A friend asked me recently how I did the skies in some of my last few pics, and I wanted to say simply, "2D Pic mixed with Skylab", but he was asking for more than that! And after my recent forays into Maya tutorials, I figured I'd spend some time on this in case anyone else was interested, as well... Also, given the sheer amount of cool sky pictures available from Mayang's and other sites, methinks the days of underpowered skies are numbered. And I'm here to usher those days out the door, if possible...! So, Xenic, here you go. Hope it makes sense, and I hope I didn't forget anything important! (And Kemal : "bit too realistic sky but its all good" on my silly castle pic? What are you trying to SAY!) (grins)

Thanks for looking! If anyone would like the source sky picture I took and then used in this scene, just let me know. I have a good 50 very picturesque sky photos I took just for the purpose of Brycifying them... Hope this helps someone, it sure was a lot of fun playing Photoshop Arena 2000-fifty tonight! - Jared (now, let's see... For January I've tackled fires, some waters, airs... and what's left...)

cool but the perspective is messed up in this way.

Aye, I forgot the step where we fixed that, and detached the 2D pic from the camera... All you have to do it set the image to "Track to None", and then turn it's X-rotation back to zero. It's Y will remain at 45, and it's Z at zero as well... (thanks, Bazze)

AH HA! Thanks LSD, that makes perfect sense. I'll try that out next time.

Thanks for the tut. Good info.