Hi all. I'm a videographer/editor/filmmaker who has never stepped into the arena of 3D graphics. I saw some wonderful pictures and animation done on Bryce 5.5 and decided to learn this awesome program to add a little more flavor to my own projects. Unfortunetly I have only been able to put floating balls around a basic landscape with a sky. I thought I would be able to draw straight lines, connect them to other lines and shapes until it started to look like whatever building or vehicle I wanted. I'm sure it can be done, but damned if I can figure it out. Any basic practices or suggestions? Thanks for all your help.
-Shawn.

Attached Link: Brycetech

Brycetech has lots of tutorials about everything Bryce. Lots of us Brycers use a separate modeling application to do our modeling in. I use Rhinoceros, but others here use the free modeler Wings. Welcome to the wonderful world of Bryce. Have a Bryce day. Dan

Attached Link: http://www.renderosity.com/subcom.ez?ID=27

Well Shawn, as with all software packages and most everything else in life, practice makes perfect. Youll need to dive into Bryce headfirst and get your hands dirty until you develop the knack and feel for the program. Often the best way to do this is to view other Brycers work and if need be, ask them about their techniques, tips and tricks on making it happen. Youll find that most Brycers are more than willing to help. You also have many tutorials at your disposal starting right here, in the Bryce Community Page that can be found in this forums logo or by clicking on the link I provided above. Further, there are sites dedicated to the furthering of the Bryce knowledge databank and offer among other things, tutorials, resources, models and galleries. There are many but heres two of my favorite to start you off: [Bsolutions](http://www.bsmooth.de/BSolutions/) [BryceTech](http://www.brycetech.com/) Quest

Well, firstly.....Welcome! Secondly...you've come to the right place to learn. I've been using Bryce, (beit Bryce 3d, Bryce 4,5 and 5.5c) for quite a few years now and I'm still learning. There are thousands of great sites on how to learn in Bryce but, you have one hell of a Brycer crew here and need only to ask and you will get more than you can bare!! LOL. Dan (above) has given you one of the main learning centers in which covers most of your problems on 'How to' in Bryce. Another learning process is to follow the names of people using this Bryce forum, scan their galleries and ask them how they made the pictures you liked. You will be amazed how many times I've used this to learn. You will also find many people (As Dan mentioned above) use other modeling programmes and then import it into Bryce for better rendering, lighting or compositions. You will pick up many ideas as you go along and stop to wonder how it was made.....again, just ask. I hope to view your gallery very soon and also learn from you too. Happy Brycing!! Marc :)

Modeler wings? where do I find those? Can's wait to start creating something. Thanks again. -Shawn

Welcome! You'll find that quite a few of the Bryce artists here have also done some animation/video work, so feel free to ask questions. My only word of caution; don't expect to "build Rome in one day". Bryce is one of the easiest to grasp 3D apps out there, but it takes time to master. That's why we're here; to promote, advance, and share Bryce knowledge, and 3D knowledge in general.

Attached Link: http://www.thewings3dsite.tk/

Wings website :)

Shawn! Welcome to the Asylum. Never mind Wings! Bryce is a great modeler on it's own. Don't let anybody tell you it's just a landscape maker. If you made a floating ball over a landscape then you already know quite a lot. At the top of the Bryce screen you'll find a 'Create' section that leads you to the wonderful primitives Bryce uses to create just about anything. In addition, Bryce provides you with many 'preset' shapes that will become more useful to you as time goes by. But what is really fascinating - and I'm sure the others will agree - is the art of Boolean! - the art of creating objects by intersecting solid objects with negative objects to create and shape your desired structures. For instance: You can take a simple cube and resize it to look like a wall. By making the cube a 'positive' you can take another cube, make it smaller than your 'wall' and make it a 'negative'. Then by simply placing the smaller cube into your wall and grouping the pair you suddenly have a wall with a square hole in it!!!! Just by learning these simple essentials you can create an entire universe. Don't believe me? Then check out some of the above's galleries!!! (Check mine out too - I don't get that many visitors these days.) As mentioned in the posts above there are loads of tutorials to be had and the Bryce freebie section is loaded with useful stuff. As Marcfx said - the guys and gals on this forum are without doubt the friendliest bunch around and no question is too simple or too stupid to get an answer. Hope this helps. Have fun and welcome to the club!!!

Attached Link: http://www.wings3d.com/

Hi Shawn, The current release for Wings 3D is 0.98.32a, grab it at the link. Any questions come to irc.freenode.net, #rendergods and we'll give you real time help in getting started. Vist the Wings 3D forum here at Renderosity also for some very good help when you're not in a hurry.. ~kimpe~ Rendergods

Godamn Heretics are everywhere these days!

Lol, as you can see Shawn, we have our own little factions here in the Forum. There are those that prefer to do everything in Bryce including rendering with no post-work, and there are those that use Bryce and other apps like PS and modelers like Wings to try to make something greater than the sum of its parts. The model I show here was built in Wings and textured and rendered in Bryce. The advantages of using another modeler with Bryce is that you can export the model to use with other apps as well as Bryce.

On the other hand you could just use Bryce.....

Yeah, Bryster, if you have the patience of Job and the spare time of Methuselah. :^)

Attached Link: Pidjy's Excellent Terrain Model

And if you want to know what CAN be accomplished in Bryce, you just gotta take a look at the link above. (and yes, I mean it's MADE with terrains! Awesome huh? Oh, and welcome to the knutt house. gg

The top image was made entirely in Bryce whereas the bottom image the space ship was made in Wings3D but textured, lit and rendered in Bryce.

<strong>bandolin</strong><br />
[Former 3DS Max forum coordinator]<br />
<br />
<a href="http://www.renderosity.com/homepage.php">Homepage</a> ||
<a href="http://www.renderosity.com/mod/sitemail/">SiteMail</a> ||
<a href="http://excalibur.renderosity.com/mod/gallery/browse.php?user_id=70375">
Gallery</a> || <a href="http://www.renderosity.com/mod/freestuff/index.php?username=bandolin">
Freestuff</a>
<p><em>Caution: just a hobbyist</em></p>

Wow! I gotta say you guys are awesome. I can't believe the responses I got in just one day. Thanks a million. I'msure i'll be up and running in no time with help like this. Thanks again.

Attached Link: http://www.robinwood.com/Catalog/Technical/BryceTuts/BryceTutSet.html

Welcome to the Bryce Forum....

At the url above.... you will find 6 excellent tutorial sets developed especially for the Bryce beginner. Don't let it sound deceiving. 6 tutorial sets. Each set has many things to learn.

Set 1... The Bryce Interface

Starting the program, and setting up the screen size
Wireframe vs Rendering
3D Space; X,Y and Z axis
Bryce Views and Simple Camera Manipulation - The Control Palette
Making Objects Appear - The Create Palette
What You See - The Display Palette
Picking Objects to Manipulate - The Selection Palette
Manipulating Objects - The Edit Palette
Convenience Objects - Using Presets
Simple Rendering

Set 2 Something To Render( A childs pulltoy)

Seeing the Primitives in Complex Objects
Moving, Resizing and Combining Objects
Naming Objects to Prevent Confusion Later
Aligning Objects
Locking and Unlocking Objects
Grouping and Ungrouping Objects
Duplicating Objects and Groups
Boolean Operations
Using the Attributes Dialog
Using the Material Editor to make a Simple Material
Importing Objects from Other 3D Programs
Smoothing Imported Objects

Set 3 Somewhere To Put It

Using the Terrain Editor to customize the Terrain
Generating Elevations
Using the Terrain Canvas for complete control
More of the Material Editor
Changing the colors of Preset Materials
Adding your own Presets
Using Textures in the Material Editor
Using the Tree Lab to customize Trees
Metaballs, and How to Use Them
Making Symmetrical Lattices
Making Rocks

Set 4 Bryce Weather

Multi-Replication
Color Families
The Sky & Fog Palette
The Sky-Lab
Placing the Sun and Moon
Star Fields
Clouds, Fog and Haze
Specifing Sky Color
Bryce Rain (two ways)
Using the VCR Controls
Using Picture Objects
Making things Glow

Set 5 Lighting

Ambient Glow and True Ambience
The Light Lab
Volume Lights
Gradients on Lights
Gels on Lights
Light Falloff
Types of Lights available (Radial, Spot, Square Spot, Parallel (Cylinder and Square)
Half Angle of Spotlights
Indoor lighting - making candles glow, spotlights indoors
Importing Objects for Presets
Sunlight indoors
Fill lights
Using materials to enhance lighting
Polygon free outdoor scenes through windows
Light streaming through windows

Set 6 Building A Scene

Flipping objects on Axis
Modifying materials in the Deep Texture Editor
Explaining Alpha channels
Modifying grouped objects without ungrouping them
Centering objects for ease of modeling
Multi-replicating objects
Skewing objects
Blended Materials (AB blending and ABC blending)
Using Light Effects
Volume Textures
Shading Modes for Materials
Interaction of Sunlight and Light Effects
Faking shadows with Ambience Maps
Transparency in Bryce; Ray Depth and Total Internal Reflections
Rendering Options - Optics
Using objects as Volume Lights to save rendering time
Depth of Field
Render masks (Object, Distance and Altitude)

All Good Stuff in an easy concise layout/format. Logical steps in the learning process. If you are new to Bryce I highly suggest you check out this set of tutorials along with the other links provided above.

Have fun learning. 8)

Don't hesitate to stop by and ask questions. Everyone develops a style all their own, and after awhile, you can even tell peoples' pics without looking at the name..;)
have fun..also, I do beleive Daz has some tutorials as well..

Good luck with bryce, if you ever need a little help with some suggestions send me a br5 and ill personally tweek it whichever way you want it to go...some of my old works can be seen on commune and even here on osity i just havent posted in awhile hell I dont even have the upgrade to 5 yet....looks like i need it...still i was pretty good at it and know many many tricks...email if i can help Shadow^One shadowone11@yahoo.com

Attached Link: http://www.blender3d.org/cms/Blender_2_40.598.0.html

talking of other apps dont forget to install a copy of blender 3d too. great for uvmapping and modeling. And did i mention it was free??

No need to add to the huge list of resources here. My only advice is to have some fun and expect to spend some time learning;)

Attached Link: http://www.wings3d.com

oh..well, if we're throwing in modelers..;) also free, not as many features as Blender, but a *heck* of a lot easier to figure out..;) *NOTE- in the interest of fairness..I have both..;)*

I have both as well. Wings was easy to learn, while Blender was a pain. In the end I just gave up.