Calico,
It will take ages yet, but when done the animation will be posted in my
DeviantART gallery, and possibly on Youtube as well for easier embedding in a tutorial using it as an example of cross platform, data format conversion and rendering export on the
Blender to RenderMan Blog, of which I am co admin and a contributing author.
Part of the idea behind this scene is to use conversion and import of real world scientific data out of context, and custom procedural modeling of scientific data, and so on. Details of what will be added to the scene before completion I will keep to myself for now.
Another important part of this scene is that I've had Terragen for nearly a decade and hardly had the time for 3D of any kind outside of work. This image is the fourth render I've done in Terragen since 2000. The previous ones were test renders using DEM data of the Grand Canyon, CO, USA and Kokohead Peninsula, Hawaii.
I will post links here to the completed animation when done, as well as adding a still of the completed scene.
Seth,
Blender's default clouds are painted on a sky and are 2D. There is no way to position the Sun behind them using this method. I will be using volume clouds within a specifically shaped boundary mesh with full transparency, and no specularity, shadow reception, reflection or any other visibility.
Then I can create clouds within this exported volume cloud zone using POVMan and Renderman. POVRay/MegaPOV/POVMan's DF3 volume rendered clouds are worth looking at and I would recommend them as a way to go for anyone considering creating a Terragen > POV export plugin.
