TP4 rendering problems...

[Tangled-Universe]

Hi everybody,

I'm experiencing rendering-problems with an update I'm working on.
I've already posted this in my image-section, but since these problems are general and in maybe also in everybody's interest I thought I'd like to post it here as well.

Here's a crop of a testrender showing several problems, from left to right:

1) What's up with the intersection of the cloud with the populations?
2) Why do some flowers render completely and some don't?
3) Why doesn't the population rotate randomnly on it's Y-axis? All the trees have the same orientation
4) Why are the trees suddenly floating, while they were not before? I only added an extra PF-based terrain (3 in total now, was 2 before) with distance masking, all before the compute terrain.

This .tgd is 99% the same compared to the latest version and I don't understand these problems and haven't been able to resolve them.
Hope somebody can help.

Hope somebody can help.

Martin

[Seth]

maybe official explainations for those problems... that'll be cool

[choronr]

I must say, this is one of your finest compositions so far. Yes, even the advanced and knowledgeable users like yourself continue to have issues with the program. What is needed is a comprehensive TG2 manual with easy to understand explanations of the myriad of settings.

[DeathTwister]

Well it would not be so bad if it worked right I do agree,

   But then that is why they call em bata builds, sure would be nice to one day get to the point where a manual would be the right thing to have, instead of the next bug ridden update fix.  But I know they are working on it, and I also agree this scene your working on is awesome bro. Sure would be nice to have a finished product that is stable though, humm, what a concept hahahahaha /winks.

Have a few tests I am going to do later today or tomorrow with the new build, but been to busy to play and spin dials yet for free and for fun. So TG2 has to have back seat 4 now.

DT

[PG]

Are the trees populations or objects? I know you said the population doesn't rotate randomly but I just want to clarify that. Try changing the sit on terrain to the last node before the compute terrain and repopulate it. Just make sure you don't change the seeds.

[lightning]

I must say, this is one of your finest compositions so far. Yes, even the advanced and knowledgeable users like yourself continue to have issues with the program. What is needed is a comprehensive TG2 manual with easy to understand explanations of the myriad of settings.

i agree totally

ha an antigravity tree!!!
could it be something to do with the displacements sometimes if the terrain is to displaced the populations will not map onto it properly
(it happened to me on the old beta)

[Tangled-Universe]

Are the trees populations or objects? I know you said the population doesn't rotate randomly but I just want to clarify that. Try changing the sit on terrain to the last node before the compute terrain and repopulate it. Just make sure you don't change the seeds.

Thanks PG, but of course I've tried that...it doesn't make a difference

I must say, this is one of your finest compositions so far. Yes, even the advanced and knowledgeable users like yourself continue to have issues with the program. What is needed is a comprehensive TG2 manual with easy to understand explanations of the myriad of settings.

i agree totally

ha an antigravity tree!!!
could it be something to do with the displacements sometimes if the terrain is to displaced the populations will not map onto it properly
(it happened to me on the old beta)

The terrain consists of two fractal terrains (which are 2 powerfractals (PF's)). I added another PF to a total of 3 then, all before the compute terrain node.
And now the populations are floating, no matter which surface layer I assign to sit on.

[choronr]

It would be great if you could take and combine these terrains in Terragen 0.09; then, take them back into TG2 and continue your work.

[rcallicotte]

TU, this is marvelous work.  Sorry to see it so broken.

[Matt]

Have you moved your tree? Check that the object position is still 0,0,0.

I don't see anything clearly wrong with the trees in the fog layer, but it's hard to see what it's supposed to look like. It would be interesting to see those trees rendered from a closer viewpoint.

Could the similar object rotations simply be coincidence? 'Random' doesn't automatically mean 'different'. What if you change the population seed? (It will change positions too, unfortunately.)

We're doing what we can to figure out why some objects are not rendering properly.

Matt

[Tangled-Universe]

1) Have you moved your tree? Check that the object position is still 0,0,0.

2) I don't see anything clearly wrong with the trees in the fog layer, but it's hard to see what it's supposed to look like. It would be interesting to see those trees rendered from a closer viewpoint.

3) Could the similar object rotations simply be coincidence? 'Random' doesn't automatically mean 'different'. What if you change the population seed? (It will change positions too, unfortunately.)

4) We're doing what we can to figure out why some objects are not rendering properly.

Matt

Thanks Matt

1) I Haven't moved the object position. The translation of the object maker is set to 0,0,0 for all objects/populations in this scene. I have tried a negative altitude for the object maker, but it didn't make a difference.
Though the populated area is somewhat moved and increased, but very little.
The translation on the Y-axis in the populator is 0m which I think is correct.
However the actual altitude of the trees in the project is around -1600m. That shouldn't matter, isn't it? I've tried setting the translation to -1600m in the populator but that didn't make a difference.

2) I'll work on a more close-up render of the trees in the fog layer. In my opinion the shading transitions of the trees in the fog isn't smoothly and looks jagged (vertical lines).
But let's see if it appears in close-up.

3) I've checked 4 other seeds and the trees still have the same rotation. I've included an example in this post.

4) I've seen similar reports elsewhere on the forum, thanks for jumping into this matter

[bobbystahr]

This tree non rotation seems to be an ongoing problem dating back to the TG2TP Free which I have ...I've had comments on a few renders I've done where they say,"Aside from the trees all facing the same direction....." and I know I have them rotating 360 around the Y axis.

[rcallicotte]

Me too, Bobby.

[Matt]

1) I Haven't moved the object position. The translation of the object maker is set to 0,0,0 for all objects/populations in this scene. I have tried a negative altitude for the object maker, but it didn't make a difference.
Though the populated area is somewhat moved and increased, but very little.
The translation on the Y-axis in the populator is 0m which I think is correct.
However the actual altitude of the trees in the project is around -1600m. That shouldn't matter, isn't it? I've tried setting the translation to -1600m in the populator but that didn't make a difference.

The Y translation of the populator shouldn't make much difference (although very large values could potentially affect object spacing), so it's reassuring to see that it had no effect on your scene. However, changing the translation in the object maker (your OBJ/TGO Loader) should definitely change the placement of all the objects in the population, and it's a useful capability. I am surprised that there was no change when you used a negative value for this. I will test whether it's still working for me.

2) I'll work on a more close-up render of the trees in the fog layer. In my opinion the shading transitions of the trees in the fog isn't smoothly and looks jagged (vertical lines).
But let's see if it appears in close-up.

It does look a little unusual, I agree, so I look forward to seeing the close-up.

3) I've checked 4 other seeds and the trees still have the same rotation. I've included an example in this post.

In your cropped example the tree on the left bends in the opposite direction, so there must be a change in rotation. Unless this is a different model. The trees are also in different positions which I will assume is due to the change in seed. But I will also verify that rotation is working with populations of TGOs and OBJs.

Matt

[SeerBlue]

okay, I may be speaking out my backside here, but is the levitating tree problem just effecting one population,  of the type of pine tree pointed out, or does it effect all the tree populations. The reason I am asking as it is hard to see the bottom of the other trees of the same population due to a slight rise in the terrain between them and the camera, but a while back I used a model of a tree which had the origin set at the end of a root, causing the population for that tree to set above the terrain, with just the tip of the root touching the ground, the other populations of different tree models sat on the surface. Perhaps when the additional PF based terrain just lowered the intervening terrain enough to see the levitation.
Just a thought, slap me if I am way off.
SeerBlue