Temporary Upgrade Path from Vue 5/6/7 Artist Products

E-on software are running a temporary special upgrade offer for Vue 5, Vue 6 and Vue 7 versions of Easel, Esprit, Studio or Complete users. This is available until August 15, 2012 only:

• Vue 5 & 6 Easel and Vue 5, 6 and 7 Esprit users can save $50 on Vue 10 Esprit.
• Vue 5, 6 and 7 Pro Studio users can save $170 on Vue 10 Studio.
• Vue 7 Complete users can save $300 on Vue 10 Complete.

Vue 10 Render Benchmarks

Virtual Lands has some simple benchmarks of Vue 10 against Vue 6 render times.

Last Chance Offer on Vue 8 Esprit, Studio and Complete!

E-on software are running special offers on Vue 8 before the release of Vue 9. They guarantee that you will have paid less in total when you upgrade to Vue 9. Until Friday October 15, 2010, save up to 50% on Artist products! This is also the last chance for Vue 6 Users to upgrade. The Vue 9 upgrade policy will offer upgrade paths from Vue 7 and Vue 8 only.

QuadSpinner HyperTerrains and Strata Tutorials

Two new tutorials from QuadSpinner about HyperTerrains and Strata are now available at the e-on software web site.

The Mighty HyperTerrains video covers techniques that can be used in Vue 6, 7 and 8 and covers creating unimaginable rock formations right inside Vue: create alcoves, overhangs, boulders, arches, monuments and even fantastical terrains. Model breathtaking rock formations using Fractals and learn to use the new Bump and Displacement features in Vue 8.

The Beauty of Strata is a companion to QuadSpinner earlier tutorial Realistic Procedural Terrains and covers how to stratify terrains with the new Strata and Confined Strata Filters in Vue 8.

3D Artist Issue 8 and Vue

Heard the joke about Vue articles in 3D Artist magazine being like busses?  None in one issue then two come along at once.

Issue 8 opens early with the current Vue advert and a thumbnail sized picture made using Vue in the community Reader's Gallery.  The main course is a nine page step by step article on creating a woodland waterway with Vue 6 Esprit that is neatly broken down into basic setup, materials, plants, ecosystems, atmosphere, rendering and post production.  Following a few pages later for desert is a one page article about making a scene with big waves in a stormy sea.

Urban Jungle 4 for Vue

Jacob Charles Dietz has a new set of Urban Jungle signs available at Cornucopia 3D.

Vue Python Scripts

I've been updating the Vue Python script section on my impworks web site so scripts that were previously only available from the impworks blog now have pages all of their own. There are also a few new python scripts following requests.

Three new scripts for working with Vue’s Bump Mapping: one to make the mapping negative, one to make it positive and one to invert it on selected objects. A second new set of scripts make it easy to switch between the four different image mapping modes in materials on more than one object and material at once.

3D World - August 2009 and Vue

The latest issue of 3D World (issue 119 / August 2009) is now on sale in the Uk and includes a short tutorial in the Questions and Answers section on using Hypertextures in Vue to slice cross-sections through objects. A really neet trick from Eran Dinur that I don't remember seeing anywhere before. The files for the tutorial can be downloaded from the 3D World web site.

Free Conifers Pack

Lars "Bigbraader" has posted a free tall conifer pack for Vue to Renderosity including 4 conifers. It is designed for fast rendering and 3 materials for either standard and "snowy" twigs.

Tutorial: Veggi! Venti! SFXI

Silverblade has posted a new tutorial for on SFX plants Vue Veggi! Venti! SFXI.

Free Vue 6 Atmospheres

These turned up in a web search and even though they've apparently been available I thought I'd feature them. 35 free atmospheres for Vue 6 by Filip. Part of Filip's Vue 6 Atmosphere Pro Pack, available from Renderosity.

Ship's Wake in Vue Tutorial

Silverblade has posted a new tutorial for Vue 6 and Vue 7 on creating a wake for boats or ships on water.

Paula Sanders' Rendering for 2d Tutorial

Paula Sanders has posted a new tutorial on rendering objects with Vue, in this example a Vue tree, for use in a 2d picture by using Photoshop and Vue's alpha mask to create an image of just the object.

Free Beer Keg and Tap for Vue

A free beer keg with tap and stand from Mesh Box design. Available in Vue's VOB format available for a limited time should be compatible for Vue 5 or higher.

Material Displacement Rocks

Geekatplay Studio's latest Vue tutorial is on the topic of material displacement rocks and also includes creating unique shaped columns in a landscape.

How to make a snow cap in Vue 6 Infinite (or higher)

Today I've something a little different for you here on the Vue News blog - a full tutorial from Walther Beck / Wabe. You can see a larger version of the images by clicking on them in the page. A PDF version of this tutorial can be downloaded: How to make a snow cap in Vue 6 Infinite (or higher) PDF

1. Preparations

Create a cube in Vue and scale it in Z so that it forms a brick (see screenshot 01).

Save this cube as a vob. I called the file PixelBrick. Give the brick a very distinct color - blue in my case - so that you are able to identify the bricks later easily in your scenes.

When you have saved the brick, you can delete the scene. It will be used in an ecosystem later.

screenshot 01

2. The cap

Load the object that you want to cover with a snow cap. I've use Tablesaws freebie old log here.

Select edit material on the object and select ecosystem in the list of material types in the material editor. Load the object PixelBrick in under "General" (see screenshot 02).

screenshot 02

Go to the Density tab and change density to a higher value. I normally select 100% and later change the density with the paint brush. Switch off "Decay near foreign objects”, just in case it causes problems (see screenshot 03 for the settings).

screenshot 03

This is important. Go to the Scaling & Orientation tab now and change the slider "Direction from surface" to 100% perpendicular (see screenshot 04).

screenshot 04

Click on "paint" to start painting the bricks onto the log (see Screenshot 05 for my settings - the important changes are: brush flow, scale, limit density off).

screenshot 05

Now paint the bricks onto the log so that you have a good density but that the bricks are not too dense. I normally have something like 400-600 instances for that. Leave the material editor and go to "Select EcoSystem Instances" either through the menu (last point under edit) or through the icon that you find to the right of the EcoPainter icon in the top line of icons. The EcoSystem Selector will open (see screenshot 06).

screenshot 06

Now you either click simply onto "select all", if the ecosystem with the brick is the only ecosystem in your scene or you select the brick instances you painted in via brush (which is the default). When you have all bricks then click onto the little triangle to the right of the word "Manipulate" and select "Convert to Objects" there (see screenshot 07).

screenshot 07

We are almost done, you have a long list of bricks in your world browser now that should still be selected. If not, select them all (see screenshot 08)

screenshot 08

Now we come to the central trick of it all: make a Metablob from the bricks. Either through the menu (under object) or through the icon to the left in the row of icons there (see Screenshot 09).

screenshot 09

Do a test rendering to see how the thing looks (see Screenshot 10). If you think the cap needs some modifications, you can play with the Metablob settings and/or manually move some of the bricks that are still available in the Metablob.

screenshot 10

Optional you now can bake the finished Metablob cap to polygons (I normally use a relative high setting in the bake to... dialog) to get faster render performance. Give the result a snow (or other) material.

The final result looks like this then (see screenshot 11).

screenshot 11

If you have more questions, feel free to ask me through a personal message on any forum you see me active on.

3D World Issue 112

3D World Issue 112 is now on sale in the UK and includes a one page tutorial on displacement mapping rocks along with the current Vue 7 advert.

Geekatplay Studio Catch Up

A couple of new Vue tutorials from Geekatplay Studio that have come out since I last checked:

• Creating slide rocks (Vue 7 and 6)
• Importing models from Daz Studio (Vue 7)

Vue 7 Comparison Charts

I missed this but Jonj1611 on Renderosity spotted these two handy comparison pages on the e-on site...

• Vue 7 Bundles: Compares Vue 7 Pioneer, Vue 7 Esprit, Vue 7 Pro Studio and Vue 7 Complete
• Vue 7 Complete - Comparative Chart: Compares Vue 7 Complete with Vue 7 Infinite and Vue 6 Infinite

Peter Plantec on Vue

In an interesting article in Studio/Monthly the magazine - Plantec's POV: Is VFX Going Down the Wrong Road? - Peter Plantec he has some nice things to say about Vue.

I’ve spent some time chatting with VFX people who are known to be clever at using simple, inexpensive approaches to achieve high production value VFX. I’m a big Adobe fan because they have some excellent tools that generally work well in tandem for creating cheap VFX. For example you can develop assets in Photoshop, slide them into After Effects and go from 2D to 2.5D very easily. 2.5D effects are created by layering up 2D images with transparency in After Effects (your application of choice), and applying virtual camera moves that display parallax, fooling the eye. You can combine that with a quick matte painting background, created by first rendering a basic photo-real scene in Vue 6, and then digitally painting in necessary details by hand or with photo-reference.

You can quickly create credible establishing shots in Vue. I created a 14 second, photo-real, time-lapse establishing shot of a jungle beach in Asia at sunrise, in 20 minutes in Vue 6, using off the shelf objects and customized preset atmosphere, lighting and breeze. In 45 minutes I created a believable two camera aerobatics sequence over a sunset ocean complete with volumetric clouds, a pirate ship, waves and sound effects. Let’s say that I was on staff at a TV production company and they needed that sunrise shot and didn’t know I could do this (and most likely they wouldn’t.) They would have to allocate a sizable budget to build a fake Japanese pagoda and set it up on Westward Beach and haul a film crew out there at 4:00 am to set up for the shot. They’d also need to rent an expensive crane as well. We’re talking days of aggravation and a lot of money.