Installation was simple, registration was uneventful, the manual is much better than the one that came with 4. Hair works great, looks great, and is very easy to use. Granted it takes much longer to start up than 4, but so far it has been rock solid as far as stability goes. With such a large number of new features I don't understand how anyone could be disappointed. There is no software for any amount of money that can eliminate confusion for new users, it simply doesn't exist. In fact, the more you pay for 3D software the more difficult it becomes to master (as a general rule). But saying "Poser 5 sucks [because I don't know how to do what I want to do and I don't want to open the book" is ridiculous. CL has done an excellent job, I wish more 3D companies would put so many features in a major release!

You should be able to edit the path Vue looks for Poser in. If I remember correctly, Vue prompts you to select the path to poser, I think there's a menu option to edit that path.

Charles River media has a Bryce 5 book out, you can get more details at http://www.charlesriver.com/titles/bryce5.html However, the book is written by Shamms Mortier. I would suggest checking out some reviews on Amazon before buying any books by this author. I do not want to turn this into a flame post against this man, but let's just say, just because someone publishes someones books doesn't make him/her a great author. You might want to try to grab a copy of Real World Bryce 4, by Susan Kitchens. Susan's books are a pleasure to read, and an excellent reference. Most everything in RWB4 still applies to 5, you just won't have any sections on the tree lab or metaballs or any of the new render options. The book lists at $54.99, but check around and you'll probably find it much cheaper online (www.bookpool.com has it in stock and priced at $35.95). Unfortunately, Susan has stated she wouldn't be doing a Bryce 5 book... :(

Also, take a look at the Whole Mountain texture under the Planes and Terrains presets. There are quite a few other terrains that use the blending mode you're after. If you need to make those captured textures into tiling textures, check out Infinity Textures (http://www.infinitytextures.com). It's a very powerful texture creator, but also has a nice little extra called Textractor that will let you turn most photos into tiling textures. The textures work great with Bryce, Carrara, Truespace, etc. Jim

You can ftp the 5.01 patch from ftp://ftp.corel.com/pub/Bryce/5.0.1 Last time I checked, it was still not shown on Corel's website as an update. It lists a few of the fixes. One thing that's not mentioned in the patch, but is fixed, is the problem with the cloud frequency/amplitude graph. Previously if you clicked and drag, the settings jumped to some off-the-wall value instead of starting at the current setting. This made that method pretty much unusable. Also it mentions fixing the tree lab instability. I didn't even mess with it pre-patch, it tended to freeze a lot. If you do network rendering, be sure to grab the lightning update as well, the previous client won't work.

I called Corel and quickly got a new key to upgrade from Bryce 3d. I was surprised, and very impressed, to actually get an answer on a Saturday afternoon. A very pleasant experience after opening the box and finding the upgrade wouldn't work with B3D without a call to Corel!