Terragen

[Doug Nelson]

A freeware Windows landscape creator, along the lines of Bryce. Development is spotty, but some amazing results.

http://www.planetside.co.uk/
http://www.terrasource.net/
and the main site which hasn't been updated in some time:
http://www.terragen.de/

[DJ Dubovsky]

Hard to believe something like that is actually free. Cool.
DJ

[DJ Dubovsky]

I installed it and I'm amazed at what you can do with it. Incredible!!! Not only that but there are plug ins to add to it also and lots of tutorials to teach you how to use it. I just played around with it about 10 minutes and was generating realistic looking scenes. Thanks for the cool link Doug.
DJ

[Doug Nelson]

Examples. We need examples

[DJ Dubovsky]

OOPs I didn't save any of them. Just wanted to see a few different scenes. I will see what I can do.
DJ

[Ed_L]

I'd like to see some too. Thanks.

Ed

[DJ Dubovsky]

OK I built 3 pretty decent images. They are the basic daylight type images because I'm not good enough to do the sunsets yet. Did a few I wasn't happy with. This program is different than Photoshop in that you never work on a large open file. Everything is done in the Rendering Control preview window. If you change a setting on any other control window, you have to regenerate your preview in the Rendering Control window. If you want a larger view it will build one but it takes time to do that. The more you add to the preview the more time it will take to generate. It's really kind of fun to just play with. And for those of you who want realistic clouds this one makes some of the most realistic ones I've seen. Here's my first image.
DJ

[DJ Dubovsky]

Here's the second image. Light source was purely accidental. Actually everything was purely accidental.
DJ

[DJ Dubovsky]

On this image, I changed the camera point of view and added water.
DJ

[DannyRaphael]

DOUG:

Thanks for the tidbit. This looks like it has great promise for generating some pretty incredible backgrounds.

- - - -

DJ:

A+ on the pronto examples. As we've discussed via PM, "pictures" worth 1,000's of words. Appreciate your sharing efforts once again.

~DannyR~

[DJ Dubovsky]

Hey, I finally got the colors of the sky right to make a neat sunset. Check it out.

Danny, thanks. As you can see, I have been having fun.
DJ

[Ed_L]

WowDeb! It didn't take you long to come up with some decent stuff. Thanks for posting. They look good. Thumbs up on that.

Ed

[CJ Swartz]

DJ -- Wow!! You learn fast! Nice images -- I'll have to take a look at the software.

Doug -- appreciate the sharing.

[Tim_S]

Deb, those are really neat. Thanks Doug for pointing out thes software...

I don't think I'd really use the "surface of the moon" looking mountains and plains, but those sky and cloud scapes could be a quick way to many photographs with boring blue skies. At least at screen resolution the clouds look very realistic...


--tsk

[Tim_S]

Whoops! Deb, I just read my own post, and I think I had better work on my phraseology.... I think the landscapes you produced are really great, and the results are remarkable for the rendering and shapes.

My "surface of the moon" remark was only meant to describe the land surfaces as rendered by the program. They are rather barren looking. While an artist might see that as only a starting point, I was more impressed by the skies that as a photographer I could think of immediate uses for...

Didn't mean to sound so negative...

--tks

Gee I couldn't even get my own initials right in that post...

[Doug Nelson]

tsk, tsk

[d_kendal]

Terragen
A freeware Windows landscape creator, along the lines of Bryce. Development is spotty, but some amazing results.

Ooh Terragen, I forgot that on my list in the Freeware thread. I love that program, and also Bryce (I have the full version of Bryce 3 from a magazine CD a while ago), and I've seen people make amazing things from those programs. (especially Jonathan Allen's "low tides" images made in Bryce - they look amazingly realistic)

DJ - those are some great first attempts in Terragen!

- David

[d_kendal]

Originally posted by Doug Nelson
Examples. We need examples

Check here: http://www.planetside.co.uk/terragen/images.shtml(these are incredible - I'd never guess they weren't photos if I didn't already know)
and here: http://www.terragen.de/gallerylinks.htm (links to loads of galleries)
I'm going to mess around some more in terragen tonight and see if I come up with anything worth posting.

- David

[Doug Nelson]

Yeah, they're great, but it isn't the same as your examples

[Sharon Brunson]

Deb, those are great. You are so talented.

Sharon

[DJ Dubovsky]

Thanks everyone but it's not as if I painted them myself. It was pretty much the basic settings on the program with a little dumb luck tweaking thrown in. I basically wanted to show what you could produce without much knowledge of the program.

Tim S
They can make terrains that are more lush but I can't at this time. So you are looking at the basic amateurs results from only using the program for about an hour. Check out the links David posted to see better versions than I can produce at this time. There are also plug ins you can get for adding trees and rocks etc.
As for the skys, they beat KPT 6 Sky Effects for reality, big time. I want to see if I can generate just the skys for future use in photos also. At anyrate you can't get beat the price.
DJ

[d_kendal]

ok, Doug wanted examples, so here's some of mine:

(I accidentally output the first one in low rez, so it doesn't look very good)

-David

[d_kendal]

# 2:

[d_kendal]

#3:

[d_kendal]

oops, the attachment didn't work for #2 I'll try it again

[d_kendal]

kind of off topic, but for anybody who's interested here's some examples of messing around in Bryce for about 15 minutes: (I didn't really spend any time on textures for the "island", I just put it in there and left it the way it was)

[d_kendal]

I like the way the first one worked out better (the sunset one), but I'll post this day time one anyway:

[DJ Dubovsky]

They all look great David. I love the sunset you got using Bryce. Is it easier or more difficult than Terragen?
DJ

[d_kendal]

Thanks DJ! There's a lot more in Bryce then there is in Terragen (terragen is just for landscapes, Bryce is a full 3D program) so it is a bit harder to learn, but I'd say its a lot more intuitive than Terragen to use. I really like working in Bryce, and you can get amazing results with not too much time and effort

- David

[DJ Dubovsky]

The biggest difference is the cost. Bryce costs around $300 for the full version. I guess I will stick with Terragen.
DJ