Cineversity

I am building an animation of space video game for a project.  I need a star filled background.  I am curious for backgrounds is it better to do the background in Cinema 4D as background object or large plain or render the scene out with alpha and null holding background position and parent a background to that null in After Effects?  I will be combing a-lot of 2D graphics and lighting effects in final animation.  I was curious what workflow would be recommended?

Hi mphillips0007,

The main question would be, is the camera moving, and will the stars show parallax if the camera moves?
Are these starfields just based on little white dots, or do you have those cloud-like systems in mind?

Here is an example with a broader camera rotation based on a Cinema 4D shader, which should be the fastest method.
https://www.dropbox.com/s/e5lhu03erpc76h6/CV3_2023_drs_22_TXsf_01.c4d.zip?dl=0

In After Effects and With RedGiant, you could do that with Trapcode.

If you have a sketch or something that shows more what the starfield looks like and what kind of motion the camera has, perhaps I can tell more.

All the best

Yes, the camera is moving, so I need to show parallax.  I see you have attached to star to sky and this is the effect I am wanting.  I am using Arnold and lighting the scene with HDRI and various other lights in the scene.  I am assuming you cant use an HDRI and background image for this effect?

Hi mphillips0007,

Use the standard render, set up a spherical camera, and render an image in 1:2 format.
This can be used in an Alpha channel while you dial in the brightness of the stars in your render’s Incandescent/Luminance channel.

In this way, you can use even more than one “large sphere” with different diameters (each P.R rotated a little bit: 15º-30º) to get the effect of a large star-field with distant stars perhaps less bright. Of course, often, one sphere is enough.

If the resolution is not a good fit, render it out differently (1:2 each time, the standard for equirectangular.

https://www.dropbox.com/s/e5lhu03erpc76h6/CV3_2023_drs_22_TXsf_01.c4d.zip?dl=0

My best wishes for your project

Thank will try that.

I hope it will work great for your project, mphillips0007.

My best wishes.