Planet Atmosphere

[john_kearney]

Hi,

Is there a way to create a volumetric planetary atmosphere in VRay? I've done a quick search and seen the age-old sphere+falloff map approach but surely that's redundant and dated at this point? I was doing it that way 15+ years ago.

Any recommendations (perhaps using Phoenix FD?) would be much appreciated.

Thanks!

[fixeighted]

Hehe, well...that's a good question. You can search in the forum for posts that are pretty exhaustive, with various tests and method approaches to this, which is the best idea to be honest.
We collectively got sort of close with some hacks but it is still a struggle I think, depending on just what exactly you need to do.
The old method still works remarkably well for many situations I'd say.

Good luck and post if you have some breakthrough that we missed

[john_kearney]

Thanks! There are plenty of impressive renders that have used novel solutions. I'm a bit short on time so I was just hoping for something a bit more automated and simple. I've ended up using VRayEnvironmentFog on a sphere gizmo. Not ideal because it doesn't fade out gradually (even if you adjust the edge falloff values). It does soften a bit and at least there are controls for density, and phase function etc! Isn't the best but it'll do for my needs, unless of course someone can suggest something better!

[fixeighted]

Based on the old method https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mTHKU9c6eAg&t=3s and a great result for the time spent.

The lengthy post https://forums.chaos.com/forum/v-ray...hallenge/page3

No developers have responded to this, which I suspect is because there aren't really any great updates to the available tech, which means picking the closest
solution for Vray or moving it to another sodtware which can do it properly. There are Blender and Unreal solutions doing a great job with this.

[Mr.Mxyzptlk]

Based on the old method https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mTHKU9c6eAg&t=3s and a great result for the time spent.

The lengthy post https://forums.chaos.com/forum/v-ray...hallenge/page3

No developers have responded to this, which I suspect is because there aren't really any great updates to the available tech, which means picking the closest
solution for Vray or moving it to another sodtware which can do it properly. There are Blender and Unreal solutions doing a great job with this.

Jonas Noell is worth subscribing to.

[fixeighted]

Yes he has a few good vids

[john_kearney]

Based on the old method https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mTHKU9c6eAg&t=3s and a great result for the time spent.

The lengthy post https://forums.chaos.com/forum/v-ray...hallenge/page3

No developers have responded to this, which I suspect is because there aren't really any great updates to the available tech, which means picking the closest
solution for Vray or moving it to another sodtware which can do it properly. There are Blender and Unreal solutions doing a great job with this.

Good links, thanks! I did see Jonass video but when I tried it (latest version of VRay), I couldn't get the Shadow/Light map to work on the GPU which unfortunately made it redundant for me given that rendering speed will be such a big factor in the project I'm working on. I thought it might just be my set-up but also noticed that official docs say it isn't supported so I'm not quite sure how he got that working?

[john_kearney]

Based on the old method https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mTHKU9c6eAg&t=3s and a great result for the time spent.

The lengthy post https://forums.chaos.com/forum/v-ray...hallenge/page3

No developers have responded to this, which I suspect is because there aren't really any great updates to the available tech, which means picking the closest
solution for Vray or moving it to another sodtware which can do it properly. There are Blender and Unreal solutions doing a great job with this.

Just checked out the other thread you kindly linked to and wow, that Blender add-on is just depressing. I'm working with colleagues that continually tell me to dump Max and switch to Blender. I argue my corner and mention it's a powerhouse when combined with VRay. I'm now given an opportunity to prove it and find out that they can basically achieve better visuals than I've managed so far.. in pretty much real-time. I don't mean to be too negative here but given that we're all paying a significant amount, this kind of thing should have been addressed by now. That thread is old at this point and this particular issue seems to be a common one for render artists that have chosen VRay. I know it's pretty specific but day by day, I feel more compelled to make the switch.

[fixeighted]

That sounds odd tbh....it's just a falloff type and I don't recall it not working for GPU....wouldn't be surprised though LOL...every time I've tried to utilise GPU it throws up something or other which screws the whole point

It'll be interesting to see what you do, in whichever way you do it

[Joelaff]

Shadow/light didn’t work in standalone either. Kind of annoying. I had to render separate passes for that out of Max for a recent project.