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General => Terragen Discussion => Topic started by: kevnar on March 27, 2009, 12:43:28 PM

Title: To abort or not to abort
Post by: kevnar on March 27, 2009, 12:43:28 PM
I started a full render before going to bed last night. When I woke up this morning it looked to be about a third done. Trouble is, it looks all stippled, sort of like it was painted by an impressionist painter. Is this just part of the rendering process, or did I screw up an setting somewhere? I don't want to wait another 20 hours to find out.  :-\
Title: Re: To abort or not to abort
Post by: neuspadrin on March 27, 2009, 12:50:57 PM
is that the render after gi pass, or what it looks like during gi pass (with a super high detail/gi level etc).

Because with high values of those the gi dots are very close and sometimes look like a painting so to speak.

however, and more likely, otherwise it looks like your atmosphere/clouds dont have enough samples.
Title: Re: To abort or not to abort
Post by: cyphyr on March 27, 2009, 01:01:15 PM
Agree with neuspadrin :)
Check what your detail level is, it shouldn't ever need to go above 1 and mostly a setting of 0.8 will be just fine.
Richard
Title: Re: To abort or not to abort
Post by: kevnar on March 27, 2009, 01:01:47 PM
I set the GI sliders all the way up. I wasn't sure what they do, but I was going for maximum quality. Maybe I over-did it.

I didn't adjust anything with the cloud samples. Should I have?
Title: Re: To abort or not to abort
Post by: neuspadrin on March 27, 2009, 01:07:36 PM
a definate yes.  atmosphere and cloud samples from details in their own should also be upped before a final render
Title: Re: To abort or not to abort
Post by: cyphyr on March 27, 2009, 01:07:52 PM
Set your GI sliders to 1 or 2, that should be sufficient, also check your cloud samples, rarely should you need to go above 512, usually 256 is enough and the atmosphere needn't go above 64 (16 will produce noise!)
richard
Title: Re: To abort or not to abort
Post by: kevnar on March 27, 2009, 01:25:46 PM
Alright. I'm gonna abort and restart with the new settings.

But could someone gimmie a quick run-down on what the GI sliders do? For future reference.
Title: Re: To abort or not to abort
Post by: kevnar on March 27, 2009, 01:34:35 PM
Restarted with the recommended settings. Thanks, guys.

I'll post the final in a couple of days (or however long it takes to finish). Wish me luck.
Title: Re: To abort or not to abort
Post by: neuspadrin on March 27, 2009, 01:47:44 PM
Here's a good post with links to various other posts covering GI and the settings.

http://forums.planetside.co.uk/index.php?topic=5452.0
Title: Re: To abort or not to abort
Post by: Mohawk20 on March 27, 2009, 03:32:16 PM
Basically, GI makes the light in your scene more realistic, by making the shadows not pitch-black...
Title: Re: To abort or not to abort
Post by: cyphyr on March 27, 2009, 04:32:03 PM
On an allied topic, can someone confirm that a higher GI blur radius will effectively negate higher GI Sample Quality and/or GI Relative Detail?
Thanks
richard
Title: Re: To abort or not to abort
Post by: rcallicotte on March 27, 2009, 07:16:35 PM
@cyphyr - I can only confirm that upping the GI Blur Radius helps with jitter when doing animations.
Title: Re: To abort or not to abort
Post by: kevnar on March 28, 2009, 11:58:41 AM
Well, here it is. My first real render in TG2. It took about 4 hours to build and 18 hours to render. It's based on Seth's Wilderness tutorial, with a few tweaks here and there.

Any pointers on making it look more real and less CG?

Title: Re: To abort or not to abort
Post by: Mohawk20 on March 28, 2009, 12:16:56 PM
Scale!
Either increase the size of the trees, or decrease the size of the stones.

Or you could decrease the amount of big boulders and add a small scale displacement on the boulders...
Title: Re: To abort or not to abort
Post by: neuspadrin on March 28, 2009, 12:47:12 PM
i agree with mohawk.  some displacement on the boulders would help them feel realistic and not smooth, also too many big boulders are unrealistic as he said.  1-3 really big ones might feel better surrounded by smaller ones, or just decrease size on all of them.
Title: Re: To abort or not to abort
Post by: kevnar on March 28, 2009, 12:56:53 PM
I actually like the boulders. I've been to a place that looks just like that. They just look sort of artificial. I guess it can't be helped. :-\
Title: Re: To abort or not to abort
Post by: Oshyan on March 30, 2009, 03:24:56 PM
I'd add some child layers or just additional surface layers to your ground and your rock textures as well. Make them slightly different variations of the color of the other layers. In reality all surfaces are multi-colored to some degree. You might even add some totally different colors with low coverage, like brown for dirt, or beige/light brown for some drier grass.

- Oshyan
Title: Re: To abort or not to abort
Post by: chromecity on March 30, 2009, 03:39:26 PM
Yeah, as others said, some displacement would really make those rocks look like rocks.  And that sort of tree variety doesn't seem like the sort you would see growing at the waters edge - or even growing among scattered boulders.  But that could be just my impression.