Creating terrain textures

miikka1978 · 14 May 2011, 20:15

How much elevation is there in that terrain? I mean height difference along the Z axis

The biggest height difference is 30 meters in this model.

Here is the terrain file and also texturemap file. I also have a file with only contours traced with elevation if you think that there is some better way to create a terrain. In this case I used Sandbox tools and Terrain reshaper plugin.

Solo, when you mentioned baking textures to mesh, did you talk about Vue or some other software?

Terrain

Texturemap

bjornkn · 14 May 2011, 21:42

Here's a very quick proof_of_concept that shows that it works, sort of. For some strange reason SU refuses to cast a shadow on the fill-in with gravel and soft edges, while it works fine in Twilight. It looks like Twilight is just sing the alpha as a clipmap, and does not use the greylevels in the alpha?
As said before, the ring is where the 2 parts overlap, and where the alpha channel is not white. The grass is a repeating texture (not really suitable for this due to the very visible repeat pattern), and the gravel with edges is one single texture, exported from SU and edited in PS where alpha was painted on a selection mask around the border, and the border area (which was originally filled with the grass) was then cloned with the gravel texture allover and reapplied in SU. One could spend some more time, add some shadows or whatever, or some other details?
Anyway, it works - sort of. It would probably be quicker and easier using some UV tools?

Gaieus · 15 May 2011, 08:07

@solo said:

@unknownuser said:

You can export the skp file to Lumion as well and paint on top

Really?, I did not think this was possible, is this in the new upgrade 2? (just released one)

Yep, see here: http://lumion3d.com/forum/index.php?topic=1085.0

(sorry guys, registered members only...)

This is not in update 2 (which is just going to be released soon) but in the current version already.
Can you remember your old signature here?
"The average user never reads user guides and tutorials, that’s why they are only average"

miikka1978 · 15 May 2011, 16:54

bjornkn, that looks really nice blending of textures.

Gaieus, is possible to paint on top of all the textures or is there some limitations?

Gaieus · 15 May 2011, 20:35

@miikka1978 said:

Gaieus, is possible to paint on top of all the textures or is there some limitations?

Sorry but what do you mean by "paint on top of all the textures" (and in which program in this cae)?

miikka1978 · 16 May 2011, 05:00

@gaieus said:

@miikka1978 said:

Gaieus, is possible to paint on top of all the textures or is there some limitations?

Sorry but what do you mean by "paint on top of all the textures" (and in which program in this cae)?

Sorry for being unclear with the question. I was talking about Lumion 3D and referring to your comment when you said that in Lumion you can paint on top of Sketchup model.

For example if I have 4 textures in a model that has been exported from Sketchup (like the golf course model in earlier replies/pictures), will I be able to paint on top of all of these textures/materials? In Lumion tutorials, they say that you have to turn a material into landscape material in order to paint on top of it. Anyway, I may have misunderstood this. Also, it seems that material needs to one of those premade landscape materials if you want to paint on top of it. Therefore, I understood that you should not be able to paint on top of "custom" materials (textures created in Sketchup).

Tutorial 4: Materials:
http://lumion3d.com/tutorials

Pixero · 16 May 2011, 05:12

I'd given this quite some thought as well and the biggest problem is that SketchUp doesn't have layered materials. Meaning that a polygon can only have one material. So I though, what if we had the possibility to store a layered material as an attribute and the blending was done with a greyscale image. The actual "baking" of the texture/material would probably mean that every polygon got it's own material though.
Maybe some openGL hack is a better way to blend between materials?
I think it's time to call in the Ruby super heroes again...

I would do this (edge blending) in another app like Unity for now until a SU solution exists.

As for using huge textures in real time apps, it's not such a good idea if you want to distribute it to people that doesn't have super graphics cards with huge amounts of memory.

Bob James · 16 May 2011, 06:11

@gaieus said:

Yep, see here: http://lumion3d.com/forum/index.php?topic=1085.0

(sorry guys, registered members only...)

Bummer

@gaieus said:

This is not in update 2 (which is just going to be released soon)

Is this version 2 or version 1.2? The reason I ask is that I can't afford to commit $1000 and then have Version 2 come out and have to pay another $350 to upgrade.

Gaieus · 16 May 2011, 07:55

Miikka: I have a pending feature request to Lumion and I even brought this topic as a good example.

So the case now is that once you bring your textured terrain into Lumion, you can swap any material assigned to the surfaces into Lumion landscape material. However as it is currently programmed, there is always one default landscape material in a landscape "theme" (say a green grass) and three others that you can paint on this default material.

So all in all, when you select a SU material in Lumion and assign the Lumion landscape material to it, it will assign this default material only. If you go to your next SU material, it will also assign this so what you cannot do now is that you selectively assign the four, possible landscape materials in Lumion.

Too bad, I also realise, as we can obviously "plan" with much more accuracy in SU then in Lumion.

@bob james said:

Bummer

Well, as it was my own series of images as "tutorial" there, here they are...

But as said, if I wanted to paint that draped road with another landscape material, I could not, as Lumion would assign that same green grass to it as well. Currently. Many of the feature requests regard these areas now so hopefully there will be considerable development here.

@bob james said:

Is this version 2 or version 1.2? The reason I ask is that I can't afford to commit $1000 and then have Version 2 come out and have to pay another $350 to upgrade.

No, this is just an incremental release. In the video here (about silhouette people) they call it "service pack 2". As far as I remember, they are planning to release major versions yearly or so. This would mean that around next December.

This coming "update" or "SP" 2 will be released soon. They say that if they do not find some serious, new bugs in the new features, still this month but early June the latest. So if you hesitate, wait what comes next. Maybe some more "sneak previews" would indeed be good.

solo · 16 May 2011, 16:00

I still maintain that Vue will be the best solution for this type of project.

miikka1978 · 16 May 2011, 19:47

Huh, Pete your Vue render looks so real! I actually bought Vue when it was on sale about 5-6 months ago. 3D modeling/rendering is just a hobby for me and I haven't had enough time to really learn to use Vue. My goal is to be able to render decent 3D animation for the golf club and hopefully the club would agree to pay my Lumion 3D license as a payment. So, I am still trying to figure out if am able to achieve "good enough" level with Lumion and my 3D skils.

This is more the level I am hoping to achieve. This is one of the newest golf courses in Finland and they created 3D model for promoting the golf club.
http://www.3drender.fi/public/tapiola_golf/Virtualgolfer/

Gaieus · 16 May 2011, 20:41

Sorry Miikka but I have to say that although I am really "crap" at rendering and website building but that site just sucks. Even I could come up with something more interesting (and more speedy to load!).

Now as you can see the limitations of the current Lumion build, I would also hesitate to see what they come up with in their next build (coming out in weeks). Vue is indeed fabulous in its look and all - but ask Pete about the speed (especially regarding such a big scene in animation)

Bob James · 16 May 2011, 22:34

Thank you, Gaieus.
IMHO I would rather have seen the demo version be the full version with limitations. The set of textures, etc is just way to small.

solo · 16 May 2011, 23:01

@unknownuser said:

Vue is indeed fabulous in its look and all - but ask Pete about the speed (especially regarding such a big scene in animation)

I agree somewhat, but then you must realise a golf course is a major construction and IMO deserves a photo-real render/animation. You do not need to animate the whole 18 holes, just some key features like tee off the 1st, Main water traps, 18th and clubhouse and maybe an aerial, the rest can be straight renders. Sure it will be a whole lot more time than Lumion/Unity, but the final result will be stunning.

Gaieus · 18 May 2011, 10:15

@solo said:

the final result will be stunning.

Now I do not doubt that - just looking at your "quicky" there (and also some other renders).