Posted on November 26, 1999

• A couple of updates for you today.

  First of all, I should report that I spent most of this week and part of last putting the finishing touches on my upcomng CD-ROM archive. It’s now in the hands of my distributor and is in the process of being being made as we speak. It should be available early next week, and it will contain every image in the gallery up to “Aftermath”. Personally, it think it would make a nice stocking stuffer, but that’s up to you. Aside from the fact that it will be discounted for members, I haven’t decided what to charge for the CD. I’d appreciate any input you might have on what would be a fair price. Either way, it will be available soon…

  Unfortunately the CD will not contain my latest work. “Early Frost” is up in the Day Scenery gallery and the WIP. It’s my first image created using Animatek’s World Builder 2.2, so it’s a little rough around the edges, I apologize. I gotta level with you now: I don’t think you’ll be seeing much Bryce or even Vue d’Esprit for quite a while. I am completely hooked on World Builder.

  Why? First and foremost, it’s multi-threaded (Bryce isn’t) so it uses my dual-processor workstation to its fullest potential. “Early Frost”, for example, rendered in just under 30 minutes at 1600 x 1200 (compared to 24 hours for “The Turning”). What else? Its vegetation model is a lot more realistic (not to mention more efficient). More? Its landscape system allows for winding roads, rippling rivers (complete with whitewater), lapping waves, waterfalls, and footprints. Oh yeah, it also exports entire scenes into Lightwave, which opens up a whole new set of possibilities.

  Anyway, I’ll stop frothing now. I hope you like the new image, but just remember that it’s only a first attempt. Your comments and feedback are doubly appreciated.

Posted on November 20, 1999

• Added “Aftermath” to the Planetscapes gallery and the WIP. Flat out, you can’t do this with Bryce. I’ve tried.
  I guess maybe with some “trick photography” you could do a still image like it in Bryce. But I don’t think you could animate it like this though. (1.8 MB zipped AVI)… The animation is a 2 seconds long and it depicts the entire “explosion”, debris and all. The animation, of course, is made up of some 60 individual frames and about 40 of them would have made cool still shots. In case you’re wondering, the wallpaper is frame 33. Hope you like them both. Comments appreciated.

Posted on November 17, 1999

• Added “Zard” to the Posers gallery and the WIP. This is my first “real” project done using Lightwave. To be honest, I’ve spent too many hours re-rendering different views of this one (using different settings) and I think it’s time to move on. Someday I’LL be good enough to model my own person using Lightwave, but for now I just wanted to learn some lightning techniques and special effects. I hope you like it even though it’s only a “training” piece.

  I’ve rounded out my software toolkit by purchasing a few more Lightwave plugins. Here’s the scoop on what I have so far and what I will be getting in the next few days (the first link you click will open a new window and each of the others will load in the same window if you leave it open):

  • World Builder
  • Hypervoxels 2.0
  • Particle Storm 2.0
  • RealFlow
  • Creature Creator
  • Metagroove
  • Aqua-Pack
  • Blow Up and Shatter
  • Vertilectric
  • Surface Effectors DSFX
  • Advanced Gradient Controls
  • last but not least, I’ll be getting the upgrade to Lightwave 6 when it comes out.

  I may also purchase plugin called “Digital Nature Tools“, but I want to see if World Builder has the features I want before I spent another $700. I just wanted you to know where your membership fees are going 🙂

Posted on November 11, 1999

• For all the images I’ve posted over the past couple of weeks, you would think that I have been spending my days at the beach, or on the couch watching the Discovery Channel. Actually I’ve done quite a lot of rendering but everything has been little bits and pieces, trying out new effects and techniques, etc. I feel kind of like a wizard with a new spellbook.

  Anyway. I really liked Fluorescence and I know a lot of you did too. None of my renders over the past few days have given me the “wow” factor I got from the blue shrooms, until now.

  In my last update I posted the original version of Gotham, resurrected from “BR3 heaven” by the latest version of Bryce. My brain cells started percolating while I was looking at that image, and I came to the conclusion that old Gotham needed a little “urban renewal”. Gotham 1999 is new today in the Night Scenery Gallery and the WIP. I hope you like what I’ve done, you may see more of this…hope you like.

• I’ve gotten a lot of mail lately from members asking how to renew their memberships. The answer is: you don’t need to let your memberships ever expire. You can add time to your existing membership at a discounted rate ($20 for another year and $10 for another month, max 2 years). The “extender” link is located on the “When Will My Account Expire Page“, or you can go directly to my secure server and place your order. Thanks!

Posted on November 9, 1999

• Last week went by way too fast. I finally assembled all the right parts for my new workstation and the last few days have been spent migrating my old setup to the new machine. In case you missed it, the system is a Dell Precision 410 with Dual Pentium III 600 processors, 1 GB of RAM and a Diamond Fire GL1 graphics card. Fast? You betcha!

  My “art time” recently has been spent working with the Lightwave renderer. I haven’t done anything yet that I feel especially proud of, or you would have seen it. I will continue, however, to prod it’s mysteries. I did break down last night and I started a Bryce only image which is still rendering as I write this. It should be done sometime later today and will be up soon thereafter.

  I managed to find a few “long lost” Bryce files yesterday. The first is “Red Sky at Night“, and I promptly rendered a 1600 x 1200 version for those of you with large monitors.

  The second file is truly “back from the dead”. You see, the image you know as “Gotham” is a “forced” second draft. The original was quite different but the file was “eaten” by Bryce (meaning it wouldn’t open for me) and I had to abandon it. I have to be honest with you here, I spent a lot less time on the second version of Gotham than the original, but I was definitely pleased with the results as I know a lot of people were.

  Still, the original look has it’s merits and I was thrilled to discover that Bryce 4.1 could “resurrect” it! So here it is, remember that it was designed over a year ago 🙂

  Lastly, I’ve posted my “alternate version” of Fluorescence. I had originally designed two different color schemes for the mushrooms, it was my girlfriend Jessie who chose the one you saw last week (though we were in complete agreement as to which one was superior). The alternate is now available because I think it looks cool, and it’s doing no one any good hiding out on my hard drive.

  More to come…