Having recently upgraded to Poser 5 --which I find most user unfriendly by the way-- I'm trying to get my reflections right but so far I failed. Maybe I'm becoming stupid over the years but I simply could not get a "plastic look alike reflection" to render on the visor of a military cap I used and no matter how deep I went into the manual's confusing "explanations" I couldn't make any head or tails! I enclose a photo illustrating my problem (which wasn't a problem at all in good old Poser 4). Any suggestions?

Here' what you do. 1. Open material room. 2. Create a new node and select glossy from the lighting menu. 3. attach the glossy node to the alternate specular link. 4. Play with settings till you get the right light size.

There's definitely a learning curve. The Material Room is far more advanced/complicated than P4's simple options, so don't be discouraged if you feel overwhelmed at first.

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Lemme take a crack at the ins and outs of reflections:

Attached Link: http://www.3-AXIS.com

The things that need to be done are as follows: (I appologize if this is long and drawn out. I didn't want to miss anything and leave you guessing) Verify that "Raytracing" is turned on in the rendering options The Material for the visor: 1. In the material room, make sure that the material for the visor is selected. 2. Locate the Reflection_Color channel in the PoserSurface node. 3. Click and drag out a wire from the Reflection_Color channel. 4. When you release the mouse a menu will appear. Choose: New node/Lighting/Ray Trace/reflect. > This creates a reflect node that is attached to the Reflection_Color channel. 5. Change the Background channel in the "reflect node" to the color in your background of the document window. Do this by clicking and holding the mouse over the reflect nodes background color swatch and then drag the cursor over the background in the document window. > If the color is left black, the reflected color on the visor will be black. A note on getting reflections to work: If you are using an image in your background and want it to reflect in the visor... 1. create an "Image_Map node" and plug it into the "background channel" of the "reflect node" for the visor material. 2. In the Image_Map node, select "None" next to Image_Source. 3. Browse to the same image used for the background and use it. > Now the reflection of the image will match the background. > You can do this with any node. Imagine using a movie in a movie node and having animated reflections that match the movie that you are using as a background. SWEEEEEEET! But wait! One more thing to do! 4. Select the color swatch in the reflect node and change its color to white. > This will allow the image map to "pass through" the node and be seen by the PoserSurface node. Black is 0% and white is 100% pass through. > You can use this swatch to tint the image as well. Use the Reflection_Value channel in the PoserSurface node to control the amount of reflection for the material. Setting it to .5 means that the reflection on the object will be at 50% strength. Use the Reflection_Color channel in the PoserSurface node to tint the reflections. If you make the color pink as opposed to white, the reflections will have a reddish tint to them. Props and Figures in reflections: As you know, props and figures will automatically reflect in the material. One cool thing worth mentioning about props and figures: You can make them not show up in the reflection. VERY COOL! 1. Switch to the Pose room. 2. Select an object. 3. Select the Properties tab in the Parameters palette. 4. Uncheck "Visible in Ray Tracing" > Now the object won't show up in the reflection when the scene is rendered. This is great for any object that is behind the reflecting object. Since raytracing reflections makes rendering take longer, it is good to turn off any object that wouldn't normally show up in the reflection (background props and figure). By doing this the renderer dosen't have to calculate those objects when rendering. This can really speed up your renders! BTW: This goes for refraction too. AGAIN: (it's easy to forget) Verify that "Raytracing" is turned on in the rendering options and render that sucker out! I hope that this is a help to you, Joe P.S. You should check out the Poser 5 Demystified video at www.3-AXIS.com. We cover the new features in Poser 5 in a 2 1/2 hour video taught by yours truly. It's very comprehensive and sounds like it's right up your ally.

Attached Link: http://www.3-AXIS.com

I noticed that the image reflected in the sphere is based on the UV of the object. It looked like I had a circle of Aki Ross blobs. Rotating the object to point at the back of the scene helped a lot. Learn sumpin new every day...

Attached Link: http://www.3-AXIS.com

Here are the settings for the material.

Thank you so much for your trouble and the time you put into it. I followed your directions and... miracle!... it worked like a dream. I owe you one! Thanks again.

Attached Link: http://www.3-AXIS.com

AWSOME! I'm glad that I could help. Thumbs up, Joe

yes ... LawnDart... thank you. I was just looking how to do this, and up popped this post. Talk about impeccable timing.. thanks again =)_

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Oh yeah, JUST what I need! Excellent. Thanks guys. :] Fish