Lake Tahoe

Started by Stormlord, April 09, 2019, 06:56:31 PM

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Stormlord

This is my first rendering of a classic lake and mountain scene in Terragen 4.12 with lots of Trees and some plants.
The rendertime was 23 hours and 33 Minutes on my old AMD Athlon(tm) II X4 651 Quad-Core Processor 3.00 GHz.

STORMLORD

RichTwo

Though the waters of Lake Tahoe are blue, this reminds me of more of a Caribbean scene with the white coral sands.  Nice scenery, though!
They're all wasted!

bobbystahr

nice one Dirk...do more!
something borrowed,
something Blue.
Ring out the Old.
Bring in the New
Bobby Stahr, Paracosmologist

Stormlord

Thanky you Rich and thank you Bob!
The next version will be one with snow on the mountains and blue water as recommended.

STORMLORD

Stormlord

This version comes with blue water and snow...working on snowy trees...

[attach=1]
Lake Tahoe v2.0

STORMLORD

DocCharly65

Almost like a postcard. Nice :)

otakar

Nice idea and pretty view. Maybe for the next iteration, work on the tree distribution (above shore, below mountain tops, closer together for forest) and rework the scale. If Lake Tahoe is a model, the trees here should be much smaller.

Stormlord

#7
Quote from: otakar on April 15, 2019, 02:08:47 PM
Nice idea and pretty view. Maybe for the next iteration, work on the tree distribution (above shore, below mountain tops, closer together for forest) and rework the scale. If Lake Tahoe is a model, the trees here should be much smaller.

Thank you for tips which helps me to receive a better and more realistic result.

I've created more dense populations, more trees and they are rescaled of course.
The main problem is my restricted memory in my old computer. 16GB or 32GB would be fine.
My machine is shortly before crashing...

Maybe the trees are to high up in the mountains???
I don't know...??? What do you mean?

Water color slightly more blue and a finer displacement of the waves.

[attach=1]
Lake Tahoe v3.0

Working now on snow on trees, wet sand on the beach, maybe some stones here and there...

STORMLORD

Stormlord

#8
YEAH
My first Image with snow on trees as recommended in various threads here in the forum.
A big THX to all who explain neebies liek me how to do it....!

This time I tried much more trees (looks more realistic) on my poor machine.

[attach=1]
Lake Thaoe with snow on trees

[attach=2]
Screenshot

STORMLORD

DocCharly65

I think the versions with the snow-free trees look a bit better, because it's more plausible for watching eyes to see all the coniferes with snow melt down in this sunny scene.

Stormlord

Good Statement DocCharly65!
My thought was that differences and contrast (Light and Shade, Sun and Ice, Summer and Winter) making an image interesting to look at?
So this is why I made it this way. Do you have some more sugestions for improvement?

But don't mind.
I never made an image with snowy trees, so this was for me really the first time.
Now I know how to do it and I am glad, that with the help of this forum I was able to do it this way.

My next try is based upon the last posted version but without snow and a dark and clear blue summer sky.
Maybe this time it comes out real good, we will see...
Ok, the Rendering is under way... Tomorrow evening it should be rendered?

STORMLORD

otakar

I like the snow covered trees, actually. Maybe could pull back the snow cover (on the trees) a bit, so the lower areas would have more green showing.

It's getting more realistic I'd say.

How about the sky? The color to me is a bit strange. The sun is not that high up, I am not sure that shade of blue really fits. How about something more like this?

https://static-18.sinclairstoryline.com/resources/media/3d30c66c-4de9-4a7e-ac92-3867eed2b7e2-smallScale_LakeTahoeLookingSouth.jpg?1525977448958

Stormlord

#12
Thank you for your replies, I do my best to create a much more realistic image.
As far as it is possible for me, I have learned a lot and try as good as I can to improve this scene.
I learned how to render masks, create snowy trees, do some pretty skies with different cloud layers, handle populations ect....

1. In this latest attempt I have rendered a lot of different skies to find one more suitable to the scene. This one seems good to me :-)
2. The water has been changed in colour, now it is more greenish. The light colours in the shallow water zones are a result of a nearly white colored sand here.
     Maybe I will change the underwater sand in the future? Some stones mixed with some sand or so...
      Also the displace of the water here is deactivated. The mirror like look on the surface of the lake looks pretty cool!
      But to be honest, the water surface is from another render, it's mixed into the current scene (this is why I needed the mask) and that's why the reflection does not fit to the sky here.
3. Now there are 2 different populations of coastal sea wattle bushes directly on the beach. The small is 3.5 Meters, the other one 5 meters.
4. Snow has been liftet a litte and the coverage has been changed to get more details on top of the mountains. More rocky, not so fully snow covered.

Here is my latest result so far, Lake Tahoe v5.0 in original size 2540x1440, more than 26 hours rendering time. Old AMD Quadcore with 3GHz, aehm... I know, I need a new one...

[attach=1]
Lake Tahoe

[attach=2]
Lake Tahoe Mask

Please let me know what you think about this sky? Is it realistic, does the sky fit to the scene?
What about the water? I haven't found a good lake water colour.
As always, critic, replies and your comments are highly welcome!

Further planned are phytoplankton streams in the water.
Some big stones in the beach area and underwater stones.
Maybe a different sky ?

STORMLORD


bobbystahr

majorly better with each iteration Dirk...keep on tweaking...that sand could have a bit more light brown in it to cut the 'glare' but over all getting much better. Keep. On. Tweaking.
something borrowed,
something Blue.
Ring out the Old.
Bring in the New
Bobby Stahr, Paracosmologist