Author Archives: Astrographer

PlanetCell on Blender Cycles – Improved Speed

Posted on May 31, 2017

Previously, I began work on a PlanetCell noise-based world map generator. Work on PlanetCell kind of came to a screeching halt, in large part because rendering proved to be so slow. For my purposes, it seemed entirely possible to make … Continue reading →

Posted in Mapping, World Building | Tagged , , , , , , | Leave a comment

A Few New Things About Wilbur

Posted on April 19, 2017

This post is just a quick aside about a few things I noticed about Wilbur while working on my last post. • Typically, when I want to show hillshade on land, but not on the water, I go through a … Continue reading →

Posted in Mapping, World Building | Tagged , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Creating Attractive Satellite-style Textures

Posted on April 8, 2017

This post is going to be a short overview of a method for creating a plausibly-realistic and visually attractive satellite-view of a habitable planet. First, I run tectonics.js until I find an attractive arrangement of continental features. Or… just, you … Continue reading →

Posted in Mapping, Planetary Stuff, Projects, World Building | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Repost: Toponymy

Posted on March 29, 2017

Some of the best mappers I know will quail in terror when the time comes to add names to their maps.

Continue reading →

Posted in Mapping, World Building | Tagged , , , , , | 1 Comment

Map of the World I Rendered in Blender

Posted on January 3, 2017

So I decided to go back and make a larger version of the planet image I created previously for use as a desktop. Basically that involved just resizing an slightly recomposing the scene and rendering it. To add a bit … Continue reading →

Posted in Mapping, Planetary Stuff, World Building | Tagged , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Cultural Oddities List

Posted on December 31, 2016

Dressing Habits Same clothes for all sexes. Characteristic clothes for some group or groups. Characteristic hats for some group or groups. Characteristic masks for some group or groups. Characteristic gloves for some group or groups. Characteristic jewelry or accessories for … Continue reading →

Posted in World Building | Leave a comment

Christmas Repost: Cultural Oddities

Posted on December 25, 2016

Last night, my wife was telling me about a person of her close acquaintance who can get teared up looking at needlepoint. This came up after I mentioned a sociologist I heard on NPR. This fellow had mentioned that in … Continue reading →

Posted in World Building | Leave a comment

Playing With Blender Cycles

Posted on December 20, 2016

This is just a little something to fill in over our trip. A successful render with Blender Cycles. Musgrave Hetero Terrain noise(cycles nodes), bumpmapped diffuse shader above sealevel and a fairly simple glossy shader below sealevel. All with a hypsometric … Continue reading →

Posted in Planetary Stuff, Science Fiction | Tagged , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

One More Bit About Noise

While I intend to continue posting new versions of planetGenesis as I make(hopefully useful)changes, this will be my last noise post for awhile. Did I just hear applause?  To start with, here is planetgenesis_301a.jar. I’ve added scaling to the Modified Multifractal node. The … Continue reading →

Aside | Posted on December 14, 2016 | Leave a comment

Repost: The Collapse of a Civilization

Posted on December 9, 2016

or: Big Things Die Hard So right now I have two draft posts, both of which refuse to come together. One requires me to just sit down and pound away at my notes in a way I just haven’t had … Continue reading →

Posted in History, Science Fiction, World Building | Tagged , , , , , , | Leave a comment