On The Horizon: How to Make a Real World

The Official Elite Dangerous Livestream, hosted by our very own Ed Lewis.

Take a deeper look at the science and technology involved with procedurally generation realistic planets for the upcoming Elite Dangerous Horizons with the Technical Artists behind the genius of making this technology.

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[Foxiol]

Thank you Frontier for giving us the entire Galaxy. ;)

You are making one of a hell job with this. My dream game. :D

[wahnraymer]

As a guy who has been in 3D for many many years and actually has a hardback copy of Texturing and Modeling a procedural approach sitting on my bookshelf, this is just amazing. These Elite Dangerous guys are setting the bar very very high. I am more than impressed with what they have done. My respect goes out to these engineers. Cheers

[galmidden]

This stream marks a significant moment in the evolution of Elite: Dangerous. Thank you very much for sharing with us all.

[Frank_G_Finster]

The footage is just incredible... i thought, we would get some elevated heightmaps and some texture magic... i never expected worlds of this detail and scientific precision... I am more than just impressed. Thank you so much. You people at Frontier Developments really rock!

[Federationmovies]

I could get lost in simply exploring planets, and forget about the main game itself.

So beautiful. With VR, this will be mind-blowing.

[sirlolsalot]

Here are the links to the eyegasm/hype material:

Ice planet (cracked surface) 12:10
Rocky planet 14:04
Small planetoid 15:38
Big rounded planet (moon-like surface) 17:48
Potato planetoid (Braben's) 38:52
Marks-like planet surface 41:50

The rest is basically a QA about technical non-gameplay stuff, starts at 47:30.

Fly safe!

[mroushion]

Simply amazing what Frontier is doing with Elite dangerous.

[RameyBarbieri]

Absolutely. It's been decades(1984 I was 11) since I dreamed of landing on another world. Elite is what brought me the Universe that changed my life. I'm a dreamer and a programmer much to the credit of Elite. Thanks to David and his capable and very talanted team.

[co_li]

It feels like a real simulation of planets... It makes me think, how are gonna be the atmospheric worlds, better the planet with life and water on it... so much to come.

[Madash]

Dear God. All the science and theory that goes into this. This is what makes ED so beautiful.

[MrEon]

Let's now all try to imagine what these planets (and other types) might look like 3 years from now... :O

[NoMatureContent]

You guys are doing much, much better with your community engagement now days. Good job.

[pryzmgaming]

This is amazing tech, well done FD You guys are like Slartibartfast You all seem like such nice guys at FD also. Cant wait to see more.

[mruhum]

Beautiful images! Could be mistaken for real life footage, even without all the lighting effects. The overlapping craterimpacts, it all looks incredibly natural. Fantastic job FD! Thanks!

[Dark__Thoughts]

You guys got some really talented people, it's insane how much you can get done in such a short time.

[CatAtomic]

This is so incredible. I can't think of a better use for procedural generation than this, and the way Frontier is using it.

So I guess as time goes on and they add other types of planets, they'll be adding new parameters to their generation systems? Like water erosion, atmospheric compositions, etc.?

[rainerzufall]

Okay, I take everything back...now I'm really impressed. Wow, well done guys...

[TheRetroArchive]

Can't wait to see the first nebula rise time lapse video. Cheers guys!

[nakedgunmusic]

I'm speechless. I will play this game for the rest of my life.

[TheHighlander]

I think it's amazing that you guys are brave enough to show your work in progress to what must be about the most critical crowd on the planet.