E-on Vue Frontier feedback?

HamEinar

Anyone have experience using the combo of Daz Studio and E-on Vue Frontier 2014? Looks very promising (and affordable compared to the Infinite & XStream editions) - promising landscape for Poser/Studio users, but when I do a search all I can find is product information and "buy me now"s - no actual hands-on reviews or comments.

The usual reservations exist; how does it actually handle imports from DS - is this another dead end with obscured textures and other funky results?

wetcircuit

I don't have Vue. For me the price is kind of high to get the features I would want for an environment renderer….

It looks like you would really need to buy at least 2 of the modules -the Renderup ($70) and the Lighttune ($40)… to get what you get in Carrara, plus you can pose in Carrara…

But it's the first paid step in the Vue family so if you like the installment plan it is the least commitment.

HamEinar

The only gripe I have is that I did try Carrarra 8.5 in beta - and getting some of my more elaborate scenes into C was impossible :-/ - but yeah, you're right about having to invest in at least two more modules.. Just curious, and $99 as an entry fee is just steep enough to keep me from jumping in with both feet..

wetcircuit

einar33 said:

The only gripe I have is that I did try Carrarra 8.5 in beta - and getting some of my more elaborate scenes into C was impossible :-/

Can't give you any advice there, I don't use Studio..., but the release version was several jumps after the beta. You might inquire how it has been working in the Carrara forum. I don't hear many complaints about it these days....

There are some other modules I would have to buy too before I got what I have in Carrara: the Botanica one, obviously, and the one that lets you paint the landscape to define where stuff grows, and the one that allows you to create terrains(?)... Hard to compare feature to feature and I expect Vue's tools are specialized, but Carrara has all this built in - plus I would want spherecam for exporting panoramas and skyboxes, which is yet another module in Vue....

This is one reason I haven't bought Terragen3, I have to spend $550 for a spherecam and uncrippled render size. :/

artd3D

I have Vue 11 Esprit with the ecosytem, ecopainter, light tune, Botanica, Advanced graph and exporter modules. All of the modules I purchased for about 1/2 price by being a member of the Cornucopia club. Since I started with Vue 11 Frontier I received a free copy of Vue Frontier 2014 by being a CC club member.

I do almost all of my Daz character renders in Vue, because I feel Vue has a better render engine and better materials, and Skinvue is absolutely great with Daz and Poser characters. You can import those characters in either Object or Collada format with Vue Frontier.

Once you have Frontier you can upgrade to Esprit for $99.00. Esprit allows you to import multiple formats and lets collada imports be re-posed in Vue and import Daz animations. Esprit also comes with the renderup module and much more content.

Sign up for the newsletters on the E-on site and the Cornucopia site, they occasionally have special sale offers.

Also check the web sites for 3d artist and 3d world magazines as they sometimes include an older version of Vue Frontier with the magazine. This is how I got Vue 10 Frontier, and by joining the cornucopia club they upgraded it to Vue 11 Frontier for free.

To really get the maximum use out of Vue, you need to get to Esprit, but you don't have to do it all at once. If you can get a copy of Vue 11 Frontier, there really isn't much difference between it and Frontier 2014.

You really don't need botanica as it only allows you to modify existing plants, and the terrain editor is included in Frontier.

I hope this helps your decision making.