As always, thank you VERY much Vladimir and Amy! :)

my pleasure folks! :)

vegemite

so many wonderful palces there are to visit across the world

damn stilll ain't won the lottery yet! :P

My pleasure :)

tons of places I'd love to see, sigh, fascinating world

I'd suggest using post effects for explosions, just put a coloured light in right spot and a small coloured sphere to note centre

Lots of brushes/PNGs for fire/explosions and best of all if you cna afford it is PARTICLE ILLUSION ;)

though oddly one of my fave SFX plugins for Photoshop went wonky when I installed in my new PC :(

Ulead GIF X 2 is awesome for lightning, lens flares etc, get weird "cannot find anigif2.dll" error even when I know that dll is in right spot or even copied it to WIndows/system32 etc grrrrrr

Pffffft!! my super sonic sonar radar (and kevlar underwear) will save me! :P

anyway even WAAAY back a scene such as UV dan has done did not ever take a week to render, volumetric soft shadow and depth of field took a day or two in bryce 5 and that's lot more complex?

http://www.renderosity.com/mod/gallery/index.php?image_id=262288&user_id=7541&np&np

Bryster

nope! you are NOt getting my mankini, again! told you that last week! :P

UVDan

even in bryce it shouldn't be taking that long unless there's some kind of internal conflict or over run going on, surely? :(

http://www.renderosity.com/mod/gallery/index.php?image_id=2358167

that was iirc 14 hours in Vue, cranked way up.
And I've done good stuff in Bryce 5 years ago that didn't take as long as what yours seems to in Bryce 7, so there must be some issue? :/

that came out years ago for the MTV awards for LOTR movies ;)

But it's sitll a HOOT! :P

also love the ones folk di dlike "Lets use a catapult to fire the ring into mordor"

or the "secret diaries of LOTR"

http://www.ealasaid.com/misc/vsd/

:P

Would render much faster in Vue, ya know....

puts on chainmail mankini! Safety from Comfy chair :P

1 metre?

well you'll need ot enlarge it up to

300 pixels per 25 mm of print size

so 1000mm/25 =40

40x300=12000

ie, largest dimension of image needs ot be enlarged up to approximately 12000 pixels for a good print.

You MAY get away with 100 pixels per 25mm, so 3000 pixels on largest dimension.

photoshop is ok, but Fractal resizer is better

http://www.ononesoftware.com/products/perfect-resize/

For such large prints, it's vital to render the final image in Vue at LEAST 1600 pixels in size (largest dimension)

:)

Shawn

normally I preffer fantasy to scifi, but I have to say I'd MUCH rather have a new Fallout game ;)

Skyrim is very good, but somehow it..,lacks something, much better than previosu ES games though, which I've played since very 1st one, but the Elder Scrolls games still lack a certian coherence, can't quite put my finger on it.
Fallout 3 and Fallput new vegas were total blasts :)

saw on Daz that some perosn had got the assets otu of Fallout new vegas into 3DMax then DAZStudio, oooooh, fun!!!

misimifein

I'm from North Lanarkshire, "Land of the Midnight Scum" as I call it :P

Yeah I post on DAZ but not much for a long while, especially after they mucked their forums around :/

I only use the graphire when I'm painting textures or touching up images in Photoshop but it is handy :)
A lightweight/small mouse is perfect for most stuff but sometimes a "brush" is needed
And the graphire should be compatible even now ;) mine is a #4 iirc.

ah just give 'em a shot, see what's fun! ;) you can't break 'em so have fun!
Most folk achieve nothing in life not because they don't have talent, but because they don't try, and you only get one shot at this life so may as well try every non-stupid/non-nasty thing, hehe! 
the fact you can undo mistakes makes creating and learning sooooo much easier on a computer as opposed ot normal mediums

Usually nvidia works well with Vue, better than ATI :)

I personally would always strongly recommend keeping game/net, and an art PC completely seperate

a gaming rig is much cheaper/easyier to get than a good Vue/3D rig.

More apps you add, espeically games/Steam/punkbuster etc, more you kludge up your PC...and more security risks

Games do not need an "uber" PC. Both my PCs died this year, gah!! normally I budget replacing them in alternate years (usually they last 4 to 5 years)

(also need net access due to disability, buyign goceries etc so 2 PCs is vital for me)

so an i5 with a 450 or 560 vid card will do fine games are actually behind the curve when it comes ot PC video cards capabilities

then have an i7 for art, and can network/back up/complimentary renderer, to the game machine if need.

my 2 cents :)

ah, a fellow haggis basher!! ;)

as folk say, yes try the Vue 10.5 PLE version, it has all the bells and whistles, just adds a "watermark" to renders

The higher end versions of Vue are expensive, so yeah very important ot "try before buy"

there's some really nice 2D apps, "Painter" is, unsurprsingly, the best "natural art" app, and Photoshop the more "wide variety of tasks"
lot of 3D work is improved, effects added etc in Photoshop
Paintshop Pro is much like Photoshop and can be used ot paint etc.

get a Graphire or Intuos graphics tablet with a good 2D app and you can still paint on the computer ;)
I can't draw worth a damn so I use 3D as I can envision scenes/lighting etc

Other apps to look at are Bryce (free, over on DAZ3D) it's very like Vue but not as "powerful".

Mojoworld, quirky but creates awesome alien/scifi vistas

Zbrush, 3DCat and Mudbox (all are sort of 3D modelling/object painting tools, I preffer 3Dcoat)

3DMAX and Maya are the "big boys" in 3D art, veeeery expensive but have PLE versions too, lightwave is similar but not so expensive

My site, Geekatplay, Quadspinner, AsilFX have lots of tutorials on Vue.

have fun! :)

Crysis 2 was one of the worst games I have ever wasted money on :(

yes gorgeous graphics, but abysmal, linear gameplay, sigh

Point is, the items/scenes are all built, limited though (no huge import of almost anything you can find/buy) and very very well optimized by professionals

the tech though does/will filter into art :)

I use UVMapper Pro for obj mapping, makes heck of a difference as some apps toally mess up mapping! :)