WIP: African Bushveld Terrain

[Morne]

Hi all

As per pic one, I have a more or less eye-level view of my terrain and I'm happy with the results. The mountains in the background is a jpg cheat onto a plane.

My problem is with image2 where I'm suppose to make an aerial shot of same mountains in image1. Obvioulsy now I can't cheat it with a plane as I need geometry. Ground crew will launch missiles so I need to animate camera from ground up to aircraft. My terrain is 10km X 10km and the aircraft is 600m high.
I was thinking of scattering some various different bushes over the terrain to try and make it more realistic.

Any hints and tips to make the aerial terrain look more realistic and same like it does in eye-level terrain?

Regards,
Morne (DVP3D)

[Morne]

image2 update

here's an update to image2. What you think is it getting better and closer to image1 or getting worse? I added some fog and made the textures darker, Did not yet scatter bushes over terrain.

Any suggestions or comments?

Regards,
Morne

[Neilg]

I would go for more contrast in the texture map/colour correction, displacement (2d with very fine detail) and ground cover proxied plants/trees sunk into the ground.
I did something on a similar scale and ended up using 7,500 proxies scattered around as ground cover, it makes a huge difference.

[Morne]

I would go for more contrast in the texture map/colour correction, displacement (2d with very fine detail) and ground cover proxied plants/trees sunk into the ground.
I did something on a similar scale and ended up using 7,500 proxies scattered around as ground cover, it makes a huge difference.

When you say displacement you mean VRayDisplacement modifier over the existing max displacement that makes the mountains? So the VRay version will just be for finer detail etc? Hmmm I tried that but the render seems to get stuck ie all the buckets just sit there and don't seem to be doing anything. I upped dynamic memory to 5gb to see if it makes a difference, but same story...
Any ideas?

[Neilg]

Yeah thats it - just something subtle to add a bit more movement and detail to it.
Dont really have any ideas as to why it's locking up without seeing the scene - with all that i've had render times of 15 minutes at 1280x720. I even had glossy reflection on the displaced ground... so it is possible to get away with.

What map are you using for the displacement? Is it an instance of the one you're using for max displacement or a new one? Whats the res/etc?

[Morne]

Yeah thats it - just something subtle to add a bit more movement and detail to it.
Dont really have any ideas as to why it's locking up without seeing the scene - with all that i've had render times of 15 minutes at 1280x720. I even had glossy reflection on the displaced ground... so it is possible to get away with.

What map are you using for the displacement? Is it an instance of the one you're using for max displacement or a new one? Whats the res/etc?

I left it rendering and it eventually rendered in about 20min. It takes forever to start but then suddenly renders very quickly. However the whole scene is much darker then, almost black. Diffuse map is sat image about 5000X5000 pixels. Max displacement is just smoke map. VRaydisplacement is same as diffuse map.

[Neilg]

Could you post up an image of it?

The displacement will make it darker, but it shouldnt be very strong - just enough to add fine detail.

[Morne]

today its not so dark but I can hardly see a difference in the terrain. I decided to just use a backplate for my current scene, but I will however revisit this problem for a later scene I'm doing...