Learning Curve

Started by luvsmuzik, April 06, 2018, 10:38:30 AM

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luvsmuzik

There is no magic button for realistic renders.
Ten years of learning, reading, rendering to improve.
Never stop trying. Play nice. :) :) :)

N-drju

Go with the third - it's "full HD" worthy!

I like the sixth as well. And I can also see you are having the same trouble as I do - runny mountain / slope edges. Never really know how to get rid of those and put something cool there instead. :'(
"This year - a factory of semiconductors. Next year - a factory of whole conductors!"

luvsmuzik

#2
Quote from: N-drju on April 06, 2018, 02:09:55 PM
Go with the third - it's "full HD" worthy!

I like the sixth as well. And I can also see you are having the same trouble as I do - runny mountain / slope edges. Never really know how to get rid of those and put something cool there instead. :'(


Oh thanks buddy  :)
These were just renders from  beta release and additional updates over the years since Version2. They are meant to show that I had a lot to learn, being used to landscape only without objects. I have been a member of the forum awhile now, rather than just lurking and downloading freeies that were around to experiment with as I did for many years. 
I am just now sort of comfortable doing populations and displacements, but realizing I cannot just think it, I have to think about it.
I have made progress I am happy with and learned many things. I will probably never do an earth shattering discovery, but I enjoy the experimentation as well as utilization. :)

N-drju

Hehe, same here - I'm a regular user who managed to improve his workshop, but has no knowledge (or patience) to build miracles. But you are right - the learning curve. We're on the incline. ;) Just compare my first ever picture...

https://planetside.co.uk/forums/index.php/topic,17748.msg171946.html#msg171946

...with, oh, let's say HANARC or War-Free Zone. Speaks volumes. :)

But back to these renders, do you actually plan to redesign them now? Or maybe already did?
"This year - a factory of semiconductors. Next year - a factory of whole conductors!"

luvsmuzik

I see what you mean! Nice stuff!

I have done a few, but my goal is to plant flowers where the spots of colors are in this one, probably by power fractals mask now. This was an old technique shared waaay back in version 9 something or other...limited coverage, slope, instersect underlying etc...way back then.

The other is a painted desert canyon, that I have sort of redone with strata renders now.

N-drju

The flowery one should indeed be easy to do based on the already existing fractals. Note however, that you need to convert bluish fractal to white spots! I learned it the hard way that TG reads dark blue or brown masks as dark greyscale, hence, a zero value area. :D

Oh yeah, and I just love deserts. The colors. They are not as boring as people think.
"This year - a factory of semiconductors. Next year - a factory of whole conductors!"

luvsmuzik

Quote from: N-drju on April 06, 2018, 05:31:47 PM
The flowery one should indeed be easy to do based on the already existing fractals. Note however, that you need to convert bluish fractal to white spots! I learned it the hard way that TG reads dark blue or brown masks as dark greyscale, hence, a zero value area. :D

Oh yeah, and I just love deserts. The colors. They are not as boring as people think.


This terrain is about 15 years old, hehe. I shall have to do a reasonable facsimile. Made in the day of slider control previews.

Dune

QuoteI learned it the hard way that TG reads dark blue or brown masks as dark greyscale, hence, a zero value area
That's where color adjust comes in handy, just slide the darks all the way to light again, or use a copy of the same mask, but white/black (but beware when doing seed changes). Lots of methods.... but that's indeed the learning curve, and often I think some nice node relation up as a theory for something I want, but when I test it, there's unforeseen glitches and I need to think again...

N-drju

Quote from: Dune on April 07, 2018, 03:11:12 AM
That's where color adjust comes in handy, just slide the darks all the way to light again, or use a copy of the same mask, but white/black (but beware when doing seed changes).

And the learning curve goes up again! ;) If only I knew it before.
"This year - a factory of semiconductors. Next year - a factory of whole conductors!"

Dune

Ask. That's what the forum is for  ;)

N-drju

That time I just repainted it to white. :D Okay, I'm heading back to the clouds... ;)
"This year - a factory of semiconductors. Next year - a factory of whole conductors!"

Dune

Just so you know, I use the color adjust too to make a (thus very bleached) mask out of somewhat darker colored, larger fake stones that way, to mask out grasses or they might stick through).

luvsmuzik

#12
Quote from: Dune on April 07, 2018, 03:34:04 AM
Just so you know, I use the color adjust too to make a (thus very bleached) mask out of somewhat darker colored, larger fake stones that way, to mask out grasses or they might stick through).

So...you are saying if I have the ter. (from version 9) output to load into heightfield, and I also have the bmp output of same: I could use the bmp as an object mask?  Ages ago you could do this out of program and load it into another program and plant trees, etc. Then you would raytrace it.

I used to save my maps with every option TG 9 had. SGi, RAW, BMP, TER. output LWO...(that may have been Terranim) been so long ago.

The trees were three stacked cones with a cylinder trunk I think.  Funny, now I am seeing similar in advertising....the NEW mixed media

Dune

The bmp map will just be a gradient from black to white, from low to high areas, so you don't really need that as mask. Altitude restraints will do just as nicely.

bobbystahr

Quote from: Dune on April 07, 2018, 03:34:04 AM
Just so you know, I use the color adjust too to make a (thus very bleached) mask out of somewhat darker colored, larger fake stones that way, to mask out grasses or they might stick through).

Often I do similar, I duplicate my Fakestones shader and remove colour variation from it and it seems to work without a colour adjust, I just reverse it in the mask/blend channel I am using...A typo just created and I corrected...I amusing and of course I was amused heh heh heh
something borrowed,
something Blue.
Ring out the Old.
Bring in the New
Bobby Stahr, Paracosmologist