email me the image - and I'll email you the correct scene :-) Len.

hopefully, then, you or someone that knows what to do to fix it properly will kindly eplain the process to those of us that need to know.

oops! I mean to say 'explain'

it makes a difference which beads you fill in the materials lab. I can never remember which ones to do. I just do it hit or miss.

Set the ambience to 0 in the texture editor and make sure there is no transparency.

Exactly, Sans. Putting a transparency on an image that doesn't have a clearly defined colour area inside the black is going to cause ghosting. Fran, put beads into Diffuse and Ambient. Do not put it into Ambience. Putting it into Diffusion will probably make the pic darker, so that might be what you want. As to the size, the plane has to have the same ratio, and preferably the same numbers. If the image is 700x800 pixels, the plane is best at 7x8 BU, or 70x80 or something like that. Multiples should also work IIRC.

That's interesting, I was going drop the image into the Ambience channel "Full-On" like I've done with my CD-Cover entry (thats the way to get a PURE image "within" a render).

BTW rstar, I offered to email a corrected scene, just to make it easier. Looking at the example, it might have helped if it were zoomed out a little - I wanted to see if reflection was playing a part, that's all.

Sorry I spoke!

I always put my imported images (or 2D images) in the deffusion channel. This approach gives me an excact copy of the image keeping in mind that lighting will also effect the way the image looks once in Bryce. Whenever I put it in the ambient channel I get an over exposed effect. But you know what Bryce is like, 10 ways to do one thing;)

Okay, I've tried everyone's suggestions and either it makes no difference at all, or I get just a fuzzy whitish plane, slightly transparent looking. I've tried "Blend Transparency" it made no difference at all. danamo, I don't want to do that as I want the ENTIRE image to show, sky and all. pumeco, if you can do it, sure I'll send you the file... IM me your email if you're still willing. Thanks for the offer.

P.S. Sans2012, This: " Set the ambience to 0 in the texture editor and make sure there is no transparency." just gave me a totally INVISIBLE 2dimage. (sigh)

Fran, did you get my IM?

Cheers,
Diolma
Edited to add: that's just a snapshot I took applied to a vertical plane..the plane can now be re-sized to whatever size you is wanted..

Message edited on: 10/11/2005 15:07

thanks for your reply, Pumeco. My statement came out more intense than I wanted it to and I admit that I was premature in my response...no disrespect was intended towards you or any others. I apologize for any disparagement I may have caused you. You are all fine and talented artists and I appreciate your generosity in your comments and advice. I feel privileged that I'm able to participate in this group. The reason I was inquiring about a proceedure is that I also have similar problems getting a crisp image instead of being washed out when I bring it into Bryce and need to figure out how to do it too.

Fran thats because you most probably have your image in the ambient channel and not in the on at the very top;)

I've tried so many things now, I'm getting awfully confused. And Bryce keeps on crashing on me. Diolma, Lots of lovely screen shots would be exactly what I need, and no doubt useful to others too. I need to start again from scratch, as I've discovered, thanks to pumeco's very kindly sending me a completed Bryce file with the image I sent him on a plane ready to use... unfortunately due to my own stupidity, I've discovered that I have the aspect ratio all wrong for where I need the image. Gawd, talk about an idiot! Well I take the cake on that, don't I? I mean... while trying things, I tried the 2D plane thingie and the Leo thingie, and a cube...crash, crash, crash... (sigh) I think Bryce 5.5c is VERY unstable, I never had so many crashes with b5.5 Diolma, if you're still up for posting detailed instructions, could you very kindly start from scratch? My current attempt will involve an image ratio of 899x1200, since I find I need a tall thin pic. Fran

Diolma, Um, that image is a bit too big for me - shoots the thread off my screen. I suppose you couldn't make 'em a bit smaller could you?

OK, here goes..
Start with empty scene.
Load the vertical plane.
Size the plane so that it's the same size as your picture, then move it back so you can see as much as you need to.
BTW - if you can survive with a tiny bit of distortion, you could re-size your pic in a 2D app to 900x1200; then you can set the square to size 90x120. The ratios of the square and the pic will still be the same...
Pic shows use of the Attributes box to set the size..
Edited to add: The pic I was loading was actually 640x480, but as you can see in the post #15, it still loaded OK..

Message edited on: 10/12/2005 11:07

Exit back to the mat lab, and plug it in as shown.... And that's all there is to it. No need to play with trasparency.. If the plane is too close to the camera (is getting shadows on it), move it back then scale it up so it fits... Cheers, Diolma

Message edited on: 10/12/2005 11:05

Thanks, I'll go try that now, as the new render has just finished.

Oh, BTW - in the last pic, that "100 refraction" is irrelevant . It has no effect whatsoever if the material is "surface", only if it is "volume". I just didn't bother (well, forgot, to be more precise) to reset it from the default.. Cheers, Diolma

Yep, what diolma said, but there's one more VERY important ingredient;

If you want the pic to be "pure", you must also ensure that
Bryce's main ambient "feed" is also pure.

This is done by ensuring that "Ambient" in the sky controls
are set to "pure white" (RGB 255,255,255).

To understand this better, if you set it to black (RGB 0,0,0)
you wouldn't see your image, because remember,
your image lies in the Ambient channel
(and basically you just cut it's lifeline).

Len.

BTW rstar, hey no prob's - I'm too touchy sometimes ;-) Len.

"This is done by ensuring that "Ambient" in the sky controls are set to "pure white" (RGB 255,255,255)." Rushing off to look at the sky controls....

Ah yes, that does help, before that the picture was a little dull. Um. There's just one thing... does this mean that I can't change the sky settings in this scene? The point being that I want different lighting to show in the pict to the lighting that shows for the landscape in THIS scene.

For instance, say that instead of a nighttime image, I had a daytime one but wanted the landscape in THIS scene to be at night. Is there anyway that could be made to work?

Yep, use any sky setting (just don't touch that Ambience).

Beacause your image is lit through the "Ambient" feed,
adding other scene lights wont effect it - and why?

because the extra lights are "Diffuse" lights,
and your material does NOT use the "Diffuse" feed,
and so it will not react to them - it uses "Ambient" remember ;-)

Now then, with a bit of luck, you'll be going aaaaaaaaah by now,
and you'll realise that if you wanted your material to react to "Diffuse" light as well...

...just go ahead and make it "reactive" to "diffuse" light
by bringing the "Diffuse" channel into play via the Materials Lab!

Len.

No, I'm not going "aaaaaaaaah", but I might do once I see the effects you're talking about - if Bryce doesn't crash yet again. Thanks.

/me goes "aaaaaaaaaahhhhhhhhh! Clink!" as the penny drops..

Thx Pumeco. I'm used to Poser's lighting setup, where "ambient" is the light "emitted" from a surface, and is not affected by any other settings (except in-so-far as human perception comes into it).
In Poser you can put a scene together where the ONLY "lighting" is ambience. No lights of any kind needed.
OK, the result is unreal, flat, no shadows etc, but it can be done.

I'd just assumed that Bryce worked the same way. I see from what you say that I was wrong.
Nothing new there tho'..:-))

Cheers,
Diolma

Message edited on: 10/12/2005 14:13

OK, I'll start a new thread tomorrow with diagrams on how Bryce is 'Hard-Wired' so to speak. THEN you'll go aaaaaaaaah ;-) Len (You might even go AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAH!)