work-around for slow PT reflection calculation

[Kadri]

Ulco as i said in Jordan's thread. For this workflow it is best to prepare accordingly.
I am making the real texturing (without  any displacements) after i import the obj landscape.

But there are possible different ways like Chris used in his tutorial (exporting the textures of 25 tiled renders https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ALbWYn_YHMI).

For another example, you could render a normal perspective render with the scene without reflection and use that for the imported ground then added with reflection as a camera front projection. You would get the same texturing plus reflection.
But if this is suitable and worth this hassle and time depends on you.
Thus the reason i said i use this mostly for animation.

If you don't do an animation just use the same perspective camera for exporting.
It gets more detail in the front and less far away.
With ortho the detail is the same on the object everywhere.
You have to take into account these kind of things too.
depends on what you want to do and your workflow etc.

[Kadri]

I mentioned front projection above...

If you use camera front projection for the method Jordan was using you actually have a small tolerance for moving your camera.
It depends on the move and the render-texture etc. But you could get away from a certain degree of camera change.
So you might not need new renders every time you move your camera. Especially if you plan accordingly.

In all these posts about obj using this or that i forgot to say this to Jordan.

[Dune]

This has been an educating thread. I indeed did an object export from the cropped render camera, imported as it was, and fed the same shaders into the color input of a default shader. As reflective wasn't taken over into that (logical) I added a reflective shader with roughness 0.1, actually all default.
I did the same with the normal micropoly ground.
Render time differs hugely, so it's clear to me that with long rendertimes this is the way to go. Though there is a difference.

So now I wonder if the same would count for transparent objects, like water on plane/sphere. Export sea, import obj and save enormously on render times....

[Kadri]

Yeah. Especially with reflection and such there is a huge render time difference.

Difference in detail is normal as you have used most probably a lower resolution export and there is a practicality limit for doing bigger better obj exports etc.
But the difference isn't night and day especially with bigger obj exports.

I was just making a test to show Jordan what i mean.
Below are a standard landscape and one with the landscape as an obj file.
Just a perspective export of  800x. This obj could be 2 times more detailed too if you wanted (with tiled export hugely more detailed).
And the obj rendered even with this just colour look so much faster. With reflection or what not the time difference would be much more.
There is difference in detail but i wouldn't care at all and nobody would know...

[Kadri]

I didn't need anything transparency related so haven't tested. Might be something for you to test Ulco.

I suspect if you have a displaced plane, lake...native Terragen object with transparency,
you might get the same speed advantage by exporting and using that instead.
But i don't know if the renderer renders those in the same way like the landscape for sure.
It is most probably as we can use the same displacements.

So it is worth a try especially when i think about your nice wave test images you did-make sometimes.

[Dune]

This is really handy, especially if a lot of ground is covered in veggies, and with a bit of reflective mud underneath. And mainly for big renders of 7k wide or so.
I'll have a go at some wild sea as obj.... curious what will happen.

The only point is that if you render an obj from ground and you import, it sits at the same location, but shouldn't 'mix' with the ground. Therefore I lowered normal ground a bit in the object area. And took off all color/displacement.

[Kadri]

I did a test with a 3 part vertically crop rendered exported objects.

I expected seams as i didn't edited and just imported the objects directly into Terragen.
Interestingly there weren't any visible seams at all.

Using objects with different cropped parts (to get more detailed objects or whatever)
or relatively exported by distance, camera etc. is easier then i thought as it looks.

[WAS]

None of my issues is about the time, or that it "doesn't" work. All these blank terrains aren't food examples imo. I want to see completed, fully shaded terrains up close

[WAS]

None of my issues is about the time, or that it "doesn't" work. All these blank terrains aren't food examples imo. I want to see completed, fully shaded terrains up close. Final scenes. I can see difference in your large terrain, which make it obvious as an obj (how low fidelity objects look) and not a landscape imo.

[Kadri]

Jordan, you can be sometimes weary as those flatearthers who don't accept any facts showed to them.

I could say more here too. But i already stated that the way the render handles micropolygons is of course much more detailed and advanced ( after all that is one of Terragen's strengths)  and this kind of obj work does have another purpose and the difference (if you especially don't have seen the original landscape) is negligible.
You wouldn't know for example that Ulco made that last test with transparency with an object bla bla bla...

It is like you want an image like a macro photo shot.
How is that not close enough?
Mine example and-or Ulco's....more closer wouldn't matter at all but you don't understand that as it looks from you objections.
Is there a special FOV, distance, etc. you accept as...acceptable?
I have really a hard time to understand what you want (Texturing i understand of course).
I picked that scene especially for you according your objections.

Anyway... everybody can work the way they want...

[Kadri]

... I can see difference in your large terrain, which make it obvious as an obj (how low fidelity objects look) and not a landscape imo.

Which one is obj?
And no you wouldn't have known if i didn't say that at all. If it was fully textured and with atmo.
When you see them side by side maybe. But not by itself.
What you say is something like saying that all the other 3D program who are using polygons do look fake.

[WAS]

I think 2 is the obj.

And again, these are distant terrains, nothing following the scenarios I am talking about.

[Kadri]

I think 2 is the obj.

And again, these are distant terrains, nothing following the scenarios I am talking about.

Now is the time you should change your thoughts.
No....
1 is the object.

[WAS]

IF 1 is the object, that's even worse, as so much of the terrain detail was changed from the source. Img 2 has a lot of connected details that are severed in image 1.

[WAS]

PS, wanted to try doing a rough ocean, see if it renders fast with brooding lighting, but TG doesn't export planes it looks like. At least not the lake obj. Going to try a plane. If not, planet should work fine blank.