I made a CGI model of a dredger-submarine using an .OBJ mesh editor that I wrote. Hereinunder is an image of the sub rendered in Poser, and an image of it rendered in Terragen.
Its bow labels are a sheet of polygons (material "label") placed about 0.1 inches out from the sub's hull. This material has a diffuse color texture map and a transparency texture map.
In Poser the bow label renders correctly, and where it is transparent, it lets the sub's hull's color show through. (But I must set the label's ambience and reflectivity to zero.)
But in Terragen for this material "label" I have tried many combinations of diffuse and translucency and opaqueness values and texture maps, and all that I can get is:-
(1) Label completely invisible and missing.
(2) As seen here, with the intended transparent parts only partly transparent.
(3) As (2) but without the text.
.OBJ file format was designed for an early CGI graphics program called Wavefront, which did not have transparency, so transparency cannot be passed on in an .OBJ file, but I must restore the transparency after the .OBJ object has been loaded into Terragen.
If you make an alpha layer in the texture file (say a TIFF), you can there set all that needs to be seen white, the rest black. In the default shader use the alpha channel for opacity. But it's either on or off, no greyscale transparency.
But the Terragen render in the attached image shows that using a .BMP file as a transparency map does work in Terragen - partly, and with what should be fully transparent shown as about half transparent. And, what is the dffrerence between the two Terragen texture features "translucency" and "opacity"?
I seem to have managed it. I set:-
Diffuse color to 1 & gdsl_bowlabels_rn_texc.bmp
Translucency to 1 & gdsl_bowlabels_rndrg_text.bmp
Luminosity to 0 & no map file
Opacity to 1 & gdsl_bowlabels_rndrg_text.bmp & do not use alpha channel & do not invert opacity image.
...... Here does "invert" mean "switch top and bottom" or "switch back and white"?
Images to unpremultiply colour but do not unpremultiply anything else.
...... Here what does "unpremultiply" mean? Presumably "reverse the effect of premultiplying a matrix by something", but what was premultiplied by what?
The shading on the sub's hull shows the polygons and is nothing like as good as Poser's rendering of shading on a curved surface. Can I do something in Terragen to improve this?
In Terragen how can I make the light diffuse, or somewhat diffuse, rather than all point-source sharp?
If Terragen when starting a job from a .tgd file can't find an object or graphic file needed, it merely errors. It would be useful of instead it then asked the user where that file is :: Poser does that.
Translucency is not needed, had probably no effect at all. And if your colors in the bmp are above average grey (more light than dark), it will read it as white and you're fine, but if you have a bmp file with darker greys that you still want to show on the hull, you need an extra B&W file where the grey is white for the opacity.
I don't know exactly what unpremultiply is; the only thing I sometimes tick it off for is to get rid of the white edges along leaves.
You can make light diffuse by using soft shadows. It does increase rendertime, though.
Polygons: did you check 'use smooth normals' in the object's tabs? Otherwise it's just too low poly (for TG at least).
Invert means black to white and white to black, not upside down.
Quote from: Dune on December 19, 2014, 09:21:47 AM
... Polygons: did you check 'use smooth normals' in the object's tabs? Otherwise it's just too low poly (for TG at least).
I used "smooth normals".
Uhh :: it looks like I will need to find or write a program that can subdivide big polygons including allowing for smoothing when adding the necessary many extra vertexes.
Quote from: Dune on December 19, 2014, 09:21:47 AM
Invert means black to white and white to black, not upside down.
Sorry: I am accustomed to Poser, which reverses texture maps in Y, and getting Poser texture maps the right way up is sometimes a problem.
Anthony, some of us run our .obj/lwo/3ds models through PoseRay a free app for making Poser model POV ray friendly but it does have a subdivision feature that may help with the poly count. I've smoothed a few models with it.
I downloaded Poseray and used it to smooth the dredger-sub model to 1 degree maximum crease angle; that increased file size from 1502 kbytes to 8469 kbytes. It looks generally smoother, but notice the ring effect on the bows, and the distortion on the front of the deck and on the bow-label. And one of the propeller's blades shows strange rendering. (Examining the mesh of the smoothed version in my mesh-editor shows no distortion at the front of the deck where the rendering shows a sawtoothed effect.)
You might not need to subdivide it maybe.
Try the "Recalculate normals" , "Smooth" options in the "Groups" first.
Quote from: Kadri on December 19, 2014, 01:36:00 PM
You might not need to subdivide it maybe.
Try the "Recalculate normals" , "Smooth" options in the "Groups" first.
Done. The smoothing looks a bit better, but I can still see the polygons.
Hmm...It still looks like it could be better.
If you don't want to share the model could you at least upload here the front part (for example) test it?
Quote from: Kadri on December 19, 2014, 04:05:07 PM
If you don't want to share the model could you at least upload here the front part (for example) test it?
Here is the sub model .obj & .mtl and its texture maps.
Heh heh heh, you said the right words Kadri,. In my previous life as a Moderator of Freestuff at renderosity Anthony was a most generous member.
To make the bow label work OK, in the sub after loading it into Terragen, find its material "label" and set its texturing to:-
Diffuse color to 1 & gdsl_bowlabels_rn_texc.bmp
Translucency to 1 & gdsl_bowlabels_rndrg_text.bmp
Luminosity to 0 & no map file
Opacity to 1 & gdsl_bowlabels_rndrg_text.bmp & do not use alpha channel & do not invert opacity image.
I am still in Renderosity.
Not sure still but at the first look there are nonplanar polygons in the object, Anthony.
Some parts that doesn't look smooth in the image below
could be made better by using a smoother objects in the polygon level i think.
I didn't play with the textures so they are not right here.
But you can overcome the problem with the polygons edges looking distinctive
if you uncheck the "GI surface details" in the "Render GI settings" that is in the "Quality" tab in the Render node.
Not sure if this is a problem only with this object or a general problem.
I remember that there was such a problem earlier too.
Quote from: Anthony Appleyard on December 19, 2014, 04:40:26 PM
To make the bow label work OK, in the sub after loading it into Terragen, find its material "label" and set its texturing to:-
Diffuse color to 1 & gdsl_bowlabels_rn_texc.bmp
Translucency to 1 & gdsl_bowlabels_rndrg_text.bmp
Luminosity to 0 & no map file
Opacity to 1 & gdsl_bowlabels_rndrg_text.bmp & do not use alpha channel & do not invert opacity image.
I am still in Renderosity.
I retired at 65 just because well, that's when it's done; and wanted to play more music then be a hall monitor for freestuff, hee hee hee.
Hope you don't mind but I made a .tif of your
combined label textures that only needs loading into the diffuse and opacity channels with no other clicks or tweaks needed. I find .tif the very best most times for textures. I've attached a .rar of the file.Bugger...worked when I previewed it and now I try a render and it blows up...try if you like but your way if a bit more cumbersome, does work
Quote from: Kadri on December 19, 2014, 06:11:32 PM
... But you can overcome the problem with the polygons edges looking distinctive
if you uncheck the "GI surface details" in the "Render GI settings" that is in the "Quality" tab in the Render node.
Not sure if this is a problem only with this object or a general problem.
I remember that there was such a problem earlier too.
Thanks. I tried switching the Render GI settings off, and the polygons do not show. There are still some polygonish edges on the edge of the sunlit area on the rounded bow front.
I suspect that the triangular effect on the front of the deck is at least partly, shadows of the fore upper hydroplane.
The horizontal mark below the bow label is the sub's port fore hydroplane, not a rendering fault :: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Diving_plane (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Diving_plane)
What are GI settings? The Wiki-type help says nothing about them.
It would help if Terragen did not take up so much time rendering background which is then hidden behind the sub.
It would be useful if Terragen could output images in .jpg mode.
Did a little render whilst I slept and to me it renders quite well...given I'm not zooming in for a close up. .2 Detail 2 AA, GI Detail 2, GI sample quality 2.
As a general rule of thumb,if there are stepped shadows,
like on the spherical front part,then you need more polygons.
No smoothing angle will help.
Quote from: bobbystahr on December 20, 2014, 10:52:10 AM
Did a little render whilst I slept and to me it renders quite well...given I'm not zooming in for a close up. .2 Detail 2 AA, GI Detail 2, GI sample quality 2.
Thanks. How did you make the sub's wake on the water?
It would be useful if Terragen had some Poser-type ability to articulate some parts, e.g. to move the hydroplanes and spin the propeller and unfold the grab-arm.
Quote from: Anthony Appleyard on December 20, 2014, 11:20:47 AM
Quote from: bobbystahr on December 20, 2014, 10:52:10 AM
Did a little render whilst I slept and to me it renders quite well...given I'm not zooming in for a close up. .2 Detail 2 AA, GI Detail 2, GI sample quality 2.
Thanks. How did you make the sub's wake on the water?
It would be useful if Terragen had some Poser-type ability to articulate some parts, e.g. to move the hydroplanes and spin the propeller and unfold the grab-arm.
I used a wake object downloaded from Renderosity I believe. click thru the pages till tou come to 193-216 of 239
http://www.renderosity.com/mod/freestuff/?search=spacebones&expression=artist_name
Had a look at your model and here is what I noticed.
The model has some n-gons (polygon with more than 4 edges).
Terragen doesn't like n-gons and you'll have holes there.
(the guns parts have them and two parts at the door opening.
The whole geometry of that model is totally outdated and you
should really learn more about modelling.
Sorry,if that sounds harsh,but you won't have much success with
a model like that outside of Poser or similar apps.
> The model has some n-gons (polygon with more than 4 edges).
> Terragen doesn't like n-gons and you'll have holes there.
> (the guns parts have them and two parts at the door opening.
Thanks for telling me. I wrote a mesh editing program, and it can find and cure n-gons.
> The whole geometry of that model is totally outdated and you should really learn more about modelling.
Please, what in detail is wrong with it, apart from the n-gons?
> Sorry, if that sounds harsh, but you won't have much success with a model like that outside of Poser or similar apps.
Sorry. Most of my CGI work has been with Poser. I have been using Poser since Poser 3 was the latest version. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Poser (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Poser)
When I used the old Terragen around 2003, I used Terragen to make backgrounds to use in Poser scenes. Terragen back then did not use a planet but a smallish flat square area of land. For underwater scenes I set the atmosphere to a thick cyan haze and I set the Terragen water to sand-colored to represent seabed sand at the bottom of the rocks.
Quote from: Anthony Appleyard on December 20, 2014, 04:55:25 PM
For underwater scenes I set the atmosphere to a thick cyan haze and I set the Terragen water to sand-colored to represent seabed sand at the bottom of the rocks.
y
you can do this in TG 2 3 the same way...look up my Shark Scene in the search....works very well, and better, visible light rays add to the effect which TG Classic couldn't do.
Just make your terrain sand and rocks, maybe populate some seaweed and add a cloud, left licking in the middle of your scene and copying the coords which you then paste into the coords area of the cloud and click Local. Adjust the height and thickness as well as cloud colour till you have water. easy peasy.
Quote from: Anthony Appleyard on December 20, 2014, 11:20:47 AM
...
It would be useful if Terragen had some Poser-type ability to articulate some parts, e.g. to move the hydroplanes and spin the propeller and unfold the grab-arm.
It wouldn't be easy but if you import such parts as separate objects you can animate them in Terragen.
But there is no grouping and parenting and such in Terragen. So you have to do it all manually.
Kind of an easier way would be an objects sequence.
Quote from: Anthony Appleyard on December 20, 2014, 04:55:25 PM
For underwater scenes I set the atmosphere to a thick cyan haze and I set the Terragen water to sand-colored to represent seabed sand at the bottom of the rocks.
Quote from: bobbystahr on December 20, 2014, 06:43:36 PM
you can do this in TG 2 3 the same way...look up my Shark Scene in the search....works very well, and better, visible light rays add to the effect which TG Classic couldn't do.
Just make your terrain sand and rocks, maybe populate some seaweed and add a cloud, left licking in the middle of your scene and copying the coords which you then paste into the coords area of the cloud and click Local. Adjust the height and thickness as well as cloud colour till you have water. easy peasy.
Dune made an underwater scene for me, and in it the sea surface overhead is a second planet-type water sphere with no shadowing surrounding the planet and its radius is negative so the top of the water is inside.
Quote from: Anthony Appleyard on December 20, 2014, 04:55:25 PM
.....
> The whole geometry of that model is totally outdated and you should really learn more about modelling.
Please, what in detail is wrong with it, apart from the n-gons?
.......
I think you'll understand that I can't go into every detail.This is not the place
for a modeling tut.And it would be quite a task to put into a few sentences
what took me years to find out.
But some hints and tips should be ok.
Avoid cube or brick like structures with only one polygon per side.
Define rims like on the propeller better.Things like that.
Model with your target software in mind.
Try to find out about the obj export of your modeler.
Does it export creased edges,for example? Not every modeler is
capable to write that into the obj file.
What kinds of parameters get over to your target application (TG)?
There are tons of tuts out there,try to catch up on box modeling
techniques.Grant Warwick has a few on general things,but you
need some experience in modeling to make good use of them.
Experiment a lot! Experience is your best asset.