you change the zoom, you'll have to keep tweaking the PanX and PanY dials incrementally.

However, this whole business is kind of not relevent to Poser 7 SR3. All the problems with ray-traced shadows are gone now. I never use depth-mapped shadows anymore. The ray-traced shadows are superior in every way, except one. They are really slow with highly complex trans-mapped hair. But the results are really worth using them. I suggest you get things basically correct in test renders, using depth-mapped shadows. Then - switch to ray-traced shadows and let-er-rip overnight with really good render settings.

Poser 7 is capable of very good realism, but you can't be cheap about compute time. A really good render is worth waiting overnight for.

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Renderosity forum reply notifications are wonky. If I read a follow-up in a thread, but I don't myself reply, then notifications no longer happen AT ALL on that thread. So if I seem to be ignoring a question, that's why. (Updated September 23, 2019)