How do you go about creating a crescent looking planet using Bryce 4. I found the tut for Bryce 3d and tried the same method in Bryce 4, but it wouldn't come close to creating a crescent shaped planets.

Did you look in the tut's over in the tutorial section?====> I thought I remembered one there. Also try brycetech.com or 3d cafe.

what I have seen done in the past has been the use of negitive lights.. here is a quick (very quick) sample of what I mean.. The light is still very close to the object, so you don't get the curve you're looking for.. but play around with it a little. The light for this is set to about -100 One possible answer. :-)

I use the sun to get the effect. Set the sun altitude to 20 and the sun azimuth to 40. This will give a nice thin crescent. Increasing the azimuth to 60 will fatten the crescent. Just play around with the settings. If the scene is in space: - set the sky color to black - make sure the planet's ambience is set to zero. - set the sky's shadow intensity to 90. - make sure haze and fog are turned off. If you want the planets to appear in blue sky, you're better off rendering them in a space setting and using PSP or Photoshop to merge them into the final scene. The unlit portions should never be visible in space, and in a blue sky the unlit parts blend with atmoshpere.