The Bryce 3D Handbook

A comprehensive reference guide to using Bryce 3D, the latest version of MetaCreations' powerful program. The book covers all the new features with an emphasis on the new animation capabilities. A quick review of the standard function shows how they work with the new features. The book and CD are filled with illustrations, tutorials, and ready-to-use animations. The text emphasizes animation functionality of Bryce 3D - covering paths, 2D and 3D terrains, water, sky, fog, haze, singular objects, composite objects, boolean animations, and rednefing your own animations. It covers f/x capabililies with 2D Pyromania, provides tips from experienced Bryce users, and teaches how to output Bryce 3D to the Web. The CD (Mac/Win) includes approximately 100 animations, colour images, utilities, and textures that artists can apply directly to heir own creations.

This guide to MetaCreations' scene-creation and animation tool helps beginning and intermediate users fine-tune their understanding of the software and learn how to tackle advanced tasks. The book first explains the package and its interface and helps you prepare a Bryce 3D world by setting preferences and understanding the various tools. Next, the book teaches you how to create the different types of 3-D models that Bryce 3D uses; you work with arrays, substitutions, and Boolean operations and go on to create terrain models, which are Bryce's greatest strong point. You also learn about materials, cameras, lights, and atmospheric effects.

In the second part of the book, you create animations, learning the intricacies of path and camera animations; Links and Targets; natural phenomena, such as water and fire; singular, composite, and Boolean animations; and the Advanced Motion Lab, the animation-customization feature. The third section focuses on more advanced topics, such as creative ways to apply materials and textures and animate imported objects, and features advanced tips and tricks from two Bryce experts.

The book features many projects for you to work through, which require files contained on the included CD-ROM. The CD-ROM also has files for the book's "Special Projects," which are for advanced users. --Kathleen Caster