Planet Earth
Hendrik Püss, Joosep Tamm, Krister Kansi
This project consists of texturing, lighting and shading a simulated model of Earth in Unity in as beautiful of a fashion as possible.
The goal by the end of the project is to have:
- realistic looking lighting originating from a "sun" orbiting the Earth model
- accurate height and texture mapping to represent the real Earth
- realistic water and cloud texturing and shading
- good looking shaders to handle lighting, day-night cycling and shadows
Initial stage
Currently the project is best accessed by cloning the linked repository and opening it in Unity Hub, after which the project can be run and some parameters changed from the editor.
Current project
Final stage
The final project is a space simulation of our own planet Earth. The goal was an accurate looking portrayal of Earth from distance in space, which has been achieved in implementation.
Features
Day and Night Cycle:
Atmospheric Effects:
Cloud Movement:
City Lights and Human Presence:
Complications
Performance optimization:
In order to improve the realism and visual quality of the atmosphere, the number of light scattering points in refraction calculations were high enough to cause large fps drops. The atmosphere functions and looks decent with fewer refraction points used, which does also mostly solve the performance problem though (at the cost of some accuracy).
Flowmap integration:
Integrating the flowmap into the project presented a significant challenge due to the complexity of achieving a realistic portrayal. Consequently, this complexity compromised the ability to implement a highly realistic cloud movement within the simulation.
References
Coding Adventure: Atmosphere by Sebastian League. This video describes the principles used in the atmosphere implementation.