When I'm a bit anxiety prone, I love serene on my desktop to help soothe and calm me down. Just what the doctor ordered!

Kinda made me think of them; what an idyllic setting! Judas, Mr. Cruise is one fortunate guy. But to the point: Wonderfully done, Mr. Bliss! I live on the west shore of Lake Michigan, and your colors are spot-on: I know- I've taken dozens of photos of our sunsets, and they're gorgeous. I'll always support you; you're the best.

Gee, how'd I miss this one before? As always I am surprised and amazed when I see how far your talent has come, let alone how far the medium itself has come that you can use your talent to creat things that probably wouldn't not have even bubbled to your brain from whatever place your creativity comes, were you using more traditional painting methods.



This one makes me think of home.. not a bad use for your inspiration to have led me. At least I don't think it is..



I think your planetscapes probably put me in awe the most, but the series of earth-like places are easily up there too.



I am glad you are well again.



Sincerely,



Judith

PS Are you glad you decided to go w/ this rather than a "day job"? I hope you are.. I know I am glad you did.

j

This picture is so beautiful and definitely one of my favorite ones on here. It has great realism and is one of your best.

I'm not a fan of remakes. Most of them are not worth the time and effort. This one is an exception. Tropic of Capricorn '99 was very well inspired, but was in need of technological brush-up. And you did it well.

This is some of your best work. Waaay better than the first on. what I like most is how the sun sets behind the clouds.

This went straight to all my backgrounds. this is the perfect tropical retreat at work.

I loved the originial version of Tropic of Capricorn so much that I bought a poster of it off of Zazzle... it's actually hanging up in my office at work! To date I still get a ton of comment of where the 'picture' was taken! Needless to say the original version was great...



Tropic of Capricorn (2006) has surpassed it predecessor by leaps and bounds! I absolutely LOVE this piece. I might have to go buy a new poster!!!

Absolutely beautiful!

I can actually put myself in this picture. It is a lovely piece of work.



My family has a home on Jomtien beach in Thailand and there is a spot such as your rendering. You must have been there before!



Thanks...Bruce

Loved the original Capricorn image. But 2006 is incredible! I'd been thinking of joining DB for sometime. This image was so wonderful I had to join so I could add this great image to my desktop! Great work indeed.

This is the sort of view I'd like from my verandah, oooo yeah !

I finally joined after thinking about it for a long time. I must say that I am glad I did after seeing the fullsize verison of ToC (2006). Every version of ToC (2006) looks great but I like the single monitor version looks the best.





Keep up the great work.

Very beautiful - I love the colors!

Below, I meant to say, "since BEFORE I could afford a membership."

My first download from DB was when you were on the Icestorm network, way back when. I even got "Fluorescence" on a mousepad back then. Still have it too. It was too pretty to use.Finally I laminated it and put it in my aquarium.

Yeah. It's really been that long. I just went back to look at the first early stuff. What an extraordinary trip back in time, and as for what is ahead, I can hardly wait.As long as YOU are here, I'll be here.

Storm

I hope know one considers this blasphemy, but the multi-monitor editions provide an additional bonus: try viewing only the rightmost 2/3 of the triple-monitor version on a dual-monitor system.* To my eye, it's a great alternative to the original dual-monitor render.



* jpegcrop is recommended if you want to try this. It leaves the uncropped pixels completely undisturbed.

I was waiting for the triple version, glad its here.

Usually the single monitor version sits in the middle of the triple version, but I guess extending the beach to the right was more logical and render-friendly this time.

Thanks for taking the time and effort to expand the dual/triple libraries - I am using a Wallpaper randomizer utility, so every time I minimize all windows to see the desktop, I see something else from your gallery.

Great addition to my day.

A Truly remarkable update.



A great warm weather desktop now that the outside temperature is 27 degress F.

Perfect. :)

Can't say that I noticed a line on my monitor here @ work, but I didn't take a look at it on my monitor @ home. Either way, still looks great.



Regarding other comments, I think this is so close to nighttime, a night version wouldn't be a lot different, although I would be interested to see one. As for planetscapes, underwater, and interiors, I like them all, though I personally tend to favor planetscapes more. Whatever you post is worth it to me. ;)



Happy New Year to everyone, and Congrats on Digital Blasphemy's 10th anniversary, Ryan!!!

i never seen the errors but it still looks great to me



im glad you didnt get rid of the palms it makes it look nice



well id love to see a night version of this :) and i'd like to say to one of the commenters before forget the underwater and interiors its all about planetspaces



(are we going to see more of them soon)



there was (ONLY 3) of them last year i hope we make up for it this year =)

Just decided to look at the older version to see the difference. Looks greater. I like the night version creation idea. Will be really great.

Great picture! Would it be to much to hope for a 3840x1024 res.version?

Nice, but I have to say everytime there are plants involved rendered up close they never look convincing.



The rest is spectacular though.

Not sure where to put these, but would love to see some interiors or underwater type stuff, not seen any in a while?

Just reminds me that it is indeed 5 O' Clock Somewhere!

there is another line on this pic, just like th line on the upper 1/6th of the pic. its located on the bottom right section of foam, all the way to the right side, and weird too, cause unlike the other line, this line does not go all the way across the page rather its isolated strictly to the foam... very odd, and the lines too, odd, glitch? pre-release software can do this im sure.



still a great image awesome job, im reminded as to why i payed to get into the members gallery with every image that you pop out ^_^

I want to be on that beach, beautiful work

Brilliant any chance of a night time picture

If you look at the palms just below the moon crescent on the left you can see a distinct line where the color of the entire image gets a little washed out from there down and it really detracts from the overall enjoyment of the image. It's on every resolution as well. Perhaps a glitch during upload or render?



I have to agree with the foam being slightly harsh but *shrug* it's not that big of an issue.



As for the rest;



Fantastic. Artwork of this caliber is why I pay for this.

Of course I love all of your work, but this in particular is just plain wow.



And I disagree with all these people talking about the foam seeming unrealistic. I used to live on the coast and I saw foam like that all the time. Love it.

when i first saw the thumbnail of this pic i was a little disappointed,i was looking forward to a great looking pic.



however



after opening i was left breathless, the detail is so intense i spent about half an hour looking into the clouds and plants.



i gave this pic a 9 of 10, only because of the foam.. with everything in this pic looking so realistic, the foam of the beach is sorely out of place.



beach foam doesn't break evenly though out a beach, due to the physics of waves, the wave has curve to the landscape, resulting in multiple waves breaking at once on different parts of the beach as well as a more angled approach of the waves. the only possible way for waves to break evenly is for the beach to be flat, the waves being influenced by the same force of wind all along he wave length, and the same depth of the water all along the beach...



even with following the last two of that minimal criteria the beach needs to be straight which it isn't.. so the foam looks out of place due to its consistancy... if it wasn't such a sore thumb i would be able to look past it. As it is its been my wall paper since the day the image was posted and i dont see it being removed any time soon



hope my input has been helpful ^_^



great job again Ryan!

I agree with Adam below. On my bright LCD, the top 1/6th of the image is slightly darker than the rest, with a visible line separating.



Other than that, this is one of my favorites!

This is beautiful! The realism is incredible! While I totally love and appreciate this render, I agree with other posters that it's time for a Vue 6 render of something otherworldly. Something in the realm of Gazebo, or an abstract, or planetscape. That would be really spectacular!





Keep up the good work!

i also Would love to see a night version of this



with the moon where the sun is

Would love to see a night version of this. Big white moon where the sun is lighting up the white sand & making the clods glow, maybe even a camp fire too :)

Wow, let's start there; this rendering is simple amazing. I disagree with everyone saying things need to be "trimmed back" and feel that it really is great just the way it is.



However now that I run triples, I have to just "slip" this in real fast, a "accidental revisit" to "Tropical Moon of Thetis" which would yield dual, and triple renders would be very nice.

I would agree that I like some of your utterly impossible, unlikely, or even abstract images best, and this is obviously not one of them. But there is something that you can get from this picture which would be impossible to capture in real life, which is the absolute ideal perfection of the moment. I doubt that I've ever seen a real picture where several elements lined up in the right positions with the relative brightnesses like that, and looking at the moon I'm not sure it would even be remotely possible (although not being a professional photographer, I haven't tried). The very calm surface of the beach seems unusual too. I think there was one thing that was least realistic (and therefore might be benefited most from improvement or from being featured less prominently in the future) in both this image and "Crimson Season". That would be the smaller vegetation. Your trees can be masterful, but the shrubs often seem plastic. I can't entirely pin it down, but I think part of the reason is that they tend to be more or less the same color, and you never seem to see hints of dead or brown plants or parts of plants (although I do notice good attention to detail in that some leaves look like they have bits missing). Something about the luster or color or shape (perhaps the leaves are too flat?) makes them look artificial.



In any case I'm very pleased with the scene, though I might be even more pleased if I saw something more extraterrestrial with your next work.

One word: beautiful!

One of your best in my opinion! I love the effect where the water finishes. You seem to be on a roll recently and this is the sort of thing that makes me glad I joined the members gallery. Keep up the good work and have a great 2007.

I see many people here (and in comments for other images) commenting about level of realism.



While I respect the desire to get photo-realistic images, in my opinion, the photo-realistic aspects of an image (clouds, sun etc.) are nothing if they are not combined with some fantasy element.



Some sharp poster once asked: Where is the blasphemy?



Personally, I am not here to enjoy digitized photos, but to be taken to another world, another dimension.



It is nice, technically speaking, to see that 3D applications can provide an almost-realistic image, in the hands of the talented artist, but I am not here to be impressed by the capabilities of 3D software, but by the imagination of the artist.



It is still very nice, but it is earth, and it is now.

Love the image, beautiful sunset.



One thing - am I imagining it, or is there a horizontal line going across the trees in the top left? The trees are dark above the line, and noticeably lighter below the line. Actually now that I look closer, I'd say the line goes all the way across (I can also see a little bit of it on the leaves on the right side) you just cannot see it on the sky portions.

The light on the foam feels unnatural and detracts from the otherwise serene picture. The clouds are great and add a photo-realistics quality.

Wow! The realism of Vue 6 is amazing. I can't wait for the dual monitor version! Thanks Ryan.

wow.... just...wow



i never was a landscape lover

but i must say this is your very best out of all your picures.... well almost



i love how you have a sunset plus the moon in the sky



the palm tress makes it perfect i also like the foam everything is perfect in my eyes



i just love it

I agree with some of the commenters below, it would be great to have a pickle jar version without the overhanging trees so we can see more of that beautiful sky. However I don't think they detract from the picture, they just give it a different feel. I'd be interested in both versions.

(Well, not quite.)



Beautiful, stunning, near-perfect. Your last few creations have been really good and this is no exception.



I'm amazed at the level of realism you've been achieving lately. In this case it's especially the clouds that blow me away. They don't look rendered at all, they look photographic. Of course, it would take one expensive camera to get a photo this good :-)



I would like the blue in the upper sky to be more vivid but then it may look less real, I don't know.

Absolutely a wonderful update! Amazing sky and sea, looks like a photo. I agree with some others that the foam is too bright, but the overhanging palms are well placed i.m.o..



Rated 9 (could be 10 if the foam would be more realistic).

Actually it is possible

I do agree that the foam is too luminous. It looks more like snow than foam.



However, I disagree that the palms and srubbery is intrusive. The foliage makes it feel like you are walking down to the beach, and this is your first glimpse of the beautiful sky. Amazing picture!



The other thing that caught my eye is the moon. A crescent moon can only be formed if the sun is behind the earth. The picture shows otherwise with the moon and sun in the same viewing plane. Blows my mind! Is there another sun!



Keep up the good work and Happy New Year!

A glorious new year's gift from The Maestro. Pure bliss!

I do not disagree with the boys and girls here - about the palms idea, and the foam - but, I like it as it is also. The foam sets a distinguishable line, the palms set some perspective.



To me the first question that came to mind was:

Where is the boat?!



I mentioned this in some other posts, I like the images that show a little story, of the little man - a boat, or a small man/woman standing on the beach, staring - these are the kind of things that add some points to a picture in my humble opinion.



Nonetheless, this is quite nice - hoping to see a triple version soon - it would be interesting to see what will be added on both sides (a boat maybe?... :)



Happy new year.

Very nice, The sun and clouds look more realistic than I have ever seen them rendered.



I think this picture would look nice with or without the foreground palms. It might even look best with just the left palm remaining, but I think it's a very small thing.



The sea foam is a bit harsh, but other than that every aspect is perfect. I think this is your best picture yet!

That's some picture! The realism is amazing.



I agree with some others though that the overhanging palms are a bit intrusive. If they could be 'trimmed back' a little it would improve the vista.



The sunset sky on its own has enough impact to make this a truly brilliant piece of art.

Another atmospheric piece - very nice. I see your gettign used to the volumetric skies too.



Only suggestion for this piece would be a version that removes the two palm trees in the foreground and also the shrubs at the bottom. I feel the trees almost distract your attention from that great sunrise/set. Removing the shrubs would give the beach is a lot bigger.



Happy New Year Ryan!

Wow! This is a very impressive piece! The view of the setting sun through the clouds is an amazing atmospheric display.



The sea foam is a mite hard, as well as the leaves on the shrubbery in the foreground; however, I rated this one a 9 for the overall look of it.



Very nice update, Ryan, and Happy New Year to you and yours!

Truly amazing sunset... beautiful angle. Did you try a version without the shrubs in front kinda like "vigil"?