Topic: Computer rendering campaign worlds?

[Jengada]

I have a city on a mountain in my campaign that is pretty much the iconic feature on the landscape. I'd love to find a way to get a cgi or other graphic of the mountain to show my players, as they are now making their way up the mountain from the city. Anyone have experience or recommendations?
Apologies if this isn't sufficiently RM-specific, but this is a forum I trust, and FWIW, this is Mount Baikal from the Shadow World "Nomads".

[Majyk]

Checkout Reddit and even the crowdsourcing sites.

I remember seeing someone “paint” rendered terrain a la SimCity but with a tonne of detail.
It also showed adding very detailed buildings along with it.

That or you’d be surprised by PC video game toolsets and how their use can create what you’re looking for.  We used to use a few for a WHFB campaign and it was perfect.

G’luck and much success.

[jdale]

I've been eyeing Worldmachine and World Creator which can do that sort of thing as well as top-down views for maps.

If you're content to find some mountain that someone else has rendered, Daz Studio is free. The mountain might not be though...  I'm sure there are other free options. For 3D rendering, I've mostly played with Poser which is not free and which is better for people than scenery (the same is true of Daz Studio).

A cheaper option is just to search the net for a picture of a nice mountain and label it according to what you want. Or an art site like DeviantArt or ArtStation. There's a ton of game-appropriate art on the net, it's fine to use it for your personal game (just not for anything commercial or your web site etc). I have a bunch of folders full of things I've tucked away for future use. The main hazard here is going down the infinite rabbit hole of looking at all the other pictures just waiting for you to look at them.

[Jengada]

A cheaper option is just to search the net for a picture of a nice mountain and label it according to what you want. Or an art site like DeviantArt or ArtStation. There's a ton of game-appropriate art on the net, it's fine to use it for your personal game (just not for anything commercial or your web site etc). I have a bunch of folders full of things I've tucked away for future use. The main hazard here is going down the infinite rabbit hole of looking at all the other pictures just waiting for you to look at them.

The trick is, the mountain is carved like a man sitting cross-legged. The idea is based on reading Plutarch's Life of Alexander the Great, years ago. In Persia, and artist offered to carve a mountain in his likeness but Alexander declined. When I read that, I almost screamed "Nooooo!" because it would have been so cool. So I put it in my world, writ large - 28,800' large.

[Jenkyna]

A cheaper option is just to search the net for a picture of a nice mountain and label it according to what you want. Or an art site like DeviantArt or ArtStation. There's a ton of game-appropriate art on the net, it's fine to use it for your personal game (just not for anything commercial or your web site etc). I have a bunch of folders full of things I've tucked away for future use. The main hazard here is going down the infinite rabbit hole of looking at all the other pictures just waiting for you to look at them.

The trick is, the mountain is carved like a man sitting cross-legged. The idea is based on reading Plutarch's Life of Alexander the Great, years ago. In Persia, and artist offered to carve a mountain in his likeness but Alexander declined. When I read that, I almost screamed "Nooooo!" because it would have been so cool. So I put it in my world, writ large - 28,800' large.

In theory you can do stuff like that with Poser or Daz. You just use a stone texture in place of a skin texture, and adjust some of the values to give it a rough stone look I can't recall for certain if you can export your models / textures to Bryce to be added in as as a mountaintop feature, but I think you can. All those programs have a pretty steep learning curve though, and like with just about any art you kind of have to do it a lot to get good at it.

[Skaran]

From memory Bryce can import greyscale height maps and allow them to be rendered using its own settings. Also allows a lot of manipulation of the height maps so that may be of use to you.

[arakish]

I cannot remember the sites since I do mine own renders.  No I do not accept commissions.  I have too much on my plate with GMing, writing two books (fantasy novel and atheist handbook), working at home for the YVO, housework, and getting mine own renders done.

However, if you do a Bing, you may find some persons who will take your idea and render it for free.  All they would ask is to have the rights to use the 3D file for other projects.  I have found such sites with persons who will do such when I have been browsing the WWW.  Do a search.

Also if you do a Bing for "free 3D ray tracing software" you can find many, many things dependent upon your skill level.  Blender is the best FOSS out there.  But it has a very steep learning curve.  Here is a sample Bing: free 3D ray tracing software.

Here are some other links:
Bryce (for $20, it is well worth it)
DAZ Studio
Blender
POV-RAY (kind of like writing a program)

Modelers
Blender (yes, Blender also models.  It also makes cgi movies)
MeshMagic (never tried)
Sculptris (I have this one.  It is great for those who know how to sculpt clay)
Wings3D (this one has been around for about 20 years)
TinkerCAD (without internet, won't work, but is an free online version made by AutoDesk)
MandelBulb3D (if you are into 3D Mandelbrot fractal sets)

If you do searches you should plenty of free stuff out there ranging from comically crapy to tremendously sophisticated.  Just depends on your skill level.

rmfr