Once again I’m attempting a animated Xmas card. The question is about the ground plane. Make plane - scale - subdivide.
Now what do you animators do about the damn corners when elevating the camera. Do you simply pick shots where the corners are not or is that a reason for going to a skydome? Now I’ve been scaling the ground plane ten or twenty times but of course the corners are still there regardless. And, with a panning or dolly shot how do you avoid them?. Sorry if it sounds like a stupid question but it’s been driving me batshit for days. Amost ready for a padded room with a view. The old ghost.
You need to add what ever you want to see there via more modeling, or an image.
Thanks Place57 and I suspected I wasn’t explaining myself clearly. Let’s say a camera director was on a actual location and wanted that exact same shot of the house. His horizon line wouldn’t have a damn corner in it. And, if I made the plane the size of Arizona wouldn’t that damn corner still be there on the horizon in any elevated shot except one at an exact right angle to the edge of the plane. Assuming you wanted to have a horizon line in the scene. Now with a skydome the horizon of course would be curved. But, I could make that curve less by increasing the relative size of the dome. Well, this is my second attempt at making some sense. It seems to me a problem that only exist in the wonderful world of CG. The camera man on a actual location would only worry about the placement of the horizon and having it straight of course. The same thing we do with a camera in the real world.
The solution is to either do a mat painting in the background that blends with your ground plane, or extend the ground plane above the horizon. A good example of this might be to look at any number of the “ocean” simulations. They also run into the same issue where as they raise the camera you see the end of the ground plane (the ocean in these cases). The solution is to fill in the blanks (everything above the horizon in the background) with more mesh or a mat image.
A simple solution I use all the time is to turn on Shadow Only for the ground plane material. Then you can use the World environment Horizon and Zenith colors for the final background. Using this material option inside Blender Internal you no longer have to worry about the edge of the ground.
In this image I have a wave modifier which produces a sharp edge when the wave reaches the end of the plane but the render blends into the background just fine.
Attachments
26_ground_plane.blend (860 KB)
Thanks Atom and I will keep that in mind for future projects. Doesn’t seem to work in the case of snow. Place57 you are right corners can be worked as long as you don’t boom a camera to high when panning say. And, of course I’m speaking of a animation now. But, it can present a problem, as I mentioned, in the CG world that doesn’t exist in the real one. Or, so it seems to me anyway. And, even with a skydome a elevated camera gives you a curved horizon line as if the camera was in space somewhere and you were seeing the curvature of the earth. So there it is in my old mind. Just something that requires a work around and has to be dealt with. No putting a camera on a boom and just winging it with elevation and rotation like you were in the middle of Arizona. Yet, somehow they must pull it off in FX and I’m going to start looking for horizon lines now when watching one of those films. Anyway once again thanks guys. theoldghost
What you will find is the same technique which applies to stills and paintings too… layered foreground, midground, and background. In CG it’s often hires textured objects in foreground, low poly lower rez textured whatever midground, and simple textured planes in the background.
For a flat panaramic desert or tundra or ocean scene those two or three layers have to be blended somehow as mentioned above. But the common technique since days of old is to obscure the transitions in clever ways whenever possible. For example in your scene (which is coming along nicely I might add) a midground of shallow hills and background of mountains, or sky… but the transition would be some plants, a fenceline, whatever. The transition to the background (plane) could be the hills, or a subtle roll in the earth, anything or anyway to keep you from having to paint the background planes to blend in with each other and the foreground.
On the other hand, a cabin on a frozen lake might just need a background plane that fades into darkness or snowy whiteout. Maybe you could get away with the auto technique Atom mentioned. But that would make for a very lonely looking cabin. Like it was sitting out in the middle of a super smooth frozen lake. A lonely flat looking scene. Not good unless that’s the effect you are after.
Google up some pics or watch… lets say pixar Cars 1. That has those panoramic views of the desert floor with the mountains in the background. Very much cutting edge work was put into the beautiful lighting and haze in the distance but the basics are still there in plain site in almost every shot. Either plant life, or the edge of the road, a roll in the landscape, anything to separate those 3 layers. Even in the unobscured shots you’ll see hi definition in the foreground which transitions into a blurry midground which blurs into the hazy mountains in the background. The back layers are just painted textures on planes.
This physically layered approach also lets you move the 2 or 3 layers for fake parallax, which has been done in animation for 100 years now I suppose.
Yes it’s a pain and takes much planning and work if you’re creating everything for CG, a drawing, or a painting. But even in live action there is much thought put into a scene’s foreground, midground, and background. It makes the difference between a flat boring scene or one with much depth.
Sorry for the long post… I find this stuff fascinating. I’ve sat and watch many movies just analyzing how they did the backgrounds. 
-LP
I have to admit I didn’t really pick up on what place57 was saying. Larry, as per your advice I watched Big Buck Bunny again. Where they make extensive use of painted planes for the furthest background. Hell it just dawned on my old ass I can cut, paint, and texture my own background cutouts right in Blender. Which place57 must have assumed I realized. Thanks guys it’s been worth it. Once again Atom your technique might very well be used in the future.
Now to the camera being panned and dollied around. There was a dolly shot in Big Buck as well as a short pan. Neither was with a elevated camera but could have been because of the short rotation and movement. No attempt was made to take in the entire horizon since it wasn’t necessary. And, wouldn’t have added anything to the shot. Now don’t I feel like the dumb ass. Larry many years ago I was trained as a commercial artist so I am aware of what you were referring to. Matter of fact I have a fence going in another blender file for a lead in line. However, like many I guess I get so tied up in the method that sometimes the rules of composition and everything else is forgotten in the heat of battle. Or, I don’t have the expertise to pull off a vision. Not having the expertise does piss me off many times but it takes time and is coming around albeit to slow for my taste. With me a specific problem can throw me into tutorial overload. Causing a bizzare tunnel vision for a couple of days where nothing is getting done. And, I can imagine a; ‘Been there done that’. Once again thank you all. I’m off and running again. theoldghost
I have to admit I didn’t really pick up on what place57 was saying. Larry, as per your advice I watched Big Buck Bunny again. Where they make extensive use of painted planes for the furthest background. Hell it just dawned on my old ass I can cut, paint, and texture my own background cutouts right in Blender. Which place57 must have assumed I realized. Thanks guys it’s been worth it. Once again Atom your technique might very well be used in the future.
Now to the camera being panned and dollied around. There was a dolly shot in Big Buck as well as a short pan. Neither was with a elevated camera but could have been because of the short rotation and movement. No attempt was made to take in the entire horizon since it wasn’t necessary. And, wouldn’t have added anything to the shot. Now don’t I feel like the dumb ass. Larry many years ago I was trained as a commercial artist so I am aware of what you were referring to. Matter of fact I have a fence going in another blender file for a lead in line. However, like many I guess I get so tied up in the method that sometimes the rules of composition and everything else is forgotten in the heat of battle. Or, I don’t have the expertise to pull off a vision. Not having the expertise does piss me off many times but it takes time and is coming around albeit to slow for my taste. With me a specific problem can throw me into tutorial overload. Causing a bizzare tunnel vision for a couple of days where nothing is getting done. And, I can imagine a; ‘Been there done that’. Once again thank you all. I’m off and running again. theoldghost
Oh, one more thing. Let me add a link you guys might enjoy. http://www.redsharknews.com/post/item/246-finishing-the-hobbit-all-you-need-to-know-about-hobbit-post-production