Posted on June 2, 2012

Not long ago a fan sent me an aerial photo of Chicago at night under a blanket of clouds. I really liked how the city lights cast a glow on the underside of the cloud deck.

That photo served as the inspiration for an update to my 1998 “Gotham” wallpaper which I’ve added to the Members Gallery this morning.

Here’s the 1998 original (rendered in Bryce using a single terrain and some creative “shading”).

Here’s the 2012 update using Vue d’Esprit’s Ecosystems and volumetric lighting.

I might try another with fewer clouds, as I think they came off a bit heavy in the final render. Aesthetics aside, this one took a ridiculous time to process so any future renders are going to have far fewer clouds.

What do you guys think?

I also wanted to mention that I’ve added a couple of new t-shirt designs to my Zazzle collection based on my “Portals” wallpaper. One uses the square version that I rendered for tablets and the other uses the narrower version I rendered for dualscreens.

You can see the rest of my t-shirt collection (plus a few neckties designed by Jessie) here. I will let you guys know if/when Zazzle has their next big t-shirt sale!