Here is a pic of what I'm working with

#1

I originally had a thread titled: “How to build a grid”, but I’ve moved to this thread and included a clip of the terrain that I’m working with for my broadcast project.

As you can see, it is a long and not very wide peice of terrain that represents a 50 mile long route upon which industrial construction is being done. I need to fly the camera into the terrain from quite high and from all sorts of directions and my concern is how to handle all the infinite space around the terrain.

I first thought of a grid because it’s industrial in nature but then I thought perhaps there is something that would be more appropriate.

I would very much appreciate anyone’s suggestions. My skill level with blender is not very high, but I’m learning. Thanks.

#2

I was thinking about your terrain, looks cool btw. Maybe you could use a real big plane with a texture on it to fake an environment.
How many vertices do you have now?

#3

I remember I have seen such filming in anmation and they usually hide things with clouds which makes it diffused. Maybe add depth of field too?
I am not good with animation though, could you perhaps use defocus in animation?

#4

I don’t know how to find the number of vertices in my terrain, but I suspect that it’s quite a lot.

I keep coming back to the idea of laying this terrain on a grid. My reasoning is that it would signal to the viewer that this terrain is a section that has been cut out from the surrounding countryside.

So, if I do that, then fly the camera into the terrain from a high angle, I will inevitably reveal the edges of the terrain at the beginning of the move (from high up). That, plus the fact that even with the camera down close to the terrain in a valley, I’ll still see some background behind the mountains where one would normally see sky.

I should also point out that I’m not trying for realism. The finished animations are meant to be illustrative and not realistic.

I appreciate anybody’s thoughts on this. Thanks.

That’s the bit I don’t know how to handle.

#5

How about putting a textured plane under the terrain, instead of a grid?

If it’s not intended to be a realistic environment, maybe put a map texture of the surrounding area on it … the impression may be that the 3D terrain rises from the flat map, and the future construction rises from that.

#6

I see what you mean. That could possibly work. I’m going to fiddle with that and will post back.

#7

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