Halloween (maybe) -- FINAL RENDER ON 4th PAGE

[typerextreme]

I've been playing around off and on with terragen, and have finally made something that I would like to share on here. I started off with wanting to make it be Halloween-ish. That's where the orange color scheme comes into play.  I'm asking for help and critique on this image because I think there is something missing.   I was thinking another fog layer (really a low-level cumulus 3d).

Render stats
800x600 (i'm using free version)
55 min 15 seconds  (see comp stats below if you wonder why it took so long)
1,614,759 micro triangles

Moon is actually a second planet with haze density and bluesky density set to 0.
Starfield is an image projection.
Fog is cumulus cloud layer.
Tree is the Large Ash model provided by lightning. ( http://forums.planetside.co.uk/index.php?topic=3759.0 )

Raytracing was checked on the Cumulus layer that is in the sky, otherwise raytracing was not used.

For more stats just look at the tgd.

[cyphyr]

Heh, we're chasing the same idea

Couple of things I've noticed ...

The ash tree has no shadow, and no obvious reason for being illuminated from the front.
I'd work on the ground texture, give it some relief to catch the moons shadow. And some grasses, bushes etc...
Is your sun positioned behind the moon? If that's your main light source that's where it should be.
I found that to get "silver lining" to my clouds I had to have "Enable ray traced shadows" OFF in the cloud layer The down side to this is the density has to be pretty high to actually obscure the moon. I also had Glow in atmosphere enabled for the "Sun/Moon" light source. To stop the whole sky glowing I dropped the glow power settings the the atmosphere and player with them in the cloud settings... quite a complex balancing act.
I'd add the stars manually in post.

Hope this doesn't sound like I'm slamming you top  the ground, forgive me I've been thinking quite intensely about all these points with my current image ,,,

Keep working on it, you're off to a great start, night time images are hard.

Richard

[typerextreme]

Heh, we're chasing the same idea

Couple of things I've noticed ...

The ash tree has no shadow, and no obvious reason for being illuminated from the front.
I'd work on the ground texture, give it some relief to catch the moons shadow. And some grasses, bushes etc...
Is your sun positioned behind the moon? If that's your main light source that's where it should be.
I found that to get "silver lining" to my clouds I had to have "Enable ray traced shadows" OFF in the cloud layer The down side to this is the density has to be pretty high to actually obscure the moon. I also had Glow in atmosphere enabled for the "Sun/Moon" light source. To stop the whole sky glowing I dropped the glow power settings the the atmosphere and player with them in the cloud settings... quite a complex balancing act.
I'd add the stars manually in post.

Hope this doesn't sound like I'm slamming you top  the ground, forgive me I've been thinking quite intensely about all these points with my current image ,,,

Keep working on it, you're off to a great start, night time images are hard.

Richard

I've found out that night images are hard. the hard way lol.

Maybe i should've explained the image a little more. I actually didn't do anything to the ground, it's the bare ground that terragen starts with. I'll try and play with it a little.

The tree and surrounding fog is lit by a light source not the moon or sun. I couldn't figure out how to get the moon to light the ground. Actually the sun is positioned opposite the moon. Moon heading is 30, sun heading is 210.

I'll try moving the sun behind the moon and see what it gives me. I'll also try the ray traced shadows off in the cloud layer.  I don't have photoshop but I do have GIMP and Paint.net  i'll think about doing stars later, but idk, it seems easier to have terragen do them for me lol.

I might try adding some grass or bushes, and hope and pray it doesn't kill my computer. Oh one detail i forgot was i rendered this at 0.75 quality, with super sampling. If that even means anything for this image.

Don't worry bout it, i never even thought you were slamming me to the ground.

[Henry Blewer]

I think you need more objects to give the image depth, they don't need to be very close to each other. I would add a dry grass object as a population. The fog is too dense. With more objects spaced apart, the fog could be much thinner; but the more distant objects would fade into it.
The theme is a good one. I always liked Halloween.

[typerextreme]

I think you need more objects to give the image depth, they don't need to be very close to each other. I would add a dry grass object as a population. The fog is too dense. With more objects spaced apart, the fog could be much thinner; but the more distant objects would fade into it.
The theme is a good one. I always liked Halloween.

I'll see what I can do. Thanks for the tips, hopefully have another render in another hour or two. Assuming the computer doesn't crash between now and then.

[typerextreme]

Crap! I keep forgetting some things, does anyone think I even need to use AA bloom? I used it but i'm wondering if it just makes it take longer.

[cyphyr]

Crap! I keep forgetting some things, does anyone think I even need to use AA bloom? I used it but i'm wondering if it just makes it take longer.

Wouldn't bother for now, you at the start of this journey. You should'nt need supper sampling at this stage either.  Check that your cloud sampling is not too high also.

Richard

[PG]

I'd leave it on to be honest. You most likely won't notice more than a second or two difference and potentially could lose some quality, especially on the right hand side of the tree. Which as Cypher mentioned, doesn't look very flat. May be worth playing around with the brightness and contrast/gamma settings.

[typerextreme]

Wouldn't bother for now, you at the start of this journey. You should'nt need supper sampling at this stage either.  Check that your cloud sampling is not too high also.

Richard

I turned off super sampling and AA bloom. Cloud samples are both 16. Atmosphere samples are both 16 as well. I set the fog's density to 0.003.  (half what it was) Added a population of bushes. Did a quick heightfield as well, although i'm still playing with it a little.

[typerextreme]

I would love to have the moon actually cast light onto the surface but I can't seem to make it do it, or else it's showing up somewhere i can't see it.

I can probably fake it using a light source, like I am using for in front of the tree to light it up.

Right now, i'm toying with another sun being behind the moon, and just peeking off the right edge of the moon. Quick rendering as i type.

[typerextreme]

Ok so the sun behind the moon didn't work out like I expected. I'm lost now.

[cyphyr]

If your "moon" disappeared, up its luminosity to 1 (or thereabouts)

Richard

[typerextreme]

If your "moon" disappeared, up its luminosity to 1 (or thereabouts)

Richard

Oops sorry bout that, should've specified. I didn't move the sun that was lighting up the moon. I just made another sun and placed it behind the moon but increased the heading by 7.5.

All in all, the moon stayed visible, just had an ugly yellow spot next to it. And part of the sky on the right side lit up as well as some of the ground on the right side.

Right now, i'm rendering two versions of the image with the tweakings i've done. One with the light source like the first image, and another without the light source. Both images have a new population of bushes and a heightfield in place. The fog's density has been reduced to 0.001. The clouds in the sky are not doing ray tracing anymore. I have disabled AA bloom and supersampling. Will post image one in about 15-20 minutes.

[typerextreme]

Scratch that, it'll be about 30-45 minutes. I've gotta reposition the tree. At the moment it's buried

[cyphyr]

I;m rendering at the moment but I'll upload a simplified version of my scene later. It may not be what your after but it should give you some pointers

Richard