I didn’t set out to make a bear picture when I started this one. I had created the mountains and the lake for another image I was playing around with that never really came to life. It wasn’t until I had the sun rise between the two mountains that the inspiration came to add the foreground elements, including the bear.

The biggest technical challenge in this image was giving the bear some fur and making the grass in the foreground. While all the modeling was done in Bryce 5, the fur and grass had to be done in Photoshop. I used a couple of Photoshop brushes that I found online for each of those. Even though it doesn’t seem like the bear’s fur is much, without it he looks very different. The fur really filled him in and made him look more realistic. I also used Photoshop to add some highlights here and there.

When I look at this image, I feel as though I’m there. I hear the silence and smell the fresh mountain air. I feel the morning coolness on my skin and every now and then I hear a short snort from my bear friend. When my art does that to me, I consider it a success.

As I became more advanced in computer art, I decided that I wanted to create an image featuring a steam engine. I knew in my mind what I wanted the picture to look like, I wasn’t sure if I had enough skill to pull it off though.

I began by creating a landscape in Bryce. I wanted the train to be going through a canyon so I made some big mountain sides and created my canyon. Then I needed a trestle. I searched online for a model of one but couldn’t find anything, so I made my own trestle in Bryce. I hadn’t done anything like that before and a lot of trial and error went into building the model. I’m very happy with how it can out. Next came the train. I found a couple different free train models online but wasn’t totally happy with them. I ended up loading the models into a modeling program and combined them together to get what I wanted. That too was something I’d never done before.

Once I got all the elements positioned where I wanted them I rendered the basic scene. The rest of the work happened in Photoshop. I added the headlights to the train along with the number 3. I also did some color work on the image and added some grain to it. Then I added the steam, that’s when the train and the image came to life.

Of all my computer art, this image is my favorite. Not only is it the most technically advanced, but it also comes very close to the vision I saw in my mind before I began work on it. To me that is the greatest thing about it.

“Sunset Dreams”

This picture has a special significance to me, it was my very first computer art image. I created it in 2001 using a demo of Bryce 4 and Photoshop 5. My computer at that time was a very old and slow Mac, so working on this image was a little difficult. In 2004 I went back to this picture and improved it. I had a faster computer by then and my knowledge of Bryce and Photoshop had greatly improved.

I really can’t say what inspired this image. It just kind of evolved as I was playing around with this wonderful new software. Compared to later images, this one is very simple. I think it’s that simplicity that makes this image so appealing though. It’s a nice picture to look at on a snowy, winter day.

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