I'm suprised that they didn't consider consolitating it with Carrara. (Maybe they did? Too many damn parallels between the programs to really warrant developing them separately with a limited budget.). I know TheBryster probably hates the idea, but it's true. It's suprising how similar I found that program to be after getting it via 3D-World Magazine #100 promotion. There's some differences of course, but experience with Bryce makes diving into Carrara happen pretty fast.

And I'll also agree that Bryce isn't a toy. (Even after moving to Carrara, simply because it does some things that Bryce can't speed-wise.) It's not that it lacks power or a sufficient tool-set. (We all know it's perfectly fine for staging and rendering.) The main problem with Bryce acceptance on the professional level is that the rendering engine is slow in comparison to a lot of other software. (You could render over two dozen proofs for visualization in another program before Bryce would finish its render. And you could probably get the final high setting render in the other program done too.) Bryce's rendering slowness probably has something to do with lack of optimization to take advantage of newer hardware (not to say DAZ hasn't worked hard on it) and less flexibility in some areas that other programs let you downgrade for speed. It probably also lacks the modularity of newer programs, so working on one chunk to improve an aspect might seriously break things elsewhere. Then DAZ has their hands full with source that may have some really neat things hidden in it, but is too vague and complex (spaghetti code?) to figure out what it's good for.

Opening up the source would be pretty neat, and not just for compiling to 'nux or higher bit levels. It would allow more breathing room for tiering. Bryce would fit in well on the free entry-level tier. (Kinda does already.) Besides DAZ makes their money on content selling and brokering, so "giving away" some software can't be too bad. (Might even be pretty big on P.R. brownie points.) By being open-source licenced, innovations (or discoveries regarding what that undocumented old code does) related to Bryce could be taken back in by DAZ for no cost. Also bugs tend to be more widely accepted in OSS, simply because the software evolves and there typically always exists a perpetual beta somewhere in the development stream. I think the neatest thing would be if the GUI layer could be found to be separable from the underlying render engine. (Imagine some cross port that had the familiar and easy to use GUI on a more powerful and flexible renderer with much better animation features.)

Who knows, maybe DAZ will figure out how to keep the GUI part somehow but only open up the rendering bits. Thus they could get away with not having to develop much and simply be more of a maintainer, and iplement the good stuff out in the field back into their particular build.

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Barbequed Pixels?

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