Which Vue is Best For Me?

All Vue products in the 3D Artit line share similar technologies. They will all let you achieve high quality results. The difference is in ease of use, level of control and integration with other tools.

By adding modules, you will be able to progressively upgrade all the way from Pioneer up to Complete.

Vue 8 Bundles

Vue 8 Esprit, Studio and Complete represent pre-bundled, cost-effective alternatives to the modular approach of Pioneer:

	Vue 8 Pioneer	Vue 8 Esprit	Vue 8 Studio	Vue 8 Complete
	Free	$199.00	$399.00	$599.00
Description	Lets 3D-newcomers and casual artists easily create realistic 3D landscapes	Serious creative power for 3D artists, with full 3D import capability	Extended creative power for advanced 3D Artists	Complete natural scenery solution for expert 3D artists and small studios
Contents
Core application
Content Starter Pack
RenderUp
3DImport
Botanica
DeepAccess
LightTune
HyperVue
EcoSystem
EcoPainter
KronosFx
AdvancedGraph
Exporter
Zephyr

Modules for Vue 8

Vue 8 Pioneer grows with you!

Add optional modules to gradually expand Vue 8 Pioneer's feature set as your proficiency increases. You can go all the way up to Vue 8 Complete - at your own pace!

Comparative Chart

Only show differences

Lighting	Vue 8 Pioneer	Vue 8 Esprit	Vue 8 Studio	Vue 8 Complete
Global Illumination	•	•	•	•
Global Radiosity	•	•	•	•
Fast in-depth computation of reciprocal object lighting for accurate indoor lighting	•	•	•	•
Radiosity engine optimized for...	Indoor or infinite scenery	Indoor or infinite scenery	Indoor or infinite scenery	Indoor or infinite scenery
Global ambiance	•	•	•	•
Ambient occlusion with user definable occlusion range	•	•	•	•
HDRI support	•	•	•	•
Image based lighting	•	•	•	•
Background and environment mapping	•	•	•	•
Sub-Surface Scattering: Absorption	•	•	•	•
Sub-Surface Scattering: Multiple Internal Scattering	•	•	•	•
Easy GI single slider Global Illumination render quality setting	•	•	•	•
Adjustment of Global light intensity	•	•	•	•
Indirect lighting can be ignored on specific objects	With LightTune	With LightTune	•	•
Influence of specific lights can be ignored from the Radiosity solution	With LightTune	With LightTune	•	•
Advanced control over the indirect lighting engine	With RenderUp	•	•	•
Separate map option for background, IBL and global reflection map channels	With RenderUp	•	•	•
Shadow and volumetric light optimization for dramatic increase in rendering speed	•	•	•	•
Light gels with realistic projection modes	•	•	•	•
Adjustable light shadow density, negative lights	•	•	•	•
Enable diffuse and highlight on a per-light basis	With LightTune	With LightTune	•	•
Custom light intensity vs. distance profiles	With LightTune	With LightTune	•	•
Lights can affect specific objects only	With LightTune	With LightTune	•	•
Variable light color based on distance to light	With LightTune	With LightTune	•	•
Area light panel for soft, natural lighting	•	•	•	•
Light emitting objects	•	•	•	•
One-click conversion of objects into light sources	•	•	•	•
Fast, fake caustics in the shadows of transparent materials. Caustics realistically depend on the Index of Refraction	•	•	•	•
Accurate computation of caustics in the shadows of transparent objects	•	•	•	•
Realistic optional "spreading" of the light spectrum in caustics (rainbow-prism effect)	•	•	•	•
Per-light adjustment of the quality of soft shadows	With LightTune	With LightTune	•	•
Complete lens flare system	•	•	•	•
Controllable lens flares per light	•	•	•	•
Lens flare editor	•	•	•	•
Lens flare reflections editor	With LightTune	With LightTune	•	•
Polygonal reflections	•	•	•	•
Point light, Quadratic point light, Spotlight, Quadratic spotlight, Directional light	•	•	•	•
Lens Glare effect simulates internal lens diffusion	•	•	•	•
Lights can be disabled with a single click	With DeepAccess	With DeepAccess	•	•

Atmosphere	Vue 8 Pioneer	Vue 8 Esprit	Vue 8 Studio	Vue 8 Complete
Atmosphere presets	Over 160	Over 160	Over 160	Over 160
Ultra-realistic spectral atmosphere model	•	•	•	•
Choice of 4 different types of atmosphere models	•	•	•	•
Volumetric clouds, lights, materials (visible rays, with optional dust)	•	•	•	•
Spectral Volume Cloud layers for extremely realistic cloudscapes	•	•	•	•
Extremely detailed Spectral 3 cloud system (for cloud layers and MetaClouds)	•	•	•	•
Realistic cloud shadowing on objects as well as internal shadowing	•	•	•	•
Automatic detail refining for very close-up clouds	•	•	•	•
Cloud anisotropy setting for advanced control of internal light scattering	•	•	•	•
Fast indirect lighting in Spectral and Spectral 2 clouds	•	•	•	•
Create spherical cloud layers at the surface of your planets	•	•	•	•
Import real-world cloud density data to recreate existing cloudscapes	•	•	•	•
Add tornadoes using your favorite paint tool	•	•	•	•
God rays in clouds	•	•	•	•
Fly through clouds	•	•	•	•
Cloud layers near ground simulate fog	•	•	•	•
Realistic "peaking" of mountains through clouds	•	•	•	•
Create multiple layers of overlapping clouds	•	•	•	•
Efficient model for cross-shadowing of objects on clouds	•	•	•	•
MetaClouds individual cloud formations	•	•	•	•
Library of MetaCloud models	•	•	•	•
Predefined cloud shapes	Over 140	Over 140	Over 140	Over 140
Unlimited cloud layers	•	•	•	•
Customize the shape of MetaClouds	•	•	•	•
Stars, rainbows, ice rings...	•	•	•	•
Individual lights can illuminate spectral cloud layers and MetaClouds	•	•	•	•

EcoSystems	Vue 8 Pioneer	Vue 8 Esprit	Vue 8 Studio	Vue 8 Complete
EcoSystem patented technology to easily distribute millions of objects in scenes	•	•	•	•
Use preset EcoSystem materials to automatically populate your scenes with millions of objects	•	•	•	•
Create EcoSystems from multiple objects	With EcoSystem	With EcoSystem	•	•
Create entire forests of trees	With EcoSystem	With EcoSystem	•	•
Create forests of trees blowing in the wind	With Zephyr	With Zephyr	With Zephyr	•
Scatter millions of animated objects	With EcoSystem	With EcoSystem	•	•
Mix EcoSystems with standard materials	•	•	•	•
Mix several EcoSystems together depending on environment (slope, altitude...)	•	•	•	•
Automatic placement of EcoSystem population according to a user defined SmartGraph density function (that can depend on position, altitude, slope...)	With EcoSystem	With EcoSystem	•	•
Advanced coloring control to vary the colors of the population over the EcoSystem	With EcoSystem	With EcoSystem	•	•
Accurate control over the orientation of the EcoSystem population	With EcoSystem	With EcoSystem	•	•
Accurate control over the size and variation in size of the EcoSystem population	With EcoSystem	With EcoSystem	•	•
Automatic decay of EcoSystem density near foreign objects	•	•	•	•
Optional size reduction and color decay at low EcoSystem densities	With EcoSystem	With EcoSystem	•	•
EcoSystem 2 technology: paint instances directly onto objects	With EcoPainter	With EcoPainter	With EcoPainter	•
Add, remove and resize EcoSystem instances interactively	With EcoPainter	With EcoPainter	With EcoPainter	•
Select individual instances or groups of instances and move/rotate/resize them interactively	With EcoPainter	With EcoPainter	With EcoPainter	•
Paint size, color or density of EcoSystems using a pressure sensitive tablet	With EcoPainter	With EcoPainter	With EcoPainter	•
Convert EcoSystem instances to real objects for editing, move them back to the EcoSystem later	With EcoPainter	With EcoPainter	With EcoPainter	•
Paint EcoSystems as individual material layers or on a global basis	With EcoPainter	With EcoPainter	With EcoPainter	•
Layered EcoSystems to control individual EcoSystem populations	With EcoSystem	With EcoSystem	•	•
Control "affinity" between EcoSystem layers	With EcoSystem	With EcoSystem	•	•
Paint EcoSystems from all sides, in any view	With EcoPainter	With EcoPainter	With EcoPainter	•
EcoSystem 3 Technology dynamically populates EcoSystems for potentially unlimited populations	•	•	•	•
Dynamic EcoSystem 3 density adjustments for improved control of density on slopes	With EcoSystem	With EcoSystem	•	•
Multi-processor EcoSystem population	•	•	•	•

Vegetation	Vue 8 Pioneer	Vue 8 Esprit	Vue 8 Studio	Vue 8 Complete
Ultra-realistic SolidGrowth vegetation	10+ species	70+ species	70+ species	70+ species
Compatible with modified plant species	•	•	•	•
Easy-to-Use Plant Editor for plant customization	With Botanica	With Botanica	•	•
Instantly create variations of existing plants	•	•	•	•
Plant Editor and Leaf Editor let you modify existing plants or create entirely new plant species	With Botanica	With Botanica	•	•
Create and save new plant species as stand-alone files for future use in your scenes	With Botanica	With Botanica	•	•
Support for new, extremely detailed plant species	•	•	•	•

Terrains	Vue 8 Pioneer	Vue 8 Esprit	Vue 8 Studio	Vue 8 Complete
Solid3D real-time terrain modeling	•	•	•	•
Sculpt terrains in all directions	•	•	•	•
Create overhangs and grottoes	•	•	•	•
Sculpt, inflate, free form and smooth brushes	•	•	•	•
User definable brush tip profile	•	•	•	•
Automatic subdivision of terrain geometry when sculpting	•	•	•	•
Adaptive subdivision adds polygons only where needed	•	•	•	•
Edit terrains in context (view entire scene in editor)	•	•	•	•
Option to view terrain clipping planes in editor	•	•	•	•
Option to display the terrain with a shiny surface to enhance details	•	•	•	•
Constrain painting and effects to clipping zone	•	•	•	•
Option to display the terrain in wireframe mode to view polygons	•	•	•	•
Create edition "zones" to modify procedural terrains locally	•	•	•	•
Create nested "zones" to build massive detail where needed	•	•	•	•
Paint material distributions at the surface of terrains	•	•	•	•
Import, view and edit distribution maps in the Terrain Editor	•	•	•	•
Terrain effects optionally affect material distribution map	•	•	•	•
Preset terrain styles	8	8	8	8
Erosion types	9	9	9	9
Geological algorithms	12	12	12	12
Glaciation, alluvium and dissolve erosion effects	•	•	•	•
High definition data in standard terrains	•	•	•	•
Procedural terrains with infinite details	•	•	•	•
Infinite procedural terrains	•	•	•	•
Planetary terrain rendering	•	•	•	•
Flat, spherical and planetary procedural terrains	•	•	•	•
Switch between flat, spherical and planetary terrains (geometry may be affected)	•	•	•	•
Combine image data with procedural functions using dedicated blending nodes	•	•	•	•
Ability to switch from one form of terrain to another easily	•	•	•	•
Skin terrains	•	•	•	•
Symmetrical terrains	•	•	•	•
Pressure-sensitive tablet editing of terrains	•	•	•	•
Reset 2D and 3D painting independently	With 8,4 update	With 8,4 update	With 8,4 update	With 8,4 update
Customizable brush shape for terrain editing	•	•	•	•
Control distribution of materials on terrains from within the procedural terrain altitude function	With AdvancedGraph	With AdvancedGraph	With AdvancedGraph	•
Control procedural terrain altitudes based on relationships with other objects	With AdvancedGraph	With AdvancedGraph	With AdvancedGraph	•
The altitude of procedural terrains can be dynamically affected by other objects	With AdvancedGraph	With AdvancedGraph	With AdvancedGraph	•
Realistic procedural terrains thanks to new dedicated natural effects noise nodes	•	•	•	•
Infinite and local procedural terrain style presets to easily create each-time-different terrains of the given style	•	•	•	•
Library of procedural terrain presets with associated materials	•	•	•	•
Create your own procedural terrain style presets	•	•	•	•
Efficient displacement mapping of infinitely detailed procedural terrains	•	•	•	•
Procedural terrain preview in function editor	With AdvancedGraph	With AdvancedGraph	With AdvancedGraph	•
Multi-processor procedural terrain construction	•	•	•	•
Stratified terrains thanks to the recursive strata filters	•	•	•	•

Modeling	Vue 8 Pioneer	Vue 8 Esprit	Vue 8 Studio	Vue 8 Complete
Primitive and Boolean modeling	•	•	•	•
3D Text edition tool	•	•	•	•
Customizable text beveling, extrusion... and material effects	•	•	•	•
Import Postscript and Illustrator data into the text editor	•	•	•	•
Optimized memory management for handling large polygon meshes	•	•	•	•
True Metablobs organic modeling from all Vue Boolean primitives	•	•	•	•
Adjustable Metablob envelopes and contribution	•	•	•	•
Welding of multiple meshes into a single mesh	•	•	•	•
Random rock generator	•	•	•	•
Multiple planets (moon and other planets of the solar system)	•	•	•	•
Create billboards that always face the camera (with a 'force vertical' option)	•	•	•	•

Rendering	Vue 8 Pioneer	Vue 8 Esprit	Vue 8 Studio	Vue 8 Complete
New radiosity algorithms that dramatically reduce low frequency blotches	•	•	•	•
Generate high-quality indoor and outdoor renders	•	•	•	•
Bucket rendering for lower memory requirements and improved spatial coherence when rendering	•	•	•	•
Indirect lighting calculation can be easily re-used between "tweak" renders	•	•	•	•
Option to update the Indirect lighting "on demand" only	•	•	•	•
One-click displacement mapping	•	•	•	•
Dynamic render-time displacement to handle extremely large "displaced" polygon counts	•	•	•	•
Optional dynamic geometry smoothing to avoid sharp polygonal edges	•	•	•	•
Automatic camera exposure option compensates for the strong variations in illumination between noon and sunset	•	•	•	•
Natural film response	•	•	•	•
Post-render exposure control	•	•	•	•
Use an image or animation as a backdrop for your renders	With KronosFX	With KronosFX	With KronosFX	•
Rendering Presets	Preview, final, superior – With RenderUp: OpenGL, broadcast, ultra, user settings	OpenGL,Preview, final, broadcast,superior, ultra, user settings	OpenGL,Preview, final, broadcast,superior, ultra, user settings	OpenGL, preview, final, broadcast, superior, ultra, user settings
Render size limitation	Full HD, with logo – With RenderUp: limited by memory only, without logo	Limited by memory only	Limited by memory only	Limited by memory only
Pictures larger than screen resolution can be rendered to screen	•	•	•	•
Custom render size	•	•	•	•
Navigation inside the rendered picture using pan controls	•	•	•	•
Alpha and Z depth directly computed during the render process	•	•	•	•
Ray-traced depth of field	With RenderUp	•	•	•
Realistic Hybrid 2.5D depth of field	•	•	•	•
Ray-traced [soft] shadows	•	•	•	•
Advanced soft shadow computation to produce perfectly smooth soft shadows	•	•	•	•
Ray-traced [blurry] reflections and refractions	•	•	•	•
Blurry reflection and refraction settings for each material independently	•	•	•	•
Fake [blurry] reflections using reflection maps	With RenderUp	•	•	•
AccuShadows shadow mapping technology for faster [soft] shadows	With LightTune	With LightTune	•	•
Exclude ground from Alpha map option	With RenderUp	•	•	•
Objects can be easily hidden from render	With DeepAccess	With DeepAccess	•	•
Hide objects from render and disable lights by clicking their icon in World Browser	Optional	Optional	Optional	Optional
Global and per-material reflection maps	With RenderUp	•	•	•
Rendering in unlimited color depth	•	•	•	•
Optional details in render information panel	With RenderUp	•	•	•
Panoramic rendering with adjustable rotation angle	•	•	•	•
Spherical panoramic rendering	With RenderUp	•	•	•
Multi-processor panoramic rendering	•	•	•	•
Rendering in all views (including orthogonal rendering)	With RenderUp	•	•	•
Render in views can be set to a different quality than normal rendering	With RenderUp	•	•	•
Stand alone renderer handles rendering while you work on the scene	With RenderUp	•	•	•
Network rendering of animations	With HyperVue	With HyperVue	•	•
Network rendering of pictures	With HyperVue	With HyperVue	•	•
Rendering across hybrid network of computers (OS X and Windows)	With HyperVue	With HyperVue	•	•
Fail-safe HyperVue network rendering	With HyperVue	With HyperVue	•	•
Number of render nodes (RenderCow) licenses included in product	5 with HyperVue	5 with HyperVue	5	5
Maximum number of render nodes	Up to 5 with HyperVue	Up to 5 with HyperVue	Up to 5	Up to 5
SmartCow automatic node detection and activation	With HyperVue	With HyperVue	•	•
Hotplug render nodes to add/remove nodes during render	With HyperVue, on MacOS X and Windows	With HyperVue, on MacOS X and Windows	MacOS X and Windows	MacOS X and Windows
NewCow automatic updating of render nodes	With HyperVue	With HyperVue	•	•
Render area can be temporarily disabled	•	•	•	•
You can lock the render area to avoid accidental modifications	With 8,4 update	With 8,4 update	With 8,4 update	With 8,4 update
Render blow-up option	With RenderUp	•	•	•
Geometry anti-aliasing	•	•	•	•
User definable geometry anti-aliasing	With RenderUp: up to 64 rays/pixel	Up to 64 rays/pixel	Up to 64 rays/pixel	Up to 64 rays/pixel
HyperMipMap material anti-aliasing (including procedural materials)	With RenderUp	•	•	•
User definable anti-aliasing strategies to optimize speed vs. Smoothness	With RenderUp	•	•	•
Improved anti-aliasing strategies produce much smoother results	•	•	•	•
Optimized render memory management to allow the rendering of very large images	With RenderUp	•	•	•
Post processing to adjust color, contrast, saturation, gamma...	•	•	•	•
Ability to load/save independent post-processing settings	•	•	•	•
Ability to resume an interrupted render	•	•	•	•
Abort rendering on mouse-click in render area	Optional	Optional	Optional	Optional
The total amount of RAM allocated to displacement mapping is adjustable	With RenderUp	•	•	•
Images can be saved to disk at regular (user definable) intervals during render	With RenderUp	•	•	•
Dual destination render option (e.g. display to screen while rendering to disk)	With RenderUp	•	•	•
Render displacement on arbitrarily large terrains	With 8,4 update	With 8,4 update	With 8,4 update	With 8,4 update
Improved rendering of indirect lighting in preview mode	With 8,4 update	With 8,4 update	With 8,4 update	With 8,4 update
Automatic adjustment of render buckets to optimize rendering of small images on multi-core systems	With 8,4 update	With 8,4 update	With 8,4 update	With 8,4 update

Materials	Vue 8 Pioneer	Vue 8 Esprit	Vue 8 Studio	Vue 8 Complete
Material presets	Over 550	Over 550	Over 550	Over 550
Level(s) of material Edition	3, 4 With AdvancedGraph	3, 4 With AdvancedGraph	3, 4 With AdvancedGraph	4
Basic material editor with possibility of importing images as textures and bump maps	•	•	•	•
Advanced procedural material creation/mixing	•	•	•	•
Advanced Material Editor	•	•	•	•
SmartGraph function Editor	•	•	•	•
Control all material parameters via function graphs	With AdvancedGraph	With AdvancedGraph	With AdvancedGraph	•
Advanced SmartGraph input nodes: screen position, angle of incidence, distance to camera, distance on ray, depth in object, distance to object below, incident light angle, light direction, light color, reflected direction, etc	With AdvancedGraph	With AdvancedGraph	With AdvancedGraph	•
Time dependent noises (including animated 'Open Ocean' water node)	With KronosFX	With KronosFX	With KronosFX	•
Browse material hierarchy inside material editor, with direct access to sub-materials and layers	•	•	•	•
Layered material system	•	•	•	•
Add names and comments to SmartGraph nodes	•	•	•	•
Individual access to identical material zones	•	•	•	•
Change material settings for several materials simultaneously	•	•	•	•
Stack layers according to alpha, slope, altitude and orientation	•	•	•	•
Alpha (non refractive) transparency channel	•	•	•	•
Color and alpha map editor	•	•	•	•
Rendering of Poser characters using the Poser shading tree	With 3DImport	•	•	•
Perfect blending of lighting and GI with Poser shading tree	With 3DImport	•	•	•
Optional texture mip-mapping	•	•	•	•
Global control over the level of mip-mapping	With RenderUp	•	•	•
16 bit texture support	•	•	•	•
Materials can be mixed seamlessly	•	•	•	•
Mixed material can be set to react to environment properties (slope, altitude and orientation...)	•	•	•	•
Material mapping modes (World and Object mapping)	standard, cylindrical, spherical, parametric	standard, cylindrical, spherical, parametric	standard, cylindrical, spherical, parametric	standard, cylindrical, spherical, parametric
Easy access to all materials in scene	•	•	•	•
Direct access to all materials inside multi-material objects	•	•	•	•
Direct access to all texture maps and imported objects	With DeepAccess	With DeepAccess	•	•
Rotoscoping (Use animations as texture maps)	With KronosFX	With KronosFX	With KronosFX	•
Detailed function output observer	With AdvancedGraph	With AdvancedGraph	With AdvancedGraph	•
Detailed node previews in function editor	With AdvancedGraph	With AdvancedGraph	With AdvancedGraph	•
Baking of procedural materials as texture maps	With Exporter	With Exporter	With Exporter	•
Adjustable maximum ray depth and Total Internal Reflections	With RenderUp	•	•	•
Anti-aliasing can be disabled for given materials	•	•	•	•
Receive shadows material option	•	•	•	•
Shadow only material option	With RenderUp	•	•	•
Backlight option (for one-sided materials only) for realistic backlighting of opaque materials	•	•	•	•
Mixed/Layered materials displayed as hierarchies in World Browser	With DeepAccess	With DeepAccess	•	•
Volumetric materials	•	•	•	•
Volumetric materials with internal volumetric color and shading	•	•	•	•
Hypertextures	•	•	•	•
Luminous and Glowing materials	•	•	•	•
Easy highlighting of sub-materials and layers to visualize the influence of each material in the final render	•	•	•	•
Ability to map textures only once, controllable independently for each axis	•	•	•	•
Control materials based on the properties of other objects	With AdvancedGraph	With AdvancedGraph	With AdvancedGraph	•
Highly realistic natural material effects thanks to dedicated noise and coloring nodes	•	•	•	•
Easily control bump or displacement amplitude based on slope	•	•	•	•
Option to re-evaluate contribution of materials based on displaced surfaces	•	•	•	•
"Foam" output in Open Ocean node to easily control the distribution of foam on water surfaces	•	•	•	•
Separate bump and displacement channels	•	•	•	•
Constrained displacement (horizontal, vertical, etc)	•	•	•	•
Ability to control the direction of displacement through the material graph	With AdvancedGraph	With AdvancedGraph	With AdvancedGraph	•
Displacement smoothing to eliminate noisy displacement artifacts	•	•	•	•
Normal mapping	•	•	•	•
Recursive strata and constrained strata filters for stratified effects	•	•	•	•
Direct access to the alpha channel in the Advanced Material editor	•	•	•	•
Per material texture anti-aliasing quality boost	•	•	•	•
Per material simplification of sub-ray effect calculation	•	•	•	•
Planetary mapping node with ability to set location of origin (latitude and longitude)	With AdvancedGraph	With AdvancedGraph	With AdvancedGraph	•
Material mapping can be absolute, relative to sea, by object or by material	With 8,4 update	With 8,4 update	With 8,4 update	With 8,4 update
Sea level input node in graphs	With 8,4 update and AdvancedGraph	With 8,4 update and AdvancedGraph	With 8,4 update and AdvancedGraph	With 8,4 update
External dependency inputs can provide dimensions in real-world units	With 8,4 update and AdvancedGraph	With 8,4 update and AdvancedGraph	With 8,4 update and AdvancedGraph	With 8,4 update
Multi-materials let you change all the materials of an object in one single operation	With 8,4 update	With 8,4 update	With 8,4 update	With 8,4 update
Drag-drop and copy-paste multi-materials between objects	With 8,4 update	With 8,4 update	With 8,4 update	With 8,4 update
Move groups of keypoints in the color map and filter editors	With 8,4 update	With 8,4 update	With 8,4 update	With 8,4 update
Invert entire color maps or filters	With 8,4 update	With 8,4 update	With 8,4 update	With 8,4 update
Copy paste keypoints in color maps or filters	With 8,4 update	With 8,4 update	With 8,4 update	With 8,4 update
Control the hue, saturation and brightness of entire color maps or groups of keypoints	With 8,4 update	With 8,4 update	With 8,4 update	With 8,4 update

Animation	Vue 8 Pioneer	Vue 8 Esprit	Vue 8 Studio	Vue 8 Complete
Animation output resolution	Limited to 720 pixels wide, 1920 With KronosFX	Limited to 720 pixels wide, 1920 With KronosFX	Limited to 720 pixels wide, 1920 With KronosFX	Limited to 1920 pixels wide
Camera animation	•	•	•	•
Animate objects, materials, atmospheres, clouds, waves...	•	•	•	•
Import animated Poser characters	With 3DImport	•	•	•
Intuitive Animation wizard for easy animation setup	•	•	•	•
OpenGL rendering of animations for quick proofing	With KronosFX	With KronosFX	With KronosFX	•
Dynamic Motion Reaction™ easy secondary movement setup	•	•	•	•
Option to ignore time spline when computing motion (e.g. to look forward even when moving back)	•	•	•	•
Customizable Dynamic Motion Reaction effects	•	•	•	•
Easy setup of cloud movement using direction and speed of movement controls	•	•	•	•
Rigged Mesh support	•	•	•	•
Animated post-processing effects	•	•	•	•
Camera switcher lets you switch cameras during render (ideal for storyboarding)	•	•	•	•
Spin and vibration effects	•	•	•	•
Twinkling stars	•	•	•	•
Timeline with animation preview	•	•	•	•
Easily change the duration of an entire animation	With KronosFX	With KronosFX	With KronosFX	•
Allow clipping of time slider to animation duration	With KronosFX	With KronosFX	With KronosFX	•
Animation properties in the Timeline	•	•	•	•
Spline time control	•	•	•	•
Field interlacing, non-square pixels, flicker reduction	With KronosFX	With KronosFX	With KronosFX	•
Enhanced time spline editor	With KronosFX	With KronosFX	With KronosFX	•
Advanced flicker reduction options	With KronosFX	With KronosFX	With KronosFX	•
Indirect lighting evaluation mode that reduces pulsation effects	With RenderUp	•	•	•
Automatic keyframe creation	•	•	•	•
Auto-keyframing can be disabled	With KronosFX	With KronosFX	With KronosFX	•
Copy-pasting of animation keyframes	With KronosFX	With KronosFX	With KronosFX	•
Keyframes can be created for single properties only	With KronosFX	With KronosFX	With KronosFX	•
Graph display of animated parameter values in Timeline	With KronosFX	With KronosFX	With KronosFX	•
Accurate control over tangents and tension of animated parameters curves	With KronosFX	With KronosFX	With KronosFX	•
High precision animation curve control	With KronosFX	With KronosFX	With KronosFX	•
Access to individual coordinates in animation graph	With KronosFX	With KronosFX	With KronosFX	•
Step, linear and smooth interpolation modes	With KronosFX	With KronosFX	With KronosFX	•
Automatic ease-in/ease-out keyframe option	With KronosFX	With KronosFX	With KronosFX	•
Animate rotation using quaternions or Euler angles	With KronosFX	With KronosFX	With KronosFX	•
Fast Hybrid 2.5D™ motion blur	•	•	•	•
Separate animation channel for camera exposure	•	•	•	•
Automatic simulation of breeze on plants	With Zephyr	With Zephyr	With Zephyr	•
Strong wind effects defined on individual plants or groups of plants	With Zephyr	With Zephyr	With Zephyr	•
Advanced breeze customization with OpenGL preview	With Zephyr	With Zephyr	With Zephyr	•
Animated wind intensity and direction	With Zephyr	With Zephyr	With Zephyr	•
Omni and directional ventilators for local modifications of plants	With Zephyr	With Zephyr	With Zephyr	•
Ventilators can be made to influence EcoSystems	With Zephyr	With Zephyr	With Zephyr	•
Plant geometry key framing for spectacular animated life cycles	With Botanica	With Botanica	•	•
Ability to mark objects as never becoming animated	With KronosFX	With KronosFX	With KronosFX	•
Object linking and tracking - forward dynamics	•	•	•	•
"Scene graph" approach allows advanced relationships between objects	With AdvancedGraph	With AdvancedGraph	With AdvancedGraph	•
Access and control object properties using SmartGraph	With AdvancedGraph	With AdvancedGraph	With AdvancedGraph	•
Save and reload entire object graphs in a single file	With AdvancedGraph	With AdvancedGraph	With AdvancedGraph	•
Object graphs can express dimensions in real-world units	With 8,4 update and AdvancedGraph	With 8,4 update and AdvancedGraph	With 8,4 update and AdvancedGraph	With 8,4 update
Loose forward dynamics for "real world" linking and tracking	•	•	•	•
"PID" and "Delay" controllers in SmartGraph for improved realism in object interactions	With AdvancedGraph	With AdvancedGraph	With AdvancedGraph	•
Time display as	SMPTE	SMPTE	SMPTE	SMPTE
EcoSystem populations can be made to evolve over time	With EcoSystem	With EcoSystem	•	•
Create custom rigged mesh animations	•	•	•	•

User Interface	Vue 8 Pioneer	Vue 8 Esprit	Vue 8 Studio	Vue 8 Complete
Productive, uncluttered interface layout	•	•	•	•
Re-posing of Poser meshes directly inside Vue	With 3DImport	•	•	•
Direct re-posing of rigged meshes	•	•	•	•
Support for mesh morphs	•	•	•	•
Select and manipulate bones directly in views	•	•	•	•
Manipulate bones numerically using the Skeleton editor	•	•	•	•
Support for wired helpers	•	•	•	•
Highly optimized mesh skinning for fast refresh during animation scrubbing	•	•	•	•
Efficient memory management: multiple instances of identical objects are stored only once in memory	•	•	•	•
Automatic object instantiation	•	•	•	•
Interactive alignment tool	•	•	•	•
Accurate alignment and drop operations	•	•	•	•
Quick color selection tool with customizable color presets	•	•	•	•
Custom previews can be used to represent saved items	•	•	•	•
Drag items (e.g. objects, materials...) into your scene from the non-modal browsers	•	•	•	•
Unified light editor	•	•	•	•
Place an image in the background of the OpenGL views for reference	•	•	•	•
Change the size of the animation preview in the Timeline	With KronosFX	With KronosFX	With KronosFX	•
Merge scenes	•	•	•	•
Repeat last operation to create an array (extend or subdivide)	•	•	•	•
Alt + move object creates a copy of the object	•	•	•	•
Gizmo object manipulators (optional)	•	•	•	•
Adjustable gizmo size	•	•	•	•
Spherical abstraction gizmos	•	•	•	•
Dynamic spherical terrain unwrapping allows easy object placement	•	•	•	•
Local, global, camera and parent manipulation modes	•	•	•	•
Multiple object renaming	•	•	•	•
Fully multi-threaded interface for fast response	•	•	•	•
One view/4 view layout	•	•	•	•
Real-time scene preview	•	•	•	•
World Browser scene management	•	•	•	•
Organize objects in layers	8 layers max/ unlimited with DeepAccess	8 layers max/ unlimited with DeepAccess	Unlimited layers	Unlimited layers
Enhanced World Browser with direct access to materials, texture maps and imported objects for efficient management of complex projects	With DeepAccess	With DeepAccess	•	•
Display material hierarchies with direct access to sub-materials	With DeepAccess	With DeepAccess	•	•
Easy replacement of textures throughout the entire scene	With DeepAccess	With DeepAccess	•	•
Library tab in World Browser shows all objects used several times	With DeepAccess	With DeepAccess	•	•
Easily modify all instances of a reference object using the Library tab	With DeepAccess	With DeepAccess	•	•
Scatter-replicate tool	•	•	•	•
Scatter replicate tool creates variations of plants, terrains, rocks...	•	•	•	•
Replication tool with configurable position/size/orientation offset	•	•	•	•
Random scattering and replication of objects	•	•	•	•
Automatic instantiation of scattered/replicated objects	•	•	•	•
Summary of materials to quickly access all materials in the scene	•	•	•	•
Resizable material summary	•	•	•	•
Drop button to easily set objects on the surface of underlying objects	•	•	•	•
Smart drop rests the dropped object on the surface of the underlying object	•	•	•	•
Undo-Redo	Three operations – With DeepAccess: multiple undo-redo on 64bit OS	Three operations – With DeepAccess: multiple undo-redo	Multiple undo-redo	Multiple undo-redo
Resizable viewports	•	•	•	•
Dockable Timeline	•	•	•	•
Trackball-type camera operations and advanced camera management grouped into Camera Control Center	•	•	•	•
Each camera possesses a target object for easier aiming and setting of focus point	•	•	•	•
Camera targets can be linked to other objects in the scene (e.g. to automatically keep that object in focus)	•	•	•	•
All cameras can appear on screen	With DeepAccess	With DeepAccess	•	•
Camera group manager in World Browser	With DeepAccess	With DeepAccess	•	•
Resizable World Browser and Scene Preview	With DeepAccess	With DeepAccess	•	•
Sort objects by size, name or type	With DeepAccess	With DeepAccess	•	•
Lock or hide entire layers	•	•	•	•
Run Cornucopia3D third party Python scripts	•	•	•	•
Directly access frequently used scripts	•	•	•	•
Picture printing with user definable DPI resolution	•	•	•	•
Real units for object sizes	•	•	•	•
Display measurements as real-world units (metric or Imperial)	•	•	•	•
Coherent display of real-world units	•	•	•	•
Centered or relative to opposite corner object resizing	•	•	•	•
Mesh splitting by material	•	•	•	•
Spotlight view through for accurate aiming (OpenGL only)	With LightTune	With LightTune	•	•
Full-screen mode	With DeepAccess	With DeepAccess	•	•
Non-modal object editors	•	•	•	•
Objects can be locked or hidden individually in OpenGL views	•	•	•	•
Incorporation of texture maps in scenes	•	•	•	•
"Only show active layer" preview option	•	•	•	•
Object replacement by other objects	With DeepAccess	With DeepAccess	•	•
When replacing plants, use the geometry of the replaced plants to generate the new plants	With DeepAccess	With DeepAccess	•	•
Automatic detection and creation of new browser collections	•	•	•	•
Ability to lock browser collections to avoid accidental modifications	With 8,4 update	With 8,4 update	With 8,4 update	With 8,4 update
Cloud layers can be easily hidden/restored	With DeepAccess	With DeepAccess	•	•
Linear and angular snapping grids when moving and rotating objects	•	•	•	•
Content files accessible from all system accounts	•	•	•	•
Easily change the location of your content folder after installation	•	•	•	•
Intelligent re-titling of files when saving under new filename	•	•	•	•
Use preset MetaNodes to easily assemble elaborate SmartGraph graphs	•	•	•	•
Group parts of SmartGraph graphs as MetaNodes	With AdvancedGraph	With AdvancedGraph	With AdvancedGraph	•
"Publish" specific MetaNode parameters for easy access from the level above	With AdvancedGraph	With AdvancedGraph	With AdvancedGraph	•
Build your own MetaNodes library of commonly used graph snippets	With AdvancedGraph	With AdvancedGraph	With AdvancedGraph	•
Ability to fix the altitude of the camera above the ground	•	•	•	•
Press "Ctrl" to slow down the controls in the Camera Control Center	•	•	•	•
Dedicated water editor to easily create and adjust infinite water planes	•	•	•	•
Go from still to stormy waters with a single slider	•	•	•	•
Easily add true displacement to the water surface	•	•	•	•
Customize the look of water surfaces using the new MetaWater materials	•	•	•	•
Support for 3Dconnexion tracking devices (SpaceNavigator, SpaceExplorer, etc)	With DeepAccess	With DeepAccess	•	•
Automatic renaming of Standalone- and HyperVue-generated frames if overwriting	With HyperVue	With HyperVue	•	•
Global EcoSystem visible as proxy object in World Browser	With EcoPainter	With EcoPainter	•	•
Select and delete Global EcoSystem instances with one click	With EcoPainter	With EcoPainter	•	•
Format specific options accessible through a special button in Save file box, and no longer prompted for each time	•	•	•	•
Adjustable separator in Timeline to change width of animated items list	•	•	•	•
Material preview option which displays materials mapped onto a small terrain object	•	•	•	•
Name of atmosphere appears in Atmosphere editor caption	•	•	•	•
Name of edited function appears in Function editor caption	•	•	•	•
Visual motion browser lets you select rig poses or animations visually	With 8,4 update	With 8,4 update	With 8,4 update	With 8,4 update
Preview motions/poses before applying them	With 8,4 update	With 8,4 update	With 8,4 update	With 8,4 update
Typical motions directly accessible from skeleton rig editor	With 8,4 update	With 8,4 update	With 8,4 update	With 8,4 update
Default views are automatically adjusted according to internal units	With 8,4 update	With 8,4 update	With 8,4 update	With 8,4 update

Real-Time Preview	Vue 8 Pioneer	Vue 8 Esprit	Vue 8 Studio	Vue 8 Complete
High-speed OpenGL real-time preview engine	•	•	•	•
Choice of 3 OpenGL engines: shader based, fixed pipeline and software provide optimal quality/compatibility options	•	•	•	•
Shader-based OpenGL engine maximizes efficiency and visual accuracy on high-end GPUs	•	•	•	•
Completely threaded OpenGL architecture makes the best of multi-core systems	•	•	•	•
Fully customizable OpenGL previewing options	•	•	•	•
Realistic OpenGL preview of plants, planets, lens-flares, texture map atmosphere... with instant and detailed feedback	•	•	•	•
Dual-resolution OpenGL preview for faster response	•	•	•	•
Preview specular highlights in real time	•	•	•	•
OpenGL preview of EcoSystem instances as billboards, boxes or full geometry	With EcoSystem	With EcoSystem	•	•
Preview EcoSystem instances as shaded billboards	With EcoSystem	With EcoSystem	•	•
User definable radius around the camera in which EcoSystem instances appear at full resolution	With EcoSystem	With EcoSystem	•	•
Dynamically populated EcoSystems around the camera can be viewed in viewports	With EcoSystem	With EcoSystem	•	•
Dynamic filtering of EcoSystem shaded billboards to improve accuracy and reduce flickering in realtime preview	With 8,4 update	With 8,4 update	With 8,4 update	With 8,4 update
Textured OpenGL preview	•	•	•	•
OpenGL and Wireframe preview modes	•	•	•	•
OpenGL Preview of Boolean operations	•	•	•	•
OpenGL Preview of Metablobs	•	•	•	•
Threaded previewing of procedural terrains with dynamic LOD	•	•	•	•
Anti-aliased real-time OpenGL preview	•	•	•	•
Automatic selection of preview color based on procedural material color	•	•	•	•
Show objects as box, wireframe, shaded or smooth shaded	•	•	•	•
Axis preview in viewports	•	•	•	•
OpenGL and rendered plant preview in Plant Editor	With Botanica	With Botanica	•	•
Sky preview with clouds	•	•	•	•
Realistic MetaCloud preview	•	•	•	•
Realistic sun shadows	•	•	•	•
Colored EcoSystem instance preview	•	•	•	•
Dynamic plant display optimization	•	•	•	•
Decimated object preview for faster previewing	•	•	•	•
Selected objects appear with a red wireframe	•	•	•	•
Parts of selected objects that use the current material appear highlighted	•	•	•	•
Selection wireframe always appears on top of other objects that are in front	Optional	Optional	Optional	Optional
Selected objects are "ghosted" in red	•	•	•	•
High quality texture and terrain previewing	•	•	•	•
Rendered images can be displayed in the background of all viewports	•	•	•	•
Planes are visible from all sides in the OpenGL views	With 8,4 update	With 8,4 update	With 8,4 update	With 8,4 update
Accurate OpenGL display of materials in world coordinates	With 8,4 update	With 8,4 update	With 8,4 update	With 8,4 update
Status bar can display poly count, free system resources, and used GPU resources	With 8,4 update	With 8,4 update	With 8,4 update	With 8,4 update
Ability to hide all layers in the World Browser	With 8,4 update	With 8,4 update	With 8,4 update	With 8,4 update
Ability to copy-paste objects into hidden or locked layers	With 8,4 update	With 8,4 update	With 8,4 update	With 8,4 update
When deleting all objects from a layer, the layer is no longer deleted. You need to do this explicitly.	With 8,4 update	With 8,4 update	With 8,4 update	With 8,4 update
Easily restore default installation folders at install time	With 8,4 update	With 8,4 update	With 8,4 update	With 8,4 update
Optimized Full Quality Near Camera option for faster high quality previewing	With 8,4 update	With 8,4 update	With 8,4 update	With 8,4 update
Optimized handling of complex group hierarchies	With 8,4 update	With 8,4 update	With 8,4 update	With 8,4 update

Import/Export	Vue 8 Pioneer	Vue 8 Esprit	Vue 8 Studio	Vue 8 Complete
Static Poser scene import	With 3DImport	•	•	•
Support for Poser dynamic clothes and hair	With 3DImport	•	•	•
Animated Poser scene import	With 3DImport	•	•	•
Support for Poser 8	With 3DImport	•	•	•
Compatible with Cornucopia3D cost-effective copy-protected content	•	•	•	•
Cornucopia3D items are identified in the Visual Browsers using a small icon	•	•	•	•
Cornucopia3D content display options in Visual Browsers: "All", "Best Selection" or "None"	•	•	•	•
Import options dialog to control imported object position and sizing	•	•	•	•
When loading objects, option to automatically drop them to the ground	•	•	•	•
2D Import	BMP, BUM, DEM, GIF, HDR, Jpeg, Pict, PNG, PSD, TGA, TGD, Tiff, Vistapro DEM	BMP, BUM, DEM, GIF, HDR, Jpeg, Pict, PNG, PSD, TGA, TGD, Tiff, Vistapro DEM	BMP, BUM, DEM, GIF, HDR, Jpeg, Pict, PNG, PSD, TGA, TGD, Tiff, Vistapro DEM	BMP, BUM, DEM, GIF, HDR, Jpeg, Pict, PNG, PSD, TGA, TGD, Tiff, Vistapro DEM
Animated 2D import	With KronosFX: Sequence of pictures, MOV (Macintosh only), AVI (Windows only)	With KronosFX: Sequence of pictures, MOV (Macintosh only), AVI (Windows only)	With KronosFX: Sequence of pictures, MOV (Macintosh only), AVI (Windows only)	Sequence of pictures, MOV (Macintosh only), AVI (Windows only)
Vector data import	Postscript and Illustrator up to 3.2	Postscript and Illustrator up to 3.2	Postscript and Illustrator up to 3.2	Postscript and Illustrator up to 3.2
Textured model imports as	With 3DImport: 3DS, 3DMF, COB, DAE, DEM, DXF, LWO, OBJ, PZ3, PZZ, RAW, SHD, SKP, VRML	3DS, 3DMF, COB, DAE, DEM, DXF, LWO, OBJ, PZ3, PZZ, RAW, SHD, SKP, VRML	3DS, 3DMF, COB, DAE, DEM, DXF, LWO, OBJ, PZ3, PZZ, RAW, SHD, SKP, VRML	3DS, 3DMF, COB, DAE, DEM, DXF, LWO, OBJ, PZ3, PZZ, RAW, SHD, SKP, VRML
Textured and animated Collada file import	With 3DImport	•	•	•
Support for rigged Collada meshes	With 3DImport	•	•	•
Support for Sketchup 7 (Win 32 only)	With 3DImport	•	•	•
2D Export	Tiff, TGA, Pict, BMP, GIF, Jpeg, PNG, BUM, DEM	Tiff, TGA, Pict, BMP, GIF, Jpeg, PNG, BUM, DEM	Tiff, TGA, Pict, BMP, GIF, Jpeg, PNG, BUM, DEM	Tiff, TGA, Pict, BMP, GIF, Jpeg, PNG, BUM, DEM
Export high dynamic range images (including skydomes)	With RenderUp	•	•	•
Export 48 bit color images	With RenderUp	•	•	•
High Dynamic Range 2D Export	With RenderUp: HDR	HDR	HDR	HDR
Embed alpha information in Tiff and PNG formats	With RenderUp	•	•	•
Object export (with textures)	With Exporter	With Exporter	With Exporter	•
Optimized object and texture map exports	With Exporter	With Exporter	With Exporter	•
Textured object export as	With Exporter: 3DS, C4D, COB, DXF, LWO, OBJ, SHD	With Exporter: 3DS, C4D, COB, DXF, LWO, OBJ, SHD	With Exporter: 3DS, C4D, COB, DXF, LWO, OBJ, SHD	3DS, C4D, COB, DXF, LWO, OBJ, SHD
Sky exports as sky-boxes or sky-domes	With Exporter	With Exporter	With Exporter	•
User-definable mesh and texture map resolution for exports	With Exporter	With Exporter	With Exporter	•
Automatic re-importing of externally modified texture maps and 3D objects	With DeepAccess	With DeepAccess	•	•
Advanced unwrap algorithms for low-distortion UV mapping	With Exporter	With Exporter	With Exporter	•
Optimized terrain exports	With Exporter and 8,4 update	With Exporter and 8,4 update	With Exporter and 8,4 update	With 8,4 update

System Resource Management	Vue 8 Pioneer	Vue 8 Esprit	Vue 8 Studio	Vue 8 Complete
Robust threading architecture	•	•	•	•
Texture virtualization allows rendering with extremely high resolution texture maps	•	•	•	•
Geometry virtualization allows rendering of polygon-intensive objects	•	•	•	•
"Purge Memory" command to cleanup memory and reduce fragmentation	•	•	•	•
Automatic memory monitoring system attempts to preserve scene integrity after memory allocation failures	•	•	•	•
Optional compatibility mode minimizes hardware compatibility issues	•	•	•	•
Automatic software updating (optional)	•	•	•	•
Video-board compatibility checking	•	•	•	•
Automatic checking of OpenGL driver compatibility	•	•	•	•
Embedded error-reporting feature to help reduce time-to-fix	•	•	•	•
User definable maximum video board memory usage	With DeepAccess	With DeepAccess	•	•

Miscellaneous	Vue 8 Pioneer	Vue 8 Esprit	Vue 8 Studio	Vue 8 Complete
Multi-processor rendering	Up to 2 CPUs – With RenderUp: resp. 4/8 CPUs on 32/64 bit OS	Respectively 4/8 CPUs on 32/64 bit OS	Respectively 4/8 CPUs on 32/64 bit OS	Respectively 4/8 CPUs on 32/64 bit OS
Hundreds of preset atmospheres, objects, materials...	•	•	•	•
Terrainscapes preset terrain material library	•	•	•	•
Optimized for PowerPC and Intel Macs	•	•	•	•
64 bit version optimized for Windows XP64 and Vista 64	•	•	•	•
License valid for commercial use	-	•	•	•
Inline help	PDF Manual	PDF Manual	PDF Manual	PDF Manual
Documentation	600 page manual	600 page manual	600 page manual	600 page manual
Media	1 DVD	1 Application CD + 1 Extras DVD	1 Application CD + 1 Extras DVD	1 Application CD + 1 Extras DVD

Compare Versions of Vue

Vue 5 Easel Vue 5 Esprit Vue 5 Pro Studio Vue 6 Easel Vue 6 Esprit Vue 6 Pro Studio Vue 7 Pioneer Vue 7 Fairy Tale Vue 7 Fantasy Vue 7 Science Fiction      Vue 7 Esprit Vue 7 Pro Studio Vue 7 Complete Vue 8 Pioneer Vue Fairy Tale Vue Fantasy Vue Science Fiction Vue 8 Frontier Vue 8 Esprit Vue 8 Studio Vue 8 Complete

Further Information

You can find detailed product descriptions here:

• Vue 8 Pioneer
• Vue 8 Frontier
• Vue 8 Esprit
• Vue 8 Studio
• Vue 8 Complete

Vue 8 Complete is the highest product in the "Products for 3D Artist" line. You can find a comparison of Vue 8 Complete with Vue 8 Infinite here.

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