Realism advice

Started by Kevin F, August 09, 2019, 02:40:01 AM

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Kevin F


N-drju

Thanks! This is a nice and concise... tutorial? ;)

I think I can directly relate some points to the Terragen's workflow:

1. Let's talk about sharp edges

This condition, to a significant extent, could be met with the "pixel filter" feature. I must admit that I always set it to "sharp"... I guess I shouldn't. Maybe I wrongfully overreact against blurry images. :D

2. Pay attention to shadows

I always do! Whenever I render, I always use the "soft shadows" option but, come to think of it, the "diameter" parameter that I use may be too much, too little I guess... Chiefly because I am actually afraid to overdo the softness.

The part referring to avoiding certain light sources made me really worried... After all, one of the most important features in Terragen lighting system is... ambient light. It really makes me wonder how much of a "legacy item" TG's lighting system really is...

What I also find seriously confusing is the fact they refer to skylights as offering soft shadows per se, while TG can have skylight casting soft shadows or not...

3. Adding a pinch of chaos

This is an interesting point and something that, surprisingly, only a handful of people can handle.

I admit that I also tend to leave the ground completely flat if, say, I would like to place some objects or people on it. For shame...?

What I have learned, however, is that one can achieve some really appealing colorful chaos by having a single, double-colored power fractal, followed by three, maybe four, single-colored power fractals. I usually used only one PF with just one size setting for a basic ground texture... How wrong I was...

Still, working with displacements and bumps, whether it's terrain or in-door still is something I yet have to try. This is a very important tip.

4. Focus on the focal length

Not too much practical information in this point... But again - there are options like this present in the "camera" settings. Focal length being one of them.

5. Adding a layer of photoreal goodness

I think I saw some of the options mentioned in this point somewhere in Terragen. I've heard about "blooming" in TG but never really explored it so far. Photographic grain is something I did not know about (seriously), though it is not a TG feature of course. This would have to be done in post work.
"This year - a factory of semiconductors. Next year - a factory of whole conductors!"

WAS

Quote from: N-drju on August 09, 2019, 03:48:07 AMThanks! This is a nice and concise... tutorial? ;)

I think I can directly relate some points to the Terragen's workflow:

1. Let's talk about sharp edges

This condition, to a significant extent, could be met with the "pixel filter" feature. I must admit that I always set it to "sharp"... I guess I shouldn't. Maybe I wrongfully overreact against blurry images. :D

2. Pay attention to shadows

I always do! Whenever I render, I always use the "soft shadows" option but, come to think of it, the "diameter" parameter that I use may be too much, too little I guess... Chiefly because I am actually afraid to overdo the softness.

The part referring to avoiding certain light sources made me really worried... After all, one of the most important features in Terragen lighting system is... ambient light. It really makes me wonder how much of a "legacy item" TG's lighting system really is...

What I also find seriously confusing is the fact they refer to skylights as offering soft shadows per se, while TG can have skylight casting soft shadows or not...

3. Adding a pinch of chaos

This is an interesting point and something that, surprisingly, only a handful of people can handle.

I admit that I also tend to leave the ground completely flat if, say, I would like to place some objects or people on it. For shame...?

What I have learned, however, is that one can achieve some really appealing colorful chaos by having a single, double-colored power fractal, followed by three, maybe four, single-colored power fractals. I usually used only one PF with just one size setting for a basic ground texture... How wrong I was...

Still, working with displacements and bumps, whether it's terrain or in-door still is something I yet have to try. This is a very important tip.

4. Focus on the focal length

Not too much practical information in this point... But again - there are options like this present in the "camera" settings. Focal length being one of them.

5. Adding a layer of photoreal goodness

I think I saw some of the options mentioned in this point somewhere in Terragen. I've heard about "blooming" in TG but never really explored it so far. Photographic grain is something I did not know about (seriously), though it is not a TG feature of course. This would have to be done in post work.


Good points..chaos is something I feel one with. I cannot stand flats, bare colours, etc..there needs to be varying degrees of lights, darks, saturated, and desaturated colours. I tend to use a single PF plugged to the main input of a surface layer, and than fed into the child, but using the child input to augment with multiply colour, add multiplied colour, saturation, etc with separate grayscale PFs (or coloured in the case of add multiplied colour).