Entries for March, 2007
[ March 4th, 2007 ]
More Landscapes
A view of sunset as the sun explodes!
Blu Sun
Exposed
Iceberg Float
Lime
[ March 23rd, 2007 ]
Monstrous Anger
Weird and scary rythm. Monster-themed and the monster is very angry!
I started doing the tune to express my twisted feelings after a disappointment arose from a friend.
Click on the eye to listen to music.
New 3d Scapes
Black and White
Black and White entitled because of the White reflection of the moon in the water and Black for it is night. The moon's reflection is over-exaggerated.
Gum
The blue-green version of Violently Violet. The atmosphere is emphasizing calmness while Violently Violet the opposite.
Violently Violet
Notice the mountains? Gum is almost identical to Violently Violet, only that the atmosphere has changed. The atmosphere is darker and it suggests that a storm is coming.
Gold and Chromium
The only thing I dislike in this scape are the mountains because of its edges. Look at the mountain that you can see on your right. The topmost area is not smooth. I know how to smoothen that part but it was too late. I already posted it on Uthtv and I do not want to lose my ratings.
Wacky Shots from our Last Retreat
AB MassCommunication Batch 2007 Saint Paul University Iloilo. The graduates are only eight. The Mass Communication Fourth-year graduating students of SPUIloilo are that many! We are only 10 in all. All the pictures below were taken in Guimaras during our Retreat with our manongs and manangs of PT 5.
POSE!
SMILE!
[ March 30th, 2007 ]
Butterpretty
(Image Copyright: http://www.frender.org)
Not intended for gentlemen but otherwise if you appreciate something cute. My college classmates requested me to make a story based from their names.
Cate Michelle and Terpy Chris always quarreled when they are together. Cate was older than Terpy. Their mothers both left them on one apple tree. Quarreling took place when they grow up as caterpillars. Cate owns the tree as she believes and also is Terpy. "I am the owner of this tree!" says Cate. "No you are not," says Terpy. "I am older and the older has more privilege in space ownership," says Cate. "How do you know that you are older than me?" asked Terpy. "I was already here before you appeared since when you were an egg and turned into a larva. I am already crawling. I should have left that spider eat you," Cate mumbled. "What did you just say?" Terpy was terrified. "I am just being good or I was just acting. As an older caterpillar, I should watch over my younger fellows and so you must be glad that you did not turned out stinky and dead caterpillar. If I have not appeared that day when your mother laid you that spider must have eaten you. I sacrificed my self just to save your unworthy life from that horrifying incident that nearly cost my life," told Cate. "Is that true?" asked Terpy. "Then if not, you're not talking in front of me as of this time," Cate smiled. "The truth is - without that spider, I could have kicked you out of that leaf," Cate thought to herself. Terpy became silent. "Ok, goodbye and thank you, hmmp!" Terpy wiggled out away from Cate.
"Good morning caterpillar!" a voice from a distance greeted Terpy. "Did someone called me?" thought Terpy. Terpy continued wiggling when – "Psst!" A giant horrible-looking shadow showed on the branch surface from where Terpy is located. Terpy was terrified. She could not move. She was stiff as a sculpture. Fear consumed her. "Psst! Look over here!" The voice spoke again. Terpy looked around. "Over here! Above you!" The voice spoke up. Terpy slowly turned her head above. "Wa-what, a-are you?" Terpy asked the stranger. "I'm Ian, I am a spider!" Terpy was terrified, "Get away from me? Don't you ever eat me. I don't taste well. I'm poisonous! Eat my friend Cate instead!" "I can never eat you. Look at your size. You are thrice bigger than me so how should I swallow you?" Ian asked Terpy. "Do you mean? You're not eating me?" Terpy asked. "No I am not," Ian answered. "Phew! I thought you'd eat me." Terpy was relaxed. Ian crawled near Terpy, "I am curious, why you've passed here? I thought caterpillars hate this area because of us spiders. You should have never come here." "We never thought of getting here because we are so afraid of spiders even we have not seen one," Terpy answered. "So you were afraid of me, of a spider even if you have seen one?" Ian asked. "You just repeated what I told you," Terpy answered. "I am curious; you still have not answered my question. Why are you here?" Ian asked. "I am a bit frustrated and depressed with a friend of mine. Her name is Cate. And so I came here without noticing that I am here already," Terpy explained. "And so that's the reason why. I'm glad you came here. It was my first time to go nearer a caterpillar," Ian said. "Nice meeting you too!" said Terpy. "Just remember that we spiders have no intention of eating caterpillars, even if you ask other spiders living around here," Ian stated. "So you mean that there are other spiders here?" asked Terpy. "Yes there are! And I'm not the only one," Ian said. "I guess I'll have to go now. So long!" Terpy wiggled away. "Come back again!" Ian shouted. Terpy remembered Cate. "If spiders living on this tree, do not eat caterpillars - then Cate was lying!" though Terpy.
Two days later. Cate was munching green and fresh leaves. She was singing happily while munching as a butterfly approached near her to sip nectar from a flower. "Wow! How beautiful!" Cate was amazed seeing the sparkling wings of the butterfly. "How would I look if I turn into that? I wonder," Cate thought to herself, "But for now, I will finish eating these leaves. They're too delicious. I'm so glad Terpy have never been here. Oh my! I could see another munchy leaves from here. What a sight! I'll take a look." Cate wiggled near the leaves she just saw as she felt something sticky underneath. Her excitement of eating freshly new-grown leaves made her not realized that she just entered the den of spiders. She's trapped in a spider's web. She saw a spider approaching her. She wiggled and wriggled but she could not get away from the web. She was stuck.
To be continued... =)
Adding a Tree on a Terragen Scene
Adding a Tree on a Terragen Scene
by Dwight Delleva
For Terragen v0.9
Please do not recopy. If you are going to use this tutorial on your website, please give me credit.
You can download the pdf version of this tutorial from the Content Pages.
Terragen v0.9 creates stunning landscapes but does not support renderings with trees. But with a little skill, using an image-editing program – you may add trees anywhere you like on your landscapes.
Take note that the final picture was done or could be done using image-editing programs like Photoshop and GIMP. If you don’t own a Photoshop, why not download GIMP now for free? Irfanview will also be used for enhancing your picture with a tree and Irfanview can also be downloaded in the internet free of charge.
1. Render a landscape on Terragen.
2. Now paint your tree on GIMP or Photoshop. If you could not paint your own tree, why not just copy-paste from a real picture of a tree. Make sure that the color of the space around the tree is white. Now open GIMP or Photoshop. Place and paste your tree on your landscape the way you desired.
If you somehow wanted to create an original tree by yourself - follow the following very easy steps:
Took some green leaves. Search for images with clusters of leaves like the picture below and open MSpaint.
Copy and paste the leaves and form it to a tree. Paint the trunk. Add some grasses. Be creative. See how it is easy to make a tree? Open your landscape and paste the tree.
3. Place the tree anywhere on your landscape. Your next task is to make the tree part of the picture.
Photoshop:
Use the magic wand tool and click on the tree. From the menu box, click on Image then Adjust and click Color Balance. Tweak the colors. Move the buttons over Cyan, Magenta and Yellow until you will colorize the tree just like your landscape and click ok same with GIMP through clicking Layer then Colors and Color Balance.
Irfanview:
You can directly change the color of the tree separately. From Image then Enhance Colors and do the thing on R, G, and B just like Photoshop and Gimp.
4. Filter your Picture.
Use again the magic wand tool and click on the tree and Blur it. From Filter then Blur – Gaussian Blur on Photoshop same with GIMP. The brilliant thing happens. Your tree will almost blend with the atmosphere. You may try using other Filters until you get the desired visual look and save.
5. Enhance your picture.
Open your pre-final image and enhance its colors using Irfanview. From the Image menu click Enhance Colors and play with the settings and save. There are many other ways of enhancing your images. How? Email me: undwight at yahoo.com
Landscaping with Terragen
Landscaping with Terragen
Learning the Basics
by Dwight Delleva
Please do not recopy. If you are going to use this tutorial on your website, please give me credit.
You can download the pdf version of this tutorial from the Content Pages.
Program: Terragen v0.9
Difficulty: Easy
Rating: Wow!!!
System Requirements:
The minimum system requirements of Terragen for Windows:
- Pentium, 64 Mb of RAM, 10Mb free disk space.
- Windows 95
- RAM requirements may be lower on earlier versions of Windows.
The recommended system requirements:
- Pentium III or better with at least 256Mb of RAM
What's with Terragen?
Basically - Terragen is an amazing 3D landscape generator capable of rendering brilliant scenes of photo-realistic and surreal landscape images for artists, for filmmaking, and games. With its intuitive user-interface, it will only take you few minutes to make a landscape for the first time. Frozen icebergs and frothy cold waters, create the sun's expressive colorful beams, using plug-ins will turn water into hot flowing lava, color the sun, sky, clouds, water and the earth. Manipulate sunrise, sunset, daytime and nighttime - you name it. The only limit is your imagination and your hardware.
There are free and commercial versions of the program for Windows and Mac OS. The free download version however had few limitations such as a 513 maximum terrain size or the wideness of your landscape terrain, and the image size for rendering not exceeding more than 1280x960. For 800x600 computer screens - do not worry; the size limit does not affect your screen. The free version is a must-have for 3D enthusiasts and is totally free for your taking. Terragen is available for download over the internet.
Terragen was developed by Planetside Software. The latest version is Terragen v.0.9.43. The in-progress version, Terragen 2 is the newest version of Terragen capable of rendering landscapes with plants and other improvements while the older versions do not.
- The tutorial will cover the basics of Terragen. First - install Terragen. Open the program and explore. Upon opening Terragen, the following dialogue boxes should appear:
I. The first two boxes will appear on screen, the Rendering Control and Landscape.
The foremost step is clicking the Generate Terrain button.
(Click picture to enlarge)
(Click picture to enlarge)
II. Next step is to add water.
Click the Water Dialogue box to add water on your landscape.
(Click picture to enlarge)
III. After watering the earth - the next step is to create the clouds for the sky.
There is a default generation of clouds every time you open Terragen.
5 - Click Generate Clouds to randomly produce clouds. Edit cloud color above button. The 2D makes a realistic cloud rendition while the 3D makes the clouds look more dramatic.
IV. Colorize the Sun and Atmosphere.
6 - Click the Atmosphere box to edit Simple Haze, Atmospheric Blue, and Light Decay colors. Save atmospheric settings for use next time.
7 - Click the Lighting Conditions box. You can place the sun directly facing the camera to make it visible on the final image. Save Lighting Conditions for use next time.
(Click picture to enlarge)
V. Getting to know the last two Dialogue Boxes and Render your final image.
- You can preview your landscape in 3D by clicking the 3D Preview box. Changing the view here will affect your camera position. To locate the best landscape scene; move the camera from the Rendering Control box while at the same time looking over the 3D Preview. See what happens when you open the 3D Preview then move the camera from the Rendering Control box.
- The Last Rendered Image box shows the image you rendered
before.
8 - Save your world. Render the picture of your landscape through the Rendering Control Box.
I recommend this wallpaper size - change image size to 1024x768. Width = 1024 and Height = 768.
- Knowing Terragen better will lead you to make scenes like these:
The Lava was done using WaterWorks and Firmament plug-ins. For more brilliant examples of images you can view or download them on this site: http://www.uthtv.com/profile/undwight
Other useful programs for use with Terragen:
- TerraPainter ( Win )
- Wilbur ( Win )
- Mini Blender ( Win )
- Firmament ( Win )
- LensFX ( Win )
- Terrain Browser ( Win )
- Solaris ( Win / Mac )
- Waterworks ( Win / Mac )
- HighDynamic ( Mac )
- SOverlay ( Mac )
For questions, comments, suggestions, tips and more tutorials - why not email me?
undwight at yahoo.com
What are you waiting for? Visit: http://www.planetside.co.uk/terragen and see how powerful and easy Terragen is.
More available plug-ins here:
http://www.planetside.co.uk/terragen/resources.shtml
[ March 31st, 2007 ]
Paint the Sky Effect in Terragen
Paint the Sky Effect in Terragen
by Dwight Delleva
For Terragen v0.9
Please do not recopy. If you are going to use this tutorial on your website, please give me credit.
You can download the pdf version of this tutorial from the Content Pages.
On this tutorial, I will basically instruct on how to do a painting effect of the sky in Terragen. This effect is my secret on making beautiful surreal sky scenes with the sun emitting breathtaking beams. Terragen users will eventually want this secret revealed.
The buildings on the picture as shown above are actually mountains modified on World Machine and Canyonized on Terragen. Bumpiness was lowered down to smoothen the terrain. Every element of the sky is done entirely on Terragen. On the following tutorial - I have included screenshots of the settings that I used to bring you all the information you need to "Paint the Sky".
For other questions, email me: undwight at yahoo.com
- Compare the sky on the images below:
Paint the Sky Effect
The usual sky scene
It may look fine but the first image is more dramatic compared to the other.
- First - we have to reach the clouds.
Click on the cloud icon
to open the Cloudscape box. Check 3d. Chooseyour cloud color.
Then choose your cloud size but I would suggest that you choose the default cloud size of which is the space between minimum and maximum. Having minimum is also a good choice to get feather like clouds or cirrus but never maximum. Follow all other number settings as shown on the figure above.
Density Contrast = 70, Density Shift = 30, and Darkening = 9%
- After the clouds let us wander the atmosphere.
Click on the blue icon
to open the Atmosphere box. Follow all the number settings as shown on the figure below. Edit your colors.
The colors that I have used for my picture are:
- Now reach the sun.
Click on the sun icon
to open the Lighting Conditions box. Follow the number settings as shown on the figure below. Check Terrain Casts Shadows and Clouds Cast Shadows. Don't check the other two boxes. Choose your sunlight Colour.
On the Background light settings, have Single Colour Shadow Lighting. The Shadow Colour is up to you. Shadow lightness is 25%.
Follow all other settings on the figures below.
Sun's Appearance
Lighting of Atmosphere
- And you've just finished Painting the Sky.
Play with colors and you can eventually make these scenes.
Both images uses the "Paint the Sky Effect".
Making Snow - Fall
Making Snow - Fall
by Dwight Delleva
For Terragen v0.9
Please do not recopy. If you are going to use this tutorial on your website, please give me credit.
You can download the pdf version of this tutorial from the Content Pages.
Add two or more objects on a Terragen landscape and you will create an attractive image. Make objects transparent. Merge objects together. Turn landscape to a painting. Add snow and learn how to make images glow.
What other programs you need?
Photoshop (trial version)
Gimp (free to download)
Irfanview (free to download)
(You can use GIMP if you don't have a photoshop)
1. Have your background landscape ready.
2. Position selected objects on your landscape.
3. Merge objects with background.
To merge the images as one, I used Gimp using the transparency tool. Open Gimp to edit your objects like the bench and the tree as my example. I have to separately make my objects transparent because of their different color backgrounds. Open an object. The color background of the bench is black so click on the Layer menu then Transparency, Color to Alpha and change from white to black then click ok. Open another object through the file menu and click Open as Layer. The color background of the tree is white - do the same thing but the Color to Alpha should remain white.
Take note: If you want darker areas to be transparent, choose a darker color like black. If you want the light colored areas to be transparent, choose a lighter color like white. Open background landscape on Photoshop. Flatten objects on Gimp. Copy image from Gimp and paste it on the landscape background on Photoshop and save.
4. Open Photoshop or GIMP and turn your picture to a painting.
From the Filter menu - click Artistic then Fresco, the image now will look like this. With Gimp, choose what you like from the filters menu.
5. Add Snow and Diffuse.
Adding snow: Click on the Paintbrush tool. Just point and click everywhere and fill the picture with circle dots. Add large and smaller dots by resizing the Paintbrush.
Diffusing the image: (Photoshop only) Click on Filter then Distort and Diffuse Glow and the whiter areas will glow like magic. Diffusing the image will make the atmosphere look cold.
6. Open Irfanview and enhance your image. Click on Image then Enhance Colors and play on it until your eye meets your desired final look. I increased Blue.
Email me: undwight at yahoo.com