However I have a weird problem when rendering. All there is in this scene is Dysto itself and this one guy. The hard line across the image, just in front of his feet seems to be where it just does not want to render the base. See how the lamp-post still renders past that line..? There is nothing overhead in the model to cause shadow.

If I move the camera around, the failed area moves with it, till I move far enough away and then it renders out just fine.

It is almost as though the camera has a big square under it moving around and hiding part of the picture. Hither is 0.0000 .. dont know where else to look really.

Thanks in advance

You've looked through all your shadow cams? Not sure if hither even functions that way. I would keep hither at default and use scale for zoom. Just my wag

Well, hither had defaulted to 0.048.. and thinking about it, I bet I was just picking at ideas to mention that. No, I had not looked through my shadowcams but I did just now.. nothing looks wrong. I don't think that edge is a shadow anyway. Wag away.. I am grateful for the help. :)

It could be something very simple: did you uncheck visibility for the GROUND prop?

Perhaps your camra is passing into geometry?

Any hints in Wireframe mode? Does it change if you change (slightly) the camera angle? Is the part with the dark area a double sided plane? ;=?

I had indeed made sure the GROUND was invisible, and I certainly thought the camera was not sunk into geometry. If I move the camera slightly, the failed area does indeed move around. I find that if I render it with the Poser 4 engine it renders as expected, but not with Firefly.

It sounds like it is a double sided polygon. ;=]

That is probably right, in so far as the base of Dystopia appears to have thickness. I was really hoping to use that viewpoint, would there be a workaround I can use? Can I mess with Dystopia in order to fix it for this picture? On another note, richardson mentions shadowcams. I have never really used those at all, and trying to find them in the Poser manual was not a success in the short time I had. Is there something online about those? Many thanks...

Hi (again) Sturm_und_Drang, re: "Can I mess with Dystopia in order to fix it for this picture?" Possibly ... if you can rotate the camera so you are looking at the bottom of the Dystopia object so that you can see the underside ... Use the Grouping Tool to select the bottom polygon(s) and reverse it's (their) normals. However, doing this may cause problems elsewhere. cheers, dr geep ;=]