Michal Park did release a new After Effects Tutorial on how you can create a realistic 3D earth in After Effects. You can watch the Tutorial here and download the project file.

“Michael Park shows you how to create a realistic 3d earth, complete with clouds and atmosphere, using only After Effects’ built in effects. Special attention will be given to combining multiple instances of the CC Sphere effect to create unique layers with different specular properties for the land and water masses, as well as creating lights from urban centers on the night side of the earth.“