Help with Mac Version...

[jmyers73]

Hi all.
I am new to Terragen and am still researching. But, I was wondering if anyone had any links to "plug-ins" or "extras" for the Mac version of Terragen 2? I looked on Planetside's links page and found a few, but those links are dead or the actual plug-in is dead (nothing posted since 2002).

What I would like to do is get some other shader plug-ins and I would really be interested in animations. In fact, I am working on a project that I could really use Terragen for but have no idea how I would animate a 10 sec clip at 60fps at 1440x900p along a "complex" path.

Can someone shed some light on this for me?

Thanks
jmyers

[Henry Blewer]

Are you using Terragen or Terragen 2? There are not any plug ins available for Terragen 2 yet. If you are using Terragen 0.9xxx then you need to post in the Terragen section. One of the links to Terragen 0.9xx is not in service any longer. There should be post with links to Terragen0.9xx in the Terragen section of the forum.

[jmyers73]

I am using Terragen 2.

I did just find an old post concerning this subject. It said that the only way to get animation was to buy the Deep+Animation bundle for $$399.

If that is the case, would that bundle just allow camera animation or is it possible to add animations to trees, grass, etc.? And how is that done through the Mac? scripts or timeline (keyframes)?

jmyers

[jo]

Hi,

There aren't any plugins available for the Mac version of TG2, or the Windows version for that matter. Plugins for Terragen v0.9 don't work with TG2.

As to animation, virtually every parameter in TG2 is animatable. In the Free or Deep versions without animation you will see that most parameters have animation buttons, with an icon that has a curve and small A. In Deep+Animation all those parameters can be keyframed. We don't have wind effects for vegetation, if that's what you mean. Camera animation on the Mac is done in the same way as the PC version. You can keyframe it, or you can import motion scripts from other applications. I'm the wrong person to be describing this, but perhaps one of the others can fill you in. There is also quite a bit of information in the forums about animation. Any information you find about it will apply equally to the Mac version.

We will shortly be starting on the animation module which will provide enhanced animation capabilities within TG2 itself.

Regards,

Jo

[jmyers73]

Thanks Jo.

Wind effects are exactly what I am talking about. Like I said, I am still fairly new at Terragen and am still learning. What drew me to TG2 was the realism that you can get without knowing the ins and outs of a 3D program like Maya or Max.

But, would there be a way to "simulate" wind with the seperate objects (grass, leaves, etc) by manipulating a single object and having it effect the rest in the scene, as in an instance? Or is any animation done at this point with shaders (water, clouds, etc)?

[Henry Blewer]

There is a wind patch effect in the water. Clouds can be deformed to look wind torn. There are many ways. Try searching the forum.

[old_blaggard]

As Jo said, you can animate almost any aspect of the shaders to get a nice windy effect, although imported objects (such as plants) are quite difficult. Theoretically, you could save a different mesh for each frame of the animation and then import that new mesh each frame, but nobody has done that yet to my knowledge.

[Oshyan]

Animation of actual objects is going to be a challenge. The current animation functions operate essentially on the core TG2 shaders and functions. Object support is limited to simple options - scaling, translation (position), etc., all of which you can animate. But changing the *shape* of an object, which is what would be required for simulating the effect of wind on vegetation, is not directly supported at this point.

- Oshyan

[Henry Blewer]

I noticed when I was exporting Wavefront objects out of Blender, that it will make copies of various key frames. This may work for rigged objects as well. The only problem would be having to load each animate instance of the object into Terragen 2.

[dandelO]

If you used the populator with imported grass clumps, or such(and you weren't so close-up to the ground for it to be noticeably poor, whole object animation) the parent object can be tilted slightly for each frame.

The min/max rotation for each instance in the populator, if set to 0/360, would then translate these movements, albeit randomly, in accordance with each instance's rotated value. 
This would give a half-decent looking moving grass, if not too close-up.
As with everything with me, that's pretty crude but with some work, I'm sure something nice could be created under certain circumstances.
I think I might go and try something to this effect...

[jmyers73]

dandel,
I was thinking something along your lines. Sure, wind effects would be nice, but for now, if we slightly altered the "parent" object slightly would that effect the population to simulate movement? And if it does, then could we create 2 shader populations with slight alterations different from the first (maybe 5-10 percent) so that it doesnt like so.....mechanical. And if it does again, the possibilities seem endless.

[dandelO]

It'll work but it'll be entirely random. You'll want to alter the X and Z rotation values in the parent object, very slightly. I'd say between 1 to 5 degrees.

You couldn't have a gust blown effect travelling across your field, for example, but some slight movement in each object, if set up correctly could simulate some movement, it will translate to each instance and, if they're set to rotate randomly in the Y value in the populator through 360 degrees then each instance will tilt in a different direction for each frame that you change parent object parameters for.

***EDITED: I've tried this now with increments of 1 degree rotation in the X and Z's. It's far too much.
Now I'm trying it with 0.1 degree increments, If I get any decent results I'll post a wee .gif... ***

[dandelO]

Very crude, as I said but, each instance is animated, this is just a quick test at low quality.

[Henry Blewer]

Could a twist and shear shader be animated? So that the top portion and say 3/4 of the blades bend? Like your test image(great result I think), the scale would have to be very small.

[dandelO]

It's a bit smoother here, there's no Y rotation at all in the populator this time.

I don't imagine a twist and shear can be applied to object meshes.