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Orestes' Bliss Tutorial
 Now that we have a terrain, find a nice POV (Point of View) that shows a lot of sky. Change the camera pitch up 10 to 15 degrees if you have to. Next, using Lighting Conditions we position the sun. In the light box, move the suns angle so that it is centered in your field of view, and set it at a low altitude, I find best around 10 to 15 degrees. Make sure "Clouds Cast Shadows" is unchecked. Under the Direct Sunlight tab, set the Sunlight strength to 500%, and move the Effect of Atmosphere slider to the far right. 
Under the Background Light tab, set the Shadow Lightness to 9 or 10 and select "Multi-directional Shadow Lighting". We will choose the colors later. These more than anything effect the shadows on the landscape, but do also effect the clouds to a lesser degree. 
Next, under the Sun's Appearance tab, set both to 0. Now render a preview to see how things are coming. Not exactly a bliss is it? Well, we're getting there.  Next up is the Cloudscape box. First off, we need to generate the right kind of clouds. Click the Generate Clouds button. On the Cloud Genesis box, set the Persistence up to about 65-95 and the cloud size down to the smallest size. The Persistence can be played around with some to get the results you want. Click Close and then set the sky size to around 50,000 and the altitude to about 1,000m. The sky size can be adjusted too, but I've found that in my own experience, the lower the sky the better. Try to have it around 500-1500m above your camera's altitude. If your terrain is taller than this don't worry, that shouldn't effect anything. However, if the sky is too low to the camera,the sky will look blocky (pixelated). Next set the Depth to 8 and be sure to leave the clouds on "2D". 2D clouds are one of the most important settings for bliss. Next we set the Density Contrast very low, to 1 or 2, and set the Density Shift high, from 50-90. For mine here I've set them to 2 and 50. Last, we set the Cloud Lighting Darkness bar to 95-100%.  Render again to see our results this far. We see the beginnings of a great bliss! But the sun's glare washes it out. But not to fear, for next we...  Open the Atmosphere Box. The reason the sun still looks so bright is all the atmosphere between the camera and the sun, filtering and scattering the light. To correct this, drop all the Half-heights and Densities to start with. Personal preference can have a lot of influence here. Play with the setting to find what you really want, because technically, we've already created bliss. Here for mine, I lowered the Half-heights, and Simple Haze Density and raised the Atmospheric Blue and the Light Decay.  The other important factor here is your colors. Below is what I used. This is where you can really have fun with this as the examples show. Also remember, your Cloud Color in the Cloud box and the Simple Haze Color are one in the same.    Render other preview to see our outcome. 
Here's a few examples sight changes can make. Many of the settings here aren't set in stone. Play with things and make a bliss that's right for you! 
Above, the Only change was the Cloud Color was changed to near black. The bottom one is the same image that was "Auto Leveled" in Photoshop.  On this on, the only change was the Cloud's Density Contrast and Shift. They were set from 2 and 50 to 1 and 99.  This is the result of the sky being too low. It was set from 1000m to 650m. See the blocky (pixelated) patches?  Above, the sky's altitude was set to 10000m. It's a beautiful sky, but no bliss effect.  In the image above, All the Atmosphere Densities and Half-heights were set to 0.  In this example the Sunlight Strength was changed from 500% to 150%.  Here the sun's altitude was raised to 35, the strength set to 150%. The camera's pitch was raised to take it all in. So in closing, here are a few final tips:
Well, that's about all I can think of. Hopefully you found this useful. Happy rendering! -Orestes |
