Dust kick up from thrusters

Travis has been working on the dust simulation from the force that the thrusters emit.

Color Corrected Concept

Laser Scanner Test

Here is a test of the laser scanning system that will be attached to the ship as it is landing. Glow and opacity will be added in comp to achieve realism.

Engine Test

Engine thrust achieved using a particle system that has metaballs copied onto it. The metaballs are then converted to a volume. Noise will be added to the particle velocity to give it a flickering effect on the tail of the blast.

Here is a shot with the matte painting in the background.

Landing Test

Here is a test to show off the ship and the ground terrain a bit.

Beginning

Hello,

This blog has been set up to document the creation of our visual effects shot Icarus. There are three of us working together on this project (Freek Hoekstra, Travis Harkleroad, and Joey kowalewicz). All of whom are current interns at Side Effects Software. The goal of this project is to not only complete a photo real shot, but to also bring what we have into the gaming environment. That being said, Icarus will consist of two shots where a spaceship is landing on some sort of foreign terrain that is made up of mainly volcanic rock and sand. There will be loads of effects to make these shots seem believable which we will be using Houdini to achieve. With Houdini's dop network and advanced particle systems we will be able to accomplish our effects in a timely manor. We will continue to update the blog as we push onward with the project.