Hi there, regarding the refresh problems with OpenGL enabled: disable "background draw," and you should be fine (i.e. no artefacting). OpenGL support in Vue4 is very slow, though--the software mode is a lot faster, regardless of what VGA you use. It's not an issue with small scenes, but in large ones? OpenGL is pretty much useless. The latest ATI drivers resolved many OpenGL problems, hence ATI cards are preferable to NVIDIA-based boards, right now, for Vue. You can get a decent video board for $100 or less (Radeon7500 / 9000), but signal quality might be an issue with cheaper makes. With Detonator40, OpenGL runs fine on NVIDIA boards with Vue as well, as long as you disable "background draw." But here, again, the make will determine the signal quality. 1280x1024@85 shouldn't be too much of a problem, but you'll have to compare video cards to make sure you won't end up with slight smearing on-screen. ta, -Sascha.rb

Hi there, regarding the original question: Vue4's OpenGL viewports are recognised to be among the slowest in the industry (at least among the several dozen people of the industry I regularly talk with ;) ), especially on NVIDIA video boards. For most people, the standard, non-OpenGL viewports will work a lot faster and with less artefacting. I am with Pete on that one--I simply don't see the point. The shading makes more complex scenes almost impossible to navigate in, and well, it's slower than the software mode, something I have yet to behold even with freeware render and modeling applications. But as you can simply turn it off, it's not too much of a problem. ta, -Sascha.rb

Hi danamo, yes, you'd have to animate a terrain over time to get "big" rolling waves animated convincingly. Vue doesn't support displacement mapping (yet? ;=) ), hence you can't do it with a procedural texture. As Pete said, mind, with lots of fine-tuning and work, you will get quite good results--certainly better than the Pixel Shader Test in 3DMark2001. ta, -Sascha.rb

Attached Link: http://www.renderosity.com/messages.ez?Form.ShowMessage=971342

Hi HellBorn, I can send you two example setups of scenes faking radiosity. A render of the first scene can be found in my gallery, and I started a thread about advanced lighting a while back (see attached link). You'll find the link to the indoor scene in that thread, as well as the second scene I could send you (the one with the ball, scroll down). If you're interested, mail me. There's no standard-way to fake radiosity; it's highly scene-dependent what will work and what won't, and how far you'll have to go. I wrote a short tut regarding more realistic indoor lighting ( http://www.nggalai.com/tutorials/tut_01.htm ) with some hints about the radiosity thing, and I'm working on a second tut exclusively about radiosity faking. But that will still take some time; I just re-installed my system and have to setup WinXP, first. ;) Hope this helps, -Sascha.rb

Hi there, thanks all--disabling Norton Antivirus and copying the .vegs freshly from the install disk did the job. Cherry trees! Wee! Avengers, here I come! :D ta, -Sascha.rb

Thanks for the quick reply, Guitta. I'll give it a shot tonight. :) have fun, -Sascha.rb

kissAble, LOL exactly my feeling when I started messing around with modelers. Albeit without the stiff drink, I was only 15 years old, then. ;) Modelers have become a lot more user-friendly over the bast 12 years or so, but nowadays, people request this and that and THIS feature and why doesn't it do THAT just like that other modeling app . . . hence: lots and lots of features that somehow need to be integrated in a GUI. Very difficult, and we guys have the additional problem that Vue's user interface is about as good (i.e. easy) as it gets. Hence: Lots of work to get used to a new modeling application, but it's well worth the effort. Good tuts are another problem. Most tuts are, as you have oserved correctly, written for people with at least a basic knowledge about 3D graphics. To understand these basic concepts, practically any 3D beginner's tutorial will do. Once you've understood what polygons, vertices, extrusion and so on are, it's easier to apply this information to tutorials aimed at the specific modeling application you're interested. Be sure to give real-time 3D tuts (for games or graphics cards) a shot, too--it may not be completely applicable to rendering, but the terminology is the same and should give you an idea what to expect. Should you have any specific questions, don't hesitate to ask them here--unless, of course, it's considered off-topic in the Vue renderosity.com forums. ;) ta, -Sascha.rb

Attached Link: http://atm.rm.it/

Hi there, regarding Process Viewer 2000: apparently, it has been discontinued. I personally use ATM ("another task manager") for setting process priorities. It's almost a combination between PV2k and WinTop; you get Wintop's overview and PV2k's task management. ATM lets you even set priorities for seperate threads in an application. Oh, and it's free, too. If you need a task manager for Win9x, give it a shot. ta, -Sascha.rb

Hi kissAble, regarding trueSpace, just one short caveat: the handling is completely different from Vue, and I mean COMPLETELY. The whole 3D-metaphor is different . . . I think there are download locations to trueSpace1, so better give that a shot first before thinking about getting one of the newer versions. ;) ta, -Sascha.rb

Hi Alex, well, I'm not YL, but Amorphium1.0 is not free AFAIK. I got my copy from a Computer Arts Magazine cover disk, myself. I'm sure it has been with other magazines as well, in the past. ta, -Sascha.rb

If you want to go freeware, try Z-Brush. Good frontend and powerful. I opted for Amorphium 1.0, myself, for "organic" stuff, but use trueSpace 3.1 for more "controlled" stuff. trueSpace2 and 3.1 are very inexpensive, and also sometimes featured on magazine CDs so you can get them practically free. Vue imports both formats easily and without too much hazzle. Cinema4D is an excellent render application, but clearly overkill if you simply need a modeler. I am thinking about getting C4D R8 myself, right now, but certainly not for modeling purposes. ;) ta, -Sascha.rb

Short update: disabling all power saving settings solved the "133h-Bug" for me--image rendered just fine in about 7h. thanks again, -Sascha.rb

Holy mother of God. That's some huge-sized images . . . are you doing print work with Vue? ta, -Sascha.rb

Hi Pete, excellent! I think you found it: "check also that you don't got some damn stupid power saver thiny turned on cause your proccessor could be forced to idle and the drives going to sleep that could lock up Vue. " I just reinstalled Windows couple of days ago, and haven't changed the power savings settings, yet. Duh. Small wonder it craps up. bangs head At least the problem with my latest render has been cleared, now. Thanks a lot. :) Also thanks for the Wintop hint, I'll check it out. The trick with the mouse should have been obvious, too . . . eh. Need more coffee, I suppose. I'm looking forward to your render, btw. Sounds exciting. Do you have a dedicated render machine for your 100h+ renders, or do you simply not need your computer for anything but Vue? ;) Again, thanks! ta, -Sascha.rb

Hi everybody, My apologies. I have phrased my question, together with the example, rather unclearly, apparently. So I'll try again. :) My question, as intended, was: Generally speaking, how does one check whether Vue is a) running as supposed or b) looping / crashing? If a render takes much time, it's hard to see whether Vue is actually still rendering or already looping, simply because one scanline already needs many minutes to complete, i.e. until the display is updated. Hope it's clearer this way, without the example. ;) have fun, -Sascha.rb