how i make my trees

[lightning]

most of you may know by now that i make all sorts of plants and trees for terragen 2
so i would like to share with you a few of my resources i use to research the plants i create
heres the main website i get all my information on trees from
http://www.cirrusimage.com/trees!toc.htm

for plants i use this site for research and referance photos
http://www.backyardgardener.com/plantsearch.html

to get my bark pictures i either get them from deviant art's stock images which is very useful or since i live in newzealand where there are heaps and heaps of trees i take photo's of the bark myself

i use a wide varity of software for making plants.
xfrog 3.5
xfrog 4.3 (c4d)
xfrog (maya 2008)
you are probably think why do you need three versions of xfrog well the reason is each software creates plants differently such as maya creates its plants slightly differently than the cinema 4d version.
i also use
onyx palm
onyx CONIFER
onyx broad leaf
onyx bamboo
onyx flower
onyx is a great plant making program and onyx suite 6 can create a wide variety of realistic plants.
dpit nature spirit 4
dpit has a great grass and tree engine and can create some realy nice looking trees with not to much difficulty
Dryad
dryads a very simple program but can create some pretty amazing looking plants but always save as massive files so i dont use it that much .

poseray
to get all my plants to look nice in terragen i ALWAYS run them through poseray. i have a lot of the high end apps such as max c4d bodypaint,maya,lightwave,modo etc etc but they don't do the job (for terragen) half as well as little poseray does it so straight forward and easy to use it like terragens little sister!

well thats just a brief explanation of how my models are created

stay tuned for more of my models

thanx jak

[choronr]

Its good to hear your enthusiasm about creating plants, bushes and trees. There are many plants here in the desert southwest that I would like to see available; such as: Brittlebush, Creosote Bush, Owl Clover, Mexican Golden Poppies, Blue Palo Verde Tree, Green Palo Verde Tree, Tumble Weeds, Sage Brush, Cholla Cactus; and, many, many more.

[lightning]

ill see what i can do if its cactus's you want iv made heaps of them in xfrog i will upload some for you if you want

[choronr]

Thank you lightning, desert scenes are my thing. Now, we are experiencing spring in the desert; what a beautiful sight; blooms every where.

[moodflow]

Many thanks for that information and your uploads Lightning.  I haven't had a chance to use any of them yet, but I am sure they will come in handy.

By the way, your current avatar is nuts.  Excellent choice!

Looks like what was probably in my closet at night when I was a kid.  I knew someone (or thing) was in there just waiting for a chance to fly out.  Now I know what it probably looked like!     

[lightning]

Many thanks for that information and your uploads Lightning.  I haven't had a chance to use any of them yet, but I am sure they will come in handy.

By the way, your current avatar is nuts.  Excellent choice!

Looks like what was probably in my closet at night when I was a kid.  I knew someone (or thing) was in there just waiting for a chance to fly out.  Now I know what it probably looked like!     

LOL!!
surfing the internet and came across this picture caught my attention immediately
i am a little nutty show its a good choice

[AndyWelder]

Hope you continue creating plants for use in TG2 now that you have the licensed/deep version. Currently there's a render going on here with the "Tortured hand" species, excellent plant for the SciFi kinda stuff.

@ Choronr: Bob, you can find a tumbleweed here: http://www.ashundar.com/index.php?PHPSESSID=62f23b2d64028874b95b6c4467903599&action=tpmod;dl=item348

I'm no expert on desert flora but I think it looks convincing enough.

[lightning]

thats what makes it all worth while seeing people using my plants i get a real kick out of it when i see people halfway around the world rendering amazing pictures with my models in

[sjefen]

Is xfrog 3.5 standalone easy to use and learn?

[AndyWelder]

Lightning, the finished render can be seen here: http://www.3dcommune.com/3d/galview.mv?Terragen+tKpzMJkXI+1205793793+&v_index=5&nd=1205700075

[choronr]

Andy; thanks for the tumbleweed link. Unfortunately I get a 'server error'. I'll check their plant download list and see if it is there.

[lightning]

Lightning, the finished render can be seen here: http://www.3dcommune.com/3d/galview.mv?Terragen+tKpzMJkXI+1205793793+&v_index=5&nd=1205700075

cool glad you found a use for it

[lightning]

Is xfrog 3.5 standalone easy to use and learn?

yep a little hard at first but you get used to it

[Mr_Lamppost]

I have wondered about getting the trial of X-Frog 3.5 a couple of times with a view to buying it if it was any good.  Given that I don't have a lot of free time, Terragen eats all that, what is the learning curve like?  Am I likely to get an idea of how useful it will be during the 30 day trial assuming that I can only use it for a couple of hours at most on around half of the days.  I know that's an almost impossible question to answer but I don't want to waste the trial period.