Ah yes, I remember it now: The joys of the e-on website. Now I remember why so many people had problems downloading demos, patches, plants, whatever from there. I decided to download the Vue 5 demo, and figured, well, I'll go to the site, click a link or 2, fill out a form and that'll be it, right? Nope. Gotta register, first. Well, I was already registered, from, like, 4 years ago, but forgot my password, although my email addy is still the same, so it gave me an error saying I was already registered...then, after much cvussing I noticed that my password should have been my billing Zip Code. Ok, no problem, and after supplying more info, they tell me that they're gonna send me a link and (I guess) a temporary registration code for the demo. Well, that was many hours ago, and still no email from e-on. Not like I'm being impatient, but tomorrow night I have to go out of town for a week, and I'd like to be able to take the Vue 5 demo with me. Unfortunately though, if I can't download it today, I'm SOL until I get back. All this hassle for a DEMO?! If I didn't already know I'm gonna love it, I wouldn't even bother. Meanwhile, as I wait, anyone have any suggestions for what I should try when I get it? I already know Vue 4 inside and out, and Vue 5 doesn't look a whole lot different, but I'm dying to check out the GI features, especially after seeing someone here recently posting a picture of a "glowing" object lighting a room, which was waaaay cool. You can do that in LightWave, but I wouldn't have thought that Vue could do it. Oh well, just waiting...

Sorry to hear that about the demo. I am not sure you will get an answer over the weekend. The new lighting modes in Vue 5 are a lot of fun. With some practice, you can even get decent render times. One things about that glowing object - the object itself is not emiting light. The scene is rendered in Radiosity mode, with the object illuminated by a light source and in return, illuminating the rest of the room with bouncing light. Not quite the same effect as in Lightwave but we are almost there :)

I know how you feel. I recently purchased the download version of V4. Vue has had my cash since Thursday and I can't use the software until they send me a serial number. I'm a less than satisfied customer. They have done a great job at hiding their email address and put a disclaimer that they probably won't get it. Obviously, they don't get it. Not sure if it is worth sending them an email about their poor practices. I guess that is why people post messages like these at BBS's.

MikeJ - I downloaded the demo on Friday and the e-mail looked like it was an automated message from some sort of online registration system for the demo. Do you have spam blocking that might have stopped you seeing/receiving the message?

Sorry to hear it, phenom01, but, not to defend their...uhhh...less-than-perfect practices in dealing with customers, but on the bright side, you will be happy with Vue 4 once you can use it. Just make sure you also have the latest patch, because...well, let's just say that the original out-of the-box Vue 4 was kinda...errmmm...lacking... Agiel, I finally got the email with my code, and it's downloading right now, but it's gonna take a good while, since I have only a CRY 56 K (currently at 32K) connection. Yeah, have a good laugh at that, but that's the price I pay for living away from the city, in the sticks. But at least I have a nice lake filled with all kinds of fish in the backyard and lots of trees. :) In LW, "GI" covers not only Radiosity, but Ambient light as well as caustics, and in the LW Surface Editor, you can assign Luminescence to an object, then turn off the lights, set the ambient light low, and the object actually becomes the light source, seemingly controlled by the ambient setting. But actually, I don't use it much, as it dramatically affects the render time, and amazing results are possible with LW's "Area" lights, which create 'almost-radiosity' effects, (minus the bouncing colors), with quicker render times. (An "Area" light is ray-traced, but can be made to be very "soft".) But, there's a definite time and place for Radiosity, and I want to see how Vue deals with it. Plus, to make a landscape scene in Vue takes, like 5 minutes. In LW, the same scene would take hours to set up, at least for me, because everything would have to be created individually, and LW's "sky tracer" plugins (v. 1&2) are totally primitive compared to Vue. Even Vue 2 has better sky controls than LW! I'm thinking about getting E-on's Ozone plugin for LW for atmospheres, though.

Thanks, impish, I hadn't thought of that, but it worked out anyway, and, like I mentioned above, it's downloading ever-so-slowly right now. :)