Background node

[dandelO]

Messing around with the background node for the triangle thing I noticed this.
Is there a reason why the background node isn't at the same coordinates as the planet? Not that the difference would make much... difference, when you consider the size of the BG compared to the planet, that is. Just wondered if it would be best to have them both at 0,0,0. planet smack bang in the centre of the BG?

I noticed that shrinking the BG sphere lowers the lighting on surfaces, is that because the higher levels of the atmosphere can't illuminate the scene with 'glow' because it's now extending past the sphere boundaries? If so, is the BG node off-centre on purpose to help make some kind of atmospheric-shift effect or something?
Probably pointless questions really and the differences in coordinates are completely negligible, I just wondered.

[Matt]

I've centred everything around 0,0,0 because that's where you want to build your scene around, if possible, to get the most accuracy. In most scenes the background sphere is therefore centred roughly on the camera.

The planet is centred somewhere below this so that there is a point on the surface that goes through 0,0,0.

[Kadri]

I've centred everything around 0,0,0 because that's where you want to build your scene around, if possible, to get the most accuracy. In most scenes the background sphere is therefore centred roughly on the camera.

The planet is centred somewhere below this so that there is a point on the surface that goes through 0,0,0.

Matt i have not used settings far away from center . But some users mentioned it. In the future with TG2 64 will be more accuracy coming too with settings far away from center?
Is there some kind of ratio (TG2 32 to TG2 64) you can give us ?

Thanks.

Kadri.

[Matt]

64-bit versions will not make any difference to spatial or computational accuracy. The 64-bits just means that the application can address much more memory, allowing Terragen to go beyond the 4Gb barrier.

You might be surprised to hear that all versions of Terragen 2 already use 64-bit numbers for most of the spatial computations. When we talk about "double precision" floating point calculations we're using 64-bit floating point numbers. These numbers have been supported in hardware for many years even on "32-bit" systems. The "64-bit" in a 64-bit OS is about how much memory can be accessed.

Matt

[Kadri]

Thanks Matt. I really didn't know that

Kadri.

[dandelO]

I'm so dense sometimes. Of course it's off-centre, to make the ground at 0,0,0, not the centre of the planet.