After learning how amazing the volumetric materials are at making atmospheres, i switched from using a compositing based method to a volumetric shader method. I’m so happy at how they turned out! especially the one with the ring!
I know earth doesn’t have a ring, but for artistic reasons it does now
I rendered them at either 50 or 100 samples at 1920x1080 resolution, but the ring one was at 4K resolution (3840x2160) and 300 samples because I loved the way it turned out.
Thanks, perhaps so yeah! From a realistic point of view the stars wouldn’t be visible, but artistically like the rings, it’s possible! I’l try photoshop them in and see, Thanks again!
It generates a spherical gradient, then the color ramps tell it when to fade and the color of it. The math node controls density. The reyliegh scattering at the edge of the shadows is done automatically by volumetric shaders.
The stars are quite small, but like you said, you don’t want to draw attention from the main focus. Keep in mind that the reason we see the sky as simply a black space with tiny speckles of stars is from the ozone layer and light pollution filtering out most of the light from space. since these viewing angles in your pictures are outside the atmosphere, the empty space should be full of bright stars and the light of distant nebulas and galaxies.
I understand where you’re coming from but from an actual photography point of view, the stars wouldn’t be visible in or out the atmosphere unless a decent shutter speed/exposure setting is used, which would over expose the image. Obviously its all CGI and each element can be adjusted separately and that can be avoided. Bearing in mind also that light reflecting off the planet itself drowns out star light, hence why all the Apollo images lack stars despite being no atmosphere. Same with the ISS live video feed.
So from a realistic point of view, there would be no stars at all, but an artistic view there can be as many as you please.
I tried a rather lively star background instead…
Wow! I’ve been working on an aesthetically realistic earth for awhile, and finally found a similar method for a volumetric atmosphere a few months ago too. But I’ve been away from BlenderArtists for a long time, so I guess I’ve gotten left behind in advancements such as this. XD
This looks fantastic! I do prefer the more realistic star background too, but this other one looks great too for comparing the transparency transition of the atmosphere.
So, are the clouds also volumetric??
Thank you!!
Yep, sorta. It’s done by using multiple spheres with an array modifyer with the same texture. Then ‘shrinks’ the top and bottom layers to round it off. I can’t take credit for this method as it was originally used by Poromaa. His node setup is here, I just changed the input texture, adjusted it it with curves and remapped it to work with my scaling.
The volumetric shader did it automatically, I think higher density volume scattering made it work for me. Also reducing the sun lamp size to almost sharp made a more prominent shadow and red shift.
I learn’t it from the community so i don’t mind giving back!
