Brycetech: See the Light with Bryce

This tutorial will help you learn how to place the sun where you want it. This will not be an all inclusive tutorial, it will merely give you guidelines to help you place the sun.

When placing the sun or moon, you need to understand how Bryce interprets the information given by the trackball for the sun. It is important to understand that (as long as link sun to view is checked) the sun is linked to the camera. Imagine it as part of a dome that is over your head. Wherever the light part of the dome is determines where the light is coming from IN RELATION TO THE CAMERA! You can set the sun's position numerically by double clicking the trackball.
Let's see some examples of this to help illustrate the point. If the lit part of the dome on the trackball is all the way forward, the sun is directly in front of the camera.
Notice the light part of the trackball is to the front. See in the image that the sun is directly in front of the camera. Numerical setting in Bryce4 is: azimuth 0 altitude 5
Notice the light part of the trackball is to the right. See in the image that the sun is to the right of the camera. You can tell this by the shadow cast by the cylinder. Numerical setting in Bryce4 is: azimuth 90 altitude 5
Notice the light part of the trackball is to the rear. See in the image that the sun is to the rear of the camera. Numerical setting in Bryce4 is: azimuth 180 altitude 5
Notice the light part of the trackball is to the left. See in the image that the sun is to the left of the camera. You can tell this by the shadow cast by the cylinder. Numerical setting in Bryce4 is: azimuth 270 altitude 5
Keep in mind that the trackball represents a dome that covers your Bryce scene. So if the trackball is changed to a position such as that to the right, the sun is actually above the Bryce world (in relation to the camera).
To further help you understand the relation of the sun to the camera, look at the image below. In this image there is a camera inside of the trackball, this image should help you get a good grasp of where the sun is in relation to the camera. Notice the highlight area of the dome and compare it to the image above. See the shadow? Is it any clearer now?

Look at the image to the right. Based on what you know, where is the sun?

Site Note:

If you picked image #2 above you were correct. Remember that the sun's location is indicated by the light spot on the trackball in relation to the camera as long as link sun to view is checked. If you imagine your head as the camera and a dome over it, you can imagine the sun's location by picturing a light source over your head at lit position of the trackball.

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!