I've had some interesting experiences with the poser import. Materials and groups : The best way to fix this is to go through the material summary. Especially if you want to control the body skin and the head skin with only one material, it is easy to assign the same material to multiple body parts that way. Bumps: Vue seems to overreact with poser bump values. Just reduce the bump gain in the vue material way way down and it looks normal again (I found this was easier to do than remove the bump map in poser and add it later in vue) Crashes: I had multiple crashes importing poser models in vue. Most of the time, I found out they were related to either props (especially 3ds props) or very twisted clothes. In one picture, I had to strip a poser character from all her props (she had a crown, earrings and a necklace) and save them as individual obj files for later import in vue. I hope this will help...

Thanks varian I had to fight about 4 hours before I finally came to the Vue forum and searched for messages about crashes. One of them was about the number of lights and that was my solution. I did not mention the multiple crashes due to the imports from Poser. The old woman's dress was so twisted by her sitting position that it caused the import into vue to fail. I had to smooth things a little before I got it right. And there was also the usual bump maps to correct manually :) But overall, it was a fun picture to make.

I forgot : The light I used were point lights, no shadow, no lens flare, with a very small radius (15 to 35 on the slider).

Attached Link: http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/1562059548/qid%3D994961189/102-3888682-2789730

Here... I made a quick collage of different levels of lighting. The first image is the default render without any additional light (only sunlight). Of course, it is very dark because they are in a cave and because of the contrast induced by the volumetric atmosphere. The middle image only has 3 lights (one close to the face of the young and mature characters, the 3rd above her stomach). The 3rd picture has 7 lights - additional lights were places next to the face of the old woman, behind and in front of the dress of the mature woman and at the knees of the young one. You can compare the improvement. I also added a link to a reference to the book I was talking about.

Ever since I read a book about texturing and lighting in computer graphics, I try to use lights a lot to compensate for the lack of radiosity or area lights (a great reference book to read by the way). For example, the light on the right side of the old woman's face is a point light placed right next to the face. As well as the light around the young woman's face and belly. I have been amazed to see how much difference just a few additional light can make in a picture. Tonight I will try to make a render without additional light and post it here to show the difference.

I started with Bryce (v3 demo first then v4) for a while and I got used to the interface. I was skeptical at first when I tried Vue but a few things kept me motivated enough to try it : - Better looking result in natural scenes (I have to spend a lot of time in tuning and lighting with Bryce to get something equivalent to a quick scene in Vue) - Easier way to mix materials - Group objects in layers with possibility to lock them or turn them off - Natural looking vegetation (I just wish more models were available :) ) - Easier way to spread a large number of copies (trees for axample) and drop them on a terrain (for some reason, I could never get it working right in Bryce) - Better control of the rendering engine (I found Vue more 'customizable' than bryce in general, even if it is with the cost of becoming confusing at times) Now version 4 has arrived, I could add to the list : - Better control of volumetric atmospheres - Lens flares, glowing materials and soft shadows - Poser 4 scenes import This said, it took me about a month of test and failures before I got used to the Vue interface. Now I am completely converted. There is one feature of Bryce I miss at times : the positioning of the sun/moon is more intuitive in bryce than vue. Other than that, I haven't looked back for months.

A reminder about the netries : don't forget to post them on the challenge arena gallery as well.

Nice work ! The softness of the scene makes sets a perfect mood. I looked at the main gallery... this picture is a lot more powerful in black and white than the original.

Crossblade : Great picture ! Coming right out of the Exorcist. This is exactly the kind of mood I had in mind. I guess you also have to upload this picture on the 'challenge' gallery for it to be accepted as an entry (I almost didn't make it last time :)).

Attached Link: http://www.renderosity.com/viewed.ez?galleryid=63007&Start=1&Artist=agiel&ByArtist=Yes

I finally received a copy of Vue 4 ! Here is the revised alien summer with a better atmosphere and hlowing textures. I hope you like it :)

Eeep... Thanks a lot for the comments :) I have to say I was so amazed by MrWyatts fly that it made me want to participate to the challenge. I will take until tomorrow night (Eastern time) to come up with a challenge. I guess I have to announce it in a new thread ?

Attached Link: http://www.renderosity.com/viewed.ez?galleryid=61776&Start=1&Artist=agiel&ByArtist=Yes

"The Elders Teeth on Beta Draconis is a hot destination this summer. Many Glavooz families have already enjoyed the shimmering beaches of this unique place in the quadrant. The cristalline waters make it a perfect playground for families with offsprings. You too could rest under the relaxing light of the moons of Beta Draconis. All you have to do is return this message with your payment to the following address..." - Excerpt from a vacation pamphlet from the Beta Draconis Office of Tourism This picture represents a group of Glavooz kids playing around the antique stones under the attentive watch of their parents. Made entierely with Vue for this month's challenge about an "Alien Summer".

Attached Link: http://www.renderosity.com/gallery.ez?ByArtist=Yes&Artist=agiel

It's rather confusing about where to post the entries of the challenges. Mine are in the challenge arena gallery : "Dirt" challenge http://www.renderosity.com/viewed.ez?galleryid=60892&Start=1&Artist=agiel&ByArtist=Yes "Displaced object" http://www.renderosity.com/viewed.ez?galleryid=60889&Start=1&Artist=agiel&ByArtist=Yes - agiel

Attached Link: http://www.renderosity.com/viewed.ez?galleryid=60850&Start=1&Artist=agiel&ByArtist=Yes

I hope this is not too early. Too bad there is not many postings for this challenge, I had too many ideas to choose from.

Attached Link: http://www.renderosity.com/viewed.ez?galleryid=59669&Start=1&Artist=agiel&ByArtist=Yes

Here is a candidate for the challenge. (Follow the link for the full image). The scene was made entierely in poser and vue d'esprit. Photoshop was there only for color correction and 'grain' effect.