I am desparately looking for something to replace Bryce.  I am leaning toward Carrara, and DAZ now has it on sale.  Vue is an alternative, but my experience with Vue 4 makes me view their claims with skepticism.

Is Carrara 5 Pro worth it?  Is it still okay, or has DAZ gotten their hands all over it yet?  If it works okay, and gets along with Poser 6, that'll keep me happy for a while.  Version 6 will be free, but that also worries me.  The last version of Bryce cost $1.99, and turned out to be worth just about $1.05 :(

Carrara 5 Pro okay?  Thanks!

John

Attached Link: Poser Figure rendered with HDRI

I like C5 Pro alot, and it plays very well with Poser 6. You typically need to modify your Poser figure materials a bit after import (or linking), but its fairly easy to do. It's real easy to get good lighting results in Carrara. You have several options including Global Illumination, HDRI, Ambient Occlusion, SSS, and all the standard lights. Terrains have improved a great deal, and the replicator makes populating a scene with many objects very easy.

Carrara has a good set of modeling tools, and uv mapping (though I tend to use UV Mapper). C5 Pro even has some of the tools in Hexagon (which I also use).

The Carrara Gallery here has some fantastic examples of what Carrara is capable of. The image in the link above was done with C4 Pro. I just dable with Carrara and Poser, so if I'm able to get decent images, anyone with more experience should be able to get jaw dropping images.

The link below is to a test image I did with C5Pro using ambient occlusion and HDRI. The lighting isn't as good as usual due to a transparent "wall" in the dorway, but I really like the reflections on the floor. Reflections are also very easy to set up in Carrara.
WARNING - Nudity
http://www.renderosity.com/mod/gallery/index.php?image_id=1150982

Thank you so much for the input!  I love the renders.  I thought the skin looked a little dead in the first one, but the second is very nice indeed.  It sounds like it has everything I'm familiar with, and then some.

I'll go check into it more deeply now.  Real user feedback beats ad copy hands down.  Thanks for taking the time!

John

I don't think you'll be disappointed with Carrara...maybe just that you waited so long to get it. ;-) I used to be a heavy Bryce user but use mostly use Carrara and Vue 6i exclusively now. Even with Bryce Lightening, renders take fooooooooorever. The Carrara render engine is faster than Vue's but Vue does handle a wide variety of atmospherics more easily. However, you can make Carrara do some pretty cool stuff (http://market.renderosity.com/mod/gallery/index.php?image_id=1196007&member - http://market.renderosity.com/mod/gallery/index.php?image_id=1114544&member) If you only do landscapes and don't want to create your own content, Vue 6i is very good. But if you even think that you'd like to work with Poser figures easily, create landscapes, create your own models or characters, import models and modify them etc., then Carrara is the way to go. Mark

I think C5 gives you a lot of 'bang for you buck' right out of the box; and there are some good, inexpensive plug-ins around that can further extend it's functionality.
For the price, it's a hard pacakge to beat.

Thanks Guys!  I decided to go with it.  I liked Vue 4 a lot, but the endless patches that always broke as much as they fixed were just too much.

The faster renders will really be appreciated.  Bryce just keeps getting slower :(

John

I was a long-time Brycer and I made the move to Carrara5 standard early last year. I love the all-around capabilities of Carrara and plan to stick with it for a long time. It's the greatest bang-for-the-buck modeling/rendering/animation app.out there IMHO.

excellent render above. now that poser has both hdri and GI, it's easier to do professional-looking renders in poser, but it can't match the speed and ease of use of carrara IMVHO. I personally don't like bryce because the renders I've seen always have harsh directional lighting. I assume this is due to user ignorance, and that bryce is actually capable of excellent renders, but apparently it's not easy for default users to do professional-looking renders in bryce.

I'm also thinking of joining you in Carrara.  I thought about it and opted out last time Daz had a sale.  This time I think I will regret it if I miss my chance.  I'm still swithering about Pro or basic.  I could use the money I save by getting basic plus Transposer to buy the Anything Grows plug in I just was reading about in the forums here.  Ohhhh so many options.

Looking forward to trying this out though.

Kathy

I have just bought C5pro. I'm so totally lost and hope I have not just wasted my money.

Attached Link: Tutorial Link for Carrara introduction

Hi SFP1, I've got some freebie tutorials to help get started. Check out the link and see if that takes some of the mystery out of it. Mark

Thanks Mark,
I have looked at most of your tutorials, good work. Havent found any on modeling or IK yet. Going to have to read the manual some.

BeyondVR,

Carrara Pro 5 is a very good renderer and Poser women look great in it.  See my gallery for examples.

I also made the jump from Bryce to Carrara. The moment Carrara got GI lighting, I stopped looking back.

C5 pro was the best investment i ever made for $130 in their sale last time, and it can render large scenes.
I asked them whether we will have some capability like vue to do sea scenes as vue is superb but falls down on to many bug's, and don't buy 6 esprite it is a cheap cut down version of 6 inf.
I have had no problem's importing poser 6 stuff into c5 and can get 50% p7 no probs, and it has a bug in 3ds export that is a pain at times on some stuff but buy program it fantastic.
 I have vue through to bryce and certain scenes c5 does some fantastic renders so take the plunge you wont be sorry.

As I understand, 3ds is not a particularly "fixed" type of file. Generaly .obj seems to be a better interchangeable file type though even here, I gather different apps interpret it in various ways.

Just a few weeks to Carrara6--I think it will be a top upgrade.

Lets hope they fixed 3ds export and am looking forward to seeing how much we c5 pro users have to pay, but am looking forward to it.

Once upon a time 3ds was nice to bring into Bryce because the materials are contained in the file. Even though what was carried over was just solid colors. These days, Carrara properly exports .obj files with attached ,mtl file, and as long as they and the texture maps referenced are where Bryce can find them, the model will import fully textured.

I bought Carrara 5 Pro this year and love it. I tried a few 3D programs in the past including Bryce and couldn't get anywhere them. With Carrara everything is laid out so logically that it makes it easy to learn and use.

I also recommend Mark Bremmers video tutorials at www.vtc.com. I never get anywhere with manuals, but the videos made it so easy to get up to speed.

I'm sure that Carrara 6 won't be $1.99, even to platinum club people.  Daz may deeply discount Carrara 5 after 6 comes out to get people hooked, but hell e-frontier just gave away Poser 5 recently for free.  The $200 is probably cheaper than what the upgrade will cost once the product is released.  I also know that Daz is working on the issue to have all the Poser functionality back in version 6 without involving e-frontier.

Thanks for all the input, everybody!  I'm in the mapping phase of a huge modeling project, so haven't been able to use C5 yet.  Just before I went to bed this morning I looked at the quick tour on the CD.  I'm still smiling :)

I also just saw the post about the ocean primitive in C6.  Since what I built is a battleship, I have even more to smile about.

I'm going to have to steal some time and play a little.  It looks a lot more friendly than I imagined.  That's a nice surprise!

John

Quote - I'm sure that Carrara 6 won't be $1.99, even to platinum club people.  Daz may deeply discount Carrara 5 after 6 comes out to get people hooked, but hell e-frontier just gave away Poser 5 recently for free.  The $200 is probably cheaper than what the upgrade will cost once the product is released.  I also know that Daz is working on the issue to have all the Poser functionality back in version 6 without involving e-frontier.

 

I'm not platinum club but I paid full price for C5 Pro just over a year ago on Ebay.  I think it was like $250 or something.  ANyways.  I just hope they throw us poor long time users who actually paid more for it a bone.  It doesnt seem fair to give those that got it for peanuts C6 fot free and not help us poor slobs who really paid for 5 something.  A bit of loyalty to the long time customers would be welcome.  Especially to those who have been using this software since it was Ray Dream Studio.