Hi all,
Well I had this scene for some time but it looked quite different http://www.3ddigitalgraphics.com/terragen/outcrops.jpg (http://www.3ddigitalgraphics.com/terragen/outcrops.jpg) , Marc Gebhart posted his winter trees in the file sharing so I thought to try these trees in this scene. For the new scene I moved the camera down and to the right a bit and found a nice place. Added snow and tried to create some granularity to the snow but it's not quite there yet, I should add some of those cool sparkles by DandelO. The terrain was done in World Machine 1.25 Standard. Right click on image and choose view image to see it full size.
Glen
(http://www.3ddigitalgraphics.com/winter_trees.jpg)
Simply beautiful :)
Some more work on the snow :) ?
Richard
I would just like to get a bit more interesting of a surface, here is an example http://www.trekzone.ca/files/images/FootprintsSnow.jpg (http://www.trekzone.ca/files/images/FootprintsSnow.jpg). I have something in the works and I try to get it up here soon.
Thanks,
Glen
Very nice, I love those shadows on the snow.
Really excellent, grat lighting and shadows, POV is good too.
Wow! Wonderful atmo and lighting - love this!
Thanks everyone for the nice compliments!! :)
Glen
Very nice. My only suggestion is to think about soft shadows, as they might be more in keeping with the hazy background - but of course, that ups render time.
Thanks domdib,
I like your suggestion, I will have to give it a try and see how much the render time goes up.
Glen
Hi Glen,
great scene, agree about the soft shadows
cheers
Jason
OK folks here is a smaller one but with some soft shadows and some fine displacement on the snow. Please give me your thoughts on the displacement and if you think it works or not. I do plan on rendering it out larger and that will allow a better look at the details.
Thanks,
Glen
Very excellent, Glen.
Marc
I think the small displacements really add to the scene Glen. Fresh snow with a little breeze when it has fallen looks like this. Did you try some ambient occlusion for softening the shadows? I think it renders faster, but does a similar job 'lightening' the shadows.
Lovely.
Very nice work on the snow, looks good!
I think the bumpsize of the snow is good, but perhaps you might try a little stretching (1.5 - 2) on either the X or Z-axis, depending on your camera rotation, to make the bumps look a bit stretched from left to right (POV-wise). I don't know if you like that kind of effect, but I do.
The softshadows are good and I guess you used the default diameter of 0.5 degrees which is physically correct. However, somehow I have the feeling this image would benefit from exaggerated soft-shadows. Say 2 or 3 degrees for example (but keep in mind that you have to increase sampling to around 12-15 samples then).
All in all very good work, great atmosphere!
Cheers,
Martin
To me the best part of the scene is the trees and snow in the mist. That atmosphere really complements the trees well and gives a very wonderful winter feel.
Thanks all!!
Martin: I will give the stretchy snow displacement a try, I would like to see how it affects the scene. I wouldn't mind kicking up the softness on the shadows, in my opinion that should help the snow too.
njeneb: I haven't tried any ambient occlusion but I really should, it's one of my favorite options in other 3D apps.
Glen
Nice improvement on the scene with soft shadows :) I like the POV and would like to see some icy water in the ditches :)
Here is an update, the stretch on the snow isn't showing so well so this needs to be increased and there is some ice on the creek but I would like to do more with it in the future. The best thing is the shadows are softer, I think that makes a big improvement.
Thanks,
Glen
this is much better(imho)...love the shadows especially, I often use upto 5 for these.
The shadows are now gorgeous. If you were able to add a little more sparkle to the snow, I think this would be a winner.
Very impressive and inspiring Glen. I need to try something like this
Thanks for the compliments guys, I'm working on dandelO's sparkle shader - first to understand it and then add it to my scene.
Glen
To get it to sparkle, Glen, you'll need your sunlight in front of the camera. This -45(approx' to camera) angle won't give you any sparkles with my shader, unfortunately. Sparkling will only work with sunlight directly in front or in-shot.
I think if you put a direct sunlight overhead with no shadows but with specular highlights checked then you should get sparkles, whatever the sunlight angle. Don't quote me on that, I haven't tried it.
Just an idea (haven't tried either); how about making fake stones lying on the snow; and, as small as you can; color them white and add luminosity?
Hee hee, we went through that aswell, Bob, backwards and forwards. Trouble there is that luminosity still sparkles in the shadowed areas, too. You need actual reflection data to make it work correctly. :)
Thanks dandelO,
I was just starting to work it in my scene, I didn't spend to much time messing around with it.
Glen
Quote from: dandelO on February 12, 2010, 10:26:58 PM
Hee hee, we went through that aswell, Bob, backwards and forwards. Trouble there is that luminosity still sparkles in the shadowed areas, too. You need actual reflection data to make it work correctly. :)
Maybe just use the Painted Shader and paint the sparkles where you want them (not in the shadows of course).
Yes definitely an option worth investigating.
I have another thought, sometime back a person came up with a way to have snow on the shadow side of mountains. This is a normal as weather warms and melts the snow on the sunny slopes the shadowed areas hold onto the snow.
If I remember right is was based of the position of the sun so my thought would be to use this for masking the sparkles out of the shadow areas. If this works and is based of the suns position then moving the sun would automatically move the mask.
I took a quick look for the post but didn't find it, I will have to do a better search and check my downloads to see if I have this.
Thanks,
Glen
@ Glen: I worked on sparkles as well and used tiny fake stones and a reflective shader instead of Dandel0's luminosity method. It works very well; no sparkles in shadowed areas, but as Dandelo said, only when the sun is quite in front of you. The second sun might do the trick. See here: http://forums.planetside.co.uk/index.php?topic=8488.0 (http://forums.planetside.co.uk/index.php?topic=8488.0)
---Dune
The final snow shaders I shared don't use luminosity anymore either, Dune, it was far too much trouble keeping it controlled in the shadows and, it really wasn't correct anyway to use luminosity for snow-glinting.
The sparkles now are from reflections via tiny(1mm scale) perlin dots over the entire surface, they still only glint in direct light, though.
It's probably much the same idea as your stones method.
I should probably re-upload them, since I'm an idiot I haven't put them back here yet. I'll do it shortly...
Allright, Dandel0, I didn't know that. Nice album, by the way...
Thanks Dune,
I'll check out your method too.
Glen
Small update, lessen the fine displacement in the snow - I think it looks a lot better. Softer shadows with more samples.
It's funny I had to told about the harsh shadows I had in my first post of this image, but this weekend just looking out the window in the backyard I realized they needed more softening.
I really do appreciate everyone's input and help!!
Next will be sparkles...
Glen
The shadows in the newest version really do look great.
This looks very good Glen; the sparkles will put the icing on the cake.
I think I prefer the softness of the shadows in the previous image, but only slightly. Look forward to the sparkles.