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Making Planets

Discussion in 'General Discussion' started by unityMark, Oct 3, 2010.

  1. unityMark

    unityMark

    Joined:
    Jul 30, 2010
    Posts:
    6
    I am working on a space game. I'm new to Unity, sort of new to 3D modeling and animation, but no stranger to gaming and programming.

    One thing I want are good looking planets.

    I guess if I needed something close-up and large scale, I could create it elsewhere and slap it into a skybox, but for small to medium scale objects (looking at a planet and its moons from a distance that puts both them all in view at once) I would like to create a graphically-immersive environment.

    I'm getting somewhere with the skyboxes, no small help from the Spacescape product and Paint Shop Pro, but planets, moons, asteroids, and other such environmental objects are just not coming out the way I want them.

    Initially it was the 65K triangle limit, but I understand that by splitting meshes, one can get past that and put up smooth objects.

    Now, the problem is getting a soft, "atmospheric" look to the light striking planets and moons. Even with asteroids or planetary disk debris, I would like to avoid harsh, pixelated effects from illumination.

    I've tried halos, but I get a distinct line visible from certain aspects on the object.

    I'm playing around in Blender trying to create an outer shell mesh to play the part of the atmosphere. Even it that works in Blender, not sure how well it will work in Unity.

    I'm looking for thoughts on the best way to attack this.... Should I be looking at shader programming? Or maybe particles?

    Thoughts?
     
    Last edited: Oct 3, 2010
  2. oblivionfeet

    oblivionfeet

    Joined:
    Jul 24, 2010
    Posts:
    481
  3. unityMark

    unityMark

    Joined:
    Jul 30, 2010
    Posts:
    6
    Thanks!
     
  4. Veli

    Veli

    Joined:
    Mar 10, 2009
    Posts:
    301
    Doesn't work with Unity3 :(