Hi Tracers!

I'm back with a revisited version of my orbital Earth picture... now the
atmosphere fringe (at least to me) looks perfect, and I started with the
next step, i. e. adding a cloud layer around Earth.

Preliminarily, I did that with a simple sphere about 0.005 units (5 kms
in my chosen scale) larger that Earth itself, I hope that later on, I
might be able to use a CSG difference object filled with media.

But even with this simpler version, a new problem arises: which
pattern/noise modification to choose to get halfway realistic cloud
coverage, i. e. cyclonic/anticyclonic whirls? I tried a whole range of
patterns, from agate to spiral1, usually frequency 1, with more or less
turbulence, scaled between 0.1 and 1 and with different scopes within
the color map for non-transparent white.

Also, I thought about some relief for my clouds to emulate cumuli
structures... up to now, I've tried bumps and dents, but none of them
yielded satisfying results.

The texture code for the image attached here:

#declare Earth_Clouds =
   material  // Earth Clouds, Medium Coverage
   {
      texture
      {
         pigment
         {
            spiral1 10
            color_map
            {
               [ 0.0     rgbft <0.0, 0.0, 0.0, 1.0, 1> ]
               [ 0.35    rgbft <0, 0, 0, 1, 1>]
               [ 0.42     rgbft <1,1,1,0,0>]
               [ 0.63     rgbft <1,1,1,0,0>]
               [ 0.70    rgbft <0, 0, 0, 1, 1>]
               [ 1.0     rgbft <0.0, 0.0, 0.0, 1.0, 1> ]
            }
            turbulence 2
            frequency 1
            octaves 6
            ramp_wave
            scale 1
         }
         normal
         {
            dents
            scale 0.003
         }
      }
   }

See you in Khyberspace!

Yadgar

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