Planet

Started by FrankB, February 19, 2012, 07:06:45 PM

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cyphyr

This looking great. Getting the full variation of a real planet is a cool goal but ultimately extremely difficult. I mean how many differing types of terrain are there (colour/morphology). Loads is the answer I think. So going for a planet that is best viewed from a minimum altitude is probably a good way forward.

<planet rant mode>
The other thing that people always ask for is a "FULLY PROCEDURAL PLANET", something they can place a camera absolutely anywhere and get great shots. I think this is a flawed idea because although it would be great just how much of a planet can you ever see in one shot/animation. You'll never see most of the planet simply because as the camera gets close enough to see detail its field of view limits how much can bee seen. Yes you can see the "canyon" in beautiful detail but you can't see all the all the rest of the planets detail at the same time. So all that detail and work is wasted. That's a lot of processing power and creative potentially time freed up.

A better way would be to use a "fully procedural planet" (small case!) for setting up your shot and then have a way of adding detail to ONLY SPECIFIC AREAS where the camer will be close enough to see them.

I do wonder if the old planet surface node (now removed from TG but still functional ~ loads if issues and nor that great ... but) could be re purposed in this way somehow ...
</planet rant mode>


Keep the updates coming.

Richard
www.richardfraservfx.com
https://www.facebook.com/RichardFraserVFX/
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Ryzen 9 5950X OC@4Ghz, 64Gb (TG4 benchmark 4:13)

FrankB

Oh come on, Richard ;)

I think the 10m picture shows that you can easily have some decent detail everywhere on a TG2 planet. It allows you to completely zoom out from ground to space, without having to create multiple scenes and stiching shots together. Still, nothing stops you from adding detail where you're close.
And about the variety of terrain: there are ways to make procedural texturing look complex enough.
I know you had your own procedural planet project a couple years ago, why not look at it again and see if the years of learning TG2 have left you in a better position now to pick it up again and improve it further? It's great fun, I bet you remember :)

Cheers,
Frank

cyphyr

#17
Ooops, I really didn't mean to offend. The rant bit was entirely not aimed at you but rather the people who want a "one click wonder planet". I know you appreciate the difficulty of the project your taking on. But then if it was so easy  .... :)

The detail you have in your close up shots is impressive, don't get me wrong. I meant that the ability to create a wide variety of effects will become exponentially more complex and difficult. In your images the detail has the same "character" in both shots, and this is where the difficulty comes in. To create two or three characters of terrain will be a challenging having them seamlessly blend together and to blend for some sort of "pseudo geological reason" will be difficult, to do any more will be hard in the extreme.

Maybe I'm talking about a different thing but to me a "fully procedural planet" is not just one style of terrain and texture but many blended together in a way that looks believable.

Good luck but to see a planet with a fully "earth" type of variety, with savannah, jungle, rolling hills, alpine mountains, volcanic areas, sedimentary erosions, rivers!, to name a few, (and there would have to be a great many more), and to have these areas blend together in a believable way is a huge challenge. All of these environments Terragen is eminently capable of producing (its got better and so have its users). But getting more than a few to blend together believably is something I never found a satisfactory solution to.

Its why I'm commenting, if you can crack I many others will be veryt greatful.

Go for it and again sorry if I offended.

Richard

PS: Just re-read your post and see you weren't that err.. that bothered (lol ;D ) but I'll leave the comments anyway as I still believe its a worthy challenge.
Oh and I do re-visit the planets frequently, still looking for a working solution. I always end up using a project specific solution.
www.richardfraservfx.com
https://www.facebook.com/RichardFraserVFX/
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Ryzen 9 5950X OC@4Ghz, 64Gb (TG4 benchmark 4:13)

Oshyan

Looks extremely promising Frank! I see an orbit-to-ground animation in the future... ;D

- Oshyan

FrankB

Quote from: cyphyr on February 22, 2012, 07:02:24 PM
Ooops, I really didn't mean to offend. The rant bit was entirely not aimed at you but rather the people who want a "one click wonder planet". I know you appreciate the difficulty of the project your taking on. But then if it was so easy  .... :)

As you figured out later on, I wasn't offended, why would I?

I agree with you in that It would be a futile attempt to try to create a full blown ecosystem, and that is not my goal, but I would still like to make it reasonably complex, so that it doesn't look too boring.

cheers,
Frank

TheBadger


"...I agree with you in that It would be a futile attempt to try to create a full blown ecosystem, and that is not my goal, but I would still like to make it reasonably complex, so that it doesn't look too boring."

I predict that at some point, someone, will endeavor to create the earth in terragen2 or some other (future) program from pole to pole, including the different climate zones and related ecosystems.

Good going so far FrankB
It has been eaten.

freelancah

Looking better! Looking forward of seeing more

FrankB

after a few weeks long break, I have returned to this project.
I am still not there yet, but I'd like to post an update anyway. This is a 3000px wide render.

I can random seed continents, and they always look good, if I may say so. I've got mountain ranges that align with the continents. I have an adjustable dry desert belt around the planet's equator, and a north pole ice cap.
Surface shading isn't easy for a full planet. As you can see, there is more work to do in this area, and more....

here is the link to the big image.

Frank

cyphyr

#23
Looking good Frank.

Just an aside, I saw a programme a few weeks ago that was describing the climate conditions on Earth as it rotates about the Sun. In it they highlighted that the equatorial belt is in fact made up of lush rainforest with a band of desert above and below it. Think of Africa, the deserts are in the tropics, the Sahara in the north and the Namibian desert to the south. Australia is in the Southern band and Mexico in the North. This is all due to the rising and falling of massive air currents, heating of the Earths surface etc.

Here's the link Orbit: Earth's Extraordinary Journey

keep going with this one :)

Richard
www.richardfraservfx.com
https://www.facebook.com/RichardFraserVFX/
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Ryzen 9 5950X OC@4Ghz, 64Gb (TG4 benchmark 4:13)

AP

Some healthy words of advise if i may.

Some distinct separations between the climates, not so soft edged. Some parts may be but from high orbit, the blends are more hard. A blend mix by a super huge alpine shader noise may work if possible giving the illusion of faked-erosion blends along the transitions of climates.

The mountains could use a more elongated chain noise effect on the large scale as in the real world.

Deserts tend to have very bright sandy colors with some dark browns, a tiny bit of grey and reds, dunes and the like. Sure you knew that already.  ;)

What are the yellow colors for?

In the forested biomes, i would have more dark green then anything, variations of the mid-darks to darks.

Savannahs if you have any tend to have dull green browns with some reds here and there, not much though.

FrankB

The color shading is most difficult on a global scale. i am not pretending this is ready, it is merely a snapshot of where I am at.

AP

Quote from: FrankB on March 23, 2012, 07:21:56 PM
The color shading is most difficult on a global scale. i am not pretending this is ready, it is merely a snapshot of where I am at.

Certainly is. I tried wrapping my brain around it looking though various images of earth, studying every inch of where the climates are supposed to be, some earth science involved here. I even would take an image, sample the colors of the earth and bring those colors into terragen. Try and match the HSBs.

Oshyan

Looking promising Frank. This is a seriously tough nut to crack! I will say the mountains in some areas look pretty immense, but then Earth is not the ultimate judge of what should be "normal". Look at Olympus Mons on Mars! ;D

- Oshyan

FrankB


freelancah

I think you could make a big impact just with giving the ocean some color variations. Very nice progress!