re-entry?
 

Okay, how do I do a reentry (sp?) effect? You know, like when a space shuttle is entering the atmosphere? I also want the effect to fade away when the craft reaches a lower altitude.

Any suggestions?

Thanks in advance!

Well, you might wanna try a combo of the following:

- Geometry wrapped around your entry vehicle mapped with an animated map of flames with greater transparency towards the top, aiming upwards (towards opposite entry vector direction) with keyed and re-mappedRGB values that go from blue to white, to blue again, then yellow, to arange, then reveal the flame map original colors, to a fade.

- all the while, have some sparks and small subtle "plasma" debris/pieces shooting off in the flame direction.

- What TRULY sells re-entry shots is WELL TIMED use of camera shake. That, along with a little full-scene glow, and depth of field blur.
So use that to your advantage for added realism:)

Good luck!

lol all the cg pros speack the same...
My maya proffessor used to say: "motion blur is your friend", and the less time the effect has to be in screen the cooler it will be and the better it will stand

so: Trogdoooorrrrr! :)

Hey ragecgi, thanks for your advice. I'm quite a newbie, so I have one additional question for you. How would I have greater transparency at the top?

The rest of that I think I can handle though, thanks for your help.

[edit]did you mean adding the transparency on the map itself? such as adding it in photoshop?

Funny, I'm doing a cartoon-ish reentry as we speak.

In the transparency channel, I used the Blend Utility to Blend a stretched out noise pattern that was animated in the Offset value of the place2Dtexture node so it looks streaky, with a simple ramp so it's more transparent on one end than the other. I'll have something to post and show tonight.

Just as Dann said:)

OK, here it is. It's about 2MB so be patient.

Now that I see it rendered and composited, it needs a little work, but you get the idea. The Re-entry effect shows up on both space ships, and some of the meteoroids.

Take a look

and because I'm such a nice guy, here is my shader. Notice how it changes color over time as it would go through the atmosphere.

oops, posted the wrong file version. I also switched from a Blend Utility to a Layered Texture

Hey, cool Dann! That is exactly what I needed to get myself on the right track.

If you don't mind, I'm going to base my shader on what I've observed on yours ;)

NOT BAD!

I had to play it again to look for the effect, but it looks like you executed it flawlessly:)

And since the reentry is not your main focus, there seems to be no need for dramatic plasma particles, and intense glow effects either.

Great job!