I've been spending time today working on my other project, "Identity Crisis" (again), and watching the Toy Story DVDs and listening to the audio commentaries on each movie and I saw the big chase scene towards the end and I saw how the sky looked with the clouds and all that. Also, in TS2, when Buzz and his pals go on their trek to find Woody, the sky and the background had that "twilight time" look with the red/orange clouds and background.

I know it's Pixar and all that and I know they're professionals () but I was wondering how to get my environments to look like that. I believe earlier in thwis post I asked if you'd use an environmental map or something like that. I've seen some of Brian Ellebracht's stuff and he has some of the most beautiful outdoor renders I've ever seen. Brian, if you're out there, how do you do it? What recipes are out there to keep render times down? I figured since I was having such a hard time with my "outdoorsy" project, I'd go back to my first love and see if I could improve on my indoor lighting techniques. Thanks for all of your help everybody. It's really doing a lot of good...

Russell