Scarran Flyby (With thanks to Hubble & Meurig)

[Starbase1]

I may try some others, and make some tweaks which is why it's not in the finished area, but I must admit I'm fairly happy with the first shot at this one...

I was looking at some high resolution HST images, and it occurred to me that there was enough resolution to wrap them around and use them as a backdrop big enough to pan around...

So I made a chunk of sphere 180 around and +/- about 40 degrees, and applied an HST high res photo to it. I decided that Meurig's Scarran Predator would work rather well, and whizzed it past the camera. I also applied the image to the whole environment and used it to add light to scene on top of the soft spotlight aimed at the ship.

Nick

[Rigel]

That worked out very well. The background is stunning.

[Starbase1]

That worked out very well. The background is stunning.

Thanks - that's the bit I was concentrating on, (and getting the lighting to match). And of course there are plenty of other HST images that will work with it, so it's fairly adaptable.

I can probably be persuaded to clean things up and upload it!
:p

[Gordon Robb]

Ooh, yes that is nice looking. What a background.

[Meurig]

That background came out very nicely indeed!

The practise of mapping images or matte paintings onto the inside of a sphere and panning around inside it is something we do a lot at work. They tend to get called Cycloramas. Provided the camera doesn't translate too much you can get away with loads using them.

Cool stuff :)

[Starbase1]

That background came out very nicely indeed!

The practise of mapping images or matte paintings onto the inside of a sphere and panning around inside it is something we do a lot at work. They tend to get called Cycloramas. Provided the camera doesn't translate too much you can get away with loads using them.

Cool stuff :)

Coming from the man who did the hard bit in that scene, I take it as high praise!
:D :D :D

Thanks,
Nick

[Starbase1]

And another version, this time with a different hubble backdrop, and a bit of swoop in the motion.

Nick

[Rigel]

That works very well too.

Where are you getting these images?

[Starbase1]

That works very well too.

Where are you getting these images?

Try here:
http://hubblesite.org/
And follow through to the maximum size option, after finding one you like.

The Hubble Heritage site is also excellent, (and much easier to navigate in my opinion).
http://heritage.stsci.edu/gallery/gallery.html

Nick

[Starbase1]

That works very well too.

Where are you getting these images?

Oh, and a google image search on 'nebula' with extra large images selected is al;so rather productive!

http://images.google.co.uk/images?q=nebula&gbv=2&hl=en&imgsz=huge

Nick

[Starbase1]

And here are a couple more - this is really easy!

I absolutely love the colours in the Horsehead Nebula, but the image is really not high enough resolution dammit. And that area is just too big to hope for a nice widefield Hubble shot...

I don't suppose anyone has a copy of that clever upscaling software who would be willing to take a crack at doubling it up for me?

Nick

[Rigel]

You're having fun aren't you?

:)

[Starbase1]

You could be right...

After this one I'll get on with tidying things up ready to upload!

[Northwatch]

Very Nice. I have been looking at images from NASA for different images of the earth as backgrounds. A lot of images to go through to find the right ones.

[kreature]

:jawdrop:Has a Massive sense of the vastness of space, the lighting on the ship looks cool.
Very nice animation Starbase!!

[Starbase1]

OK, I finally got my act together. Attached is an image of the backdrop object, as seen in Modeller.

Not that it is big! It started out as a complete hoop, (missing the poles), and I textured it with a spherical map, autosized, and set to a texture repeat of 2, so that one image fitted a half hoop, as you see here. (This should be easy in any 3d package).

You need a high res image, in the proportions 2:1 width to height. You can use the image editor as a quick way to load a new packdrop. Note that these need to be high resolution, I recommend an absolute minimum of 4k wide, and 8k is a lot better.

Try looking on the hubble telescope web pages, or do a google extra large image search with words like "nebula" or "galaxy".

Niote thathe illusion will be broken if you move the camera! Keep the camera at (0,0,0), and move the spaceships past.

Next message will have some sample files.

Nick

[Starbase1]

Sample scene, object, 2 image maps attached, and a video of what the sample scene should produce (VERY simple, but should get you started).

If anyone shows an interest (and shares what they do with this here), I'll make a bundle for the resources area, wih more stuff in.

Nick

[DELTA]

Thanks, I wish our night skies looked like that with the naked eyes.


Nice work!

[3D_CG]

perrty darn cool if I say so myself...
tk on the sample scene

[today]

I've always wanted to try that kind of a shot with a cloud background instead of a nebula, but I can never seem to find a suitably proportioned cloud photo.. suppose I could take one myself if I really wanted to:p

Nice job, it seems like a simple effect but it's not easy to pull off flawlessly:)

[lonewriter]

OK, I finally got my act together. Attached is an image of the backdrop object, as seen in Modeller.

Not that it is big! It started out as a complete hoop, (missing the poles), and I textured it with a spherical map, autosized, and set to a texture repeat of 2, so that one image fitted a half hoop, as you see here. (This should be easy in any 3d package).

You need a high res image, in the proportions 2:1 width to height. You can use the image editor as a quick way to load a new packdrop. Note that these need to be high resolution, I recommend an absolute minimum of 4k wide, and 8k is a lot better.

Try looking on the hubble telescope web pages, or do a google extra large image search with words like "nebula" or "galaxy".

Niote thathe illusion will be broken if you move the camera! Keep the camera at (0,0,0), and move the spaceships past.

Next message will have some sample files.

Nick

now I juswt need to figure out how to make that hoop.

[Starbase1]

now I juswt need to figure out how to make that hoop.

a) make a sphere and clip off the top and bottom. Then split.

or

b) Download the one provided in the zip.

[lonewriter]

thanks, you are a lifesaver.