Attached Link: http://www.bryceformac.com/phpBB2/viewtopic.php?t=16

Hi everyone. Well, here is some of the latest news on Bryce 6's development. I have been busy talking with many people in the industry, andhave been provided enough headway, and enough support to start work on a business plan, marketing plan, and development plan for the new bryce. In fact, today saw the first talks with the most likely canditate team of developers, here in Sydney, who would be coding the new Bryce from the ground up. The team is especially good with Fractals and fractal generation, which is at the heart of Bryce's landscape and texturing engines! Unfortunately I cannot give the name of the team just yet. I have also been talking to Corel, and in particular part of the noe defunct Bryce team. This particular individual has shown great interest in the project, and has also stated that all of the other Corel employees who are still around, who worked on bryce, are very excited about this new project. So, the development of a business plan and marketing plan progresses now, as well as new screenshots and features from which I hope to get lots of feedback. I will post again in here and in the community forums with an update as soon as it is worth making public. Warm Regards Scott Richardson

Good luck! I'll be waiting for more news!

Sorry, but ill have to say this again! Bryce has one of the best interfaces there is, well organized and not cluttered with a lot of crap icons/windows all over the screen. The changes youre suggesting on your webpage, is only for the worst. And honestly, i dont see any of the things you mention as problems. As it is now, Bryce is THE easiest app to work with, and the reason is...the interface!

Hi Rochr I agree that Bryce is the easiest application to use, because of its interface. However that does not mean it can't be improved. The aim of the new interface is to minimise the amount of clicks it takes to acheive something. thankfully, the interface being suggested is by no means a final design. In fact its already going under a lot of changes. Would you suggest leave it the way it is? Coz if we did, it would be limited as far as multiple open documents, and would also limit much of the new features that really need more screen space than 640 x 480 to be used efficiently. But, its comments like yours that are what I am seeking, as well as positive ones too of course. The aim of the site is to get as much feedback from users as possible. The investors paying for this project are going to do with the hope that people buy a copy or upgrade. The best way to make sure people do that, is to offer an application that everyone wants! While its hard to please everyone, I can assure you the interface WILL be tweaked quite a lot, and it will probably be closer to the current Bryce than the current screen shot is now. Also, I can say that the interface will be totally customisable. If you don't want certain parts of the interface visible, you can turn them off. Additionally, you can save your interface settings as a preset, and send them to others so they can work in the same manner you do. This was a feature idea submitted by madmax, and am happy to say it WILL be in the final designs. Rochr, I can tell you now, the interface WILL change. I can also tell you now, that the interface was ALWAYS going to change, even if Corel was to finish their Bryce 6 - I know first hand that the interface had already been altered, before they canned development. Cheers Scott

I think this project has to start in the right end. First do the research like user studies and a rigid business plan. THEN you can begin worrying about details in the user interface.

puts on the tar and feather proof suit I agree with Rochr as well. I don't mind doing a bit of digging/clicking, as long as my interface gives me a nice big bit of real-estate for the work view, and bryce does that - I use the "max recomended" setting. If too many other palletes and things appear, that will cut down the space (unless the interface is going to be customizable, which would be nice :) ). But I still give you top marks for pushing this forwards.

Scott, I don't understand your comment about 640x480.

Before I make any judgements... 1.I hope it is true and if it is I would like to be a BetaTester... 2.Vector/Corel sold the Bryce Code to you guys? 3.Vector is letting you guys Re-code but didnt hire you... 4.You guys are making a NEW BRYCE? 5.I definitely want to Betatest then.... 6.The only way I see this project going forward to completion and helping the Bryce Community is to have complete POSER intergration as in Scene Import and Animation Import...Also Being able to Model inside of Bryce using Nurbs and Low Poly methods AND I REPEAT and you need to be able to EXPORT the Models into any format available,THIS IS PARAMOUNT to Bryces succsess.. 7.Tree Lab Update to include the ability to sculpt Trees and Bend and Morph...Like Tree druid or Amorphium 8.The Ability to Interact With the COMMUNITY and Let us all know how things are going.....Meta and Corel were very BAD at this and it hurt them in the Long run... 9.Plugins.....PLUGINS....PLUGINS....The Ability for the community to Develope their own Plugins for Bryce...You dont have to give us the code but design a little Program that will let us design the Plugins then the Program converts all of the codeing into Bryce's Language? 10.ME ON THE BETATESTING TEAM.....

Scott have you bought the right's to Bryce from Corel/Venture Capital? If not how can you use any of the current Bryce interface? I guess I'm a bit confused here as to what is going on and would appreciate an explanation. Catlin

My understanding is that Scott's trying to put together a detailed business plan including viability studies and future product options that he can then use to leverage vector to sell the product to another developer and also to try and tie in that other developer. A lot of work to do and he has my support for one, we need someone with this sort of drive to keep Bryce available. There's quite a few suggestions etc gone into Scott's forum at the link, it's worth any Bryce fan participating. For me, I'd love to see better modelling (including a collapse to mesh for the 'skin' of a set of metaballs), better import/export, plug ins, a faster render engine (:-)) and support for the linux platform.

Pendulum, Its good to hear that the interface will be customizable. But i do need to correct you in two points. 1. You CAN already have multiple documents opened. I always work with 2 or 3 Bryce windows open, using one for the scene itself, and 1-2 for modeling. Ive even had 2 images rendering, while working on a third one. The only thing that limits this, is the hardware youre using, not Bryce. 2. As for the screen space, im not sure if you mean the app itself, or the workspace, but the size depends on screen resolution, and monitor size. I work in 1152x864, and have a workspace thats 980x740. No problem there. As for the clicking, most features are just one or two clicks away, very easy to find. As i see it, the interface has proven to be optimal, however this is my personal opinion.

Foley, you want to be on beta test team? Welcome to the club! We all want to be on the team. :-) BTW, www.bryceformac.com has forums.

A customizable interface with elements that can be docked at will sounds like a good idea to me. :)

Good news indeed! Thanks to you, Pendulum, for your work and information! J.

Really really good news Pendulum! I think the Bryce interface works very well as it is but I'm sure there's room for improvement. There's always room for improvement. Yeah Customizable would be the best way to go. Here are a few things I really wish they would improve on: 1. I really hope they can make a faster render engine. 2. A treelab that allows more control of the trunk, branches, and area of distribution of leaves. Something comparable to XFrog trees. Coconut trees that can compete with Vue's. 3. A grass and floral generator? So we don't have to keep importing this stuff. 4. Meta booleans? 5. Skies/Clouds that are similar or better than those generated in Terragen. 6. Tapering and chamfering functions for booleans? 7. Many of us are fascinated HDRI that we actually find ways of emulating it, so why not real HDRI this time? These are just wishful thoughts that may or may not be possible yet. I really don't expect all of them to happen but any one of these improvemens would be enough to make me buy a Bryce 6. Well, I think I will buy it anyway regardless. hehehe Whatever they do with it, I'm just glad that they are keeping it alive. 8^D

people didn't you see the 'for pc development' too part? it's general knowledge that PC owners can't think straight. :P

You can only have poserintegration if you pay for the right to do so. That is why in Bryce 5 was no Poserintegretation. Curious Labs wanted too much money from Corel for it.

Well, now that Curious Labs were bought by e-frontier, and e-frontier partnering with e-on, I think we are in for interesting times. e-frontier's Shade looks like a great program, comparable to Lightwave or Max. Why not an integration with DAZ|Studio instead? That one will be backward compatible with Poser. BTW, alvin, Scott did say that the new Bryce will have a particle generator, used either for grass or flowers or huts. Or even for hair. It will also have HDRI, a faster renderer... http://www.bryceformac.com/phpBB2/viewtopic.php?t=12

Hi guys, wow, another night of sleep, and another huge bunch of replies :) Great work. I'll answer some questions that have been put up here: 640 x 480 resolution - I'm not specifically talking about the main assembling interface, but the other labs and rooms of Bryce. At the moment, only the Terrain lab uses the full screen, and even then it does so poorly. We'll be beefing up the expected normal resolution to 1024 x 768 for all of the labs and rooms, meaning you can fit more things on screen. No, we won't make things more complicated, but we will need more space to add the new features in each lab, such as the new sky lab with celestial controls way beyond what Bryce has now, the vegetation lab for creating grasses, bushes, and flowers. Flowers and Vegetation - i"ve mentioned this before, however yes, Bryce will have two labs for plants, thats the tree lab, and the vegetation lab. The treelab will be similar to what it is now, but with a few enhancements. The vegetation lab will be a lot more powerful, in that its a full particle system allowing you to spread any object all over the surface of an object! (grass, trees, houses, people, you name it). For confirmation - we now have a strong enough position to start working on the business model, suggested feature sets, and marketing plan. Our position is stong because of the many talks I have had with people in the industry - too many to name - and we beleive that vector will sell Bryce to us. We won't even be approaching them to buy it until the business amd marketing plans are complete, and that I have the investors all tied down. Someone also mentioned that we should investigate the demographics more first before suggesting features and interface designs. However essentially we arew doing that. We won't be working the same way most software companies do. We really need to know how viable a project this is, and by showcasing some early designs, can only spart debate and conversation - which is exactly the healthy discussion we need to further develop our demographics study. More soon, Scott

quote from foleypro: "Also Being able to Model inside of Bryce using Nurbs and Low Poly methods AND I REPEAT and you need to be able to EXPORT the Models into any format available,THIS IS PARAMOUNT to Bryces succsess.." I have very mixed feelings about trying to make bryce a modeler. One of my biggest dissapointments about b5 was that instead of fixing the core issues, bells and whistles were tacked on that really were not needed. Bryce is a rendering engine/landscaper, and a very good one, at that. There is no need to waste resouses on trying to make bryce something it is not. Please, stick to the basics, improve what is already there. Poser 5 is a very good example of what NOT to do. Just my opinion.

It's ok to stick to the basics and I don't care if it becomes a bonna fide modeller or not, but I would like to be able to export what I make from the primatives, to use in other apps. Catlin

I totally love this forum! Wishlists galore, and so far only ONE person is making any progress on it. But Im not bitching, I have my own wishlists. I agree with Bladesmith, there's no need to develop a Rhino or Modeler type environment for Bryce itself, that would just waste time and production costs. Poser 5 is DEFINITELY an example of "New Features" gon awry. The should have just MADE a "crash room" you could click on whenever you wanted to just crash the app. YSVRY, I understand that Macs only account for 3% of consumer sales, but did you know that they account for more 85% of the graphics professional industry? I hate them too, but statistics are just numbers, used to manipulate opinions. I suggested making a version of Bryce for the X-box and the Nintendo Gamecube, but nobody took me seriously! I personally loved your interface concept, and if you make it customizable or dockable, I think everyone can be happy. OR, you could just stick with Bryce 5, which is just a re-skinned version of Bryce 3, as far as the UI goes... Regardless, I applaud your efforts in this area, Pendulum, and again congratulate you on your first Bryce Gallery post! You are really the only one making the effort, and taking the time, to make our dream come true...

thans for the kind words SDL, much appreciated. heh, at the end of the day, I'm just trying to keep the one application that we love so much alive. Look around at the forums, Bryce is the most popular. Look at 3d commnue, 30,000 images or more in there, way more than any other of the 3d apps. I'm sure we will get the interface to the point where almost everyone is happy, even rochr. But remember that this has to be marketed to a lot of different groups, children, mid-market (you guys) and the high end guys (also some of you guys). Scott

Aye, things are changing for this utility. Some of the stuff we've been doing, especially technical freaks like Ornlu and Madmax and of course AgentSmith, rivals anything I've seen rendered in other utilities. I'm to the point where I have no qualms about taking my renders to graphics shops and studios and whatnot, my portfolio commands Bryce-respect, and most of the stuff isn't even as good as my gallery (good?kinda stretching it!) But there's noone else in the industry doing stuff like some of our Brycers, it's devastating but we could have a serious impact on the market if we just apply ourselves... "I can do anything in Bryce." Or at least find a workaround!

damn straight! and thats exactly why we will do our best to bring Bryce back to you all! Scott

The reason why I said that we need a modeler inside of Bryce is not just to export out of Bryce but also to be able to move individual Vertexes and vertices and to be able to MORPH other Imported Objects inside of Bryce...The Ability to Export Tree's and Bryce Modeled Objects is not only smart but will make alot of money for the owners of Bryce...Think about it...

Yes, smartest idea for Bryce, (imho) is to help it exsist in multiple markets. In my own daydreams, lol...I would split Bryce into three programs, one simpler Bryce with a VERY easy interface for children, a "regular" Bryce for us normal render-freaks, and a Bryce-Pro, that would completely target the high-end market. I wouldn't worry too much about interface changes, people. I fully believe Scott is just as in love with it as we are, although we DO fear our interface changing at all, I am quite sure Scott will be the keeper of the flame, so to speak, lol. As far as Bryce 6 wishes go, I will only mention a couple things, one of which Bryce was originally meant to have; modules. Add-ons for the program which, I'm sure, would be sold seperately as you wanted/needed them. Animation, mesh export, modeling, adavanced lighting/rendering, vegetation, etc, etc. Oh...one other request, I would love to see Bryce 6 NOT come with the all the old extras and presets that came with versions 4 and 5, no offense to all the past contributers, but the content CD and (some of) the presets need to be replaced with newer/richer content. I, or I am sure anyone else here, would LOVE/KILL to contribute new, free resources. AgentSmith

HI AgentSmith. You are right on track there. It is now up for debate, as to wether Bryce actuall is three programs, or if it is one application, with a startup first time only preference of setting the user level? startup: - beginner? - intermediate? - pro user? You can later change your setting in the preferences. Essentially, the lower the user, the less (complex) features there will be. So a Beginner user will really only be able to create shapes, make simple terrains, adjust the sky and thats about all. Intermediate users would have almost the same level of control now, and pro users would have access to things like particle systems, spline modeling etc etc. Again, this is up for debate, and it may work best if this feature is excluded completely, or perhaps if there were only two versions, basic and pro. With regards to new presets, I agree completely. There are SOME which will stay, such as basic metals and glasses, and a few other water mats, but the others will all be replaced. We have already discussed this at some length with Bruce McLeod, who is, as you know, excellent with materials. Scott

Aye, the Material Libraries could be replaced, but really I just think there should be a better way to organize them? And like AS said, it would really be awesome if some of us could contribute... I for one refues to use ANY preset, ever again. They are way too primitive and look like crap, although they are great building blocks...

Sure, perhaps only one install CD produced, and the type of Bryce you will use (that you have purchased), will be determined by what serial number(s) you input upon install. Maya uses this. Libraries - Well, Bryce 5 has given us the ability to make custom subsets of material catagories, which that could be improved. And, yes of course, some presets will obviously stay! ;o) I believe Bryce's DTE editor to be ahead of it's time, a time which seems to fully be coming around, as I just now see higher-end apps now matching what Bryce's DTE's could do for years. I dream of the Presets Libraries (materials, skies, objects, etc) behaving more like my windows explorer. Very easy for folder and file organization, manipulation. Being able to drag and drop folders, the expanding folders and its sub-folders, etc. Of, course instead of file names, there would be the normal thumbnails for the presets that we are all used to, naturally. SO many aspects to think of...lol, just glad to hear serious discussion about it, Scott, thanks! AS

There's a lot I dream about for Bryce 6 (I like foleypro's ideas for a start)...but I do think it's really really important to keep it affordable to those of us (not necessarily myself, mind you lol) who are proud to put out renders that match or surpass hi-end apps, at a fraction of the price. Otherwise, what's the point? The low cost of Bryce is the only reason I do 3D at all. I don't really like the beginner/intermediate/advanced thing if it means different prices. For purely selfish reasons of course, because I know the "pro" version will end up being too expensive for me and I get tired of being excluded :oP~~~~ hehe.

IndigoSplash: "startup: - beginner? - intermediate? - pro user? You can later change your setting in the preferences." I've quoted a part of Scott's message that I think you might have missed. There'll only be one program, you'll just be able to set it up in preferences which version you want to use, with the ability to change it at any time. I guess to keep from confusing beginners with too many features at first. :^)

The DTE is ahead of it's time in some respects, but behind in others. the actual production of procedural textures is excellent, but it does lack the ability to create (and animate?) composites/shellacs/blends of complex materials. That would be a real bonus to the realism side of things.

What real world material or subject could you not create? (example?) I'm not specifically sure by what you mean "composites/shellacs/blends". AS

okey dokey tjohn. That way sounds ok with me. I was thinking along the lines of what so many other software developers end up doing. They release a basic version of the program for a decent price and then have pro versions or expensive add-ons that have all the good stuff for a price targeted more toward those in the profession. I know some say that it's the user and not the app that makes all the difference, but for some things it can be the opposite. I'd just hate to see Bryce turn into another Maya wannabe. I really like that the users of the program come from so many areas of life. Frankly, I think that's why this forum is one of the friendlier ones. Not a lot of uppity 'tudes about which program we use or why. That's all I'm saying. :) Just my humble opinion.

I would love to contribute too...Folks things are moving and Scott will keep us posted...Scott here is my second Daily Bugging....See ya Tomorrow Scott...

Shellac is the ability to place one material as a shell around another, composite and blends are being able to mix materials together, much as you can in the DTE, but I'd like to be able to do it with multiple image textures and to have a greater number of sources available. For composites think of things like being able to create a dirt map to sit on top of a texture. You can do this with the DTE but it's harder then having the composite or blend option. for shellac, think of things like a really deeply polished table, you can create a wood texture and a polish layer, with seperate specularities, refraction index etc, it'll create a deeper more realistic texture.

Hi all! thanks for the replies! To answer the question about pricing of a new Bryce. We would be aiming at selling Bryce for its old original price of $200 - $300 USD. This would include the pro, and basic versions all in one application. We definitely could NOT sell it for the same price Corel has it for now, and we would definitely not make it any more expensive than it used to be. I have an idea for the DTE. .. for creating more and more detailed textures.. Imagine being able to essentially have infinitely deep textures. The DTE has three parts and the combination part. Lets say you make a procedural using all three parts and the combination part looks like a green grassy material. What if you could THEN restart all over again, in a deeper level of the DTE, and use that grass material you just created, as only ONE of the three channels of the next level of DTE. So, in essence you could then grab 3, three channel procedurals, mix them up in the 2nd level of the DTE, and thensave THAT as a new resulting procedural. After that, you could repeat the process all over again. Ofcourse the DTE's interface would need to be able to accommodate multiple levels of editing, but I think it could quite easily be done with regards to coding, since its taking what is already there and using it over and over. Scott

Just one question: how "officially" is that all? Is there really a team which actually develops a Bryce 6? J.

Hi J. At the moment, I am at the beginning stages of putting together a team. So yes, its official in the sense that YES, I am making my own move to creating a business plan, marketing plan, gaining official investors, and sourcing out a development team. I started talks with a development team just recently. Its all very early stages, but yes, I'm actually doing it, it's not just all talk. Scott

Thanks. :)

I have to agree with Rochr, the Interface I see displayed here. Isn't Bryce at all, it's more like a mix of Carrara and Vue. Both of which I do not like. You say it's to minimize the amount of click, well there are plenty of keyboard command right now that do that. Personally I think a user friendly program, lets the user decide what and where, menu and options are displayed. In other words the user sets up the way the interface looks to their preference. This is the only thing that will make this design work for me, GIVE ME THE CHOOSE ON HOW I WANT THE INTERFACE TO LOOK. What Bryce needs are more features and a new rendering engine. If you want faster work flow. then I say learn the program!! Nuff Said.

Hi Stephen, If you read through my notes, you will see that the interface will be completely customisable, you can show or his any part of the interface you want. Also, the interface is going to go through some changes, and I will repost the screenshot once I have finished the next revision. You will find it a lot closer to the current Bryce interface I feel. Although the area on the right containing the attributes WILL be staying, although it can be hidden. faster Work flow and less clicks are actually needed in a production arena, of which I personally work in, as do many others here, including Clay etc etc. I create on average 2 or 3 full artworks a DAY for my clients, including modeling custom objects etc. If things can be done even faster, by minimising mouse clicks, then it is adefinite plus for those of us who rely on Bryce for our income. It's all good and well to say learn the program, but those of us in the production world know the program almost inside out, and its not how well we know the program any more, its how fast it can allows us to do our jobs. I know that the production world only accounts for a small percentage of the Bryce demographic however, but it still must be considered. Scott

I actually think that the displayed interface doesn't look too bad. hides under table 8) The DTE is great in many respects but I would like to be able to make my own procedural textures, and as you all know that's not possible right now. There's also the new CG code which is based on C++, which has been developed between Murky Soft and Nvidia. This code allows you to program the GPU in graphics cards, (the new ones), in order for them to work in conjunction with the application when rendering. If Bryce could work with an Nvidia FX it should reduce the render times dramatically. At the moment it can only be used to program the cards for Lightwave, Maya, 3DSMax, etc. Of course there's the ability to export Bryce primitive, based, objects. Then if you wanted to do excess work on your model you could take it into a real modeller to refine the details. As for how many versions of the program to make for varying ages, abilities, and pocket's, how about making a base version that everyone can use and the intermediate and advanced programs can be bought as add ons. I'm going to stay possitive about what Scott is doing 'cos it is simply brilliant that someone is trying to put Bryce 6 into the realms of reality and as ever I hope it does come out for PC too. 8) Catlin

"I have an idea for the DTE".. Yup, I second that idea, Scott. And, higher-end apps that are just now harnesing the power of their own procedural texturers( or with plugins) are doing basically just that. What they use is sometimes called "ramp maps", which control how two or more complete procedural textures are mixed or blended together. A ramp map can also be a procedural or picture based creation. (Best example of this, imo, is the 3DSMax plugin called "Ground Crew" -Gog_CA1, I know what you mean (I was just making sure we were on the same page) You CAN sorta make shellac's, composite materials, but it isn't too easy. Yet, if a future Bryce was able to aplpy "multi-mats" to objects, it would be easy as pie. With a simple object, like a table top, you can create a very flat cube directly over the table top, so you can have a "glass" layer, which can be completely tweaked/controled, and then the seperate wood layer/object, which can also be manipulated. But, of course with more organic objects, this is very hard, or impossible to pull off. I have sometimes duplicated the mesh, and then increased that duplicate slightly, and that would be my "shellac" layer, but it doesn't always have pleasing results. I assume that a future Bryce being multi-mat capable is (probably) the solution. AgentSmith

Yesm in fact it could be a matter of sikmply dragging a 'shellac' slider would allowed you to control the blend of two procedurals in terms of depth.. ie: how deep into the object the first material lasts before the 2nd material appears. Slider all the way to left means shellac is off and first material is the only one visible, slider in the middle means that the first material is one quarter of the width of the object in, and slider all the way to the right means that you can only see the 2nd material. Scott

AS said - "of course with more organic objects, this is very hard, or impossible to pull off. I have sometimes duplicated the mesh, and then increased that duplicate slightly, and that would be my "shellac" layer, but it doesn't always have pleasing results" Now that would be great, to have more control over the sizing of objects. If Bryce could be more precise it would open up a lot of possibilities that are difficult a best to achieve right now. Catlin BTW AS, I sent you a couple of IM's, did you get them? It's just that I didn't receive a response that you'd got them. 8)

It nice to be able blend/composite/shellac with a gray scale image to contol it as well as a slider. the suggestion for a multi layer DTE would be getting close to what I'm talking about

yes.. a sort of blender material, just for controling the way the two materials interact... ala Vue D'Espirit 4

Hey...careful with the V-word...j/k, actually...you are correct. (I have Vue 4 also, and that part of its material lab is a neat feature)(although, it's layout/workflow is a bit more confusing than it needs to be, imho) AgentSmith

AS, I agree there. Vue has an interesting materials system. Not as feature rich as bryce, but still interesting.