This is one of a series of threads that I'm posting.  I worked on an image all weekend and encountered several problems with it.  In fact, I posted it in my gallery and the first comment I got on it fully confirmed my opinion that it sucked so I took it down.  I thought it would have some value to write what happened and post it for two reasons.

1.)  My experience might be interesting for some to see what kinds of things happened during the development of the image.
2.)  I would like feedback on what I could try to get it better.

I think these issues are big enough to have a separate thread for each so I have broken this up into separate threads with images and text to support each issue.

I am happy for any and all feedback!

Thanks!

Aura (My current revived #1 SUPER DUPER PET PEEVE!)
What worked.
Nothing
What didn't work.
Anytime I turned it on.
What I tried.
I tried using it.
What I learned.
It's busted and DAZ nor EOVIA fixed it!  In C4 and older versions of C, the aura function worked like a charm.  Turn it on, stuff has that warm and fuzzy cool glowing aura around it.  Don't you think that rocket flame needs some aura?  Of course you do rocket fans!  If you turn it on, C renders it with this nice dark sharp edged and clear outline of the original object.  Back in the old days before it was busted, the Aura never had this problem.  There was no line or transition between the original object and the aura that was post rendered.  Now?  It totally completely sucks.  The code draws in this super duper zero aliased outline of the original object between the aura and the object.  It looks like a jr. draftsmen came in with a pencil and outlined the object in dark lead.  I'm mad about it. I've written to Eovia about it, it has not been fixed now for four versions of the code.  AAAAAAAARRRRRGGHHHH!
I want to use Aura all the time!  Star wars bullets without Aura?  STUPID!  Light sabers without aura?  STUPID!  USS Defiant all glowing green in space in front of the Enterprise without Aura?  STUPID!  Rocket engine exhaust without aura?  STUPID!  Fiery hot chunks of rock flying into space without aura?  STUPID!
Yes!  I have had a lot of need for Aura and NO LOVE!

By the way,
#2 pet peeve.  No matter what you set it too, the jpg quality option you set in the render room has no meaning.  When you save your rendered jpg, it will always ask you with the default setting on good regardless of your initial setting preference.
#3 pet peeve.  When you change your camera names or add cameras or whatever, the list of cameras in the corner of the scene in the assembly room does not update the names.  This isn't a big deal but it annoys my tiny brain.
#4 pet peeve (C8 specific).  Who farted around with the production frame scales?  I updated C to 8.1.0.18 and all my production frames are about 5% smaller.  What the .....?
#5 pet peeve.  Why can't we have specific value entries for a metaball object?  Ever tried to put a metaball at 0,0,0?  It's a major pain when you can't type it in.  Sure would be nice if you could just type it instead of guess and guess and guess and guess until you die.  If the metaball modeler had more hardness to how you move and position metaballs, it could be quite useful.  As it is now, it's just messy.  I've seen some really great metaball models in magazines that I would love to try but there's no way when you can't really position a metaball at a reasonable reference point.

 You've been busy. Carrara as therapy. 

The aura is broken is C8. It worked great in C7. This is a bug I filed and has been acknowledged by DAZ and has been corrected - but not released yet. 

Camera name changes don't update. You shouldn't have to do this, but closing and reopening the file will display the correct names. 

Metaballs need an overhaul.

I didn't realize aura was fixed in C7.  I do remember this issue appearing in C5.  I wrote to Eovia with essentially the same image as above and they said they filed it in the bug list.  What makes it a big deal for me is it seems like it's been around for a LONG time.  I went into Carrara hibernation for a lot of C7 and I didn't notice if it was fixed.

I'm not sure but I think changing from the assembly room to the render room and back can update the camera list.  I might have stumbled on that this weekend (should test).  i've been closing and re-opening the file for the list update forever.  Like I said, it's annoying but not a biggy.

I'm glad to have the metaball modeler, it just needs work.

Hey by the way, I still have C7 loaded on my machine.

Aura wasn't fixed in that version either.

A lot of good things changed with C5. I remember the Aura allways works fine (even in RDS), but the problem started in Carrara 5 . Another nice feature changed / removed from C4 to C5 was the bone system. Like Poser, C4 has the "Restore element" or "Restore selected bone" parameter (I don't remeber the real name...). You could select the bone of the attached figure and restore only that element to zero position. Now you must select the model to restore all the skeleton. It's so stupid! Sometimes I need to restore only a hand or a finger, it's very usefull on animations, and now I can't...

 It might be a version issue. I'd loaded some C7 files where the aura worked a-ok into C8 only to discover that it didn't work any longer. This is when I reported the regression bug. 

Ya I thought about that too Mark.  This is a file which I created in C4.  I should see if I could reproduce it in C8.

I did actually fuss with this in C8 pure and I could get the edges to show up but not nearly as bad as the file I have posted here.

I tried a whole bunch of different things like scale and intensity and blah blah blah.  I can still get it to happen, just not as bad as what I've posted using the old C4 file.