Very well done, I have no idea how this is done, but I sure like the results of your computerized imagery. tigs=^..^=

Boy, you really have 'the touch' Russ...wonderful composition and sooo realistic...what program do you use?...is it fairly user-friendly?...something I might like to try some time...meantime, a marvelous result here and a fave for me.

Thank you Pat and Sandi, I'm glad you liked the picture. The software is Terragen 4, and rather than buy it, I just pay a few quid every month to rent it. It's not difficult to use, but it is difficult to get good results simply because of the coarseness of the interface. You have to do lots of small test renders to get an idea of what's going on in the image as you make changes. It just takes a lot of patience and intuition about what the controls are doing. Basically it's a random noise generator that uses filters to create shapes and surfaces, which are then modified by 'shaders' which add color and fine detail. You can also import satellite elevation maps from NASA and other sources to recreate mountains and ranges found on Earth that you color with shaders. The tree models in the above image are from Xfrog and are imported into the scene using Terragen's object populator, which can either make one tree, or millions, with variations in scale and rotation to give the appearance of different plants. Or, said differently, each tree species in the picture comes from a single model, but generated many times, with only size and rotation changes to give the illusion of a wild forest. The plant models are more than just static objects though, and will grow and intertwine with surrounding plants so they look like they grew together naturally. Growth and branching behavior that matches the actual plants is contained within the models so that they always appear natural and true to life. This technique eliminates the problem of overlap seen in earlier programs, where leaves or whole plants could intersect each other unnaturally and spoil the illusion. Also, render times for large, high-res images are pretty slow. But for me, the end results justify the trouble.

Here's a link to the Terragen image gallery. It makes me feel completely inadequate :^(

https://planetside.co.uk/terragen-image-gallery/

I thoroughly enjoyed your computer landscape and the subsequent explanation.

TicK
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