hi all,after some unnesisary(wish I had a spell checker)tinkering,my bum. files now open as pz3 files and don't work as bump maps.I tried re-loading poser unsuccesfully.could someone please look in the file types menu of win98 and find out what should be opening this file,thanks...oh,BTW what is lol an abreviation for?

Poser automatically converts TIF, JPG and BMP files to BUM format for use in the bump map texture section of the Surface Materials window. They have no purpose outside of Poser. I have a graphics viewer that will open them but the image is unclear and uneditable. When I need to make bump maps I do so in TIF format and let Poser convert them. LOL .... err little old ladies? .... loads of lucre ....lots of love ... or just possibly laughing out loud LOL :)

On the Poser PC version, the .BUM files are actually uncompressed windows .BMP bitmap files. Change the extension to .bmp and they'll open in most graphics packages.

In Corel PhotoPaint 8, it shows in the thumbnail view and can be edited, but what's kinda funny is they change into a greenish hue. You'd think they'd stay black and white.

K.B., there should be no reference to a BUM file in the file types menu. If there is, remove it, and your BUMs should go back to normal. The green/orange color of the BUM file is the way it's supposed to be. To me, they look like the picture has been "embossed" and re-colored.

BTW...... By The Way...... www.geocities.com/area51/corridor/2590/23century/class3.html This link, If I did it right will give you a whole bunch of those....

Thanks all,I believe that removing the bum file from the file menu has solved the problem,so until the next act of self inflicted sabotage, or the day I finally have something usefull to share,see ya.......