I'm using Poser 6, applied Ajax's free mirror shader to a wall prop. Everything is set to show in raytrace. But for some reason Poser stops showing the reflection of this guy towards the bottom of the render. I changed camera angles and got closer in and it cut off his reflection from the chest down with a second render. I even changed light sets and got the same results. I have not installed SR3 either...I have done many raytraced renders before but haven't had this happen.

Thanks in advance for any advice

Is there any light shining on him in that direction?  He looks awful dark in the part that
is reflected.  If no light is shining on his leg from that direction, there would be no
light to reflect, just like in a real mirror.

It's a studio light set-up...except it's behind him shining on his back.

Even if the light diminishes, shouldn't the reflection at least diminish as well instead of altogether stopping? I'm not sure.

I did try this with a very bright light set and get the same results though.

It might be my monitor, but it just doesn't seem like I see any of his suit. Just his hands,
face, and shirt.  That's sort of what led me to ask if there were enough light shining on
him from the direction the reflection would see.  Would it be possible to increase the
light intensity shining on the front of his body, or to add another light even that
would highlight the front of his body.  You have Poser 6 so a point light might work
better than a spotlight because another thing that could be happening is the
light angle could be to small.  With a point light you don't have to bother with that.

Thanks for the help Dbowers22.

I rendered this with same camera but with a different, much brighter light set up and same thing happens. I also zoomed in and still it's the bottom of the render where it stops reflecting - meaning it's not just the pants, it's whatever is at the bottom of the image.

It is reflecting the full wall to the right of the guy though - which is weird. It's reflecting everything else okay but not the guy...hrms

Attached Link: http://www.renderosity.com/mod/forumpro/showthread.php?message_id=2517564&ebot_calc_page#message_2517564

Thanks Dizzi

Only way I have been able to get it to work is by rendering with shadows 'off' altogether

Maybe it's just the shadow drawn from the metal frame?

There was a thread about this 'culling bug' in Poser's raytraced reflections on RDNA some time ago.

I seem to remember that work arounds were: 

1. enabling polygon-smoothing in render options,

1. not using shadow maps.

Another approach might be to put something like a 1-sided square (suitably textured) behind the camera. That'd give the mirror someting to reflect besides pure black. It would also, of course, probably involve a major re-lighting problem.:-((

Cheers,
Diolma

Mirror needs to be a one-sided square. Upping your "bounces" from 3 to 4or5 i would try as a second.

The reflection node needs light shining on the object from close to the same direction it's reflecting. His suit is well lit on the back but you're not reflecting the back you're reflecting the front.

Try adding a light behind the mirror and turn off cast shadows on the mirror so the light can come through from behind it and light up his suit. Also as has been suggested, increase the raytrace bounces to 3 or 4. Also you don't need shadows off, but you do need to make sure each light is set for Ray Traced shadows and not Shadow Mapped ones.

For what it's worth, the whole scene is a bit too dark for ray tracing to bounce much of anything. I can see his suitleg in the mirror but it's so very dark that it blends into the background behind him. You might also try adding a wall behind him with a lighter color to reflect so that his pants stand out from the black behind him.

Here's the shot with more 'global-esque' lighting and rendered with shadows off

This is the first of a series of shots and I wanted it to start dark for dramatic reasons but I'll use the mistiness of the reflection for the effect instead.

I'll play around with your all's suggestions.

Thanks much!