Heightfield Make River Questions

[jaf]

After playing with it for a while I can get it to work, but it's sure frustrating.  What does the "Make river" checkbox do?  I thought it would enable/disable, but it doesn't seem to do that.  Also, is there any way to change values without the "making river" process starting?  Even entering a zero in a field that's already zero starts the whole process again.

[Oshyan]

Quite honestly this is just an experimental node, and probably shouldn't have been included in the final release. We removed some even more experimental nodes previously, like the Planet Surface Shader, but some less-than-functional ones like this remain. Think of it as experimental and perhaps interesting to play with, but don't expect good or easy results from it.

Sorry I can't give you a better answer.

- Oshyan

[reck]

Jaf, until the make river feature gets completed you could look at using the painter shader with a displacement node. Some people have got some nice results using this method.

[jaf]

Thanks for the replies.  I sort of knew the answer from reading search results on this subject, but thought it worthwhile introducing the subject (again).

I wonder if it would be worth the effort to group the experimental or maybe beta nodes into appropriately labeled menus?  Like:  Add Operator-> Experimental -> Heightfield make river

This would help new users stay within the workable areas while getting up-to-speed and identify areas that were  maybe aren't being developed/debugged.

On the other hand, there have been so many really creative uses for many of the nodes to get those special effects that it would seem a good idea to keep them around.  Maybe a program option "show experimental nodes" or something like that?

[Oshyan]

I agree it would be good to partition these nodes into an "experimental" category, or allow an option to enable their display (turned off by default). Unfortunately there wasn't time to do that before release.

- Oshyan

[zionner]

I agree it would be good to partition these nodes into an "experimental" category, or allow an option to enable their display (turned off by default). Unfortunately there wasn't time to do that before release.

- Oshyan

Does this mean if you implement this, we could see the PLanet surface shader again? *I lost all my Clip files with it in, so I cant play with it anymore*

[sjefen]

I really want back the Planet Surface Shader.
Or something to repleace it

- Terje

[rcallicotte]

uhhh...I kept it as a clip file.   

[Confusoid]

May i ask if you are willing to provide it.       I miss that shader as well.

[cyphyr]

I uploaded a "Planet shader" clip file to Ashundar/Terragen.org here a while ago. Seems to still work
Richard

[rcallicotte]

http://forums.planetside.co.uk/index.php?topic=6341.0