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Atlantis Riverside

Bryce Science Fiction posted on Aug 10, 2009
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Description


I was going to try to do this rendering in Vue. After all, I spent a bunch of money for Vue 6 Infinite and I had high hopes off doing some fancy ecosystems. Too fancy, perhaps. I got a nice rock and plant field, but when I started trying to put the floaters in the water, all hell -- or all crash -- let lose. 4GB RAM, but the thing kept puking. Plus I haven't figured out how to do materials well yet. Wasted a Saturday afternoon getting more and more annoyed. So back to Bryce. Couldn't handle the fancy spike trees (too many objects), so I made them into 2D images. Looks fine at a distance, though. Looked for a zodiac boat (see the little yellow thing on the beach) in free stuff and with Google. Couldn't find one, so I built a crude little boat out of cylinders and spheres. I even made the outboard engine with a propeller (way too small to see). FYI, my world "Atlantis" has nothing to do with the TV series. I my little universe, it’s the habitable planet around Alpha Centauri B. Got its name because that was the name of the ramscoop that first made it there; plus it has one small continent and a couple of sunken ones. The light in the sky is Alpha Centauri A -- way brighter than a full moon -- a lens flare in Photoshop. Sig and crop done in PSP (yeah, silly, but that's how I did it.) No other postwork. Thanks for all your views and comments. --- To divide Atlantian life into "plants" and "animals" is misleading. Yes, the native life does use DNA and produces eighteen amino acids, six of which overlap our own. Yes, Atlantian bacteria, though unrelated, is little different than the earthly varieties. But the dominate form of life on Atlantis is more akin to fungi than anything else. The worms that crawl in the ground and swim in the sea, and even float in the sky under methane sacks, are just a motile life stage of a creature that starts as a slime mold and ends as a bush. The giant spores that fly and float like colorful bubbles are the spawn of fruiting bodies of the styrofoam plants that line the shores, rivers and pools of Atlantis. The cellular components of this dominant kingdom of life draw power from the sun through small organelles that produce carotenoid-like chemicals. But inefficient chemicals and a redder sun leave very few pure "plants". Most organisms supplement their energy, at least in some life stage, through methods chemical or predatory. Styrofoams are the most widespread ground cover. Tendrils from many species of styrofoam static life stages reach deep into the soil, leaching nutrients, trapping burrowing worms and acting as a sturdy webbing to limit erosion. Like an iceberg, nine-tenths of a styrofoam is underground. Technically, styrofoams are edible. Some Atlantian proteins, carbohydrates and fats can be digested by humans, but they are a poor source of energy and lack many vital nutrients. And they taste like styrofoam. And they often contain unhealthy concentrations of heavy metals. Some styrofoam species expel heavy metals by concentrating them into nodules that are covered by spheres of cellular material. These little red beads are called "berries". Don't eat the berries. --excerpt from Introduction to Exobiology, Chiron Press, 2216

Comments (9)


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NefariousDrO

8:32PM | Mon, 10 August 2009

Your science fiction is always top-notch, and this is certainly no exception. What I really like is how you always have a carefully thought-out reason for everything you do in your work. There's nothing simply there "for looks" alone, it always serves the story, or the reason why something was made. The world you describe here is fascinating, the image very evocative, and now I really want to visit the place!

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Colin

8:54PM | Mon, 10 August 2009

What a fascinating set of concepts you're playing with here... I'm a sucker for alien ecosystems myself, so I applaud your inventiveness! Bravo!

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preeder

2:53AM | Tue, 11 August 2009

Nice - unusual but nice.

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kjer_99

10:58PM | Tue, 11 August 2009

Excellent description of the life-forms there.

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grafikeer

10:58PM | Tue, 11 August 2009

Very cool alien landscape and lifeforms..especialy like the floating jellyfish-like creatures.The accompanying story adds greatly to the image,and the zodiac boat looks great....nicely modelled!

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Shirahime

1:29AM | Thu, 13 August 2009

Fantastic!

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aguirre

1:35PM | Sat, 15 August 2009

What a fascinating place. I'd love to explore it.

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Seaview123

9:30PM | Sat, 22 August 2009

Don't give up the ship with Vue. It's capable of a lot of things, but the crashes do come with the territory. My advice is to keep at it, but save often. Also, check out some of the free tutorials at 'geekatplay.com'

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e-brink

6:02PM | Wed, 11 November 2009

Hey, I must have missed this one! Excellent creative work. I agree with you about Vue. I have used Vue for a long time and upgraded to Vue infinite 7.5 recently and it is, as Vue has always been, highly unstable. Worst than that, Vue 8 infinite only runs on the new Intel Macs - that's just stupid, considering there's so many great (and powerful) PowerMacs out there that will last for years. Having said that - getting one of them to run Vue consistently will be asking something. Bryce is so stable (though obviously in need of updates). I also find Carrara stable too. Anyway, Vue is extremely limited - what it does, it does very well, but it pales side the side of other programs like Carrara and C4D.


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