Near and distant terrains

[JReble]

http://www.newtek.com/products/lightwave/gallery/gal/LightWave3D/797.jpg

See those tree covered mountains in the back? Unlike the Bryce-like rocky mountains seen elsewhere, I'm finding these are very hard to create.

Where can I get a lightwave scene and models with some mountains like these? I've heard and seen that it's possible but I've repeatedly fallen short in trying to create them well myself. I'm thankful for the recommendations other Lightwave users have offered on possible ways to create them, but I'm wanting the real deal from somebody who's better at that than I apparently am so please don't tell me about a new technique that might work. My head's too bruised from trying. I'm sure I could come up with some cash if there's a pre-constructed scene with models & textures out there with which I could tinker and incorporate into some of my work. I'm talkin' cash money here people! :)

Also if anyone has anything similar they've created and would be willing to share for reference and education sake it would be greatly appreciated. I'm still wondering why Newtek hasn't released & sold some additional content disks for Lightwave. It would be real nice to have a set of various themes like terrains, nature, environments etc. that gave users the scenes, models and preconstructed textures to have a jumpstart on their personal projects. I think those would sell quite well. Too bad my business isn't on the left coast where the mountains are easier to render. :)

[JReble]

So by the silence should I assume that nobody has had any success with these type of mountains either? I haven't even seen any object collections or websites that have anything of the sort. There's gotta be something out there?

[marvin]

I haven't tried this yet as I know it's render intensive (what isn't that's good?), but us hypervoxels.

To put it very roughly you copy the terrain, kill the polys maybe jitter the points a little, then use points-to-polys. Bring them into your scene and add hypervoxels to them. Texture them to look like plants.

marvin

[Fozz]

No need to use Point-To-Polys. They render HV's just fine without. Even better actually. :)

But those mountains you need? Do they have to be 3D?
You could use photos mapped to polygons in the background.
Or, if you don't need the trees in 3D, you could perhaps even model the mountains, and then just map them with a forrest texture.
Or, mix it up to get some 3D effect:
Model the mountains, add a forrest texture, and then add hypervoxels outside the mountain, and use the same forrest texture on the voxels.

[HowardM]

Although not perfect, this could be tweaked to look better , I just ran out of time!
These are HVs, actually ONE tree clipmap used as a sprite, with some tweaks to the color to give a world coordinate color change...

CLICK HERE FOR MPG (http://www.3dink.com/CompAll3.mpg)

You could use real HVs, but thats crazy...I mean yes, render some good looking HV foliage, save out as clip maps and use as sprites...but NEVER re-render HVs for every frame if not needed! (like for explosions, or smoke)

Use your ground object as an emitter and youve got an instant forest!