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Download the PDF of this tutorial.
How many times have you rendered a scene just to see a major flaw within it such as an object floating, a hole that shouldn't be there, a really bad texture? Here is a function that can aid in finding those errors. It can also help reduce time and effort while perfecting your images. This tutorial will focus on the use of the "Plop Render" function in Bryce.
While here, you will learn not only what it is, how to use it and some of its basic features, but you will also see one of the features of the plop render that many do not know exists. This is a "must see" for those who render in large resolutions.
What is plop render?This is a term which represents a marqueed selection of a rendered image. Selections appear to be "plop" forward with drop shadows and rendering controls. This little window will appear as if an easel has been placed on your image. This feature can be enabled, disabled, or hidden. Use it to help perfect placement of objects, materials or lighting. |
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How do you use plop render?Ensure the plop render mode is enabled by checking the plop render control to the right of the main render window.
When it is enabled the control will be red; when disabled, it will be white. |
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| Start a render then stop it by pressing a key or
clicking the mouse. (If you desire you can let the render finish.) Then simply
draw a marquee on the image. (A marquee is drawn by holding down the left button of
the mouse and dragging it over the desired area, then releasing the button.) A separate set of render controls will appear which are similar to the existing render controls, except these controls are for the plop render. Notice how the plop render window appears to be in front of the image. |
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| The top button starts a render of this plop window. |  |
| The second area resumes a render of the plop window. |  |
| The small triangle beneath indicates a popup menu. Upon clicking this triangle, you will be presented the options to Zoom to Selection; Collapse Selection and Hide Selection. |  |
| Zoom to selection: If you have marqueed a portion of the scene and select this option from the popup menu, the camera will zoom in to this area and fill the render window with this portion of the scene. This is excellent for close-ups of objects you wish to emphasize in additional images. | |
| Hide Selection and Collapse Selection: remove the marquee from the image. | |
| While rendering an image, you may need to determine placement of objects or other features quickly. Due to the complexity of some elements in your scene, you may not want to waste time rendering them. You may only want to render portions to verify placement and texture. So start the render and then stop it. |  |
| Marquee the area that is over the area you are
interested in and then start a plop render. When this plop render completes, it will
help ensure proper placement of the objects with a minimum amount of time.
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| What are some additional uses for this feature?
Let's assume you have rendered an image, but you notice a problem in the image. Notice the center box is floating. This is obviously unnatural. You can fix the problem. Save your camera position then land the object. |
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| Go back to your saved camera position. Then make the image visible again by clicking the display control. |
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| Now all that is necessary is to draw a marquee
around the problem area and render the plop window. Select the "Collapse Selection" option from the options available from the menu when you click the small triangle beneath the controls. This image can then be exported in full! Imagine the time this can save on some of those intensive renders! |
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| How many times have you created a large resolution image and wanted to watch the whole thing occur? Bryce is stubborn about displaying the entire render while it's happening if the render is larger than the render window. Below are instructions to work around Bryce's default display while rendering high resolution images. | |
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| These panoramic renders are much larger than my monitor can display, however sometimes I want to see the whole render at one time while it occurs. Bryce defaults to a "zoomed in" preview, this preview only shows a corner of the render which is not what I want. | |
However, the plop render option solved
my problem. I simply start the render and stop it.
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Now that I have the first pass of the render, I
enable the quick preview mode.
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| Without removing the display of the render that has
started, "Zoom out" from the image by clicking the zoom controls to the right of
the render window.
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| This will zoom away from the image that had started rendering. Eventually, the large resolution pre-render is fully visible in the render window. |  |
| Drag a marquee around the entire preview to select
it all...notice that the plop render controls appear. Click the render button on the
plop window and you can watch the entire render take place! Using this feature to
help render large resolution QTVR images has saved has me countless hours while making
scenes because errors were quickly visible! Note:
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| For Bryce 3D only
(this function does not work in Bryce4) Hey, ever wanted to render just part of your scene as an animation? Plop render allows you to animate just part of the scene and render only that part! Simply render the first frame (click render). Once the first frame is rendered, marquee the area that will be animated and the plop window will appear. Now go to "file" and "render animation" and ONLY the plop window will render in animation mode. You just GOTTA love that! |
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You can check to see that Bryce is actually rendering by moving your mouse's cursor over any of the visible controls to the left or above the scene (...do not click). If Bryce does not update the explanation of the control (beneath the main render buttons), it is rendering. If you see an update to this area, you need to click the resume render button for the plop window. |
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What did you learn here? Hopefully you now know how to use the "Plop Render" control. You know how to activate it, and what the basic features are. You also were introduced to the ability to disable textures and to the quick preview mode. All of these can save time while perfecting the scene's lighting, materials, and object placement before performing a final render.
You were also shown how to use this simple "Plop Render" function to display a large resolution image while it is rendering.
By simply:
you can watch it all happen.
You can try just to click "resume" to see if the whole thing will just resume the render. This may work, it may not!
This should be invaluable to those who like to watch Bryce render large resolution images. However, one thing to keep in mind if you use it for this purpose. Large images eat RAM! Forcing a large render to display can not only be RAM intensive, but it can slow the render process because your computer's processor must now update the monitor display as well as render the image.
Have fun!
This is not meant to be an all inclusive instruction on every possible way to have made the final image or produce the desired results. Bryce offers zillions of wonderful ways to replicate, multireplicate, reposition, etc. in its powerful interface. Experiment!