BTW Spit, I certainly am a fan of Vista Internet Products (VIP) and think they also are providing some really fine products- the kind of stuff I guess I like- ducks, chickens, fruit stands, barns and all kinds of great animals. Also like Sams3D stuff and I own all of Cal's stuff (from buying his low-priced CD's.) Cal's collection is a fantastic trip into Americana, Nostalgia and Country Lifestyles. All of them make using Poser, Bryce and Vue a real pleasure! Thanks to all of them for their great work!

Well Phantast you are right about that. I STILL use Bryce 4.0.1 and have been very happy with it for my needs. Still comes up with "Metacreations" logo- kind of nostalgic in a way. But like a good old car, it still runs nicely and what I guess we are actually talking about is the rise and fall or different corporate entities and not really the software itself- which will live on as long as our operating systems support it. I'm running Win2000 and ol' Bryce 4 seems to run better than ever on it. It's the same reason too why I still use Pro-Pack instead of P5. I would still be using ol' P4 from Metacreations if they hadn't thrown in enough new changes to make it worth getting CL Pro-Pack. For me Vue 4 is a bridge from Bryce. It does more things that I want now yet still has the old ray-tracing familiarity that Bryce has. Bryce has probably been a victim of corporate politics and bad business decisions. I'm sure the people running Mojo World probably would have been better caretakers of Bryce had they been able to aquire it- maybe running it on a smaller business scale the way E-On Software runs Vue. Vue has been successful because they are, 1. Truely Dedicated (the way the original Bryce team was), and, 2. Keep their business operation and overhead LOW- meaning profitable and sustainable.

Attached Link: http://www.weiser3d.de/frame.htm

Surfing my favorite Japanese websites lead to a link to Weiser3D, a German website devoted to Poser and Bryce. Found: Really nice PP2 grapes- plus entire fruit basket! No need to convert OBP to Poser! Click on Download, 1. Spit- Vue's strange silence about new vegetation is puzzling but frankly there are so MANY good options these days from other sources- especially from RNDA and their insanely multiplying woodlands, grasslands, forests, wildflowers, etc. for just $2.50 that I go nuts every time I go over there. I say forget LaRoo, the BEST DEALS are their plants! (But, I'm a plant kind of guy, anyway. )I'm not very excited about Mike 3, but I am turned-on by the Millenium Cat, and would like to see a Millenium Horse and other animals. Also a REAL Puppy and Kitty! CUTE SELLS! Where are the cute puppies, kittens and baby ducklings? Whoever GETS ON THAT will sell tons of them, I think. Yah- turn OFF OpenGL in Vue. It's a waste of time. I don't need it anyway, myself. I like it better without it. Also, TURN OFF shadows in Vue, you will get faster and better renders anyway, I think. Also visited the Bryce Forum and it really sounds like Bryce's DAYS ARE NUMBERED. Also lots of Corellers soon hitting the streets looking for work. Maybe they will plant some nice Easter Eggs in a final Bryce 5 service release like SURPRISE- full Poser import by hitting Control-P!

Hi Spit, Yes, I was referring to B4 trees that I have from the Metacreations era. They offered other alternatives then because in B4, trees and plants were not Bryce's strong point. When Vue came out with truely superior trees and plants (the single greatest reason why I switched to Vue) and many people raved about Vue's tree-plant technology, this forced Corel to make much better native Bryce plants and trees as an upgrade selling point. But I was by then already hooked on Vue plants and trees- so I never got into B5- and therefore have never tried to export anything from it (since I DON'T have it!) I have heard people say that B5 does better "metal reflections" than Vue, but since I use Poser heavily and have the great option of DIRECT Poser file into Vue, WITH wonderful plants and trees, metal reflections are not my main area of interest. Vue wins every time for me- and I think that, from what I hear, the Marketplace is saying the same thing and there are considerable doubts about there ever being a Bryce 6. But of course, who knows? (Only the SHADOW KNOWS!!!)

There are ALL kinds of tree types in Bryce. By B4 they were even giving people 2-D tree samples as well as hybrid mesh-boolean trees and true 3D mesh trees. You can get the "leaves" and "bark" out of Bryce if they use texture maps instead of proceedural textures (native Bryce). You can also get out 3D trees if they are in fact 3D meshes. 2-D "faked" trees were/are popular because they render much faster and often look the same. Many programs use this technique and it is even useful in Vue. There have been some nice Vue tutorials posted about this as well. Actually, Poser often uses 2-D trees, such as in the cyclorama, and they work great too for most renders. True 3D mesh trees work well for close-ups. You can get TONS of free plants and trees on the internet. I have more than I could use in my own lifetime of 2D, 2D Hybrid and 3D trees, with real bark and leaf textures. Just look around, they are everywhere. With the X-Frog DEMO you can use it free for 30 days and get lots of very nice 3D mesh plants and trees WITH textures for use in Poser, Bryce and Vue. They look and work great in all three programs.

Attached Link: http://www.wolfiesden.com

Brycers- please save this website in your Favorites list. Ol' Wolfie has been helping Brycers get tons-o-models out of Bryce since the Summer of '69! (Heh- just kidding there) I have been getting nearly 90% of my years of collecting Bryce models OUT OF BRYCE as 3D meshes and WITH Textures, into Vue (since the ancient Vue 2 era, when mankind had not yet even invented the wheel- heh- just kidding again). Nearly ALL of my Bryce models into Vue can look indentical to the original Bryce scenes with a little tweaking- usually lighting and atmosphere choices make the difference. I have so many former Bryce models in Vue and Poser now you wouldn't believe it! Yes, you cannot easily export Booleans out of Bryce (but read Wolfies method) The vast majority of madels made and used in great Bryce scenes over the years were made in 3DStudio, Lightwave, or some other "foreign" modeling app. Most Brycers use Booleans for making buildings and various general scene filling objects (but some have actually made some great detailed Boolean models, but I think it makes up only about 10% of the models you find for downloading). BTW- here are important tips: You need to at least Bryce 4.0.1. ---4.0.1 was the last Metacreations service release for Bryce and the great Brycer technies decided to lay in some GREAT Easter Eggs for all their Brycer buddies as they knew their days at Metacreations were numbered and they would soon be on the street looking for work. When Corel took over Bryce they released version 4.1, which still included the Easter Eggs and mainly updated things to say "COREL" instead of Bryce. I never got the Corel update so I don't know what else it did. I still use 4.0.1 now on Win2000 and it STILL runs great when I need it. Also Remember when EXPORTING using Wolfies tutorial- Some models export better as LWO, Some as OBJ, some as COB, and some as 3DS. I have found that an initial format selection will CRASH Bryce- so just reload again and choice another format. While OBJ's often work the BEST, it is an ASCII format and takes longer to process out. Also, if you can get a model out of Bryce closer to its original model format (like LWO or 3DS, etc.) you will find that it will be better grouped for texturing, etc. The other thing to know is- in rare cases a model can be a HYBRID of MESH and BOOLEAN, and you will have to ungroup and select only the MESH part if you still want it out. HERE's WOLFIE (It's been there FOREVER, as far as I can remember) 1. Select "Bryce" 2. Select "Tutorials" 3. Select "Intermediate- EXPORTING" (Exporting Rocks & Meshes) READ IT CAREFULLY. Wolfie is a dedicated Brycer and has also told me this works for Bryce 5 as well.

Nice looking babe and nice render. I think other Manga-Anime babe makers should keep in mind that people like to use the investment they have made in Vicky Hair, Clothes, etc. Haven't tried this character yet, but the automatic scaling of Hair and Clothes sounds like a really good idea. If it works as advertised, other people should pick up on this concept. I think FUTURE characters should contain SMART SCALING as their main selling point, rather than just selling another whole line of clothes. I think consumers are going to rebel against constantly having to purchase new clothes and utilities in an ATTEMPT to make models work right.

Looks Great! My ship's cabin needed a desk!

Now I LOVE That! Where can I get a ToonyRoo? I knew you have tons more tricks up your sleeve with these toon animals. I bet a LOT more Toon Animal characters could be created with them. I was just thinking (from the Ziggie Circus posts) that a Toony Lion and a Toony Tiger would really be great also. Just don't call the Tiger "Tony", (heh)

Manga Vicky renders better as a TRUE cartoon character in Z-Toon mode than anything made previously. People talk about only the characters they have seen before. Almost no one here has downloaded and played with the new Manga Vicky yet, according to everything I've seen here so far. And the P4 Manga Babe also works fantastically! I have tons of classic P4 clothes that work on her immediately and render as illustrations FANTASTICALLY! Love this. Can't believe they are free. But since its from a Japanese website it no doubts scares some people who can't deal with that. Technical Note: P4 manga babe needs about three zeros knocked off the face sensitivity dials, as in "000" taken off each one. The expressions are GREAT if you like Manga characters, Lots of excellent morphs! Motsura has done a great job on this new character!

LordNakagawa has made a mannikin for V3 to V2, but DAZ has yet to post it for some strange reason. The one there now is for V2 to V3. I and a number of other people are waiting for the V3 to V2 mannikin. Ask Jaager, he's been following this whole saga of the missing mannikin.

I found that Motsura's P4 Manga babe comes in with some magnets around the chest area. They screw up standard P4 poses and some clothing items, so I found that deleting the mags make everything work great and she's P4 clothes ready.

Attached Link: http://ockhamsbungalow.com/Python/Z-flatten.zip

Ockham has just updated his Z-Toon Python script and you will need it to Z-Toon Motsura's Manga Vicky. Something to do with the Camera setting (ask Ockham, he knows). Also another great goodie in the Motsura basket of goodies is also a P4 Version of his Manga character, so nearly all your clothing bases are covered!

When you get the new Motsura Vicky character, she is a Pz3 file, so Very Easy to use immediately. But I found I had to adjust the sensitivity of the face parameter dials, and found that by removing one zero (as in "0") from each dial setting, they performed well. The default settings are too low, at least for me (Win 2000). I know Motsura uses a Mac, so I don't know if that has anything to do with it.

I think the "Play With Poser" characters like Yuka are also great and very useful because they wear Vicky clothes AND have all their digits. I like Koshini a lot as a "Doll-Like" character, and I think that's why so many women like Koshini and Ichiro, as they are basically DOLLS. (I don't own Ichiro, and Motsura's original version of Ichiro satisifies any needs in that department for me.) I REALLY think people will like his new Vicky Character once they download and play with her. She RENDERS FANTASICALLY as a TRUE MANGA Character, especially with a Z-Toon setup. Looks JUST LIKE a real Japanese Manga Comic character!!! Hat's Off to Motsura, he's got a HIT here for true Manga fans, trust me!