Hi,
You replied 'tried that, no luck, other suggestions.'
That's not really a reply we can help you with.
it's like saying 'my car won't start, what's wrong?'
A lot of users have made a lot of really nice renders using the riptide plugins,
so if you have an issue we need details, screenshots, your OS type, specifications, versions, zipped OBJ+MTL files etc..., eg enough to tell you what's wrong and how to correct it.
Radiance