AnimationMay The Prophets Forgive Me

Mustang13Camaro68

As if I need another project that won't get enough attention...



I've read that the wormhole was made by Rhythm & Hues. They might have used Wavefront Dynamation or their own software.
But I've never found an in-depth article on its creation, or even screen grabs.

Since I like to choose projects no one else is doing, I started analyzing the sequence frame by frame and thinking how the wormhole might have been created - which led me to see if I could approximate it without using particle simulations.

Pretty sure it was done with multiple simulations & some textured vortex geometry all composited together. The growth and shrinking as it appears and disappears looks to just be scaling it up and down.

Plenty more to do, but this IS the Work in Progress section. Gotta fix the terrible camera move and work on animating it bursting to life. I also want to do what the show never did and go THROUGH the opening and into the tunnel in one unbroken shot.

trekki

Good start, I like it.
Keep us informed.

BolianAdmiral

Very nice.

markmassey

Nice man.. not seen anyone recreate the bajoran wormhole to a level anywhere near the the one in the show.. like the stargate kawoosh I'm betting that they used a fair bit of practically shot effects for it as well, not just cgi effects... you're off to a good start.... cant wait to see you progress..

Mustang13Camaro68

Updated with the wormhole growing at the start, a terrible geometry lens flare experiment that's not working, a better but still a little bumpy camera move and some placeholder parts of the tunnel/interior of the wormhole.

Starship

I still have the old wormhole built by the Wolfpack team more than 20 years ago. It still renders very well despite it´s age, but it isn´t animated.
Looks like a good start Mustang!

Mustang13Camaro68

Starship wrote: »

I still have the old wormhole built by the Wolfpack team more than 20 years ago. It still renders very well despite it´s age, but it isn´t animated.
Looks like a good start Mustang!

Interesting. Gonna have to look that up for reference.

trekki

Nice

Brandenberg

Yeah, Really Nice. I would love to know how to do that. A few years ago, someone did the Stargate power up with the liquid billowing out into the room before settling back to the rippling liquid effect inside the gate. You guys are talented.

count23

off to an excellent start, so few people try to do the wormhole, I guess because it'ssuch a complicated effect for a such a niche requirement.

I think you and NeonVisual are the only ones who have, and yours looks more accurate (i presume because you know the platform they'd have made it in better than Neon did).

Can't wait to see te end result.

Mustang13Camaro68

Thankyou to trekki, BolianAdmiral, markmassey, Starship, Brandenberg & count23 for the nice comments!

-Youtube squashed this video to 16x9 when it didn't the previous 2. Thanks Youtube! Guess I'll have to render 16x9 from here on out.
-Made the camera move slightly better again. Might just have to live with the "bumps" I perceive when it changes directions.
-Tweaked the geometry and shaders of the clouds some more. There's still some geometry intersections I need to fix.
-Need to add the dome in the middle iris-ing open.
-God Rays of light in the center are terrible. Gonna have to redo that material or think up a new way to do this.
-Replaced the geometry lens flare with a much, much better one. Flares Wizard in the Blender Market is great!
-2nd pass at the tunnel. Need to make the "tentacles" move around and add the rain drops and circular ribs onto the tunnel walls. Tentacle material is only OK. Not yet a good match to the original. UVs on Blender curve objects aren't great. Never got a great handle on how Blender does UVs anyway... Maybe I'm just too used to 3DS Max's UVs - they're just more useful.

Going on a camping trip next week, so possibly one more post and then expect some radio silence for a while.

Brandenberg

Looking right on. I think the prophets will forgive you.

Starship

Mustang13Camaro68 wrote: »

Interesting. Gonna have to look that up for reference.

Here it goes the rendering.
It was released by Jörg (wolfpack member) in 2003, in 3ds max 4 format. I resaved it for 3ds max 2016. If you need the file, just let me know.