I have seen so many scenes posted in the gallery that have the simple shapes of birds flying high in the sky and those birds are such a nice touch. I have been looking, with no luck, for something I can use for this. Can anyone point me to a download for this effect? Also, although I'm not particularly interested in using figures in my scenes, I'm thinking of buying Poser to be able to use some of the neat props by importing them into Vue. I'd appreciate some feedback on this idea. - Lin

If you just need "simple shapes", use Vue's eagle, resize it, map it. Otherwise thete are lots of birds at Daz3d. I don't know any free birds, but if you do a search in the Vu efree stuff, you may be lucky:-) I have no opinion on your Poser question. Anyhow, if you buy Poser, you also will use figures, not only props. You will see:-) Guitta

Attached Link: http://digitalidesigns.net/Downloads.htm

Not free, but check out: vistainternetproducts.com for very good birds and animals.

If the birds will be far away, one solution is to use the terrain editor to draw the objects. For example, draw one with wings up, one with wings down, etc. You could make an entire flock this way. As far as Poser is concerned, I use it a lot to put figures in my Vue scenes. It takes a while to get the hang of using Poser, (took me about a year of fiddling around with it!), but it was worth it to me.

I may be wrong but If you could find a group of birds flying in an image, take that group and make an alpha plane and save it in your objects for use when ever you need it. That way you want have to make a new group each time you need them. Position them different each time in your new scenes. You could do the same with poser birds when you get it. Save a bunch of different posed birds flying and then group them once in Vue to use again and again. :o) Poser and Vue work well together. I think you will like poser very well once you get it. :o)

I appreciate your wonderful comments! I will check out all of them. -Lin

I think i found some free flying seagulls in 3ds format somewhere. Probably here in the free stuff. Or at 3dcafe, i am not sure. iloco's idea with alphas is another one of course, even when i think you have to be aware of copyright problems. You can't take elements from others images simply without asking and without permission. Be aware of that.

When it comes to copyrights and things of that nature I am about as dumb as anyone can be. Don't even want to get started on that subject. What if you could get someone to paint you a group of birds in a paint program and then make an alpha plane. Since it would be used in the distance detail would probly not be noticed that much. Just another thought. ;o) Would that be a copyright problem.....:o)

Depends - lol. In fact it is all very simple. The copyright always belongs to the creator of an image. Full stop. They can allow the use for others (normally you give them a thing called money for the allowance) and they can give it away. No problem. The moment you take it without asking it is a copyright violation. Of course, if you use elements for images the copyrights for these elements belong to the creators. Like models and/or alphas. Same principle, they must give their allowances that you are using it. Normally by paying money. But iloco, i knew that you haven't had in mind stealing things from others. I only wanted to have this copyright issue clear here. To avoid strange things that could come out of it! Sorry for being a little pedantic here, Walther

I understand you wabe. "lol" Money....... that is the root of all evil. Seems that is what it is all about.

Iloco, as a professional designer it is constantly part of my business. I always have discussions with clients that do not understand (or care). Especially that it costs money. Another reason why i am so sensitive about that issue. :-)) Walther

lingrif:

What do you mean by Poser? If you mean 4 (AKA Artist) you can't really go wrong, if you just want to use it as an import filter, it's pretty basic. Poser 5 OTOH is an immensly able program cursed with a terrible interface, it can still do the simple bits that P4 can plus a whole lot else, especially in combo with Vue. Big learning curve with P5 though :(

John

John: Thanks for the info. I'll keep that in mind. It seems that once you get interested in this stuff, there is always more to learn, always more software, always more ideas of things to do.......It's wonderful!

lingrif; Be vewy, vewy careful; place Poser and Vue on the same system, and you may be tempted to do something vewy, vewy Phoulish..... (GDR).... ;)

ROFLMAO @ Dale B!!!!

If you're talking about REALLY distant birds, the simple solution I use is to create a tube or two in Paint Shop Pro and use those in post. Because of the distance and consequent lack of detail, the shapes are very simple to create; a few of similar size but in different orientations, and you can easily use the random sequence of the tube to create a flock. Varying the gamma, size and position is easy too by placing them on a separaate layer which can be moved, sized and adjusted without affecting the underlying image.