Is it possible in Vue 6 Pro to render a Poser character in Vue with the background of that render being a 2d image?

In other words, I want to place a 2d image (scene) behind the Poser character and have it all render together in Vue.

Is that possible?

Thanks.

you could use a backdrop, which is i guess what you mean

click on the main camera in the world browser then with the "pen" option selected at the top of the right hand side click the button that looks like a projector screen and load your image.

hope this makes sense, if not ill pose a screenshot showing where it is.

Rich

Thank you that did the trick, however, a slight challenge occurred:

Now I see the lights rendered on top of the 2d image.  Any suggestions for
not seeing the lights as little sun centers in the render?

Is lens flare on? If so turn that off - best place is to go to your atmosphere editor and turn off lens flare in the far right tab there.

There is another way also.
Use the 2D image on an Alpha plane and use it like a billboard, this can be resized and positioned easily, it also has the advantage of being able to adjust whether you want lights to react with it or not or whether you want it to receive shadows. You can adjust your light parameters not to react to the plane.
I find this more effective than using the camera backdrop myself, but it does depend on the scene you are trying to create, sometimes the backdrop works better!
It's just another choice.

Thank you Timspfd!

That was the trick. Worked as advertised. Thank you.

thefixer,

How do I get the 2d image imported as the Alpha plane?
I do need that option of resizing it.

I have infinite so nto sure if 100% the same:

load an alpha plane, set as BILLBOARD, this makes it always face the camera
then import the picture :)

the difference between a billboard and a backdrop on the camera is, a billboard can be scaled and moved, so the picture can be offset, etc.

Like silverblade said!

Hmmm, this whole concept of Alpha planes is interesting. I haven't used it and not sure what its purpose is other than using it to make things transparent. Maybe it can be applied somehow to what I'm trying to achieve which I describe below.

 Can Vue 6 Pro output a layered file where a character can be separated from its 2d background (the alpha plane technique) without having to cut it out in photoshop?

In other words, I'm trying to put a Poser character, rendered in Vue onto a 2d background. Using the alpha plane option renders the 2d background and the poser character into one image but does not allow me to the option of having them in distinct photoshop-type layers.

Here's the problem that I'm trying to solve:

Take a poser character, render her with a solid colored background so that I can later take out that background in photoshop (which produces jaggedy edges that need to be smoothed)  and then put her on top of a 2d background.

Now, if I have her hand with fingers spread apart (or hair strands) then taking out that colored background becomes quite difficult and reduces the quality of the character image.

And in Vue 6 Pro there is no option to save as a png file, so is there a way to cleanly do this in Vue rather than photoshop so that I end up with a character that has no background attached to it in Vue's export?  If not, then I would have to carefully position the alpha plane in vue so that it would not need any editing in photoshop.

Is the alpha plane suggestion the best way to do this?

You see, I'm trying to merge the character with the 2d background but not until they are in perfect position with one another and sometimes I need to remove portions of the character so that she looks like she's embedded in the 2d image as if she were sticking her head out from behind a tree.

Sorry for the verbosity. I'm just trying to make it clear what I am needing to do.

Thanks.

Michael

I think maybe you might be going about it the wrong way [no offence intended].
No need to take anything out in Photoshop.
Try this: Render your person in Vue with no ground, save the picture as a png and tick embed Alpha information. This will give you a picture of your person without any background at all, i.e. just your person.
Load an Alpha plane into Vue and attach the afore mentioned png image of your person to it and tick "billboard"
You will now have a person with a transparent background that you can position anywhere in your scene, other background image that will always face the camera.
This can be done using 2 billboard alpha planes for what you want, one for your background and one for your person, this makes your person independent of the background but also part of it because the person plane is transparent and all you see is the person.
hope that's close to waht you were after.

Ahhh... but here is where a fly is in the ointment, (and thank you for your help):

Vue 6 Pro has no option when saving as a png to "embed Alpha". A very useful feature indeed.

And, I'm not sure it has billboard as an option either.

Ah! Sorry about that, I thought it would have those features.
Apologies for leading you along the wrong path.
They have too many different versions these days!