My Planet entry

Looking for suggestions. There is plenty of time left to make some adjustments…
Just for info purposes, I have 15 render layers on this thing…


The blue planet is oversaturated as blue isen’t the dominant color in the image.

Great job! I really love the story. I agree with all of @Jamie’s points except the clouds. Otherwise, follow his every word. :slight_smile: Can’t wait to see the finished image!

Thanks for the suggestions guys.
The laser is actually destroying a small moon, not the planet. I can see how that is confusing…I actually like the concept of destroying the planet more, so I am probably gonna make that change.

Had a little time today…
Decided to keep the exploding moon in play, just make it more obvious…


Good: Your image has a point to look at and suggestive lines directing to that point. I also like the spaceship and materials are good enough.

Bad: Colour scheme. The red laser beam is good but then you have a green planet, a blue lens flare / star knocks the whole composition over. The rings of the planet seem to me like a plane with a texture. Make them a particle system (hair) emitting a group of rocks and it’s going to look more realistic because then there are actual rocks flying around. Also, you might want to experiment with the sharpness of the light - it’s waay to sharp for a star or a sun that is millions of miles away. The shadow of the rings on the lower half of the planet shouldn’t be there.
Back to the color scheme: Go for a blue / red composition. Make the planet a little more blue - and especially the background with the stars (I suppose, it’s a texture). Why blue? Blue is normally a cold color - and space is very cold as far as I know. Also, it makes the red laser beam a little more pop. Leave out the blue lens flare (I know it’s a star but it looks like a lens flare) or tone it down a bit - it takes too much focus away from the spaceship.

I can see that a lot of work went into the spaceship - but I can’t see it: Light the spaceship (maybe) a little more.

The planet is good, but maybe duplicate it, scale it out a bit and apply a transparent/cloud texture to it so your planet has a little more depth. (plus, apply a tiny amount of bump on the planet!).

Thats about everything I can say. Your image has potential - now make something out of it.

Thanks for the input sharazam.
Trying a different look…Gonna be adding some distortion where the laser hits teh atmosphere.


Much better now. I like the green laser actually more than the red. Only maybe turn the stars in the background a bit - they are a bit to bright. Also, try to use the galaxy in the background to be a suggestive line to your focal point. And I can still not really see all the detail of the spaceship at first glance. Just add a mesh light at the other side of the ship (or make some lights ON the spaceship). And maybe move it towards the middle a little more (the image is based on thirds, right?). The rings are OK, but maybe increase either the count or the size because the rocks are almost invisible and tend to blend in with the stars (because of this make the stars a little less bright).

The other problem I can see is framing (and balance). My eyes tend to fly right off the bottom left corner. Can you spot why? In a good composition, your eye goes around in circles (or follows a path). My suggestion: make an asteroid and place it right in front of the camera so that it is out of focus. It has to cover up the bottom left corner and be rotated so that your eyes go up at the left side of the image. Then duplicate the starship and place it a little away of the left side of the picture, far away from the camera, pointing at the laser beam (so that the loop is closed). It’s hard to describe it here with text.

Just as an experiment, try to duplicate the spaceship in a circle around the earth, so that it looks like a army of spaceships attacking (if you have the time).

Thanks for all of your input. I was handed a rather large project for work, so I had to bring this to a close. This is the image I submitted. It may not be a winner, but maybe I will get an honorable mention…
Thanks again.
I named it “Attack on the Capital”