Sunlight

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Sunlight

Node Description and Purpose:
The Sunlight node is the main way of lighting your scene. It basically puts a sun in the sky. You can create as many suns as you like.

If you use the 2D Heading style compass in the 3D Preview all of the Sunlight nodes in the scene are shown as yellow dots around the outside of the compass. The position of the dot shows the Heading of the Sunlight node.


Node Type: Lighting


Settings:

  • Heading: This sets the direction of the sun, in degrees. 0 is North, 90 is East.
  • Elevation: This sets the height of the sun in the sky, in degrees. 90 is directly overhead, 0 is the horizon.

  • Colour: This is the colour of the sunlight.

  • Strength: This controls how powerful or bright the sunlight is. Larger numbers mean stronger sunlight.

  • Cast shadows: If this is checked the sunlight will cast shadows.

  • Shadows of surfaces: TBC

  • Shadows of atmosphere: TBC


Soft Shadows

  • Do soft shadows: If this is checked the shadows cast by the sun will be soft rather than hard.
  • Soft shadow diameter: This controls the softness of the shadows. Larger numbers mean softer.

  • Soft shadow samples: This sets the number of samples used to generate soft shadows. Larger numbers mean higher quality but can be slower.

  • Sample jitter: TBC


  • Glow in atmosphere: TBC
  • Specular highlights: TBC


Sun disc

  • Visible disc: If this is checked the sun will look like a disc or circle in the sky.
  • Angular diameter: This sets the size of the visible disc in the sky. The angular diameter describes how much of the sky the sun disc covers. The measurement is in degrees.

A single object or device in the node network which generates or modifies data and may accept input data or create output data or both, depending on its function. Nodes usually have their own settings which control the data they create or how they modify data passing through them. Nodes are connected together in a network to perform work in a network-based user interface. In Terragen 2 nodes are connected together to describe a scene.