I love the way I feel when I'm using my Bryce 4 program. I don't think there is any other activity, that makes me feel more like a god, a creator of worlds. I wouldn't hesitate to recommend Bryce to anybody who is interested in creating works of Art on their computers. It is an excellent beginning to productive pastime with a computer.

Bryce is like a game, that produces valuable scores, which can be cherished for many years after the game is over. It beats the heck out of wasting hours in chat rooms.

With all the above being said, and all of the other interesting posts about Bryce 4 on Epinions, I felt it important to contribute my two cents about what Bryce is, and isn't.

Bryce 4 is a program originally marketed by Metacreations. Metacreations was a wonderful company that sold some very well known, and I thought successful software that helped artists exploit the power of the computer, to achieve creative satisfaction. They spun themselves out of another company called Fractal Design, (KAI's Power Tools, Painter), Fractal Design created wonderful sets of plug-in filters that worked well with Adobe products like Photoshop. Metacreations also marketed programs like Poser, Canoma, Ray Dream Studio, (very similar to Corel Dream 3D). All of the above mentioned programs would be very helpful in the library of a Bryce user, I'll explain why in a bit.

For some reason, Metacreations, and Fractal Design went out of the consumer software publishing industry. Metacreations changed its name, and Corel bought out rights to Bryce, Poser, Ray Dream, Kai's Plug-in products.

Because Corel bought out the rights to Bryce, and is about to release Bryce 5, one Epinions author was wrong to say there is no chance Bryce will be updated. (Bryce 4 users, who will sign the agreement, can beta test Bryce 5, right now, if they wish.)

Now that all the business is out of the way, I will begin my critique of Bryce 4.

Bryce 4 is a wonderful program almost anybody can use right out of the box, there are versions for both Macs and PC's, I use the PC version.

Bryce, as well as all other 3D rendering programs, requires quite a bit of memory, and processor speed to keep it's user's from going crazy. I wouldn't bother with it, if I had less then one hundred Meg RAM. Most of the serious users, I know, are using gigahertz processors and hundreds of meg of memory.

I hate the user interface, it seems as if the designers went out of their way to disassociate themselves with the operating systems that the software was designed to run on. I personally don't find the GUI to intuitive at all; sure anybody can start the program, and fiddle around until they get a generic landscape scene, that will impress them at first. But to really use the powerful features of this program, one needs to spend lots of time practicing, conversing with other Bryce users, and possibly buying a book, like "Real World Bryce 4", to supplement their learning. In my opinion, the documentation supplied with the program sucks.

Once the user deciphers the interface, and advanced features of this program, one will realize that Bryce truly is a program for amateur and professionals alike. The problem many people have with the program, is that they never find, or decipher the advanced features. When they finally do, they will find they have infinite control over skies, terrain, and materials. The advanced user will also realize, that even though Bryce does perform tricks that many other types of programs do, the artist will want to own other 3d software, to merge with Bryce, to create complete images of all types.

Anybody who uses Bryce, should also have a good 3d modeling program, Currently, I'm having good luck with Amapi, which I was able to find a legit, and free download for. A must if the user wants to include human characters, as well as a few other things, is Corel Poser, Poser helps the artist compose anatomically correct 3D models of people, to include in the scenes.

A good image processing program, like Adobe Photoshop, lots of plug in filters, Scanners, Graphics Tablets, CAD programs the list never ends, it's like a drug, if you enjoy working in Bryce, all you'll want is more.

Elements of all these types of programs enable the artist to complete complex scenes with photo like realism, no matter how absurd the situation depicted is.

If a potential buyer, wants to see the really incredible images, and animations that can be created in Bryce, by skilled artists, he should look to the USENET group alt.binaries.3d.bryce. The uninitiated eyes will bulge with wonder. There are also many web sites devoted to the craft.

The best places to buy Bryce can be found on the Internet.




Recommended: Yes