Attached Link: Digital Blasphemy

I'm interested in rendering a scene with northern lights (aurora australis, borealis) and I would like to make it as realistic as possible. I have two main problems before beginning: 1. Use postwork for the sky and northern lights. My first thought was to make the scenery in bryce with a black sky, add the stars in Universe. Then try to use my mediocre Photoshop skills to add a blanket of lights, perhaps combining vertical motion blur with some simple brush strokes and then fill the whole thing with a procedural texture. My first guess on this is that it's going to take me forever. 2. Use Bryce, create terrains (basically the sand dunes or rolling hills fractals), prop them up in the POV and simply add that default light texture. This might take less but there's a chance of it sucking in the end, not to mention that it might prove a slight challenge to add the stars in the background through Universe and Pshop. Ideas? Ryan Bliss made me have a pretty good digital orgasm on his site with the link attached and I think it's my duty to prove the wanker that Bryce is just as good as Lightwave in its native environment (landscaping). K, ideas, suggestions? :) Drac

here is some aurora pics I've made after reading your message.. the easier way I found to make it is to use some photoshop layers as texture on a 2D plan.. there is no post work at all.. stars etc.. are from bryce sky... It took me less than 20mn to do this. If you nedd some furthers informations please IM me.. cheers

Drac: That is a great render at the link, although it seems the ones I have witnessed first hand seem to have a little more color to them (similar to the picture above). As I am relatively new to Bryce I cannot offer you any suggestions as how to go about doing this, but I would be very interested in your results to compare the two.

GO GET HIM !

pidjy, that is absolutely awesome. thank you for the ideas :)

thank you too, brycefreak. I've never seen the aurora and it's one of my many life wishes that I would live to see one in all its splendor. I hope that my render will only serve to help that moment come true. Drac

Well, Drac, I think it is your duty to show what Bryce can do. While I can't advise you as to technique, I did a quick search for some online reference pictures for you. It looks like the Northern Lights take many forms, so you should be able to create something both unique and gorgeous. Keep us posted! Lin btw, I too would like to see them in person. http://www.holycross.edu/departments/chemistry/jvandore/atmospheric/dom/Dom1.html http://www.geo.mtu.edu/weather/aurora/images/aurora/jan.curtis/index.html http://www.exploratorium.edu/learning_studio/auroras/photo.html

Wow nice way of doing northern light. Pidjy : Vraiment bon, ca fait tout un effet. Isstrout: Seeing a show of northern light is incredible, its amazing. Brycefreak they can be many colors like they can be only one color, i saw green ones and blues ones. Depends on the altitude of the Aurora. Denis

Could someone please be kind enough to explain what pidjy did in the screen shot he posted? I am very new to bryce and don't understand it from just the image. Thanks in advance:) Moonbow

Well, I've lived 26 yrs in Massachusetts and 14 yrs in upstate NY and I have yet to catch the borealis. ERrrr. The pictures seem so beautiful, I can't image what it must be like to see it for real. Someday, I hope.

Moonbow, You might want to Instant Message Pidgy, but it looks like he went into photoshop to create the aurora effect in the lower right hand corner. Then opened Bryce, created a 2d plane and applied the photoshop picture using the materials editor. Here is a link to a brief explanation on how to apply the picture: http://www.renderosity.com/messages.ez?Form.ShowMessage=1083151 The little red dots above show what the settings should be to get the best effect. Play with the materials editor, it's a lot of fun. Lin

Thank you Lin. I did Instant Message Pidgy when he first posted the image, but he must have been busy. I appreciate your help and the link. I have been using Bryce only since Dec so I have alot to learn! Moonbow