"Canopus"

@C-ram. I look at it this way, if there was nothing new to learn it would quickly become dull. Fortuntely Bryce has a lot of depth and the users plenty of imagination to keep things interesting. If you ever feel like sharing a scene like this I'd be happy to have a shot at tinkering up the lighting. I can't promise to make any progress, I've been stumped by Rashad scenes because of their sheer complexity, but I'm not afraid of trying and failing. Horo and I have passed a few scenes back and forth in the past, it is good exercise, the blank canvas offers no limitations and in that repsect can be a bit daunting. Working on something that has already come into being changes the focus in sometimes surprising and instructive ways.

David : Sorry, there is no transparent material in the palm leaves. I've use the greenstuff 8 texture by DAZ3D . So, no transparency but a lot of specularity. You know, each one has it's own style, and if you're not familiar with scenes involving multiple objects, from my side i am unable to produce scenes as incredible as yours. I am far from having your mastery with the DTE and functions very advanced bryce. I compensate my lack by using as much as objects as i can in my scene. I think it's just another discipline and another aspect to use our favorite software.

Definitely a fascinating scene that merits a 5/5. My only qualm is the low contrast. On the other hand, if this is in the rain forest, humidity would be high, washing off strong contrasts.

Yes, Rashad is correct, I am not familar with such complex scenes. I feel that a scene is getting overly busy when I get into double figures of objects. I take it that the palm leaves in the foreground have a transparent material on them? Or is it just the sheer quanitiy of trees in general that is causing Bryce to have a seizure?

David, You are not very accustomed to working with scenes which are highly complex geometrically. Such scenes are not feasible for TA, no matter how it is optimized. Like any other scene, the more reflections there are and polygons the more processing. I have similar scenes that give multiple days of render times estimates with TA, but mere hours with fake GI techniques. Scenes like this are the very reason why we need fake GI methods, as full GI is simply not an option.

Thank you for your positive comments and for taking the time to analyze this image. Rashad: I have not had any problems with the backup of my scene for a simple reason : from a very long time I learned to work with bryce by merging in my scenes. I modeled several parts before bringing everything under bryce and then i run the whole render scene. David: Unfortunately I haven't got a super powerful computer (a Predator with AMD Phenom 9950 Black overclocked to 3.2 ghz watercooled). I tried to calculate the image using the true ambiance mode but this method giving me a killer render time! I'm saving money to buy a Box workstation with Dual Xeon.

Excellent scene. Worthy of top marks. However, if it were still possible to open this scene I think it would be interesting to experiment with the lighting. As things stand, your choices are indeed good, but they are also "safe". The contrast seems a little low, usual suspects would be, shadow intensity not being 100, ambience and/or sky dome colour. If your processor could withstand it, I'd suggest TA + softened Bryce sun + TA optomised lighting. Not that I'm not going to give you full marks! 5/5

c-ram, this image is astounding. Everything about this image is top marks. Your skill with the Instance Lab is noteworthy. Very good choices for lighting and haze, I find the scaling to be just right. Question, did you find after painting so many instances, that Bryce might refuse to reopen the file? Anyhow, full marks!!!