Forgotten

[fleetwood]

I know this is late advice    since you're finished with this but for myself, when the lighting seems flat the first thing that comes to mind is that the sun is probably obscured behind clouds.
To check the Sun for sure, exactly and not just randomly move the sun about, you can use the preview window.

To make a sun check : (this is just my way - it works, but others might have better)

  In the Preview window use Set Object Display Mode ( the small blue cube) to set the mode to show objects as bounding boxes. This causes the sun to show in the sky as cross hairs.

  In the Sunlight node turn off Glow in Atmosphere if you happen to have it on. This is temporarily so the sun glow effect does not wash out the cross hairs in the preview window. Remember toTurn the glow back on when you render, if you are using it.

  Use the Preview rotate left or right buttons as needed to turn the Preview directly toward the sun. You can follow your progress on the small compass. When the little compass sun is dead ahead, Use Tilt up if the sun is high until the cross hairs come into view.

Now that the sun is in the window let the preview finish rendering the sky in that position and then pause the Preview Window.
If clouds are rendering in the sun's position, you can click on the sun cross hairs and move the sun to a clear blue sky area directly from the Preview Window or you can alternately use the sliders or type exact numeric values in the Sunlight node. I think it is fastest-easiest to just drag and drop the sun in a clear blue area. Or if you want clouds filtering the light or special cloud shadows you can move the sun to a cloud edge boundary or little hole in the clouds or whatever on purpose.

Now you're done with the Sun Check you would return the Preview back to your untouched Render Camera view.

If you happen to have really thick clouds everywhere there might not be any clear blue area nearby, but that's a different problem that can be solved by localizing the clouds or various schemes for masking the clouds in the area of the sun.


Here is an example of a Sun position preview. Looks like my sun is just barely in a small clear spot. 


 

[Oshyan]

You could also just try turning off the clouds to see how it affects lighting, for a quicker, easier test.

Personally I think a large part of the issue here is haze though. There is an unnatural (IMO) amount of haze for such small distances and I think this is reducing contrast and perhaps even dimming the lighting overall as well. Certainly it's making the shadows very "muddy" and gray.

- Oshyan

[choronr]

Yes, haze seems to be the most logical cause here.

[Lady of the Lake]

For sure the last one.      Thanks everyone.  But the sky/clouds are not so great now.  (sigh)

[Oshyan]

Hmm, well in my humble opinion that final one is way better in every respect and solves all of the issues of the previous. I even like the sky better, personally. It's a bit noisy (and I wonder if you've applied some sharpening after the render which would accentuate the noise), but otherwise it's great. It does have a somewhat different feel now as an image, different tones entirely (which to me are more pleasant), but if you want to recapture some of the old colors you could try lowering the sun angle to get a more sunset/afternoon look ("golden hour" perhaps).

- Oshyan

[Hannes]

What an improvement!
To create the golden afternoon mood, Oshyan mentioned, you could also increase the Red Sky Decay of the atmosphere settings a bit (maybe to 3.5?).
Plus you could use the Cubic B-Spline (soft) pixel filter in the "Extra" tab of the renderer and try to use soft shadows, which would give your image a slightly softer look and would make the plants look even more natural.
Please make at least one more!!!!

[Upon Infinity]

Yep.  Final version is the best one, yet.  It's great you were able to get some shadows AND keep the light haze effect.  Sort of like a hot, pollen-filled afternoon in the summer. 

[Gannaingh]

I love the colors in your latest version! It looks very warm and pleasant.

[choronr]

Come on Lyla, just one more trying Hannes' suggestions...

[Lady of the Lake]

The last, only because you asked so nicely, Bob.   

I had already incorporated some of Hannes' suggestions in the image (soft shadows and red sky decay at about twice what was suggested) but I changed to the Cubic B-Spline.  I have lost the haze-ish look I was going for but I like the more realistic look of what I have now.  I changed the sun position, once again, and brightened the leaves on the trees and bushes a bit.

As Oshyan had noticed I had sharpened the image in post and thus messed up the sky, so I didn't do any post on this version.  None except the jpeg.

So from first to last I think this one is the best.  Thanks a lot everyone for the help and support. 
Lyla

[choronr]

Lady, this is the best in your series; and, I believe one of the best images you've created in Terragen. Fire up your printer, go out and get some good paper and some frames ...this is going up on your wall.

Now, all you've learned here you can apply to your future work.

[kaedorg]

Very impressed to see how you used ideas and advices to get such a good result.

David

[mhaze]

Excellent

[Hannes]

Great!!

[TheBadger]

looks a lot better!