Recreating the Carboniferous Swamp Forest

[Chacal]

A few years ago I was in Florida in January and tried to explain to some locals that if they went outside in Quebec City for 30 minutes wearing t-shirts, they would DIE. They were unable to grasp the concept.

[Jennifer_P]

You know...actually I think I'd prefer to have a really cold winter than a really hot summer like they do down in Florida. I remember stepping off an air conditioned plane in the Lower 48 and *wham!* It was like this giant hand of heat and humidity had just slammed into my body. Give me -40 rather than +90 any day!

[Chacal]

On the other hand, it gave you an idea how your carboniferous swamp forest should feel like.

[Jennifer_P]

Well, what the climate of the forest should be is sort of a complicated question. See, the Carboniferous period lasted 60 million years (a long time), and it was warmer in the beginning and cooler towards the end. And then there's the little matter of just where exactly in the world this particular forest would be located, since like today, the temperature wasn't uniform... These are good questions. I'll have to do some research.

[Jennifer_P]

Check out this Blender Console readout!

@ Saving page Textures -1
@ Saving page BuiltIn -2
@ Saving page mainRoom 0
=> Storing 16834 vertices of geometry...
=> Storing 32767 vertices of geometry...
=> Storing 32760 vertices of geometry...
=> Storing 32760 vertices of geometry...
=> Storing 23304 vertices of geometry...
=> Storing 50010 vertices of geometry...
=> Storing 58012 vertices of geometry...
=> Storing 34038 vertices of geometry...
=> Storing 34011 vertices of geometry...
=> Storing 36029 vertices of geometry...
=> Storing 34000 vertices of geometry...
=> Storing 34038 vertices of geometry...
=> Storing 34060 vertices of geometry...
=> Storing 34082 vertices of geometry...
=> Storing 34022 vertices of geometry...
=> Storing 34038 vertices of geometry...
=> Storing 34038 vertices of geometry...
=> Storing 34000 vertices of geometry...
\/ Unloading page Textures -1
\/ Unloading page BuiltIn -2
\/ Unloading page mainRoom 0
Writing carbo.fni
Writing carbo.xml
Writing carbo.sum
done in 7109.02 seconds

It took like two hours to finish exporting, during which I developed an ulcer and a nervous twitch. But it finished alright, and even loaded quickly in Uru, with the result below. As you can see, I added tree ferns, normal ferns, and flying attack ferns (visible against the mist in the distance.) This is all I'm going to do until finals are over.

[Trylon]

That's a loooong export....

Nice view though

Maybe you can add a floor haze by using a couple of semitransparent planes (or shapes ) that have a foggy texture...

[Chacal]

[bluewyvern]

Flying... attack ferns?

I can't believe the speed of your progress. This looks great! Especially the non-flying, non-attack ferns on the ground there...beautiful!

[Chacal]

Maybe they're just playing innocent ferns, waiting to pounce on you.

[Jennifer_P]

That's a loooong export....

And it's even longer when your project is due in a few hours. (It's late now anyway though; gmail is being incooperative)

Maybe you can add a floor haze by using a couple of semitransparent planes (or shapes ) that have a foggy texture...

I'll certainly give that a shot to see how it looks. I never knew you could create fog that way.

Flying... attack ferns?

Yep; amazing creatures, really. Who would have expected that the Carboniferous period was just teeming with them? And I'm afraid Chacal is right about the hiding ferns; indeed, many of them look perfectly normal off in the distance because they deliberately blend in with the normal ferns in order to stalk their prey, but when you get close enough you can see they are actually hovering a foot or two off the ground.

I can't believe the speed of your progress.

Hehehe, it's the last minute day-before-the-project-is-due panic. I'm neglecting sleep, showers and nutritional meals trying to finish this up. But I'm glad you like those ground ferns--I really like them too. (Although of course the texture could certainly stand improvement)