Welp, here's my first space wallpaper, sry if it takes a while to load: Latest version: v1: Spoiler (it looks better in full size) I followed bits of this tutorial if interested. You can download to the right of this page if you like. CnC please!
It looks good, but the planet doesn't have very much depth, can;t put my finger on as to why though :\
I tried to add accurate lighting and shading n' stuff. The only thing I could add is some space dust in front of it or something. Idk what to do there if it looks flat :/
I personally think the planet looks fine. The space, though, looks off. It needs better stars, rather than just a layer of monochromatic noise. One other minor gripe the darkest part of the planet should be the same darkness level as space, shouldn't it? Maybe not. Seems like it would, though. Overall, good work.
the semi large stars (the bigger white dots) are too big to be believably stars, and much too erratic and close to be planets. I think you can keep about a quarter of them and play them off as planets in the same system as this one, but they dont work as stars imo. The planet looks fine but it might help to put some slightly larger chunks of debris foating around the rings edge. Another moon wouldnt hurt either. Maybe lighten up the shadow to match the background dark tone. All in all, better than my first space scene, mine kinda just looked like mars.
For the starfield, I would increase the contrast, making the dark darker, and the stars brighter, then use a soft round brush at a small size, with high amounts of spacing and scattering, as well as a size jitter to add some more depth in the size of the stars. Soft brushes are better for stars because it accounts for the dispersion of the light over the long distances. Hard edges generally indicate something is in clear focus, and over such distances that just doesn't really happen.
Yeah, I went a bit overboard with the stars. I pretty much just added a layer with noise and left it like that. I'll go in and remove some of that layer and will try to add more variety (and maybe delete some of those big dots). Also, the only reason the background looks brighter than the shadow on the planet is because of the stars.. Thanks for the comments, helps Edit: added new version with different star field, made the shadow of the planet and the background match, and tried to add some subtle space dust in the ring.. Critique again pls!