How to achieve this beautiful cloud rendering?

Started by gao_jian11, May 31, 2018, 09:31:35 PM

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Oshyan

Voxel Shadows actually *decreases* render time in many/most cases (and I've just done a quick re-test on this to verify, saves 10-20% render time in a simple test case with v3 clouds). Not sure why it would be slower for you.

- Oshyan

WAS

Quote from: Oshyan on June 05, 2018, 04:20:16 PM
Voxel Shadows actually *decreases* render time in many/most cases (and I've just done a quick re-test on this to verify, saves 10-20% render time in a simple test case with v3 clouds). Not sure why it would be slower for you.

- Oshyan

Yeah it wasn't the voxel setting, but how many millions of voxels that was adjusted in your clip compared to default. It basically cripples my computer, every change causing a freeze before it calculates and renders preview.

DutchDimension

Quote from: Oshyan on June 01, 2018, 09:43:16 PM
The thing is the "magic" of these clouds is in the *shape* (density shader input), and the reason they haven't been shared yet is that the setup to create that shape is very complicated. There are nearly *60 nodes* that all combine together in various ways, starting mostly with various Power Fractals, then colour adjusted, mixed, added and subtracted, etc. all down to a single input to the Density Shader of a single Cloud Layer V3. There is just a single Simple Shape Shader, which defines the radius. The rest is the artful and laborious combination of many different isolated scales of noise functions in different ways.

I must say, the bolded sentence baffles me.

Oshyan, don't you think that the complexity of the setup could be educational? With the dearth of TG instructional material, I don't think you should be holding this back for fear of frightening folks with complexity. When the video was originally published on youtube,  it was made know that sample material would be made available. That was more than 2.5 years ago. Unless I missed something in the interim, I urge you post the scene file somewhere in the documentation. Better late than never.

Matt

#18
Hi DD,

That R&D project is what led to Easy Cloud. I don't like to say it, but the main reason we haven't shown this complete node setup is because I know that it could easily be ported to any other node-based software or even incorporated directly into the presets of competing software. I consider the workings of Easy Cloud to be a trade secret which - for the time being - we have to protect so that we have something unique in the market, generate some revenue to put back into hiring more developers so we can work faster, and into producing more documentation and training materials.

The material we intended to release from this R&D is Easy Cloud.

There are some aspects of this R&D setup that didn't make it into Easy Cloud, but I'm aiming to close the gap with improved presets in future.

In current builds it is possible to get something not too far off this look by using the 'Altocumulus castellanus' preset and making sure to switch 'Model' to '3.9.04'. You may need to try many seeds before you get something that looks great, but that was also a problem in the R&D setup - different seeds would create blobs that separated from the main cloud and/or too many smooth areas.

The wispy edges are something I plan to incorporate into Easy Cloud in future. But perhaps I could make a tutorial that shows how to combine Easy Cloud with other methods to get something similar.
Just because milk is white doesn't mean that clouds are made of milk.

WAS

Quote from: Matt on August 09, 2018, 02:35:31 PM
The wispy edges are something I plan to incorporate into Easy Cloud in future. But perhaps I could make a tutorial that shows how to combine Easy Cloud with other methods to get something similar.

Would absolutely love a tutorial or docs on some wispy-ness approaches.

DutchDimension

Quote from: Matt on August 09, 2018, 02:35:31 PM
Hi DD,

That R&D project is what led to Easy Cloud. I don't like to say it, but the main reason we haven't shown this complete node setup is because I know that it could easily be ported to any other node-based software or even incorporated directly into the presets of competing software. I consider the workings of Easy Cloud to be a trade secret which - for the time being - we have to protect so that we have something unique in the market, generate some revenue to put back into hiring more developers so we can work faster, and into producing more documentation and training materials.

The material we intended to release from this R&D is Easy Cloud.

There are some aspects of this R&D setup that didn't make it into Easy Cloud, but I'm aiming to close the gap with improved presets in future.

In current builds it is possible to get something not too far off this look by using the 'Altocumulus castellanus' preset and making sure to switch 'Model' to '3.9.04'. You may need to try many seeds before you get something that looks great, but that was also a problem in the R&D setup - different seeds would create blobs that separated from the main cloud and/or too many smooth areas.

The wispy edges are something I plan to incorporate into Easy Cloud in future. But perhaps I could make a tutorial that shows how to combine Easy Cloud with other methods to get something similar.

Hi Matt, thank you for replying.

while it wasn't the answer I was hoping for, I can understand and respect your reasons for doing so.
Easy Cloud certainly generates some lovely out of the box results. The big downside with black box solutions of course is that the user has no access to what lies under the hood.
I almost always find myself in a situation where Easy Cloud setups get me 75-80% of the way where I want to be, even after a lot of seeding and tweaking. When VFX sups ask for that last 20-25%, where is the artist going to get it from? Too often the answer is: "from somewhere other than TG." And that is unfortunate.

Node systems are great, precisely because they are so in-depth and powerful in the right hands. To see compounds get closed behind lock and key is not where I hope the future of TG lies. It's what made me turn away from the likes of Vue.

Having said that, I think everybody would welcome more of your tutorials. I'm personally very interested in getting on closer terms with the blue nodes and how to unleash their strengths in situations like this. But perhaps they're not relevant in this case.  :)

DutchDimension

Quote from: Matt on August 09, 2018, 02:35:31 PMHi DD,

That R&D project is what led to Easy Cloud. I don't like to say it, but the main reason we haven't shown this complete node setup is because I know that it could easily be ported to any other node-based software or even incorporated directly into the presets of competing software. I consider the workings of Easy Cloud to be a trade secret which - for the time being - we have to protect so that we have something unique in the market, generate some revenue to put back into hiring more developers so we can work faster, and into producing more documentation and training materials.

The material we intended to release from this R&D is Easy Cloud.

There are some aspects of this R&D setup that didn't make it into Easy Cloud, but I'm aiming to close the gap with improved presets in future.

In current builds it is possible to get something not too far off this look by using the 'Altocumulus castellanus' preset and making sure to switch 'Model' to '3.9.04'. You may need to try many seeds before you get something that looks great, but that was also a problem in the R&D setup - different seeds would create blobs that separated from the main cloud and/or too many smooth areas.

The wispy edges are something I plan to incorporate into Easy Cloud in future. But perhaps I could make a tutorial that shows how to combine Easy Cloud with other methods to get something similar.




Any update on that tutorial, Matt?

DutchDimension

No tutorial then?  :(  :'(
Would still love to see it. I'm once again heavily invested in making skies and clouds at my current employer, so any additional training and information would be welcome.

Come on guys!  ;D

D.A. Bentley (SuddenPlanet)


bobbystahr

something borrowed,
something Blue.
Ring out the Old.
Bring in the New
Bobby Stahr, Paracosmologist

D.A. Bentley (SuddenPlanet)

Quote from: bobbystahr on April 25, 2020, 10:00:00 AMUp Vote as well!
Bobby, I'm working on this more and will share my results including the TGD(s) when I'm done.

I know how frustrating it is when others won't share their findings through tgd's but I understand it's a lot of time invested, and a lot of experienced Terragen users treat their tgd's like Soure Code because of this. 

Stay tuned!

-Derek