Background in the horizon in 3dsmax

[alekzab]

can anyone share a technique on making horizon full of buildings and trees thats looks realistic enough to make an aerial flythrough one in which it shows 4 miles in the horizon.

[Claudio Branch]

"Realistic enough" is somewhat subjective, but ultimately your approach needs to be in accordance with your project budget, your technical abilities and the expectations of your client.

 

Down & Dirty

 

Grab a digital camera, go out and take a lot of pictures and tighten them up in Photoshop. Create large montage textures with alpha masks and map them onto several cylindrical planes. Use a sky dome.

 

Middle of the Road

 

Build a few low-poly buildings and use commands like Scatter, Particle Systems or Advanced Painter (search CGA threads) to populate the scene with a mix of 3d and 2d elements. Use a skydome and/or HDR.

 

Top Shelf

 

Go full 3D on the trees and buildings. Use an alpha mask on the outskirts of your terrain to blend into a hi-res HDR.

 

 

 

The first approach is definately the "cheapest" in terms of rendering time, but still a whole lot of Photoshop work to pull off nicely. If you have been doing large exterior scenes for awhile, the other two should suffice.

 

Good Luck....