The current series of lessons is called Advanced Shaders and it's not for nothing. There's a few hours of work and three (somewhat) complex networks.
The Earth (top), clouds, and atmosphere Networks
Not having a simple file texture slapped on the sphere really opens up a new world of detail. No matter where the sun hits, on the night side of the Earth, city lights will shine through. The Earth also has added attributes for control over Mountain Height (controls the bump depth), Self Illumination, City Lights Intensity, Cloud Intensity, and Atmosphere Intensity. This level of control allows me to really tweak how I want my scene to look.
To show the complexity of those small details, I created a small demonstration.
Link to Video Page on Youtube in case the video doesn't load
I had a lot of fun making those Networks. But the lessons are not over. The spaceship and the alien still needs to be shaded.
