"When did you start with Bryce?", I have been asked a few time – often by people who are curious about my images. When I actually come to think about it, I can't remember many of the details, but here are a few.

My best friend, and ex-business partner (we are still best friends but no longer business partners) brought a CD home one day with a whole collection of programs on it. It was from some or other computer magazine and had  an evaluation version of Bryce3d on that had just been released that year. (1997 – I think) I recall having seen Bryce on the Apple Macintosh and marvelled at the images that were created.

I borrowed the CD and took it home and installed it on my computer. The evaluation version was fully functional and wouldn't expire but it put a nice watermark all over the rendered images. I played with it for a few weeks and loved every moment as I recall.

Bryce 3D

Of course I was a total klutz with the program. There was no manual to speak of and the help file was – dare I say? – not very helpful. I didn't know all the shortcuts and "hidden" features of the program. You see, Bryce was, and still is, a quirky program whose creators seemed to like the idea of hiding vital functions in rather obscure ways, often using the Ctrl key or buried under tiny little arrows. 

Nevertheless I became attached to it and soon realised that I had found a program that suited me and that I could easily get to do what I wanted it to do without a manual or a degree in computer science. So I went to my employer and asked for a budget to be able to purchase this program, I certainly couldn't afford it. He of course asked me what I needed it for – and I lied (well didn't tell him the complete truth) and said that it was a 3d graphics program that could render things in 3D. He seemed happy with the explanation and asked if it did human figures as it would be useful for the medical environment. (where I was currently working) 

I had seen some images where human figures had featured so in ignorance I said "yes", and my boss approved the purchase.

When the package was ordered I realised that it could not do human figures, but I had to show something to my boss. A visit to the Bryce website (owned by Metacreations) revealed that Metacreations had just acquired a new program called Poser that did…guess what… human figures… so I added Poser to the order and got the programs delivered after about 3 weeks.

Poser 3Now I had a manual, and a program that didn't watermark everything and another program that could do human figures…

A good start to my life with Bryce.

 Now you know as well why the human figure features so much in my Bryce artwork too!