Author Topic: Photoshop tutorials for making planets and stars  (Read 7705 times)

Offline contingencyplan

  • Villain
  • Ivory-Tower Theorist
  • Admiral
  • *****
  • Posts: 977
  • Karma: +1/-0
  • Must I sin once, and repent forever?
    • View Profile
    • My Blog
Photoshop tutorials for making planets and stars
« on: December 21, 2006, 03:55:40 am »
Figure the arteests of the group could appreciate this. Came across it on SomethingAwful. Here ya go - two Photoshop tutorials, one for making star fields, and one for making planets.

Starfield
Planets

Now, let's see what y'all can do with it!
« Last Edit: December 21, 2006, 10:25:29 am by contingencyplan »
We've all heard that a million monkeys banging on a million typewriters will eventually reproduce the entire works of Shakespeare. Now, thanks to the Internet, we know this is not true. 
    ~Robert Wilensky

It is not bigotry to be certain we are right; but it is bigotry to be unable to imagine how we might possibly have gone wrong.
    ~GK Chesterton

Men never do evil so completely and cheerfully as when they do it from a religious conviction.
    ~Blaise Pascal

Offline Recon

  • Lieutenant
  • ***
  • Posts: 60
  • Karma: +1/-0
    • View Profile
Re: Photoshop tutorials for making planets and stars
« Reply #1 on: December 21, 2006, 06:28:18 am »
 Hmm, is it just me or are the links missing ?

Offline contingencyplan

  • Villain
  • Ivory-Tower Theorist
  • Admiral
  • *****
  • Posts: 977
  • Karma: +1/-0
  • Must I sin once, and repent forever?
    • View Profile
    • My Blog
Re: Photoshop tutorials for making planets and stars
« Reply #2 on: December 21, 2006, 10:24:46 am »
Yes, it's just you.

* contingencyplan waves hand
- I did not edit my original post... I did not edit my original post...

Ah, forget it - here ya go:

Starfield
Planets

Okay, NOW let's see what y'all can do with it!
We've all heard that a million monkeys banging on a million typewriters will eventually reproduce the entire works of Shakespeare. Now, thanks to the Internet, we know this is not true. 
    ~Robert Wilensky

It is not bigotry to be certain we are right; but it is bigotry to be unable to imagine how we might possibly have gone wrong.
    ~GK Chesterton

Men never do evil so completely and cheerfully as when they do it from a religious conviction.
    ~Blaise Pascal

Offline Morgul

  • GNE Founder
  • Moderator
  • Grand Admiral
  • *****
  • Posts: 2086
  • Karma: +21/-4
  • Godlike Fuzzy Dice
    • View Profile
    • G33X Nexus Entertainment
Re: Photoshop tutorials for making planets and stars
« Reply #3 on: December 21, 2006, 06:49:16 pm »
Well, 20 minutes created what you see below. Not very good, and if I spent more time on it, it would look better. Eh, it does work though.
« Last Edit: December 21, 2006, 06:54:15 pm by morgul »
"Just because my math may tell lies doesn't mean that I don't understand the quantum mechanics of it all." --Caenus

The popular videogame "Doom" is based loosely around the time Satan borrowed two bucks from Vin Diesel and forgot to pay him back.

"In the beginning there was nothing. And it exploded." --Terry Pratchett

Offline Morgul

  • GNE Founder
  • Moderator
  • Grand Admiral
  • *****
  • Posts: 2086
  • Karma: +21/-4
  • Godlike Fuzzy Dice
    • View Profile
    • G33X Nexus Entertainment
Re: Photoshop tutorials for making planets and stars
« Reply #4 on: December 22, 2006, 01:57:56 am »
Here's my first try at a planet. Keep in mind, this is all done with gimp, not photoshop,so half the tools I need are missing.
"Just because my math may tell lies doesn't mean that I don't understand the quantum mechanics of it all." --Caenus

The popular videogame "Doom" is based loosely around the time Satan borrowed two bucks from Vin Diesel and forgot to pay him back.

"In the beginning there was nothing. And it exploded." --Terry Pratchett

Offline Morgul

  • GNE Founder
  • Moderator
  • Grand Admiral
  • *****
  • Posts: 2086
  • Karma: +21/-4
  • Godlike Fuzzy Dice
    • View Profile
    • G33X Nexus Entertainment
Re: Photoshop tutorials for making planets and stars
« Reply #5 on: December 22, 2006, 02:40:44 am »
Here's a planet done in Photoshop in about 3 minutes.
"Just because my math may tell lies doesn't mean that I don't understand the quantum mechanics of it all." --Caenus

The popular videogame "Doom" is based loosely around the time Satan borrowed two bucks from Vin Diesel and forgot to pay him back.

"In the beginning there was nothing. And it exploded." --Terry Pratchett

Offline Morgul

  • GNE Founder
  • Moderator
  • Grand Admiral
  • *****
  • Posts: 2086
  • Karma: +21/-4
  • Godlike Fuzzy Dice
    • View Profile
    • G33X Nexus Entertainment
Re: Photoshop tutorials for making planets and stars
« Reply #6 on: December 22, 2006, 03:24:54 am »
... and here's a nice starfield done in Photoshop.
"Just because my math may tell lies doesn't mean that I don't understand the quantum mechanics of it all." --Caenus

The popular videogame "Doom" is based loosely around the time Satan borrowed two bucks from Vin Diesel and forgot to pay him back.

"In the beginning there was nothing. And it exploded." --Terry Pratchett

Offline Morgul

  • GNE Founder
  • Moderator
  • Grand Admiral
  • *****
  • Posts: 2086
  • Karma: +21/-4
  • Godlike Fuzzy Dice
    • View Profile
    • G33X Nexus Entertainment
Re: Photoshop tutorials for making planets and stars
« Reply #7 on: December 22, 2006, 03:42:31 am »
...and now, here is the final product. (With and without logo.)
"Just because my math may tell lies doesn't mean that I don't understand the quantum mechanics of it all." --Caenus

The popular videogame "Doom" is based loosely around the time Satan borrowed two bucks from Vin Diesel and forgot to pay him back.

"In the beginning there was nothing. And it exploded." --Terry Pratchett

Offline contingencyplan

  • Villain
  • Ivory-Tower Theorist
  • Admiral
  • *****
  • Posts: 977
  • Karma: +1/-0
  • Must I sin once, and repent forever?
    • View Profile
    • My Blog
Re: Photoshop tutorials for making planets and stars
« Reply #8 on: December 22, 2006, 09:26:20 am »
So is this just some random planet, or does it have a backstory?

I vote backstory if you're gonna associate it directly with the game via the logo. :)
We've all heard that a million monkeys banging on a million typewriters will eventually reproduce the entire works of Shakespeare. Now, thanks to the Internet, we know this is not true. 
    ~Robert Wilensky

It is not bigotry to be certain we are right; but it is bigotry to be unable to imagine how we might possibly have gone wrong.
    ~GK Chesterton

Men never do evil so completely and cheerfully as when they do it from a religious conviction.
    ~Blaise Pascal

Offline Morgul

  • GNE Founder
  • Moderator
  • Grand Admiral
  • *****
  • Posts: 2086
  • Karma: +21/-4
  • Godlike Fuzzy Dice
    • View Profile
    • G33X Nexus Entertainment
Re: Photoshop tutorials for making planets and stars
« Reply #9 on: December 22, 2006, 12:40:37 pm »
Oh, I could invent a backstory if I wanted to. In fact, this seemes like the perfect candidate for a planet on the edge of NorAellian space. This particular planet is quarantined by the NorAellians, who are so scared of it, they won't even tell anyone it'd name. Something very bad was discovered here long long ago, and though they won't tell the story, rumors are that this is the planet where some of the first spacefaring NorAellians and GikDaa discovered something linked to the Overseers... and well, it either destroyed them, changed them, or both.

(Yes, I personally know the entire story. It will be featured in the Comic, I assure you.)

--Chris
"Just because my math may tell lies doesn't mean that I don't understand the quantum mechanics of it all." --Caenus

The popular videogame "Doom" is based loosely around the time Satan borrowed two bucks from Vin Diesel and forgot to pay him back.

"In the beginning there was nothing. And it exploded." --Terry Pratchett

Offline Caenus

  • Married Man
  • Concept Artist
  • Grand Admiral
  • ******
  • Posts: 2351
  • Karma: +5000/-1
  • That, I cannot do.
    • View Profile
    • Art Blog
Re: Photoshop tutorials for making planets and stars
« Reply #10 on: December 22, 2006, 03:46:06 pm »
SNAP!!  I haven't even looked at the tutorials yet.  I'm gonna have to play with it. 

Right now, I'm having too much fun in Ancient Greece. 

If you don't get that, check my art blog: http://www.keithart.blogspot.com

Merciful Father, I have squandered my days with plans of many things. This was not among them. But at this moment, I beg only to live the next few minutes well. For all we ought to have thought, and have not thought; all we ought to have said, and have not said; all we ought to have done, and have not done; I pray thee God for forgiveness.

Offline Morgul

  • GNE Founder
  • Moderator
  • Grand Admiral
  • *****
  • Posts: 2086
  • Karma: +21/-4
  • Godlike Fuzzy Dice
    • View Profile
    • G33X Nexus Entertainment
Re: Photoshop tutorials for making planets and stars
« Reply #11 on: December 25, 2006, 09:37:15 pm »
Did some more work, and I made a 1400x1050 desktop background out of it.

Whatcha think?
"Just because my math may tell lies doesn't mean that I don't understand the quantum mechanics of it all." --Caenus

The popular videogame "Doom" is based loosely around the time Satan borrowed two bucks from Vin Diesel and forgot to pay him back.

"In the beginning there was nothing. And it exploded." --Terry Pratchett

Offline contingencyplan

  • Villain
  • Ivory-Tower Theorist
  • Admiral
  • *****
  • Posts: 977
  • Karma: +1/-0
  • Must I sin once, and repent forever?
    • View Profile
    • My Blog
Re: Photoshop tutorials for making planets and stars
« Reply #12 on: December 26, 2006, 03:41:43 am »
Kickass - set it as my desktop.

Deviantart's Science Fiction section has a lot of good ones like this too; that's where I usually go for new wallpapers.

Ugh, first post after my Ninja Gaiden marathon. The keyboard feels weird now. :( Damn good game, though (just frustrating as all fucking hell at points).
We've all heard that a million monkeys banging on a million typewriters will eventually reproduce the entire works of Shakespeare. Now, thanks to the Internet, we know this is not true. 
    ~Robert Wilensky

It is not bigotry to be certain we are right; but it is bigotry to be unable to imagine how we might possibly have gone wrong.
    ~GK Chesterton

Men never do evil so completely and cheerfully as when they do it from a religious conviction.
    ~Blaise Pascal

Offline ryguy_1617

  • 3d Modeler
  • Commodore
  • *******
  • Posts: 474
  • Karma: +6/-21
    • View Profile
    • http://flashcubestudios.com
Re: Photoshop tutorials for making planets and stars
« Reply #13 on: December 27, 2006, 09:49:44 pm »
First, a 20 minute work from this tutorial and last, an original work from before this tutorial that I did -- I felt like posting since it has to do with stars.

« Last Edit: December 27, 2006, 09:52:49 pm by ryguy_1617 »

Offline contingencyplan

  • Villain
  • Ivory-Tower Theorist
  • Admiral
  • *****
  • Posts: 977
  • Karma: +1/-0
  • Must I sin once, and repent forever?
    • View Profile
    • My Blog
Re: Photoshop tutorials for making planets and stars
« Reply #14 on: December 27, 2006, 11:39:37 pm »
The first is cool, but the last is kickass. Two thumbs up on both!
We've all heard that a million monkeys banging on a million typewriters will eventually reproduce the entire works of Shakespeare. Now, thanks to the Internet, we know this is not true. 
    ~Robert Wilensky

It is not bigotry to be certain we are right; but it is bigotry to be unable to imagine how we might possibly have gone wrong.
    ~GK Chesterton

Men never do evil so completely and cheerfully as when they do it from a religious conviction.
    ~Blaise Pascal

Offline whitelynx

  • GNE Founder
  • Moderator
  • Commodore
  • *****
  • Posts: 304
  • Karma: +4/-0
  • Internet Idiocy Pundit
    • View Profile
Re: Photoshop tutorials for making planets and stars
« Reply #15 on: February 11, 2007, 12:32:42 am »
I really like a lot of the work that came out of this thread... what I'd like to see is someone doing some new skybox art for the game using these techniques. When doing skybox art, there's a few things to keep in mind:
  • There should be 6 individual square images, each representing one side of the cube. (i'd suggest 512x512 or 1024x1024 as the size of each image)
  • Each image has to line up with the images that border on it; we don't want nebulas that suddenly cut off at the edges of the cube. (keep in mind, you're creating images for the inside of the cube, so make sure they line up right)
  • Stuff at the edges of each image is going to take up less screen space than in the middle, since it is further from the camera and tilted away from it; therefore, stuff in the corners should be "stretched" a bit to make up for the strangeness in perspective. (you can try doing a "pinch" on the finished images, and it might have the desired effect. The image at the bottom of this post is an example of that.)
  • Don't make it overly flashy; space may be full of interesting things, but that doesn't mean that there's alway 30 psychedelic-colored nebulas with weird shapes visible from any given point. Something along the lines of ryguy's first image would be great for a skybox.

Think you guys can come up with something? If so, it'll probably make it into the game's test levels. ;D
"Without music, life is a mistake, a trial, an exile."
 - Nietzsche

Offline Recon

  • Lieutenant
  • ***
  • Posts: 60
  • Karma: +1/-0
    • View Profile
Re: Photoshop tutorials for making planets and stars
« Reply #16 on: February 11, 2007, 07:23:16 am »
well, I did a little bit of work on this



http://img178.imageshack.us/img178/1448/screenshotwd9.png

still got a few issues, The stars are generated from the star catalog and draw each frame. The stars are currently rendered last due to a bug with taking screen shots while window was resizing. Will have to ask jorrit if anything has been done about that. I had this working the right ( stars in background) but had that bug crashing app, will have to see if it's a CS bug or somthing i was doing.

Unfortunitly I dont have as much time as I used to code so things going much slower. I need to make this star thing it's own plugin as it currently in the same plugin as stargen which is GPL (Used that pluging as it already loaded the star catalog). and need to work out how to use effects to sharpen and blur the image to make it look better. but it's a start on a dymanic star's.

Basicly it just draws a point for each star on the screen. Things to add
 
   Different colours for different star types
   Different brightness different luminisoties
   Taking faraway stars, drawing them and then bluring them to give shades of space

Comments welcome, is this the direction we want to go with skybox?

Regards