It seems to me that Vue 4 has really stolen a march on Bryce with its ability to read Poser .pz3 files directly. I was getting my hands dirty with the .pz3 file format over the last few days, and it looks sufficiently close to .obj that I don't think it would be a huge job to make a .pz3 reader for Bryce. It might be a good move for Corel to consider releasing a Bryce 5.1 with this import ability included. Otherwise a lot of people are going to switch to Vue.

I'm a heavy Bryce user myself and love it. I am however planning on buying Vue for the very reason you mention. I'm not exactly a fan of the interface that Vue has....but to not have to fuss when importing is a big seller. I do however think there is room for both softwares.....but if Bryce had the capability to do the same I probably wouldn't bother with Vue at all.

I agree! I may have to try Vue for that same reason! :)

Yeah that is very true...that would make life much easier...but I haven't had a problem importing stuff except for sometimes the textures don't apply right, but then all I have to do is just reapply them. I will stick with my trusty Bryce 5 :) hehe

I haven't had a problem importing either. It really doesn't matter if the object ends with a pz3,3ds,lwo, or obj to me as long as it works. Now if importing pz3 included the animation perhaps it would be useful. The only time I used pz3 in lightwave was to see if it worked and to do animation. It turns out if I save the file as say obj I can open it in all my application and do work on it (morphs, add jewlery and other stuff), pz3 would limit me to working the file in poser or if bryce used it bryce (lightwave does funny things when importing pz3's that make the mesh unstable), and rhino won't open it at all. Of course another file format is always welcomed. The animation aspect would be cool though. Does Vue do the animation? Griggs also sticking with Bryce 5

Well, I don't have problems exporting and importing, but it is a hassle retexturing each figure every time I need to change the pose slightly. Although Bryce recognises the texture, it doesn't recognise transparencies or bump maps, and always imports with inappropriate values for ambience and specularity. It's partly a problem that when Poser exports a .obj, it only uses a subset of the .mtl file format. It would be very useful to get hold of the full .mtl file spec but it doesn't seem to be on the web. The only online documentation is for the limited subset that Poser uses.

I see where your comming from, though in my thinking each scene is different and each lighting setup is different. Even if the mesh came in with better defualt values they still would need to be worked on due to differance in lighting. It would definently be a bonus if the mesh came in with the transperancies applied right though. As you say its more of a problem with how poser saves files then Bryce's import ability. Even then.... using the Pro Pak plugin for Lightwave yields horrendous results that need to be worked on each time. Even though it could be useful I am sceptical on exactly how useful it is. Griggs

Months ago, before Vue 4 or Bryce 5 were released, I lamented what a hassle importing Poser figures into Bryce. I stated if B5 didn't have and import feature for Poser, I was buying Vue. That's what I did and it works great for me. Everything comes in perfectly. However, some Vue users are experiencing problems with Poser's *.bum files. On import, Vue gives them a message that it can't read the bum file. Then they have to apply it afterwards. All in all I think it's a smart move to have both programs if you can afford it.

If you dont want to wait corel do a complete exp/imp from poser to bryce, use one of two plugings there are in the net. Natural Pose or susanna, they import to bryce the complete scene created in poser with animations included.

From above it's still unclear to me, does Vue take in the animation properties or not? If so, it's a winner. manowar

Man O' War: No, Vue does not import Poser animation. There was an earlier thread in the Vue forum about a plug-in being written by E-on (or some company) to allow Vue to do that but I can't find it now (the thread, that is).

Unlike griggs, I'm often working on pictures that form a narrative. So two pictures may show the same figures in different poses in the same scene with very similar lighting, in which case the textures can be the same. This means setting up the textures the first time, and then copying the textures for every part from the old figures to the next ones every time there's a change. Which is a bit tedious.

Having used both Bryce 5 and Vue 4 - the Poser import function in Vue is a great time saver. You can get great results in both programs -- but if you use Poser a lot - Vue becomes the easy choice for a renderer . . .