GAH! The one thing, above any other, that drives me nuts about Carrara is that the transparent textures I use in it, in short, aren't. At absolute most, they're slightly less opaque at 100% than at nothing, but that's rare and in fact stuff seems to be not only not getting any less solid, but actually glowing, when I use procedurals. Is there some stupid function that I left on and overlooked that is doing this? Is there any way around it? I'd kinda like to be able to use Carrara's better renderer and effects, rather than an increasingly ratty copy of Ray Dream (which can take more than two days to render a minute of movie), but transparency is unfortunately a rather important thing in a lot of the renders I do and if it just permanently sucks I might as well toss my copy in the trash...

Don't give up yet! This is a lightly documented "Gotcha!" that messed with my mind for awhile too. The total value of the color+transparency+Reflection should not exceed 100% or the object begins to glow. You can cheat this 100% rule a little with the transparency and reflection combination but not with the color and transparency combination. Control color value with the different options available in the color selection window(change these options from the little pull down window on the color window). Color Value (darkness of color) is determined by the "L" in the HLS color wheel; L meaning Lightness. For RGB it its shown in the V of the HSV numbers; "V" meaning Value. Enter specific numbers or simply check them after using the eyedropper. The safest way to go is to use a dark value in the Color area and then actually control color of the object in the transparency area with an actual color selection. Hopefully the picture will explain it better than the words... Mark

I think I got it... thanks. Kinda sucks, but at least it should be workable now...

Attached Link: http://www.renderosity.com/viewed.ez?galleryid=404068&Start=1&Artist=Hoofdcommissaris&ByArtist=Yes

This used to drive me nuts too. Found it out by using the preset transparent materials. BTW, now you have transparent stuff (you can always combine color and another function in the transparancy channel if stuff is too transparent) you might encounter something strange when rendering caustics. That resulted in the next large question and explanation marks above my head: strange 'cloudy' stuff in transparent areas. Crank up the 'filter' value in the Caustics part of the render. Attached link is wild transparant stuff that illustrates the possibillity to make something rather nice looking...