Hmm... not bad. We do live on such a pretty planet! Is there a way to add a bit of fuzz to the earth to indicate that it has an atmosphere and the moon does not? Perhaps having a globe within a globe and your cloud layer on the upper one? Carolly

Beautiful! I wish I could do that - I could use it for an astronomy lesson about moon phases. :)

There are three spheres/layers already applied to the earth model. It does have an atmoshere sphere around it. In this 'photo' you wouldn't see the atmosphere very much to 'high' above the Earth. I mean look at some NASA images and you'll see what I am talking about. :-) Also the closer you get to this Earth, the more detail you can see, like for example the mountains start to show height. :-) Don't worry though, when I can get rid of the seam in the cloud texture I'll release the scene above. :-)

You're right - you can only see the atmosphere when your F.O.V. is 1/4 of the surface or less. But when you say "seam", does that mean you didn't use spherical mapping?

EremticWolf, It's the difference between perception and reality. Our atmosphere is maybe 5 miles high or so? and doesn't show from far away... yet the mind expects to see some softness of the edge, especially when compared to an airless world. I am looking forward to this. Carolly

Looks great, and the moon would look even better if you put a very bright spotlight (or lightened the texture)on it to simulate the direct exposure to intensity of the sun. The earth looks about right for exposure, but could use a few more clouds (unless this is a REALLY clear day in North America) - Nice work!