suggestion - Sunlight independent control

[JimB]

something i been wondering about with the sun and such...how can you set up a moonlite scene?
im guessing something like placing the sun infront of another planet, lower its brightness and change the color to a white-blue
or have another light sorce infront of the moon to make it look like the sun reflected off of it....sounded like this is the best place to put it

Technically speaking that should work, provided your GI settings were high enough, I imagine. It's exactly what happens in real life with moonlight being a simple reflection of the Sun's light.

[Njen]

the only problem with that is i don't have or use photoshop
its alittle like cheating lol

show me how to do that only in terragen

Gimp is free, and can be done just as easily in.

btw, nothing is cheating if it gets you what you want. Technically creating a landscape and rendering it as a picture is 'cheating' when you could go out to take a picture of it outside.

In the end it's all pixels on a screen and what ever gets you there fastest with the most desired result is the best way to do anything, don't fall prey to single program elitism when a combination of programs could help with your solution.

[rcallicotte]

Create a planet, kill the sun object (or save it for later - your choice), download a good picture of the moon from Google Images (free) and use this object to map (using the Image Shader) to your new planet that you have set in the distance on the horizon away from your first planet.  If you have kept the sun object, make it invisible, set it at the correct angle, and then set the strength accordingly.  Or you could increase the luminosity of that planet and/or just use source lights to light it and your surrounding scenery. 

These are ideas I've tried and used successfully.  Try some of these and see what you come up with.

The most difficult thing might be to find a moon JPG on Google that doesn't need a lot of trimming, but it is possible.

the only problem with that is i don't have or use photoshop
its alittle like cheating lol

show me how to do that only in terragen