Hi All, Noobies in particular.
Having seen quite a few requests on how this or that is done on a basic level I'd like to present
The Preset Approach.
The attached render and .tgd (foldered up in the zip file) are composed entirely of the Presets available at planetside's downloads, the models (veg) also available there, and a grass and a fern plant I think from Walli...lost the readmes if they had 'em.
Also I used the canyon terrain from the Cliff dl in file sharing here. I gave it negative displacement to make it a Lake.
To easily use the .tgc files with my .tgd the place to put the Preset package is:
Documents\0TG3_presets and tgds
and extract this zip to:
Documents\0TG2Dirs\Presets and Freebies Project
for the XFROG files I put them here:
Documents\0TG2Dirs\VEGXFROG5SpeciesTerragen2\Xfrog\BL02_Betula_lenta_Sweet_Birch
You will have to repath that.
1. My approach involved breaking up the terrain into 3 levels and as such each has a Surface layer to start with a red yellow or blue Test colour enabled. At this point I name them, I use the colour I've assigned to that layer as the name.
2. Next I attach a Distribution shader to the Mask input of each Surface layer and adjust them till colours appear where I want them to on the terrain. As I create Distribution shaders I name the thusly so the appear at the top of the Assign stack and you can easily find them:
! red Distribution shader...
3. Then I go into each Surface layer and Break connection with the Distribution shaders of each.
Alternately you could just go into the Nodes and unhook and delete the Surface layers leaving the Distribution shaders still alive floating there.
4. Next, making sure both the Tab and Nodes are focused on Shaders ( I do this as it makes everything happen at once for me) so you can see the clips insert themselves, I insert a few clip files and allow TG3 to connect for me. File>Insert Clip File..navigate to where you extracted the Presets and select (one at a time obviously).
5. I also added a Cloud clip when I was focused on the Atmosphere Tab and Node area.
6. I also added a lake but you may not want to.
7. Next I start assigning the previously created Distribution shaders by clicking the + next to the Mask on the Surface layer selected, selecting Asign Shader and selecting the Distribution shader you want to use of the 3 you've created...they will need adjusting as they have Altitude and/or Slope settings internally; you can adjust them the same as the distribution shader to restrict them to that specific area.
Repeat.
Repeat.
Do not resist the urge to tweak the presets...that's how you learn what they do.Test Render.
Render.
I have added to the zip, canyon.ter from the Cliff in File Sharing, and grass 5.tgo and fern02.tgo which were given to the community for free by the very generous Walli. The Sweet Birch is from the XFROG free pack.
As they were free i figured it was O K to add them to the project folder so you just have to unzip one thing to one place and then double clicking the .tgd will open it in TG3 if you've put the Presets where I indicated.
I have also included a 2nd Camera; Camera 01 for a different view.
too large to upload here so good old send space. I'll keep this active by dl ing it once a week.
Check this out and explore all the Tabs...then start fresh and do your own.
http://www.sendspace.com/file/6ncp11
