First try. I had a hard time (harder than I thought it would be) to get a decent 'wall of ice' sticking out of a reasonably flat tundra. First tried it procedurally with large scale clamped fractals, blended by a simple shape, but couldn't get the right shape. So I painted a simple mask and added some redirect, resulting in this image. I'll drag it through WM and see if I can get it nicely fractured, along with some morene and outflows of meltwater. Also the strata are too warped (they are blue node strata, by the way, based on altitude and sinuses). The ground, sky and some boulders and small rock need a lot of work still.
---Dune
'they are blue node strata, by the way, based on altitude and sinuses' aachoo.
Bless you.
The plain looks good. I think I would try some more vertical 'chunks' of ice in the glacier. I think the sin based nodes maybe too strong.
i was thinking of the farside comics when i saw this...
"the good news is we wont have to move the house for while" :D
i definitely agree with henry, the plain looks great.
but the glacier needs better surfacing.
Second iteration, but I have to check how the ice crept over the tundra, and were there trees at all? This wall of ice is too huge, it must have been a sloping bubbly mass, with perhaps crumbling edges, pushing debris (morene) forward. Terrain done in PS and taken through WM + extra in TG.
I like the ice in the water. It's a nice touch.
I think the edge of the glacier would depend on the season, what latitude the face is at, etc.
nice and interesting.
One question is, is your ice coming or going?
I think it looks more like going, because there are more signs of erosion than of deposition in your shapes.
In that situation I would expect some stony ground around it that only very slowly is reoccupied by vegetation.
A Birch as early tree is perfect, But I´d say, this is a really fast one. But why not, it fits in the image.
Best regards,
Jan
@ Mahnmut: What I hope to make is the ice coming in an Ice Age developing over relatively flat ground (Netherlands), pushing the ground forward into morenes (if this is the right word), like this next iteration.
I wouldn't know (wasn't there at the time) if the land would be frozen and snowed over all the time, or tundra like with just the ice moving over it as a sort of glacier. I also don't know if the ice would dive deep into the soil and thus spilling rocks and debris over the moving edge, and if the edges would be smooth, with occasional pieces breaking off when hitting hard round, or steep, like in todays glaciers where they melt at the low end.
I still need to get rocks and debris into the ice itself, perhaps in a bit layer like formations. At least I think that would be the case. Perhaps the end of this ice flow would be a rough mixture of ice, and soil, not as 'seperated' as here.
The ice pushing the ground before it is good and probably happened. Moraines are deposits left behind as the glacier melts. Sometimes huge boulders get stacked from the ice melting away.
It has been a long time since geology in school. I have forgotten a lot.
How about this one? A bit funky perhaps, but it randomly came out this way with a little redirection. Rendered out in 1 hour and 30 mins @ 0.7 and AA6. This is made with a very simple soft PS mask of a ragged circle and the rest done in TG. No fancy WM stuff. Next iteration will have the moraines and will be less plastic (I added another perlin)!
I really like the shapes on the distant part of the glacier, looks far more interesting now! Not sure how this will work but try slapping on the attached clip file to the surface of your glacier (you may need to reduce the luminocity to fit in with your scene lighting but it may be interesting anyway. It is a clip from a very old project Feb 2008 - http://forums.planetside.co.uk/index.php?topic=3352.0 (http://forums.planetside.co.uk/index.php?topic=3352.0)
I'm sure you can make a better ice shader anyway, but from the glaciers I have seen most of them are a little more blue than white.
I've seen snow melt into shapes like that. :)
yep, as Ryan said, much more glacier-ish now as far as the structure is concerned :)
Some ice-blue will only add to that.
Great job Dune!
I like image no 4 the most but they all look intimidating ;D
Would like to try it with an blueish iceberg so thanks for the idea and info.
Btw I think I saw Dune's glacier north of Stockholm in January this year. Hell of a winter.
Cheers
Cool work Ulco :)
I hope you will stick to your original POV eventually, since I like the mudpools and stones there. It looks convincing.
For the ice I'd go for something more slightly bluish, but also less glossy/reflective.
Also you could try to add some spikyness and breaking effect by applying stretched voronoi displacements.
See here for some examples of both:
http://www.travelvivi.com/the-most-beautiful-glaciers-in-the-world/ (http://www.travelvivi.com/the-most-beautiful-glaciers-in-the-world/)
Martin
I really like the new ice structure. The rocks in the foreground seem right also.
I wonder if some photos of the glaciers in Greenland would help. They are retreating.
The iterations with some water are more interesting I think. Many good ideas here.
Thanks for the clip, Ryan, I'll certainly plug it in today. Never saw your earlier work, I wasn't there back then, but it looks good. And, Martin, thanks for your suggestion; I did put some fake stones in as spikes, as well as stretched ridges, but I might enhance that (and put some voronoi in).
I agree with the too white color and too much reflection. I looked at quite some photo's, and some glaciers are really bluish, other quite white, some also have dirt and gravel in them in stark lines.
I got some sort of moraine now, by merging the mask with itself through a color adjust shader, and also tried to get some 'TU-snow' in there. Problem was that due to the displacement intersection, there was a sharp edge on the glacier, so I restricted the effect with a distance shader. I'll take it out again, maybe.
I was wondering which height the distribution shader reads, the one after compute terrain, or the last one in line?
Ghehe, well there's now some debate about what compute node is being used.
Generally the last compute terrain node before the distribution shader is being used.
(For example, the smoothing function in a surfacelayer uses the smoothed terrain generated by the last compute terrain before that node)
I still think that would make sense, but like I said things are getting a bit muddy now since Goms found out there might be problems with this.
QuoteGenerally the last compute terrain node before the distribution shader is being used.
So if I have a surface shader with some displacements after the last compute terrain, it will not be considered by a distri shader? I don't attach anything to the distri input, by the way, it's 'hanging loose at the blend end'.
Perhaps you could show a part of your network to show what you mean? I think I don't understand?
I will, shortly.
Here's another version. I tried Ryan's tgc, but changed that as well. Also added some blue nodes for voronoi displacement and coloring, blended by a 3D perlin, etc. It's getting more and more complicated as time goes on....
the last one is especially beautiful...love the surface and shape work on the ice!
Hi
Klasse! And very much better now.
The ground is excellent, only the ice needs some cracks and/or sharp edges.
ciao
Naoo
Looks like a piece of marmor now, a bit. Will need some translucency.
it now has a nice sculpted look to it, slippery.
some translucency would be good too,
Another tgd, with the same mask and different displacements, as a start...
I really like the "versie-8" version. Very convincing crusted snow overlaying icy rock. Excellent work.
John
This last render seems to be right on. The ice looks like it has been 'conveying' debris. The ridges at the front of the ice sheet look very good; at least very much how they appear along the south side of Lake Ontario. Awesome!
The last tgd, but a little enhanced with a moraine slightly whitened by powdered snow from the glacier. I'm still not satisfied with the layers in the ice, and some grass patches through snow in the front, but that can be solved. This one took longer; 3 hours (0.7 @6), probably due to the reflective shader in the mud. The jpg has quality 70%, by the way. Had to.
You're doing a great job. The latest one is very good but I must admit I like the shapes in the 8 best. Keep on posting, I love to follow development threads like this!
I think these shapes a more like a real glacier, but I also liked the '8' shapes. But it's fairly easy to put them together...
I like the glacier here best based on your lighting. The surfacing and water suit the conditions perfectly. No hints of warmth here anywhere.
I had trouble getting the snow to work with displacement intersection; a sharp line occurred at the base of the glacier (quite logically actually), so I figured out a way to avoid that. Here I put it all together differently again; the big displacements of the glacier after the displacement intersection of the snow. A big difference in coloring, and I wouldn't know why.
And something else I tried...
Quite honestly the last 2 do the best job of conveying the look of ice. cracktest-2C is I think pretty successful, you just would need to change the color of the glacier now to be more blue. I personally felt all along that the "stretched image map" look in the glacier was the biggest fault, and this latest image avoids that while at the same time seemingly achieving a more "translucent" ice look. So see if you can change the color, then I'd say it'll be pretty top notch.
- Oshyan
Hey Oshyan, thanks. I'll spend some more time on it.
ps. How about the Garden of Eternity ;)
How about it indeed! You wouldn't want to be in my shoes right now - massive data recovery efforts. :( May need to get the source files from you again TBH. :(
- Oshyan
That doesn't sound hopeful, so you got a virus or a breaking down pc? I've been there. Contact me if you need anything! Good luck.
RAID melt-down (ironic). *sigh* I'll let you know if I need to get the files again. I'll know what I'll be able to retrieve in the next few days (hopefully everything!).
End of off-topic. ;)
- Oshyan
I'm having a hard time with this one. The colors seem to react differently depending on where I put the glacier. Glacier as a child of a surface layer somewhere in line after the snow patches, or as main displacement and color of a copied planet. The blue nodes I used for the banding (get altitude in texture and get position) also react differently. Mixing them with some ice (Ryan's slightly altered default ice shader) makes all gray, so I had to ADD color by factor 2. Which makes the snow patches (same linking) a bit bleached out. I am getting confused, so if I have time (this already took me days) I'll get into the Ice Age again.
Anyway, here's a bit bluish ice, but I'm not yet satisfied and another one is cooking...
The ice is looking better in this one, though scale is thrown off a bit now perhaps. Needs some more surface shadowing I think somehow. That may just be down to the soft atmosphere not throwing more hard shadows though. The snow is also thrown out of whack, as you said (was perfect in the earlier versions). It's definitely hard to balance all these aspects in a scene like this!
- Oshyan
Not all glaciers have this old bluish sheen I've noticed, some are fairly white, with layers of dirt and rock, others just white like plain snow, others like transparent ice cubes. I think this bluish ice is too icy, and I will try for more 'packed snow', with occasional patches of ice, or glistening layers. Fresh snow on top anyway, as this will probably be the case in the Ice Age.
So I've tried a different venue; no Photoshop mask anymore but a set of masks produced by distance shaders. And the glacier end will be lower, which is more appropriate than this wall of ice in my last tries. Here's the first try. The glassy stones are really weird, they need to shift. Will be continued...
Interesting new approach. I agree with this version at least that more white is appropriate. Even with the previous version (which I honestly liked more), a whiter surface would probably be better.
- Oshyan
This is bringing back memories from a past life...
I think this approach to the glacier is much better. I think that the top of the glacier would be whiter. The translucent blues would be near the bottom.
Exactly, and that's what I'm working on right now; snow on top, bluish in the cracks...
The last one is looking quite good in terms of the bluish tint. With the improvements you suggested, it should look awesome. It's just how I remembered seeing the glaciers in the Himalayas. ;D If you need reference pics let me know.
Thanks, Saurav, but I think I've found enough glaciers in my book library and on the internet. But if you care to post a particularly nice one here, it would be nice as a comparison.
Anyway, my efforts are slowly paying out. I don't like the regularity of the ground yet, but the masses are scaled alright I think. Not too grotesque, but still quite awesome. I only need to get a little closer to the glacier I think (but it's so cold out there :D ) A low POV with a clump of dying trees right in front would be nice, but I also like to keep the oversight. And I'm not satisfied about the cracks and 'whiteness' of the snow. Perhaps I should darken the sky...
Woah, big improvement! That crack shading is dynamite. The trees are important for the sense of scale, without them I'd think the foreground is more like small depressions in a relatively flat landscape rather than hills and depressions filled with snow drifts. Maybe there's something more than can be done about that? Previous versions seemed to have a better inherent sense of scale, but the glacier in this one is far better than any previous incarnation. You definitely nailed that part!
- Oshyan
agree with Oshyan...DYNAMITE!
This is the most convincing glacier so far.
;D Wait till you the next iteration... really perfect!
The bushes help with the scale I think. I would avoid trees, I do not think they would be very big adjacent to a glacier anyway. Some mammoths, woolly rhinos, or yaks(?) would help with the scale. They would also look cool.
These are the last remaining birch trees, due to be swallowed up my the encroaching ice mass and the pile of rubble it's pushing forward. That's the idea. I worked on some nice lighting yesterday, but I'm still not pleased with the foreground soil. I've searched for 3D mammoths indeed, but couldn't find one (not free anyway). Perhaps interesting to make one, but the hair would be a big problem for me (and TG2).
I got some interesting displacements when one of the distance shader colors was set to -1 (very black), in combination with smooth terrain where displacement intersection was active. It probably reversed or something.
Hmm, I enjoyed the lighting of the previous one a good deal more, but the ice is indeed improved here. You are tenacious!
- Oshyan
Well, there's no work (no income) at the moment, so why not teach myself some more ;)
And did you indeed like the soft light more? I prefer the more dramatic light, like Freelancah did in 'some experiment': http://forums.planetside.co.uk/index.php?topic=11095.0 (http://forums.planetside.co.uk/index.php?topic=11095.0)
Very convincing glacier. If you could somehow incorporate a few touches of blue translucent ice here and there, and maybe a few sparkles, then it would be perfect. But it's not far off!
I had the blue ice in before, but decided against it, seeing many photo's of glaciers which were actually quite white. And the sparkles wouldn't be seen at hundreds of meters distance, I purposely blended them by a distance shader to 1-100m.
I would actually say the light in the earlier image here: http://forums.planetside.co.uk/index.php?topic=11057.msg114000#msg114000 is more "dramatic", though perhaps also "soft" at the same time, at least in that there is less large-scale contrast. But the sun being in view makes the sky more dramatic, and there is much less of an "obscured", "tunnel vision" feeling somehow, whereas in the latest version it feels somewhat claustrophobic with the darker foreground lighting. Honestly I'd say it hurts the sense of scale a bit. But as I said the glacier itself is definitely an improvement.
- Oshyan
Dune a few reference images of glaciers from my last trip to the Himalayas. This one is looking up at the glacier from the bottom of the mountain.
2nd is on the glacier it self. The glacier is at 6000m above sea level. ;D
Thanks for your comments and pictures, guys. The pictures are amazing, especially the second one. Must have been a great trip!
I might try another sort of lighting, after I've conquered my wall of ice. This latest iteration quite pleases me, so I made it in B&W. I always liked Black&White photography more than color (I still have boxes full of negatives dusting away). Gives more drama.
And in color, no postwork.
perfect!
love the foreground snow details too!
You were right to include the trees. As always your work is very impressive. I think you have nailed this one now.
The latest one is very nice indeed. That glacier surfacing is pretty much photorealistic, particularly in black and white. Very impressive. I like the new camera perspective too, with the grass and whatnot. I do however wish for a little greater sense of size from the glacier, maybe a closer perspective looking a bit upward, with a vertical frame instead of horizontal ("widescreen")? I know, big changes to what you've been doing, but I think it could make for a more "epic" shot. You have all of the scenery worked out at the least, now IMO it's just a matter of finding the right perspective and getting the lighting dialed in.
- Oshyan
i'm nearly speechless Dune, 8) :)
they look perfect,the last two, they look really good, realistic.
This last image Ulco is what I think most all of us have waiting for. It delivers a close render of realism. Our individual tastes can wish for different things; but as is, I believe you have achieved your goal.
I'm not finished yet. Here's a totally different approach, now the distance shader masks have been replaced by a perlin 'blob' blended by high contrast immense ridges + a simple shape for the basic shape. Added some high contrast ridges (unclamped) as vertical displacements in a redirect shader + some more small perlin for detailed blobs. And some things I cannot remember. The light is not as good as in another discarded render I did yesterday, and the ground is still totally raw, but I like the icy glacier so far.
I'll try a vertical render in the last one, Oshyan.
Hi
It's nice to see how you get better and better.
ciao
Naoo
Both of the last two renders are great, but quite different. I like the Nov9 one - no I love it, but looking at the foreground makes me a bit dizzy because of the blur. The glacier and lighting is simply fantastic.
Here's some more renders from the last setup.
You have really nailed the "ice" shader setup Dune. You might consider selling it on the NWDA community store!
- Oshyan
Thanks, Oshyan, but I can't really do that. It wasn't entirely mine. Actually, Ryan gave us his tgc for old ice. I modified things and added snow, but the idea to use a default shader with its translucency and such was his. It's quite simple in fact, just add the snow over the old ice tgc with a surface layer with restricted angle. The terrain is just a large displacement, blended by another and a simple shape to get a huge blob. Then add some redirect with unclamped fractals (much contrast, shove it towards black) until you got some cracks, oh yes, and I did indeed add some voronoi cracks.
Something else I had forgotten:
QuoteSo if I have a surface shader with some displacements after the last compute terrain, it will not be considered by a distri shader? I don't attach anything to the distri input, by the way, it's 'hanging loose at the blend end'.
Perhaps you could show a part of your network to show what you mean? I think I don't understand?
Here's a screendump of my 'loose hanging' distribution shader setup. It's not supposed to get any input, does it? It just reads it from the last (?) surface shader?
Then share it for free, even better. ;)
- Oshyan
stunning work
Wow!
From the first image to the last ones this is quite a journey ! I like the snowy and icy look of the glacier :)
By the way did you forgot to adjust the levels in post or do you prefer this look in your images , Dune?
The glacier does look better as it is already is with such a little postwork , to me at least...
What post work do you mean? You could post what you would make of it, if you like... Personally, I like a bit of a haze, it shouldn't be too harsh.
Quote from: Dune on November 15, 2010, 11:48:04 AM
... Personally, I like a bit of a haze, it shouldn't be too harsh.
I know what you mean but i think your images are a little to much on the , how could i say...washed out (?) side...
This is maybe a subjective thing or on your monitor your images look better or what not .
http://www.photoshopessentials.com/photo-editing/levels/
This link says it better as i can say here. And i know that you most probably know this already , just speaking loud here Dune :)
Knew you'd get there in the end!
Best glacier surfacing I've seen in Terragen, by far.
Well done.
Chris
The * gletsjer-13nov2010-allwhites.jpg undoubtedly is the best of all thus far. You've nailed the glacier perfectly!