Quote - Bryce just outright lies about estimated render times when it comes to glass/water, lol.

Is that because it still has outdated coding? I read Daz overhauled the code quite a lot, but maybe they concentrated too much on getting the thing stable or add new sparkly goodies.

Quote - My longest render time was around 60 hours which couldn't be avoided since the scene was just a giant block of glass and a whole mess of radial lights. But, I'll never do it again, unless I use a dedicated rendering computer.

I guess peoples render times are going to vary quite a lot because of different configurations. I used to think my old computer was fast at rendering...... and even back into the old days of Bryce3D, but that could have been that I read somewhere that Bryce rendering should be given a lot of patience because of the many millions of computations the processor has to make.
But the same old story, get a faster computer and push it to the limits till you can afford the next speed marvel.

Quote - I have found that when I rely on any other disciplines other than say, hardcore volumetrics, soft shadows or especially Super (fine AA), I am a happier person, lol Just because the end render does come faster, and even after seeing a final render I'll want to go back and tweak things again (and again) and re-render, so these days I would always build a scene with speed in mind.

Well, one could always do quite a bit in postwork, but I always feel thats cheating slighty.... doesn't stop me sometimes, but thats my 'trade off' I guess. And then there is the option of just rendering a small portion of the scene if you've only tweaked.... but hey, who am I to teach you to suck eggs. LOL :laugh:

Quote -
Although,sometimes, obviously you just have to use soft shadows. In your scene, dhama I would agree it was the best way to go. I have tried post-working soft shadows into glass/water, and while the effect might look good to another viewer, it still doesn't look quite as polished to me. So, I would have to take the render time hit.

I love soft shadows, but I guess it depends on the scene. Like you say, if it's water or glass etc. then it will take a long time.

Quote - Bryce TRULY needs to be made to handle dual core cpu's though! What with quad cores available now, and 8-core cpu's coming out before the year is up, this would be a miracle of an update for the program.

Just wondering if there is an ultimate limit..... I mean if there will ever be a computer capable of rendering the most complex scene, in a matter of seconds? I think the way to go is programming the code more efficiantly rather than speeding up processors to the extent one could almost microwave ones dinner in the PC case *(sorry Mac users, no favouritism meant)

*> Quote - I have yet to do a realistic render but my very best took me overnight to finish rendering at super fine. Now that I am using Bryce 6.1 I am wondering if those early rendering could use a revisit to see just how long it will take to re-render. It probably won't matter but if the results are better than the original, I will probably say to myself "Go for it."

Thats just how I feel, but usually the new stuff gets so much that the older stuff never gets re-done. I have done it a couple of times though.

Quote - Personally, I've found beer times render time to be an acceptable tradeoff. :)

Exactly!....beer, beer, beer.....bed, bed, bed!