In this tutorial, we will go through the steps of creating a realistic globe and clouds using only shaders. We will add some atmosphere to the horizon with a volume and standard_volume shader. We will also light the scene using a physical_sky connected to a skydome_light light. This scene would make an ideal backdrop for a fictional film about some unfortunate astronauts, for example. Many thanks to Will MacNeil at MPC for providing the scene used for this tutorial.
The final C4D (R18) scene can be downloaded here.
The tutorial is broken up into the following stages:
You will need to download and use these high-resolution textures for use with this scene. Remember to convert the textures to .tx format prior to rendering.
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Earth Color (base_color) | Earth Elevation (displace) | Clouds (emission, opacity, displace) | Earth Mask (specular) |
Start scene containing Earth and Cloud objects
Hide the Cloud object for the time being. We will focus on the Earth shader first.
'Earth Color' map connected to base_color of Earth standard_surface shader
Now we want to add a specular map to determine where the sea is reflective and where the land has no specularity.
Land/sea shininess determined by 'Earth Mask' texture connected to specularity of Earth shader
The Earth's surface is looking a little bit flat. We can add some elevation to the surface using the displacement map - 'Earth Elevation'.
Create an image texture and connect it to the Arnold Displacement port of the Earth Standard shader. Under Image name open the texture Earth Elevation. In order to see fine detail in the displacement, we will need to add some subdivisions to the Earth geometry.
Select the Earth geometry and right click on it to create an Arnold tag - C4DtoA Tags> Arnold Parameters. Under the subdivision tab, change the type to catclark and increase the iterations to 4. Under the Displacement tab, increase the height to around 100cm.
Earth Displacement settings
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Earth terrain is being displaced using 'Earth Elevation' texture
The clouds shader is a little bit simpler to set up. We will use the clouds image and connect it to the emission, opacity, and displacement of a standard_shader.
Displacement, opacity, and emission of clouds driven by Clouds texture map
Finally, we will create some atmosphere, visible on the horizon, using a volume.
Create an Arnold Volume - Plugins> C4DtoA> Arnold Volume and change the type to sphere.
Scale the volume so that it covers the Earth object.
Create a standard_volume shader and assign it to the volume.
Change the scatter_color to a light blue color. Increase the transparent_depth to fine-tune the effect.
That concludes this tutorial on how to realistically shade a globe. Finally, why not try keyframing the rotation of the cloud and Earth to create a fake time-lapse effect or animate an astronaut plummeting to their death?