I would like to make some realistic smoke in Vue. I tried with a rock with a black cloud material, that was horrible. I would like to make it look like smoke that comes from a steam train, so I need black puffs for smoke and white puffs for steam. Vue is not very good in making realistic clouds, smoke and steam so perhaps I should do it in the post-render phase. What are your thoughts on this?

The best mat I.M.O. to fake realistic smoke is volumetric material used on (relatively big) multiple spheres (unioned in csg or not)it requires some adjustment (fuzziness, intensity etc.. but you can obtain fine results

In the past, I have used a sphere that I have elongated and then lenghtened. There is a great steam texture (http://www.renderosity.com/freestuff.ez) that you can plly to it, then edit it to your liking. I you place several of them together, it has a really good effect. Hope this has helped. James VUE Coordinator