ok, Im trying to animate, and what I want to do is have certain objects (Planes) in view on frames 1 - whatever and on frame say 10 have another plane show up. I animate the first plane with sucess, but when I add plane 2 on say frame 10, It shows up throughout the whole animation and is moving??? I only wanted plane 2 on frame 10 and beyond... Is there a layer function or something where I can animate objects independaly of each other. So only what I want on certain frames will show up/animate and so forth? Please tell me what Im doing wrong... ???, Cedric

did you just copy and paste the plane mesh? because that might be the cause of the problem. you can animate things independently in bryce, of course. just import the model separately once you've reached frame 10. drac

ok, Thanks for the help, I was copying. So i can get it to animate seperatly now. The only problem is still even though I imported the item at frame 10, it still shows up from 1 - 9? I tried using the hidden option, but it will either not show or show through the whole animation. What would cause that. Cedric

yeah that's a toughie. i'm not sure, i just tried bypassing that and it doesn't work =/ haven't used the animation lab much

Bryce animation is evil... The only animation I've ever done was a bouncing deforming ball... Took me something like three hours just to animate... I sort of gave up on it after that little incident.

Attached Link: http://brycetech.daz3d.com/

Ornlu - the best tutorial I found for animating in Bryce was on the old Brycetech site, which is now on Daz, see attached link.

Thanks, I've actually went through those tutorials and all. The problem here isn't so much "How" to animate in bryce, but how to do simple things that most basic animation tools can do. Like here what I can't figure out. I have a scene with a rock... on frame one the rock is visible.... on frame 10 I want to make the rock invisible... In bryce I can't see how to do this. Ususally you would turn off visiblity on the rock at frame 10 or something to that effect. But If I turn on the hidden feature on the rock on frame 10, then now the rock has disappered through frames 1-9 also? Simple things like how to simply turn on and off objects on the timeline is not working??? Am I overlooking something. Cedric

No, I do not think you can do the effect you want in Bryce. I have done a number of animations in Bryce and while I've never needed for something to suddenly appear, the only way I would endeavor to do this is to do two renders of the sequence. The first one without the second plane up to the point where it is supposed to appear. The second render should be done with the second plane in place and visible in the frames 1-9 as you indicate and on through to it's end. Then the two animation renders should be joined together: Render one frames 1 - 9 and Render 2 frames 10 through... whatever. Dave

Thanks for the info Dave, Well Question, Since you've done some animation in bryce, what would be your best approch to creating a seamless cloud animation. Something simliar to this one... http://www.skyworksinc.com/ (Maybe not as good as that one, but something similar with bryce) Cedric

i think you can make a cloud plane just rotate (not the plane itself, the way the clouds move), but that's not exactly what you're looking for... drac

That's a nice clip. I think what it is though is actual time-lapsed cloud footage and that a clever dissolve is done at the point where it needs to replay (or loop). The frames at the point of dissolve were very likely photoshopped for a smooth transition. The nature of clouds that are all gathered and taking up an entire viewspace makes that an easy task because it's easy to make a separate cloud bank look like part of another. We accept that they're nebulous and have no expectation of total distinction. If you notice the loop work is most likely done when most of the frame is full of clouds as opposed to where there is visible sky and cloud distinction. They probably had to search through the footage to find a good spot and it looks like they did. In Bryce I would probably do essentially the same. Render a long sequence of clouds passing by (maybe a couple minutes worth) and then look for natural points where the frames could be isolated and photoshopped. A challenge for sure (as it even was for skyworks probably). I've been Bryce slacking so maybe this'll be a little thing for me to try myself. Sometimes the doing brings up issues and techniques that thinking about doesn't. : ) Dave

Attached Link: http://dawnstarproductions.50megs.com/downloads/marauder2_compress.avi

Ok, didn't read all this so maybe someone answered. First load all the objects you will need for the animation. place the first plane where you want it for frame 1 and all the other objects way off of camera (say behind the camera). Animate the first plane frame 1-9. Select the second plane and add a keyframe for frame 9 where it's currently sitting off camera. Frame 10 move plane 2 to where it enters the camera shot and set another keyframe. Animate normally from there. This technique can be used to keep objects that will apear later and the camera is moving and the objects cannot be easily kept out of camera view. 1. note the x,y,z size of the object and write it down 2. change the objects that you don't want to appear yet to size 0,0,0. 3. When you want them to apear, on the frame before set a keyframe (size of object still 0,0,0) 4. On the frame that you want it to appear, change the size to the origianl that you wrote down and set a keyframe. This may be easier to do is autokey is turned off. In the animation attached I used the second technique with just about every object except the missiles. Take note of the falling shells. They were placed in postion on frame one and reduced to size 0. then on the correct frame they were resized. You want to set a keyframe before the size change because otherwise Bryce will interpolate the change from frame 1. For example if on frame 1 the object is size 0 ad then on frame 10 I set it to the correct size without a keyframe in the frame before set to size 0, Bryce will enlarge the object over frames 1-9 so it slowly gets bigger each frame. Setting a keyframe on frame 9 (size 0) it stays at size 0 for frames 1-9 then suddenly it is it's correct size on frame 10.

For some reason primitives and 2D planes "disappear" much easier than rocks and terrain/lattices when doing an animation in Bryce. One trick I've learned is if you want to make an object disappear on say frame ten: 1. set a keyframe on frame one and nine for object scale. 2. on frame ten scale the object down as far as you can with the scale control. This will make the object disappear completely. On frame nine the object will be there, on frame ten it goes poof. This is often easier than animating the transparency of an objects material.

Here's frame 9,both still here...

By frame ten the rock is gone, and the primitive will disappear by frame eleven, but as you can see its material has gone slightly more transparent as a kind of "tween" stage.

Thanks, With some of your ideas, Im almost have a nice seamless loop going. Once I get it going, Ill show you what I was able to come up with. also, can Bryce make those Fluffy clouds instead of cirrus type clouds. Cedric

Attached Link: Clouds like in this image Cedric?

You mean clouds like I have in this image?

Yes they can be made....

Create a sphere... or more depending on how many clouds you want.

Add a volumetric cloud texture to the sphere. I like to use the cumulus volume texture for my clouds.

Plop render your cloud to make sure it is what you want. You can stretch the sphere on the x,y, and z axis for added dimension. If you stretch too much you lose definition though... this is something to be careful with.

If you have several spheres you are using for clouds.... do not let them intersect. If they intersect you will get some very undesireable artifacting. Placement of your spheres is crucial in that respect.

mess around in the dte with the Base Density, Edge Softness, Fuzzy Factor and Quality/Speed to change the cloud.

Also... sometimes you will want to create a spotlight directed at the clouds underside to reveal the form of the cloud as it may look quite flat and grey. Just depends on the image you are working on as to how you want your clouds to look. You can also add a sleight tint of color to color the clouds for images that have a sunset/sunrise, storm, etc...

YOU MUST REMEMBER... that these are volume clouds and your render time can skyrocket... but the render time can be worth it there is no doubt.

Hope that helps Cedric. 8)

That helped greatly, You guys are great. Finally a community that answers questions instead of punish newbies Thanks, Cedric

Yes you can make something disappear in an animation. You have to turn it transparent though. Objects themselves must exist throughout an animation. You also cannot make an object invisible in attributes without the change being propagated throughout the entire animation. To make an object vanish suddenly you need an initial material keyframe at the beginning of the animation. You must create another keyframe with this same material setting the frame before the event. You move to the next frame and make it totally transparent then create another material keyframe. In this way the material goes from visible to totally transparent within one frame instead of slowly fading from the first frame.

These are Bryce Spheres with blue and red materials from the simple and fast menu. The blue ball has a material keyframe set at frame 1. I Went to frame 10, turned transparency up to 100% and added another keyframe. The red ball has a material keyframe set at frame 1. It also has another material keyframe set at frame 9. I then went to frame 10, turned transparency up to 100% and added another keyframe. Notice the blue fades from frame 1 to 10 while the red blinks out between frame 9 and 10.

Yes, same applies to my size trick which I prefer. Depending on conditions sometimes the transparent object shows up as a haze and even transparent can have an effect on light. It's really a preference I guess on which you use :)

Resizing works better on objects that already have a transparent component or objects you are animating with materials. If the object is in motion I like transparency better because it's one less thing in the same channel to keep track of.