I was playing around with gimp in my spare time, and thought why not use blur, iwrap, map object to create planet.
NOTE : this tutorials is entitled [v2] becuase a very good detailed tutorial for creating planets of brilliant quality have already been posted HERE by Marvin x. Most of the practice in this tutorial, is based on selections and some filters. You must be good at workin with selections, i.e. Making elliptic selections, intersecting another selection with existing one, growing and shrinking selection etc.

Then why another tutorial on samething?
Becuase while playing I ended up with a way to do such effect in fewer steps and without consuming much resources of CPU. BUT, to created more detailed image and more clear, you obviously need image with big dimensions and more memory needed to process it, as in the other tutorial author used 3000x3000 image size.

Final results will look something like this:


And results after last fine tuning:


Let's get started:

Step 1:
Create a new Image with dimensions 500 width, and 500 height and fill the default Background layer with black color.
In this tutorial we will have total of minimum 6 (seven) layers, one is the background layer that is by default there in the image which we filled with black, the we create 5 new layers and rename them from top to bottom as: shadow, grunge, texture, sphere, and light, as shown in following image:




Step 2:
Select layer named 'sphere' and fill the layer with white color.
Now Go through Menues, 'Filters' > 'Map' > 'Map Object'. A new window will appear, in this window, first tab is 'options'. In options select 'Sphere' from Map to: labeled drop down, then check the 'transparent background chekcbox', and click button 'OK', as show here:


You see there is a sphere created onto layer named 'sphere'
Now, rightclick the layer 'shpere' in layers list window, and select menu item 'Alpha to Selection', you will notice that an elliptic selection is made around the sphere you created. Now this selection will be reused in almost all steps, so better is save it to channels, go through menus 'Select' > 'Save to Channel'. NOTE: Channel tab/window will get foucs, so you are recomended to get back to layers listing window and select any layer. Now you iamge window must look somehting like this:



Step 3:
Select layer named 'texture' (NOTE: selection is active), and fill the selected area of layer 'texture' with any stonish kind of background. Set layer 'texture' mode to 'Overlay'. So your image window must look something like this depending on your stonish texture:



Step 4:
Select layer 'grunge' and go through menus (within image window), 'Filters' > 'Render' > 'Clouds' > 'Plasma'.
A new filter window will appear, do not chane any settings except 'turbulence', set value of 'tubulence' to 3.0, as shown in following image, and click ok.



Change layer 'grunge' mode to 'Difference', then go thorugh menus 'Filters' > 'Colors' > 'Colorify', a new window will appear, simply click button 'ok' on it, aslo change the opacity of the layer to between 60 to 80. Now your image must look something similar following:



Step 5:
Select layer named 'light' (make sure selection is still active), fill selection with white. Remove selection by going through menus 'Select' > 'None'. Then go through menus 'Filters' > 'Blur' > 'Gussian Blur', a new window will appear, enter value '20' in Horizontal and click button 'ok'. Now press Ctrl+F about 3 times to make the layer 'light' more blur, it is the surrounding light which may be increased by blurring again and again, any filter can be reapplied by going through menus 'Repeat "Gussian Blur"'. Now you image must look something like this:



Now we have the tricky part, it is tricky if you do not have grip over selections, otherwise it s game of few minutes for you.


Step 6: Making shaow

You notice that we have removed the selection, but you must remember that we have that saved in the channels, so let's get our elliptic selectio back to manipulate. Go to Channels list window which has two parts, the top part is not of our use, the lower part contains our channel, as you see here:


Simply rightclick the channel named 'Selection Mask copy' and select menu 'Channel to Selection', notice our selection is restored in the image window. Go back to layers list window, and select layer named 'shadow'.

Now select the elliptic seletion making tool and notice the following iamge first.


A. Hold dow Ctrl (control) key
B. Click left moue buton where point entitled 'PRESS' starts in image
C. Drag down the mouse and release the mosue button where point 'RELEASE' is placed.

You will notice that selection has been cut to something as following:


First save the selection to channels, as we did earlier with our first selection, so that we can reuse it.
Grow the selection by 5 pixels, go through menus 'Select' > 'Grow', enter value '5' and click 'ok'.
Make sure layer 'shadow' is selected,
i.fill it with pure black color
ii.remove selection
ii.Go through menus 'Filters' > 'Blur' > 'Gussian Blur' enter amount '20' and click button 'ok'.
iii.Go to channels window and rightclick the old elliptic chanel (the circle one) and select menu item 'Channel to Selection'.
iv.Go to layers window and select layer 'shadow'
v.Set teh opacity of layer 'shadow' to 65 %.
vi.press Ctrl+i, or go through menus 'Select' > 'Invert', which will invert the selection, now press Ctrl+K to delete selected area.

Upto here you have something like this:


Step 7: Making the top light:
Here comes a new layer, in this process I found someshortcut way to create same sliced selection that we created in step 6 but not on bottom but on top-left corner of our planet.
A. Duplicate layer 'shadow'. You will see two layers of same type, name the second layer (from top) 'top-light'. So you have layers listing like this now:

B. Select new layer named 'top-light', and go through menus to rotate it, 'Layer' > 'Transform' > 'Rotate 180 degrees'. Now you have two shadows, first on bottom-right corner of planet and other on top-left corner of planet. The top one is basically created to make light, SO, how to turn this shadow to light? very simple.
C. Select Colorize tool click the layer 'top-light' within image window, a new window will appear, set 'Saturation' to 0 (zero) and 'Lightness' to 100 (hundred) and click button 'ok'.
D. Set opacity of this layer to 65%.

It is done, your planet is ready.

Fine Tuning:
1. Select 'move layers & selections' tool by pressing 'M', then select layer named 'light', move it a bit (about 10 to 20 pixels) to top-left.
2. To make planet surface more detailed, duplicate the layer named 'grunge' 2 or 3 times, run filter Filters > Distorts > iWrap, window will appear, select Deform Mode as Swirl CCW, move mouse some on duplicated layer and click ok, then use colorize tool and give some different color and set lyer mode to Overlay. The more you repeat this process the more detailed planet surface comes out. And here are results after fine tuning:



And even more:



I am sure, once you follow these steps, the next time you need to create planet, you you robably spend 3 to 5 minutes on one.

We meet again sooner :w:
Let me know if you have any questions (comments are welcomed too :h:).

regards

Wow... awesome tut... glad to be the first to post about it :l:
My result:

Well... i admit it... i went i bit overkill with the props :l:
P.S. May i add this to my site?

my results:



and i made an animation but it's a bit glitchy lol:



awesome tut ali.
to make the grunge i used the sparks brush and then emboss it them lowered the color.
it looks like the moon :l: thanks again ali imran!!

Great tut! I finally found a use for those sky brushes. :w:

nice job jJmF

looks kinds like mines lol....

Great work guys,

Here is latest, I am adding one more step to above tutorial soon, that will allow you to colorize your planet surface too, as well as add more detials easily.



Some might have seen this already in galleries section I posted last night.

regards

Just updated and finalized.

regards

[wow. I cant belive how easy you made creating a planet. :h:
Great tut. I experimented around a bit and made a planet with a ring. :w:
I dont like it much because its to undefined for me, but I thought you'd like to see.

My first one: (I like this one best. The glare on the planet is awsome)
http://i172.photobucket.com/albums/w16/n00bn00b13/planetsun.png

My second one: (I really overdid the stars. bleg. but the spires inside the planet are cool)
http://i172.photobucket.com/albums/w16/n00bn00b13/planetflame.png

My last one: (yay for an ugly ring! lol)
http://i172.photobucket.com/albums/w16/n00bn00b13/planetring.png

I seriously thought gimp was just for photo editing, glad someone pointed the tutorials out to me! This is a great tutorial, easy to follow and simple. I've been playing around with it for awhile, although apparently I'm not swift enough to figure out how to post the picture, lol.

Im having some difficulty. Whenever I go to 'Map Object' and follow the steps, no sphere appears. ?_?

-SL213

Remmeber to enable show preview checkbox.
And make sure the layer you are using was not the first background layer created by gimp when you created new image.

regards

Awesome tutorial, maybe even better than the real planet creation tut!



That flame I can't explain.. something with red and yellow brushing, a gaussian blur, and set to dodge.

nice tut, I might do a science project or something with this.

This what i got...

i´v done it.... and i like the finished work and i posted into Deviant Art.... http://knifass.deviantart.com/art/Mars- ... t-68498499
i wonder... if i can post this tutorial in the DA... it is an art comunity and this tutorial is very good so... if anyone have done it before and if you allow it... please answer me.. i´ll credit this page.... pleas answer soon...
cheers!!!

Sure post it, with full credit back to gimptalk community and author (me).

regards

thanks!! :l:
greets

Realistic!!

I am so trying this out in a minute, will post with results.

umm hopefully this isn't a stupid question.. but how do i get texture?

I like the tutorial it was fun. I'm just a bit dissapointed because I don't have any good 'rocky' patterns to apply.

I really like Pixkid's, he managed to get water on it too!



I will be tackling episode 2 tomorrow, i think

Hi, I am very new to Gimp and painting and so on.

The planets look not bad though they look just flat.
The skin should somewhat strecht more and more from the center to the edge.
€: Hope you get what I mean, the structure doesnt change but is the same on every spot of the planet, looks unrealistic.

Not sure about all the features Gimp holds but Ill give it the tut and 'stretching' a try..

€: Hmm wouldn it be better to do most steps before you convert it to a sphere..?

I repeated the grunge step a few more times, trying differing turbulence settings, and after some flipping and rotating and coloring of all the grunge layers, i got this.


Much better than my first result, methinks.

GREAT tut thanks

good Work guys

Boba Fetuccini : duplicate grunge layer few times, I think repeating entire step wont produce desired results..


regards

awesome tut!never even thought about doing something like this