1. hmann's 3D Worlds Kit Poser 5: Rendered (any kind) Default "EmptyScene.pz3" file, with Figure, GroundPlane prop, Terrain prop, Sky prop & 3DW Lightset. Rendered: the skydome prop always turns nearly black, no matter if I set background color to black or white, adjust or try to turn off the Poser5 "Background", use the Firefly or Poser4 render engines, disable "Smooth Polygons" or "Remove backfacing polygons", ...or do anything else I've tried so far. (Note: Yes, the Figure is too dark; I've left the light set & all at default.) So, the 3DW Kit is great, & renders OK in P4, for which it was made. But how to get it to render in Poser5??? Any ideas?

2. hmann's 3D Worlds Kit Poser 5: Unrendered and not antialiased. Default "EmptyScene.pz3" file, with Figure, GroundPlane prop, Terrain prop, Sky prop & 3DW Lightset. (In Poser5, if I click to just Antialias, it seems to ignore the command & do a whole render.)

3. hmann's 3D Worlds Kit Poser 4: Created & rendered in my separate P4 prog.

Have you tried contacting Hmann? looks like your texture is there, just extremely dark. maybe the whole dome inverts in P5. have you tried pulling your camera back outside the dome and seeing if the outside renders?

Thanks for the reply. Yes I have written him, though about something else. No reply yet, though I realize he's pretty busy. Anyway, yes, I have tried changing the main cam, even extremely, on the Z axis to no avail. But I don't know if I got outside the dome. Problem is, there are so MANY combinations of variables, & I "feel" like I've tried so many. Just hoping someone else may have found the key. The World Kit is great, & so much more affordable than other 3D environment programs... now if I could just get it to work in P5. :)

wdupre, try using your own light, and not the 3d world ones and see if you can get it to lighten up, I'll try it in a few, and see what happens.

pokeydots, That's one of the things I tried, and you CAN lighten it up a bit in an area... but it's still not right. Attached view from outside the dome (unrendered. Still goes dark when you render). It LOOKS like all the lights are inside the dome, but none aimed at the sky...

Hmmm I just tried it in mine and it worked okay, give me a minute and I will do it again and show a pic for you.

BTW- I downloaded & installed the latestP 5 patch, & immediately went to check out any differences that might have occurred with the 3DWK, but nope. Same ol' dark sky. Now, I know I could go in & tweak all the default lights, but that is sooo time-consuming. Right now I am just trying to check out the default action in P5... and hope it may help me to better understand P5 in the process.

Do you have the latest patch, Knuten? CL released the second beta earlier today. Don't know if it'll make a difference with your problem, but it probably won't hurt.

Oops, you stealthed your post right under my radar while I was typing. :) Apologies.

here is a quick render, lighting not as good as the original lights, but at least you can see the sky :)

Tha's OK. I appreciate any help. So do you have 3DWorlds working fine for you???

Turn off that backface culling thing and also turn off smooth polygons. I think that's the solution.

pokeydots, Hey you got sky. The only way I've been able to, so far is to import a background sky.

Spit, I did, I did... See image one: they're disabled

All I did was use my own lighting, I don't know why the light sets for the kits don't work, its one of those things that make you go hmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm! lol

Thanks for all the suggestions, all. I'll keep messing with it; gotta have landscape. Related: has anyone made any textures for it besides the ones in the 3 Kits? I've only ever seen ONE other posted. I made one. Hard to figure out how to do it, but it turned out well. Only problem is it's humongous...way too big. Wish there were a few new ones available.

Finally got some sky. If all is default, as my images are, go to Lights>Sunlight>Transform: Xrotate > change it from -90 to 0 degrees. Voila: the sun shines at the sky. Kinda takes away from the ground, however, so I guess you'd just set up one more "sun" at -90 degrees.

Thanks I'll give that a try ;)

Attached Link: http://www.renderosity.com/messages.ez?ForumID=12356&Form.ShowMessage=915606

With Firefly you can disconnect the sky map from the Skydome's Diffuse and Specular channels and plug it straight into the Ambient Colour channel. Set the ambient value to 1.0 and Diffuse and Specular to black. This will give you a self illuminating sky. Any lights that are used to light the skydome can also be deleted. Bill

Interesting thread, as I too own and LOVE Harvey's kit. However, have always been disappointed with the BUGS introduced by Curious Labs with the Pro Pack, regarding lighting. It had to do with spot distance not working correctly ... could this be the problem here too? I hope not, that would be inexcusable ... but not at all shocking. Thanks for the Ambience workaround, Bill ... nice tip! -Tim

This is completely off topic, but I have to say I just love the first picture you posted Knuten. Looks like a fish swimming on the moon. :)