Attached Link: http://www.renderosity.com/viewed.ez?galleryid=907196

Message edited on: 03/14/2005 16:41

Attached Link: http://www.e-onsoftware.com/Products/vue5infinite/?Page=5

He is a master of Vue.....An absolute genious at this stuff...an inspiration to all......This has to be one of the best pics I've ever seen here at RO...there are only a couple exceptions...I won't call them exceptions, but = to.

That's incredibly good looking, but still looks a bit like a toy set.

I'll refrain from further comment on the above.....:(

WOW....I am impressed...what a great pic. Sharen

Czarnyrobert deserves a cookie. 'Nuff said.

On my Favs, caught it earlier, Phenominal work.

He's been one of my faves for quite a while, and this is one of his best.

Absolutely phenomenal work! Credit must be given where credit is due. Beautifully done, detailed work. One can sense the amount of time consumed putting it all together. Seems like Vue, may have finally taken the lead. Too bad Bryce has been put on the back burner for so long. Imagine where Bryce would be now if it had kept up with CG technology where it was once the unsurpassed king of the hill. I can almost hear a vacuum, sucking sound as Bryce limps behind its descendant.

Sheesh...that WOULD be an infinite render in Bryce...it would take several days before the counter even showed a number...

Hahahahhahhahhahhahhaaaaa.. Just wait folks Vue has been getting upgraded for a few years and Bryce will need to catch up BUT Bryce will catch up and then Surpass all of the "Poser" Products... 79 billion Polys...Not bad I have heard of Bryce handling 600 million Plus and its code is a Few years old...Hmmm Upgrade the code and I could see Bryce easily handling 100 billion Polys... That Plant generator is cool so I will reserve Judgement on that one until I know What will be incorperated into Bryce...More then likely we will see Bryce Getting Plugin support for XFrog or something like that...

Attached Link: http://www.sacada.com.au/sacada_Vue5Gallery.asp

Wow, sacada has done some mind-blowing stuff too, with the Vue infinite Beta!

It's a rather simple concept...are you listening daz?

max, if you mean ecosystems, it's not so easy. Mojoworld 3 has Forest and it gobbles up resources faster than an old car gobbles oil.

The problem is that when Bryce arrives here (v6-7) then Vue Inf. has already left our Galaxy; only the fat price (600 ) stopping me from buying it. (Must test EcoSystem, must test EcoSystem...drooling)

Robert is a true magician with Vue, and that scene can only deserve the highest rating!

Attached Link: http://www.renderosity.com/viewed.ez?galleryid=907221&Hot=Y&Sectionid=3

foley: how does bryce getting support for xfrog compare with this megajuiced greeble plugin? drac (because it doesn't)

Yeah, just look at the Vue Hot 20; you can't fail with Infinity. One click for terrain, one click for ESys. and you've got a living, steaming Bali forest; it shows what Bryce could have been by now.

The concept is simple in that it is using randomized instancing based on a grayscale map. Think of it as a terrain editor with reasoning. Steepness (rate of change between two areas on the grayscale image) is taken into account to provide A: presence or absence of certain objects and B: presence or absence of certain materials. (If it's flat, give it grass and add trees, if it's really steep, don't add trees and use a cliff rock material) Vue's solidgrowth randomizing technology is merely an automated tweaking system for the plant generator. You set the variance, which acts as the boundary as to the degree of difference from the first set of settings. Then all it does is apply a set of random constants which at the time of render are used to calculate the slight variations. The actual "new" part of the whole deal is the instancing aspect. The trees do not actually exist as mesh objects until they are rendered. In the preview window they are just placeholder bounding boxes for meshes and plant objects. When rendered, if a ray of the render engine intersects their bounding box, the mesh is drawn and rendered. But because the mesh is only displayed as a ray hits it, it is possible to have millions of them rendered with the memory drain of only a light scene. The infinite aspect of the whole thing is a simple fractal algorithm that holds the places of the representative bounding boxes. This is an industry standard technique and could easily be incorperated into any software package where it would prove useful. Instancing made it's role clear in the lord of the rings films with their epic battlefields. They do not have tens of thousands of individually animated guys, they have one guy who has a set of rules telling him how to behave when he's near another guy, and another set that alters his movement and materials, and so when these sets of rules interact they form the battle scene. But only upon render are the meshes produced and the materials applied. I just don't want people to go around thinking this is some kind of vue-doo (haha) magic. It is hardly a new technology and hardly unique. If anything it is a good example for bryce to follow. There are many precedents and bryce already has almost all of the neccessary components. (Raytrace render engine, grayscale image manipulation, editable trees and plants, highly advanced fractal support, and excellent procedural materials). The hardest and most technologically advanced issue involved is in fact the display of the scene in the workspace. This is an optimization issue which has a distance-based polygon reducing algorithm designed to work interactively. Coding-wise, this would be the hardest to implement.

Yes, instancing and referencing have been around for quite some time. 3DS Max has had them since its earlier versions. Saves a great deal on memory while modeling since both, the model and its textures already exist in memory and gets shoved into its place holders when rendering. I think Bryce will have to make the effort to catch up, otherwise, it will be the loser in the market and losers dont make it.

Yeah, I'm looking forward to telling a few people to bugger off for the 30 (or 60) days the Vue Infinite trial/demo version will last when they make it available. There's a couple of things in czarnyroberts image (and a couple of other betatest images in the gallery) that are a bit calming... now that I look real closely and have stopped drooling so much as this morning. Some of the trees appear in the middle of the plowed fields and on the roads (and in a river in another pic I saw somewhere). That could be due to either a software limitation (as to how sharp you can make a boundary for an eco-system) or just the result of the artist working with features they're only just beginning to explore and aren't fully conversant with. This is just an observation, not a value judgement on either software or user, the pictures rock either way. Like Attileus, I see that 600$ price tag, which becomes even more when you do a currency convert to Oz$, as a pretty big hit to the wallet though...... Heh, maybe its a good thing that b5.5 is delayed a bit ;) aeilkema/benjamin (apologies if you're not the same person) - ah, wondered when you'd surface here ;) But I do agree with you... I think Bryce is going to be very hard pressed to catch up to Vue. Vue's development has essentially had a three year head start on bryce, and in the last year especially, the Vue family of programs has really covered some yards.

Thanks madmax for explaining the new Vue feature; I've never seen instancing in low-end software; it's an incredibly effective tool for planting veggies and forests...can't wait for the demo. ;-)

Hey Drac... Well since I havent Played with either Program I cant tell you how it would be in Bryce... Or how it would compare to this new Eco-Enviorment.... But I do Believe that Bryce6 will have to have a Vegitation Generator..Be it a Lab or be it a Plugin... Either way you look at it Bryce has alot of Catching up to do and then a tons more to come out on top... Willl we see this...? Who knows...? I am Pulling for Bryce and will stand by Bryce... Bryce will also need a Low Poly Modeler by Version 6 too...

@Flak "Some of the trees appear in the middle of the plowed fields and on the roads (and in a river in another pic I saw somewhere). That could be due to either a software limitation (as to how sharp you can make a boundary for an eco-system) or just the result of the artist working with features they're only just beginning to explore and aren't fully conversant with." In Mojoworld you can tell the program to watch where the steep slopes are, or where is the water, so it doesn't put trees there. Judging by the pic on the second link posted above, by Erka, Vue does something similar, as there are no trees on the vertical parts of the cliffs. OTOH, it would be interesting to know whether the program itself put the palms in the lower parts of the terrain, as a part of the ecosystem mix, or the artist just selected that part and told the program to populate it with the palms. BTW, the stone texture in Erka's pic is to die for. That is the Mediterranean stone. :-)

Erlik - When I have time, I plan to go and chew through the e-on site and the vue forum here and see what folks have to say about the eco-placement... or I can just wait till the demo comes out and monster it myself ;) And yeah, that is a cool stone mat for sure.

Well, after browsing around the E-on site, im seriously thinking of actually adding this one to my toolbox. Kinda like making a deal with the devil, but still... :)

First scroll back up to the top of the page....read below the Renderosity header. Then click here and read foleypro's two posts carefully. Then click here ->Rochr with Bryce5<-goggle at the picture then scroll down to post #4.

Bryce was dead, kept afloat only by the love of its users. Now that Bryce is being resurrected, where have you all gone? The 5.5 upgrade is a cleaning up of the code to improve speed, and a bell and a whistle. DAZ knows what they have to do for 6 to be a viable package, and is actively pursuing those routes. i.e. "DAZ has contacted Kai Krause...the makers of Wings3D....Maxwell coffee....and the best Brycers bar none."

I'm seeing Bryce compared to specific purpose software. I am not willing to give up it's flexibility. I'm seeing Bryce compared to software that has shelves of how-to books at the bookstore. I am not willing to give up it's simplicity. I'm seeing Bryce compared to software that cost $400 or more. I am not willing to give up it's affordability

How much did you pay for Bryce? Was it the free Bryce4 from the magazine? $80 Bryce5? Or are you an old timer? Get Bryce3 for 6 furs and some shiny beads? I got Bryce4 for $160 shortly after it was released. I got Bryce5 from DAZ for $40, and I'll get 5.5 for about $25 after vouchers. How can you demand the same features of a $400+ program?

I understand that some people are posting comparisons out of concern for the future of Bryce. But that is not the tone Im reading. Over and over and over.

My Dodge Neon is not a Porsche 911! Whaaa!

xenic101
(sick and fucking tired of seeing his pastime thrashed about in the single largest BRYCE community on earth.)