I've always wondered what other planets in our Solar System would look like if they were more Earth-like. Covered with clouds and water to just the right elevation. Where would the vegetation be thickest? Where would there be deserts still? Snow covered poles perhaps? I offer these dozen orbs, terraformed to human's liking. Can you tell which is which after the transformation? If you have any other ideas or images of Solar System objects that have been altered in some fantastical way please share!

Answers in the spoiler.

I've spent 20 minutes trying to hide the spoiler, but can't seem do the most basic of postings.
Oh well, just don't peek if you can help it.

Neat!  I was able to identify Mars immediately, and then the Moon, and then had a lucky good guess with Titan (its seas are somewhat distinctive).  Everything else felt entirely alien.  It's cool how different things look with water on them.

I also used to play around with image manipulation to make planets, and here's a series I created for terraforming Venus:

Gnargenox wrote:

Source of the post I've spent 20 minutes trying to hide the spoiler, but can't seem do the most basic of postings.

Oh, try uploading the image to a site like imgur, and then copy the direct link to the image in the spoiler tag.

Gnargenox wrote:

Source of the post I've spent 20 minutes trying to hide the spoiler, but can't seem do the most basic of postings.
Oh well, just don't peek if you can help it.

You must press "Place inline" for attached image, then enclose it in spoiler.
Also, Europa, Titan, Pluto and other worlds cannot be terraformed like that. They are icy worlds made by 50% off water, so if you warm them up, you will end up with ocean planet with no land. Actually, starting from Jupiter's moons (except Io), all outer moons and planetoids are iceworlds.
Mimas and Miranda are too small to retain atmosphere.

Wow, you guys are too kind! You really make someone feel at home in this community, and thanks for cleaning up my mess. I'll be sure to use Imgur for large pictures and now I can do spoilers, woohoo! I see what you mean SpaceEngineer, about warming up icy worlds warm enough for liquid water. You would liquify the existing topography lol. We would have to change the physical laws of nature to ever create things like in my OP photo.

Great images of Venus changing into an Earth-like world Watsisname. First being able to see through the clouds, then watching color emerge onto the landscape. I wonder if that is cyanobacteria specifically shown, as many suggest that is the way to terraform Venus. The final version is breath taking, and such realistic looking details I almost imagine it spinning, even if it would be backwards. It seems like I can make out the shape of the Alpha Islands, Ovda & Thetis on the Aphrodite Terra, all familiar to me but seen in a new light like this is so cool!

I was so inspired I had to make this gif of Venus rotating using a drawing I made long ago.
I reskinned Venus in that really weak and outdated program Celestia, but only because it was easy.

These were really fun trying to guess! like the second guy, i recognized mars immediately, and within 30 seconds i had identified the moon and Mimas, and after about a minute i had worked out Io. my only complaint is that you've ordered the worlds in order of distance from the sun, so i was able to extrapolate mercury (as it looked like the moon) and Venus from logic instead of my genuine knowledge of the bodies. still though, fantastic work!

HA! My OCD got the best of me, I didn't realize that was a huge clue. Thanks!

That is neat!

I hope a terraforming system gets in the game!

I would love to see the ability to pick a planet, change the atmosphere, the entire climate, add water and even vegetation to it! But of course some planets such as Ice Worlds would change dramatically when warmed up. The topography would basically melt into a flat smooth ball without much above sea level. Or maybe even turn Earth-like planets into Desert Worlds.

 

Gnargenox wrote:

Source of the post I would love to see the ability to pick a planet, change the atmosphere, the entire climate, add water and even vegetation to it!

Let us hope that gets added when gameplay becomes a thing in SE

I have terraformed the terrestrial bodies of the Solar system too. (All but Mercury)



Venus - It has a little bit thinner atmosphere than Earth. I calculated it's new rotation period by turning most of it's thick atmosphere mass into rotational momentum and added it on top of the slow rotation of Venus. (The idea was to shoot the atmosphere off at more than the escape velocity. My calculations may be inaccurate or outright wrong) Don't ask me how to blow off planetary atmosphere without stellar winds or massive impact events. I do not know.



Moon would have a rather high atmosphere due to it's weak gravity. We would have to keep it there by some force shield or whatever...



High volume of iron oxides makes me assume that Mars, if terraformed, would have rusty oceans.


Copy & Paste Mars atmosphere to Earth, then play with the terrain a bit and you marsform the poor Earth.

WOW, I really love that version of Venus! I have yet to do any editing of planets. I didn't know you could switch data like that and it would mix atmosphere effects on the different terrains, changing water elevations, vegetation textures, cloud textures etc. I was thinking I would have to edit that manually with new textures. Does it also effect erosion formulas?

An'shur wrote:

Source of the post Venus - It has a little bit thinner atmosphere than Earth. I calculated it's new rotation period by turning most of it's thick atmosphere mass into rotational momentum and added it on top of the slow rotation of Venus. (The idea was to shoot the atmosphere off at more than the escape velocity. My calculations may be inaccurate or outright wrong) 

If the mass of atmosphere is ejected tangentially at the escape velocity, then using some crude but reasonable approximations I get a change in angular frequency of 4.2x10^-6 rad/s, for a final rotation period of about 17 days.  But of course that can be shortened further by increasing the ejection speed like you said.

To actually do this is probably not very practical, but still pretty neat!

Venus must have a slow rotation to enable temperate climate, according to some modern study.