Zoom Test (http://vimeo.com/2819931)
Apologies, this was rendered at 320 x 240 but the play back module is 400 x 300 so there is a little blurring.
A test of zooming in to a planet with the coast line detailed with the painter shader. Unfortunately although this is good for static scenes it looks to be un-reliable in an animation. As you can see in the "estuary" area you the small islands and creeks flicker in and out. I'm not too sure about the painter shaders uses but I've detailed the work flow below.
Firstly I created a large scale (continents and islands) black and white 1:2 ratio map in photoshop.
This is then manipulated to make it a spherical projection map (I'll link a tut if requested)
In terragen the map is used as a blend shader masking off a Terrain PF.
This image shader is it self masked by a Painter shader in the blend channel to give extra detail (projection = 3D).
I wonder if this is a "related" issue to the shadow clipping in some way. Maybe Terragen is "optimizing" the painter shader on each frame and hence making a slightly different version of the painter shaders output each time.
Well it almost works :) ......
Unfortunately I cant get an image map large enough to make a convincing detailed coast line so using the painter shader seemed like a good idea.
Shame, I had hoped to be able to use this technique to paint on different terrains on a planetary scale, rolling hills here, alps there, savanna over there, dunes beyond etc.
Comments very welcome.
Richard
At what detail level did you render?
It might be that if you render this at higher resolution with higher detail the 'flickering' will be less. It could be the results of some kind of detail filter...
Yes I thought it might be that but sadly no, I re-rendered frames where a flicker happens and its still there, same place, same frame nos, just more detailed.
Thanks for the suggestion though.
I'm having more luck using a procedural approach to detailing, still a large scale image map for the continents but a masked power frac for the coast.
Richard
Might be an issue with clipping determination accuracy. I'll see if Matt has any comment.
- Oshyan
Have you set detail blending? That setting used to be at 1 by default, which is good for animations, but now defaults to 0 because it is less important for stills.
Matt
Hi Matt
I made another test run using the "Detail blending" option as you suggested. Much better and definitely smoother. Although you can see some areas changing shape (albeit smoothly this time) as the camera moves in.
Link to test zoom 2 (http://vimeo.com/2848956)
Cheers
Richard
It looks better this time and I'm wondering if the changes are just like in real life - details gather as you zoom in.