Hi, I've looked in the forum for this and can't seem to find anything that really addresses the problem. I was out tonight and the moon was full and quite brilliant. It was casting good shadows on the ground, and was as bright as a street lamp. That's the real thing, one over which we have no controls. When I tried to duplicate the effect in Bryce, I found I just couldn't. Turning on the Moon in the Sky lab and fussing with the contorls only gave me an idea of a moon, and it looked more like something one would see in a sci-fi fantasy picture, not the real planet (er, satellite?) I also find that the color of the moon changes depeding on the sky used, even when the fog and haze controls are shut completely off. I just can't seem to get a very bright moon, and shadows are also hard to generate, even with the sky shadows turned all the way up. I know I could post process an image in Photoshop to make it look better, but if I wanted to animate my scene, this would become a problem. Any tips on making a moon in Bryce that acts like the real thing, has brightness and definition? Thanks!

I agree totally...last nite over an Arizona sky the full moon rose and looked full and orange and as it rises it loses that orange..but theres a few moments when it's first rising that it looks alive...

Clay, Really nice image! Can you explain a bit more about the RGB perspective? Do you mean the RBG controls in the Sky Lab? I tried those but didn't get very far, in fact, I didn't see any difference. In your image, the moon is a grey-blue color. This is what I keep getting. But in the real night sky, the moon is yellow and sometimes orange, as Robnobs says of Arizona. Got any clues about the color? Again, really nice image and evocative. Can some of the shadows you are getting be a part of the water's reflect material Setting? If so, what about none reflective surfaces, such as grass or concrete? Thanks!

I love the way clay pops in out of nowhere from time to time with a tidbit that none of us mere mortals could reproduce or with something simple yet vastly effective, then melts back into the ether leaving us to question if we've seen a ghost or not.

add moon texture as a semi-transparent overlay in post work...I like it

You could use a sphere texture mapped with the moon. Kick up the ambience a bit. And then hide a light source somewhere around it for good measure. Dunno how well it'd work, but it couldn't hurt to try.

there's a program called Lunar Cell from Flaming Pear. Now I'm not sure if this is a seperate program, or a Photoshop plugin (in which case I'm out of luck..;). They have some other things like Solar Cell, but I think Lunar Cell does moons.

Hey Pakled, I checked Flaming Pear! Thanks for the tip, they've got lot's of good stuff cheap (well, relatively, considering the price of software packages these days). The good news it works on Mac and Windows; the bad news is the products appear to be Photoshop Plug-Ins. However, Bryce can use Photoshop Plug-Ins, some of them. I have found access in the Materials Lab when a photo texture is used. For Bryce to use these, I don't know if one has to have Photoshop installed, or if Bryce can find a folder with the plug-ins by itself. Unfortunately, I've found that most of the plug in's just crash Bryce when I have tried to use them. Bryce can be highly tempermental at times. Lunar Cell would not be of much use in Bryce except in post processing of an image (I guess one would superimpose a lunar image over the Brycian one, and then somehow deal with shadows and glows and such.) Anyway, though your info doesn't directly resolve the issue of moons in Bryce, it is wonderful because of all the OTHER stuff that Flaming Pear has to offer! Anyone who has used KTP 5 effects would love the things Flaming Pear has available. For us Photoshop Plug-In junkies (can one ever have enough add-ons?), it's a great resource. Thanks for the tip!

sigh..well, at least I know now..;) glad it was some help, tho.

you can run the Potoshop plug-ins like lunar cell and solar cell in UFX too and UFX is free. Handy if you don't have Photoshop. How do I use photoshop plug-ins in bryce?

Rayraz, To use plugins in Bryce (I can only use sharpen and blur, but others might work), go into the materials lab and set the material for an object to a picture or image texture. Then go into the picture selector (see the Bryce manual if you aren't sure how to do all this). The picture selector will show three large boxes with the picture, the mask, and the result. Each has a down arrow next to it. Click on the down arrow and you'll see a list of plug-in's that Bryce found, and/or the option to point to a plug-ins folder. You can point it to Photoshop's plug-ins folder and press the select button. Now all those plug-ins will be available. However, many only work from within Photoshop and some crash Bryce, so proceed with caution. So far, I can only use the sharpen and blur filters.

interesting.