Animated cloud and light rays?

[uOkO]

Anyone has an idea, or knows a tutorial about creating animated sky (I found one, but it's basic) and/or lightrays? :)

[mike yucka]

Take the animated sky tutorial you found and experiment with it. It may be basic, but many concepts that are basic form the framework for more complex effects.

What exactly are you going for? Animated clouds? Do you want them realistic, or do you want them to look like a cloud plane moving? If you want realistic looking clouds, you should use particles or geometry, which you can texture and animate just the way you want.

Other than that, I would say to make a huge sphere with flipped normals and a cloud map on it. Rotate the sphere to move the clouds. Looks best on a huge sphere though.

You can also use more than one sphere for different cloud layers. Of course, they will not react to light correctly, but unless the sky is the focus of your animation, getting it to look good quick is the most important aspect.

[uOkO]

Thanks, I'll try to make something as soon as I get my comp back. ;)

I was looking for some way to make an animated sunset (with cloud shadows). I've got an idea but still try to make it. :)

[thewolf_vii]

Hey, to get animated shadows of clouds, cant you use a spot light and project black clouds moveing on the ground? I got the effect of ripple shadows on the bottem of the ocean by doing this. then i added fog and partical light for the sun rays. ill see if i can find the pic.

[thewolf_vii]

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[uOkO]

Looks very cool. I've tried to do the clouds with particles or fog. Looks kinda strange, but with some modifiers it coudl work. :)