Recent posts

#1
Terragen Discussion / Re: Urgent Help Needed with Te...
Last post by Kevin Kipper - March 28, 2024, 11:33:44 PM
Have you tried running the command line version of Terragen, the tgdcli.exe file, which is located in the install directory?  When run, it opens a command line window and will output information so you can see what Terragen is doing.  This may help to locate where the problem is occurring.  Let us know what you discover.
#2
Terragen Animation / Re: Need help!
Last post by Kevin Kipper - March 28, 2024, 11:29:18 PM
From you're description I imagine this is an issue with the TCB (tension, continuity, bias) on the keyframes.

Here's a couple links in which we've discussed this issue on the forums:
https://planetside.co.uk/forums/index.php/topic,29776.msg291593.html#msg291593
https://planetside.co.uk/forums/index.php/topic,29782.msg291537.html#msg291537

Out of curiosity, do you have the ability to create the animation in another 3D application, such as Blender, and export that motion as an fbx file?  If so, that might give you more predictable results, especially if you bake out all the keyframes in the 3D application, and set the interpolation method to linear once it's been imported into Terragen.
#3
Terragen Animation / Need help!
Last post by jackharrison - March 28, 2024, 11:11:56 PM
I'm trying to create a fly-through animation showcasing a dramatic volcanic landscape I've built. I've set up the keyframes for the camera path, and everything seems smooth in the preview window. However, when I render the animation, there are jarring jumps or stutters in the movement, especially during camera rotations. Has anyone else encountered this issue with Terragen animations? Any advice on how to achieve a smooth and seamless fly-through animation?
#4
Terragen Discussion / Urgent Help Needed with Terrag...
Last post by laurawoods - March 28, 2024, 10:45:10 PM
Greeting all,
I have been using Terragen 4 for quite some time now, and it has always been a reliable tool for my projects. However, recently I have run into a perplexing problem during the rendering process. Whenever I attempt to render a scene, the software crashes unexpectedly, without any error messages or warnings. I have tried troubleshooting the issue myself by checking system requirements, updating graphics drivers, and even reinstalling the software, but unfortunately, none of these steps have resolved the problem. I have a tight deadline to meet, and this issue is severely impacting my workflow. Any guidance or assistance you can provide to resolve this problem would be greatly appreciated.
#5
Terragen Animation / Re: Cyan Eyed Biomes | Part 1 ...
Last post by Njen - March 28, 2024, 09:39:03 PM
Happy you liked it! It is set in a steampunk world that is long after an apocalypse, so society is getting back up and running again. I have more stories planned for this world.
#6
Terragen Animation / Re: Cyan Eyed Biomes | Part 1 ...
Last post by Doug - March 28, 2024, 08:35:39 PM
really cool

i like the broken building
#7
Terragen Animation / Cyan Eyed Biomes | Part 1 - a ...
Last post by Njen - March 28, 2024, 06:22:49 PM
It's been a while since I have posted work here, but I think this is worth the wait! Explore the rich world of Cyan Eyed (award winning animated short film: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G2h1Mtcn9VQ) with the first in a series of breath taking flythroughs of various landscapes that feature the beauty of a world that seemingly goes on forever. Clouds drift and evolve, ley lines brim with energy, water laps at the shores, birds meander about, even the sun changes angle just a little bit. All this happens while Captain Corliss 'The Red Snake' Vail's feared skyship, The Black Cloud sails through the skies, looking for its next prey.

If you can, please watch to the end and even click through the end card as it really helps me with the Youtube algorithm.

This fully 3D environment was created and rendered in Terragen (except for the skyship comped in from 3DS Max), with all three minutes of this single continuous shot taking over 4 months to render on just two computers (I never like my computers doing noting at night).


[Edit: Make sure to watch this in its full glory on Youtube, if you play it through this forum, you may be auto given a low quality 360p version.]

#8
Terragen Discussion / Re: Pixel gaps in rendering
Last post by sboerner - March 28, 2024, 01:09:49 PM
Oh, and by the way. Changing the filter to Cubic B-Spline seems to have fixed the artifact issue. I did 3-4 renderings with no changes to any other settings, and they all look good.

One artifact did appear after I specified a custom value for the subdivision cache. But the documentation clearly warns that reserving too much memory for the cache can cause rendering issues. I'll back off on that to see if it fixes it. There is a lot of shallow water in the scene, so increasing the cache can make a big difference in rendering times.
#9
Terragen Discussion / Re: Pixel gaps in rendering
Last post by sboerner - March 28, 2024, 11:42:54 AM
For some reason one of the attachments didn't make it. Here it is.
#10
Terragen Discussion / Re: Pixel gaps in rendering
Last post by sboerner - March 28, 2024, 11:41:11 AM

QuoteI have access to most of the Mega Scan Library, if you post  (or private pm) the file I can almost certainly re-create it without you having to share the commercial file.

Alternatively, try to convert the exr to a 16bit tiff and see if the issue remains. I doubt the image would look any different after the conversion.

The material causing the error is "pine_2x2m_Bark_Pine_vmbibe2g." The displacement file is "vmbibe2g_4K_Displacement.exr."

I checked other Megascans surface materials, though, and found that many of them use "[R]" single-channel EXR files for displacement. They are easy to spot in Adobe Bridge -- the thumbnail previews show up bright red.

Opening and simply resaving the files (as OpenEXR) in Photoshop converts them to RGB files and fixes the problem.

The attached tgd will show the error. I've removed the displacement file from the Project_Assets folder -- you'll need to drop it in there. Here's what I see when I open the tgd:

trImage attempting to read file Project_Assets/vmbibe2g_4K_Displacement.exr
FreeImage error: Warning: loading color model R as Y color model


The error appears benign in that it doesn't cause any rendering problems . . . but as I suspected no displacement or bump is produced. The attached renderings show the results of using the original EXR file vs. one fixed by a round trip through Photoshop.

Interesting.