It seems that Bryce 5 upgrade will not accept my Bryce 4 serial number. Corel has not been forthcoming as to why. Does anyone have a solution?

check down a few threads. It's a common problem with Bryce 5, check their website, get their 800 number and call for a new serial. For some it's working, others.. call. :)

Sort of sneaky on Corel's part really, but I can understand their reasoning. I wonder how many users of pirated versions of Meta Creations Bryce 4 will be VERY disappointed that they can't "upgrade"....

I understand Corels concern, but it adversely affects this legitimate owner! Thanks, I'll look again for an 800# I couldn't find one the first time through.

I agree, and I meant to say that too. I really detest Corel, and it makes me sick that out of all software companies, THEY had to be the ones to get Bryce. Just to think that they never even mentioned it, that the old MC serial #'s wouldn't work, just letting thousands of thrilled Brycers run out and buy it, only to find out they have to first call and wait...and wait...and then maybe for some the number won't even work. :(

I feel your pain. But the remedy will take care of it. I know how you feel about Corel though, but at least Bryce wasn't orpahned, then we'd all be using Bryce 4 forever. The number I was given from their 1-800 to get the new serial was 1-613-274-0500, I had to wait on the line for 20 minutes, but they took care of it quickly. I have never liked Corel either, but I truly hate Metacreations for what they did to everyone. I bought almost every piece of software they ever made, and was dumped on the side of the road. If you bought Carrara originally when it came out, you'll know what I mean. Hang in there, it's gets better, I'm actually pretty satisfied with my Bryce 5 upgrade, for $99 I can't complain too much. The upgrade is a nice little program,other than slow renders, I have nothing bad to say about. kaom

I upgraded yesterday and had no problem with the MC number.

Attached Link: http://www.polygonstudios.com/Projects/ISS/

RimRunner, I just downloaded the Viewpont plugin for Carrara yesterday. I havn't used it yet, but I hear it works great, pretty much like Metastream. I knew that Meta had become Viewpoint a long time ago, I recieved a letter from them. I was this close () to becoming a beta tester for them. But thanks for the tip. I wonder what else they will get into, obviously they still have a big interest in 3D, especially on the web. Thanks, kaom

The number I was given from their 1-800 to get the new serial was 1-613-274-0500, I had to wait on the line for 20 minutes, but they took care of it quickly.<<< Are you saying that you have to call a long-distance number to get a serial number that will work? You can't just use their toll-free line? And then they make you wait online for 20 minutes? Tell me you are kidding!

Not kidding here! Maybe we should make them pay fot the long distance charges??? I'm sure that some people will be very unhappy about it. Same story for me, called the 800 number to get the long distance number, then waited 20 minutes. They should have a way of taking care of this on the net, 24 hours a day. But this is Corel were talking about, I'm just happy to have a working serial number and working copy of Bryce 5 upgrade. It could be worse though, at least they are taking care of it, even if we have to call long distance. They could be making us wait to get one in the mail, that would be a drag. kaom

I got mine by calling an 800 number and its a good thing it was toll free, I waited 40 minutes. Im very happy with Bryce 5 though. I dont care for the new interface but can live with it and its actually growing on me.

I just got the upgrade. It installed just fine for me. (Thank God!) I don't really like the new interface either, tho'. :( Definately going to take some getting used to. The only thing that really sucks is that I have to go to bed to be up for work in the morning, so I don't have any time to play with it. :(

Hi all, I just go the upgrade to Bryce 5 (using on MAC). Had no problem with the serial number. I kind of like the interface. I'm used to the one in 4, so it looks a little more jazzy to me, that's all. I have a three questions for anyone who might be willing to help or suggest ideas. 1. What are "metaballs" used for? The manual doesn't say much about them. What do any of you use them for? I'm new to the concept. Looks interesting, if I can find a use. 2. Tree Editor. Mine opens with red leaves. Seems very odd that red would be the default color, unless they designed it in October in New England (which I doubt). Also, I tried the willow tree preset, just to see what it would do. Doesn't look anything like a willow to me. Anyone else notice this? 3. Does Bryce 5 seem to render a bit slower than Bryce 4? I know I have to upgrade my computer (looking at the new Apple G4 867) which is (sniff) only two years old, but apparently ancient history. Thanks!

Hi Clyde Hope I can help out with this. question 1. Metaballs are used for organic modeling. Some uses would be puddles of water, drips, dew, simple fruits and vegies. Depends on how much you work with them. question 2. There are several leave presets. My suggestion to help them out a little is go outside and scan a leave in cut out the middle and add that to the preset. Some of the trees don't look very good as defaults play with the setting some and you will get excellent trees. There will be several web pages out with tree data. http://www.hinchu.com/tuts/trees/ is one (I think thats it.) question 3. All reports so far is that Bryce 5 is faster on macs. With a larger jump in speed moving from older operating systems to the newest one. 2 years is a lifetime in the pc world :) Griggs

Hi Griggs, Thanks for the quick reply! I read further into this forum and found others are wondering about the trees too, and the rendering speeds. I should have looked before I wrote, but I was excited about the upgrade! I saw a posting called "What a waste", where the artist did a great rendering of a wine bottle and spilt wine (cute posting actually) and when I saw the wine, it dawned on me what metaballs can do! :>) Thanks for the link to the trees page, it will be most helpful! One has to wonder though why Corel didn't show the same intelligence as the author of those pages and give us good defaults for the trees to begin with! I sure hope Bryce will run faster for me on a new Mac! Between the software vendors and the hardware vendors, I am running just to catch up all the time, and money doesn't grow on trees, even Bryce ones (at least, I don't think so!). Still, it is a wonder that this stuff does as much as it does for the price, compared to the higer end 3-D modeling products and systems the "professionals" use. I also have Strata 3-D Pro (a very good program, and the basic Strata 3-D is free! But one would want Pro for the extra features) (http://www.strata.com), which lets me do complex models that I can bring into Bryce as DXF. There is very little I have seen in the Strata Galleries though that matches the quality of the work done by Bryce users! Thanks for the tips. CHU

lol you all are bitchin' about 2 minute waits? lol I called..I got a message that said "you have called during our regular staff meeting, please call back in an hour" ...I called back..same message.. I called back..same message 4 hours later, I called and actually got a "wait til next available rep" message... 20 minute later I got a new serial number lol..so rem. btw, the reason Bryce5 has metaballs is that it was necessary for the engineers to make trees. The trees are actually metaballs set to a path. They dont work the same, but thats what they are. To my understanding, originally, they werent gonna make them a menu item. I guess it was a "I want them" thing that got them there. and yes, on windows machines, bryce 5 renders from 115% - 7% slower. I have been working on "why". On my machine, the original file renders ~14% slower. I now have it to ~4%. This will be in the review I do shortly. To get the faster render times means doing things you SHOULD NOT have to do...but with the same settings on B4, you get no real difference (I tried it)..so it must do with "background" programming (just a guess) I am happy overall with B5, but like anything...it could be better (just dont say that to your wife!..lol) later BT

ooops, sorry I just realized that for the posts I have recently placed..the cookie was giving me the name "posertech"..duh fixed it now.. BT

posertech/brycetech wrote: +++++++++++++++++++ Bryce5 is "relatively" [s]lower in render times on windows. It is not a memory leak, nor is it an actual "setting" from within the render settings. My initial bryce4-b5 render was 14% difference. However, now that I have a bit of grip on Bryce 5 and its rather picky settings... I now have it to ~4% difference. I will be reviewing this necessary bryce setting and OS settings (yes it appears to be your OS!) that will reduce it significantly. Still waiting on other confirmations before I post this as fact, so thats why Im not telling what you need to do now. ...This will be in the review I do shortly. To get the faster render times means doing things you SHOULD NOT have to do...but with the same settings on B4, you get no real difference (I tried it)..so it must do with "background" programming (just a guess) +++++++++++++++++++ It's nice to see your actual experience temper your previous dismissal tone towards others' concerns. It is becoming clearer that these very real reports of PC Bryce5 being relatively slower than Mac Bryce5 are down to the programmers neglecting to set things for Windows (and/or PC hardware) properly. Probably due to time constraints and a 'deliberate' choice to focus on Mac OSX, some important 'background' programming for Windows was overlooked. As you say, the user has to tweak settings that he/she should not have to, just to get the error down to palatable proportions. That implies a balls-up, plain and simple; though it isn't particularly surprising this one didn't make it to the 'known issues' list in the readme. Word of mouth will ensure this issue becomes widely known and loudly talked about, so I hope Corel are ready to patch this up fairly quickly. If the new low price version of Lightwave comes out first, they'll have probably lost a sale as far as I'm concerned. I look forward to your review with interest. DigitalDream#3 wrote: >>>>>>>>>>>> I am very happy with B5. And I really do not see what some are grousing about. I am on a Mac... <<<<<<<<<<<< LOL, I guess that sums it up. I'm pleased for you DigitalDream#3; you seem to be enjoying the Bryce we all should be getting. If you were experiencing render times up to 15 percent slower than they should be, while seeing others get comparatively faster render times, I think you'd be doing a little grousing of your own. ;-)

well pj the dismissal, was not of the speed...it was the "this was planned" things that people were kicking around. Actually, this is very reminiscent (sp) of when Corel messed with the volumetric materials. (rem that?) That little excapade actually cost lots of folks 20x render time increases on the same scene. This is, from the best that I can understand, the way that Bryce is behaving in that it thinks it is a "background" program...not the primary one that should be getting some more cpu. Win 95 used to let you set priorities for programs...I still have to see in later versions let you do that. I do have to take back the "the same settings in b4 have no real difference" thing, because setting my computer the same and running either b4 gives me ~ 1 minute faster render per hour on b4. Not a lot but 1.x percent does count, that is a bit faster....but the difference for b5 is closer to 4-5% faster per hour...at least on this machine. If you'd be interested in helping me confirm or deny the setup requirements to get the "approximate same speed" as b4, just email me...and I'll tell you what I did and then you can test it to see if it gives you the same...or similar as what Im getting now. I have it to about 3% difference..same quality of render, same size. But it IS silly to have to do this kind of setup for the same result as b4 gave by default. BT

PJF if you find Bryce hard to use especially with tweaking render settings you will find Lightwave impossible. It has 10x the amount of setup for a scene, 20x the options for rendering. And yes when you turn up the settings in it you will find out what slow is.

griggs, I don't find Bryce difficult to use - that's the real reason I use it. The 'hardest' thing of all is not being able to use interesting options because the render time runs into weeks. This is further exacerbated by Bryce5, which has some very nice new render features but is even all round slower than previous versions. I know it is possible to make Lightwave (and the others) grind to a halt by enthusiastic settings, but I also know that feature for feature, Lightwave will be quicker than Bryce. Indeed, a radiosity calculation for a fairly complex scene will be much quicker than Bryce trying to simulate it with soft shadows and 'true ambience' - and it only has to be done once for camera animations. And you have to admit; the feature set of Lightwave is light-years ahead of Bryce. If the rumours for the upcoming 'light' Lightwave are true, the content will still be vast. 'Inspire' is already tremendous value for money, and if the new effort is in keeping with that price point it will be hard to resist the temptation. Despite my love of Bryce, my fiddling with the demo of Bryce5 is leaving me underwhelmed. Combined with the reality that it is disturbingly slower than Bryce4 with the same scenes (much slower than I was expecting), I feel like I'm being hit with a big stick. If someone dangles a nice juicy carrot in front of me, I'll probably start climbing the steep learning curve after it.

Lightwave is indeed an awesome program. I had only heard of whispers on the Lightwave lite, only enough to call them rumors. I think though there are several things you need to look at. Bryce 5 is able to run two instances at the same time. Therefore rendering a scene and setting up the next at the same time can be a huge time saver. You can literaly half your work time. Also the network rendering can increase your overall workflow by many times. While the rendering speed loss of around 10% (for me that is), it is more then offset by the increase amount of work you can do by rendering and setting up a scene at the same time. I think if you look at the overall effect of the Bryce 5 upgrade you will see that in reality it is many times faster (overall work flow not rendering speed) not slower. Griggs Who is seriously thinking of selling his lightwave 6.5, and many plugins (legal even) hehehe now hows that for a carrot!

hee-haw, hee-haw, how-much? ;-)

You can email me at dcindian@netsync.net I will reply with all the particulars :)

jval has just reported that the Bryce5 demo is very much slower than the full package which he has just received. The real thing is 'only' about 5% slower. Thank God for that! ;-)

Im waiting for my Bryce 5 upgrade... Im wondering if I have to call from SWEDEN !!! to get a new serialnumber. isnt it possible to get it by e-mail??? anybody know???