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Support => Terragen Support => Topic started by: choronr on February 17, 2009, 01:38:48 PM

Title: Artifacts- Atmo appears through terrain
Post by: choronr on February 17, 2009, 01:38:48 PM
While rendering a new scene, I see two artifacts where it appears that the atmosphere is showing through the terrain. I've attached the file for your information. Would appreciate any thoughts you may have. Thanks.
Title: Re: Artifacts- Atmo appears through terrain
Post by: Tangled-Universe on February 17, 2009, 02:46:52 PM
When I render a crop of the horizon I don't see any problems with atmosphere showing through terrain.
Is it on other areas?
Perhaps you could show a screencapture of the problem? Would save me a lot of time :)

In general when the atmo is showing through the terrain it helps to enable raytracing in the atmosphere node. I see you haven't enabled that, so that might help.
But, be sure of this, since it will at least double your rendertime, if not triple.

Martin
Title: Re: Artifacts- Atmo appears through terrain
Post by: PG on February 17, 2009, 03:01:55 PM
Just adding to what Martin said, checking do reverse primary rays seems to do the trick as well with an apparent smaller performance hit.
Title: Re: Artifacts- Atmo appears through terrain
Post by: choronr on February 17, 2009, 03:08:44 PM
Thanks T-U and PG. I had just run into a monitor issue (not related to the problem). As soon as I can fix it, I'll get back here with the image.
Title: Re: Artifacts- Atmo appears through terrain
Post by: Tangled-Universe on February 17, 2009, 03:34:58 PM
Quote from: PG on February 17, 2009, 03:01:55 PM
Just adding to what Martin said, checking do reverse primary rays seems to do the trick as well with an apparent smaller performance hit.

You mean it helped in this case? I find it difficult to believe/understand.
This is what's known so far about the "do reverse primary rays":

http://forums.planetside.co.uk/index.php?topic=5092.msg52714#msg52714 (http://forums.planetside.co.uk/index.php?topic=5092.msg52714#msg52714)

Could be that things are being traced differently, hence 'reverse', but it remains still unclear.

Martin
Title: Re: Artifacts- Atmo appears through terrain
Post by: choronr on February 17, 2009, 03:38:06 PM
Here is the .jpg of the image. Note the 'white' artifacts in the upper terrain - both to the right and the left.
Title: Re: Artifacts- Atmo appears through terrain
Post by: Tangled-Universe on February 17, 2009, 03:39:48 PM
Quote from: choronr on February 17, 2009, 03:38:06 PM
Here is the .jpg of the image. Note the 'white' artifacts in the upper terrain - both to the right and the left.

Haha, ok...I had the cloudlayer switched off for speed-reasons ;D
I'll take a look at it again :)
Title: Re: Artifacts- Atmo appears through terrain
Post by: Tangled-Universe on February 17, 2009, 04:14:37 PM
I also noticed you have detail blending set @ 1.25...for still images detail blending is hardly necessary, though it is very important for animation.
If you set it to 0 it won't affect the result very little and it will render a lot faster :)
Title: Re: Artifacts- Atmo appears through terrain
Post by: choronr on February 17, 2009, 04:15:57 PM
Thanks T-U, I'll give it a try and get back to you.
Title: Re: Artifacts- Atmo appears through terrain
Post by: Tangled-Universe on February 17, 2009, 04:21:35 PM
Ok, I reproduced the artifact.

1) reverse primary rays resulted in a black sky (as reported by other users). The clouds pinching through the terrain are replaced by black pixels, looking like gaps in the displacements.

2) raytraced shadows in the atmosphere node didn't help either (interesting!!)

Will get back to you if I know more...
Title: Re: Artifacts- Atmo appears through terrain
Post by: choronr on February 17, 2009, 04:29:52 PM
Ok T-U, now crop rendering on your previous suggestion...
Title: Re: Artifacts- Atmo appears through terrain
Post by: choronr on February 17, 2009, 04:31:25 PM
Quote from: Tangled-Universe on February 17, 2009, 04:14:37 PM
I also noticed you have detail blending set @ 1.25...for still images detail blending is hardly necessary, though it is very important for animation.
If you set it to 0 it won't affect the result very little and it will render a lot faster :)
Set detailed blending to 0 and still get the artifacts.
Title: Re: Artifacts- Atmo appears through terrain
Post by: Tangled-Universe on February 17, 2009, 04:37:40 PM
It was not meant as a suggestion for solving your problem, but as a suggestion in general for rendering :)
Setting up the renderer this way makes your rendertimes unnecessary long, think this setting will save you in this case at least 50% of the time.
Also, I saw you have a compute terrain, then base colours and then a compute normal which isn't needed at all. Remove it, and save even more rendertime :)

I just used the setting "raytrace everything" and that works, but the terrain looks really messed up now.
I think this is a bug we're dealing with. First the clouds sticking through and secondly the odd results using raytracing on everything.

Martin
Title: Re: Artifacts- Atmo appears through terrain
Post by: choronr on February 17, 2009, 04:43:40 PM
Well that is a good observation if in fact it is a bug. I will have to go into PS or Paint.net and fix the image for later posting. Would appreciate hearing from you or Oshyan on your findings ...thanks again Martin.
Title: Re: Artifacts- Atmo appears through terrain
Post by: Tangled-Universe on February 17, 2009, 04:55:08 PM
Could you also check if enabling "raytrace everything" works for getting rid of the clouds, but results in a messed up terrrain?
Title: Re: Artifacts- Atmo appears through terrain
Post by: choronr on February 17, 2009, 05:23:21 PM
Quote from: Tangled-Universe on February 17, 2009, 04:55:08 PM
Could you also check if enabling "raytrace everything" works for getting rid of the clouds, but results in a messed up terrrain?
I will check it out. I hope it don't 'mess up' the terrain as you mentioned.
Title: Re: Artifacts- Atmo appears through terrain
Post by: Tangled-Universe on February 17, 2009, 05:26:42 PM
It probably does, just want to check if this is not specific for my machine or version of TG I use.
Title: Re: Artifacts- Atmo appears through terrain
Post by: Cyber-Angel on February 17, 2009, 05:36:40 PM
In the current Beta [Can Some one else confirm this, please] there seems to be instances of micro [and larger scale] holes appearing in the terrain with certain displacement values. In addition there arises, on occasion, to be ripping of the terrain to the extent that you can see the underside of the terrain. ;D

Regards to you.

Cyber-Angel
 
Title: Re: Artifacts- Atmo appears through terrain
Post by: Mohawk20 on February 17, 2009, 05:52:59 PM
This doesn't seem to be a ray-trace issue. In both cases the bottom of the artifacts is cut of in a straight line, presumably the artifacts only appear in two single render buckets, which would indicate a displacement cut-off issue discussed in several other places on these forums.
Still strange, and should be looked into by planetside.
Title: Re: Artifacts- Atmo appears through terrain
Post by: choronr on February 17, 2009, 06:07:08 PM
Quote from: Tangled-Universe on February 17, 2009, 05:26:42 PM
It probably does, just want to check if this is not specific for my machine or version of TG I use.
Checked all the ray tracing; and, the cropped render indicates that now, it is even worse. Apparently this is not the fix.

Thank you C-A and Mohawk for your input. I'll be watching and trying the latest suggestions.
Title: Re: Artifacts- Atmo appears through terrain
Post by: Tangled-Universe on February 17, 2009, 06:46:13 PM
Quote from: choronr on February 17, 2009, 06:07:08 PM
Quote from: Tangled-Universe on February 17, 2009, 05:26:42 PM
It probably does, just want to check if this is not specific for my machine or version of TG I use.
Checked all the ray tracing; and, the cropped render indicates that now, it is even worse. Apparently this is not the fix.

Thank you C-A and Mohawk for your input. I'll be watching and trying the latest suggestions.

I didn't say it would be the fix ;) On a contrary, like we saw both it makes it even worse.

Like Mohawk I also tend to think it is not a raytrace problem.
It could indeed be the "displacement-cutoff" problem now often reported and maybe it also has to do with a problem I had some time ago:
http://forums.planetside.co.uk/index.php?topic=3991.msg41710#msg41710 (http://forums.planetside.co.uk/index.php?topic=3991.msg41710#msg41710)

Quote from: Mohawk20 on February 17, 2009, 05:52:59 PM
...presumably the artifacts only appear in two single render buckets, which would indicate a displacement cut-off issue discussed in several other places on these forums.
Still strange, and should be looked into by planetside.

The problem occurs also when you increase the AA. The AA-setting determines the size of the renderbuckets (high AA = small renderbuckets). So if the problem area is split into more renderbuckets, by increasing AA, the problem is still there.
I'm not THAT familiar with the displacement-cutoff problem, but if that occurs only in single renderbuckets then the problem could be something else.

Anyway, they indeed should take a look at it :) Already reported it.

Martin
Title: Re: Artifacts- Atmo appears through terrain
Post by: choronr on February 17, 2009, 07:14:02 PM
Thanks a bunch Martin. I will reduce the AA and see what happens. You are up extra late tonight aren't you?
Title: Re: Artifacts- Atmo appears through terrain
Post by: choronr on February 17, 2009, 07:55:36 PM
Reduced AA from 14 to 6; and, the problem still exists.
Title: Re: Artifacts- Atmo appears through terrain
Post by: buzzzzz1 on February 17, 2009, 08:31:27 PM
Hi Bob,

Have you tried doing a small crop of the problem areas only? Or is that what you have been doing? If the small areas render complete, then you could layer them in with photoshop.  Or this might sound silly but, try moving the camera just a hair and setting it. I have had this problem in the past and it worked.  BTW, that scene is really nice, in my opinion your best thus far. 
Title: Re: Artifacts- Atmo appears through terrain
Post by: RArcher on February 17, 2009, 08:58:10 PM
I get this same sort of problem fairly often when working with some displacements.  Have never really found a good solution besides the clone brush in a post-pro program after the fact.
Title: Re: Artifacts- Atmo appears through terrain
Post by: choronr on February 17, 2009, 09:28:57 PM
Quote from: buzzzzz1 on February 17, 2009, 08:31:27 PM
Hi Bob,

Have you tried doing a small crop of the problem areas only? Or is that what you have been doing? If the small areas render complete, then you could layer them in with photoshop.  Or this might sound silly but, try moving the camera just a hair and setting it. I have had this problem in the past and it worked.  BTW, that scene is really nice, in my opinion your best thus far. 
Hi Jay,

Yes, I've done the small cropped sections to no avail. I did some clone stamping in PS to fix the image; and, it looks pretty good. However, I would have tried your camera moving suggestion; but, did the PS thing before I got your message - good idea though. Trouble is, with a meta camera in for the clouds, it probably would have changed the clouds as well (with my luck, probably not for the better).

Thanks for your encouragement. I used the 'Bright Angel' terrain you once sent to me and made some changes like adding strata and displacements. This terrain has lots of possibilities.

Hopefully, Matt, Oshyan or somebody else will find a fix for this problem. Looks like they're getting close to the final version.
Title: Re: Artifacts- Atmo appears through terrain
Post by: choronr on February 17, 2009, 09:31:34 PM
Quote from: RArcher on February 17, 2009, 08:58:10 PM
I get this same sort of problem fairly often when working with some displacements.  Have never really found a good solution besides the clone brush in a post-pro program after the fact.
Thanks RArcher for visiting. Yes, Photoshop or Paint.net seems to be the only way of recovering from this issue. Hope the guys find the fix.
Title: Re: Artifacts- Atmo appears through terrain
Post by: Oshyan on February 18, 2009, 12:20:24 AM
That really looks like a displacement cut-off issue. Does this occur in the same places if you change the render resolution (either larger or smaller)? I'll see if development can take a look at it for any additional information.

- Oshyan
Title: Re: Artifacts- Atmo appears through terrain
Post by: choronr on February 18, 2009, 01:57:06 AM
Quote from: Oshyan on February 18, 2009, 12:20:24 AM
That really looks like a displacement cut-off issue. Does this occur in the same places if you change the render resolution (either larger or smaller)? I'll see if development can take a look at it for any additional information.

- Oshyan
Thanks Oshyan for having a look at this issue. I haven't tried a change in resolution. I'll increase the image size from 1280 x 960 to something a little larger and do a cropped render of one of the problem areas to see what happens. I'll get back to you on this.

Bob
Title: Re: Artifacts- Atmo appears through terrain
Post by: choronr on February 18, 2009, 02:34:05 AM
Quote from: Oshyan on February 18, 2009, 12:20:24 AM
That really looks like a displacement cut-off issue. Does this occur in the same places if you change the render resolution (either larger or smaller)? I'll see if development can take a look at it for any additional information.

- Oshyan
Hi Oshyan,

I increased the 1280 x 960 to 1792 x 1344 and the problem still exists. Then, I crop rendered to 768 x 576 and all appeared ok with no artifact. Your suggestion worked!

Any further information on this would be appreciated ...thanks again.

Bob
Title: Re: Artifacts- Atmo appears through terrain
Post by: Tangled-Universe on February 18, 2009, 02:50:38 AM
Quote from: choronr on February 17, 2009, 07:55:36 PM
Reduced AA from 14 to 6; and, the problem still exists.

Again I wasn't saying this would help :) lol...it seems you were very eager to solve this :P
I was thinking out loud how the software works/behaves.

Glad to see resolution-reduction seemed to help, though it makes me wonder why.
Think it must have to do with renderbucket-size related to the resolution (and maybe AA as well).
Never mind, just think out loud again :)
Title: Re: Artifacts- Atmo appears through terrain
Post by: Oshyan on February 18, 2009, 02:57:35 AM
Quote from: Tangled-Universe on February 18, 2009, 02:50:38 AM
Quote from: choronr on February 17, 2009, 07:55:36 PM
Reduced AA from 14 to 6; and, the problem still exists.

Again I wasn't saying this would help :) lol...it seems you were very eager to solve this :P
I was thinking out loud how the software works/behaves.

Glad to see resolution-reduction seemed to help, though it makes me wonder why.
Think it must have to do with renderbucket-size related to the resolution (and maybe AA as well).
Never mind, just think out loud again :)
That's my thinking exactly - changing the resolution moved the render bucket borders. The problem may still exist though, it might just occur in a different place.

Bob, are you using a lot of displacement here?

- Oshyan
Title: Re: Artifacts- Atmo appears through terrain
Post by: choronr on February 18, 2009, 01:42:01 PM
Quote from: Oshyan on February 18, 2009, 02:57:35 AM
Quote from: Tangled-Universe on February 18, 2009, 02:50:38 AM
Quote from: choronr on February 17, 2009, 07:55:36 PM
Reduced AA from 14 to 6; and, the problem still exists.

Again I wasn't saying this would help :) lol...it seems you were very eager to solve this :P
I was thinking out loud how the software works/behaves.

Glad to see resolution-reduction seemed to help, though it makes me wonder why.
Think it must have to do with renderbucket-size related to the resolution (and maybe AA as well).
Never mind, just think out loud again :)
Hi Oshyan,

Yes, I've used minimal displacements on base colors and four surface layers. You can see these in the .tgd file. The terrain includes strata/outcrops as well.

Bob
That's my thinking exactly - changing the resolution moved the render bucket borders. The problem may still exist though, it might just occur in a different place.

Bob, are you using a lot of displacement here?

- Oshyan
Title: Re: Artifacts- Atmo appears through terrain
Post by: Cyber-Angel on February 18, 2009, 05:36:52 PM
If you use the magnification tool built into TG2 you will find that these artifacts and small [and some larger] holes in the terrain, it should be noted that as far as I know the issue did not exist in the version of TG2 we had at the time of the release of build 1.10.23.1 which is the beta we have today. Why this happens I have not been able to determine, but has others have noted it dose seem to be related to some kind of displacement issue. I hope these few words help track down the route cause of the issue.  ;D

Regards to you.

Cyber-Angel       
Title: Re: Artifacts- Atmo appears through terrain
Post by: choronr on February 18, 2009, 06:08:35 PM
Quote from: Cyber-Angel on February 18, 2009, 05:36:52 PM
If you you the magnification tool built into TG2 you will find that these artifacts and small [and some larger] holes in the terrain, it should be noted that as far as I know the issue did not exist in the version of TG2 we had at the time of the release of build 1.10.23.1 which is the beta we have today. Why this happens I have not been able to determine, but has others have noted it dose seem to be related to some kind of displacement issue. I hope these few words help track down the route cause of the issue.  ;D

Regards to you.

Cyber-Angel       
Thanks C-A, I'll be looking for another POV on the terrain and using the same settings. Through some earlier suggestions by T-U, I'll be making some adjustments to see whether or not I run into the same problem.

Bob
Title: Re: Artifacts- Atmo appears through terrain
Post by: Matt on February 20, 2009, 03:42:52 AM
I'm investigating this now.

Matt
Title: Re: Artifacts- Atmo appears through terrain
Post by: RArcher on February 20, 2009, 11:10:05 AM
If you need additional files where this tearing of the displacement happens let me know and I can provide a few.
Title: Re: Artifacts- Atmo appears through terrain
Post by: choronr on February 20, 2009, 11:18:13 AM
Quote from: RArcher on February 20, 2009, 11:10:05 AM
If you need additional files where this tearing of the displacement happens let me know and I can provide a few.
Thanks RA, I might be needing them in a few days.
Title: Re: Artifacts- Atmo appears through terrain
Post by: choronr on February 20, 2009, 11:18:57 AM
Quote from: Matt on February 20, 2009, 03:42:52 AM
I'm investigating this now.

Matt

Thanks Matt; hope you find something on this.

Bob
Title: @ Matt: Artifacts-problems already solved?
Post by: Tangled-Universe on March 08, 2009, 09:00:37 AM
Hi Matt,

Did you already have time to investigate this?
I'm having serious problems rendering a scene because of these artifacts as you can see in the image below.
Tried many different resolutions and rendersettings, but can't get rid of them.
If you'd like I can send you the .tgd.

Thanks in advance,

Martin
Title: Re: Artifacts- Atmo appears through terrain
Post by: Mohawk20 on March 08, 2009, 06:03:12 PM
I'd say your displacements are way to large to handle...
Title: Re: Artifacts- Atmo appears through terrain
Post by: Oshyan on March 09, 2009, 04:11:03 AM
Nice rock formations! We're currently investigating these displacement rendering issues. I do think it may be helpful to send your TGD in. You can use the support address, support AT planetside.co.uk

- Oshyan
Title: Re: Artifacts- Atmo appears through terrain
Post by: Tangled-Universe on March 09, 2009, 07:05:59 AM
Quote from: Oshyan on March 09, 2009, 04:11:03 AM
Nice rock formations! We're currently investigating these displacement rendering issues. I do think it may be helpful to send your TGD in. You can use the support address, support AT planetside.co.uk

- Oshyan

Thanks for your response oshyan.
Yesterday I spent about 5 hours solving this, from which 2 together with FrankB. We were unable to resolve the responsible nodes.
Therefore I sent an email to Matt himself. However, next time I will send it to the appropriate address.

Martin
Title: Re: Artifacts- Atmo appears through terrain
Post by: Oshyan on March 10, 2009, 12:33:02 AM
Quote from: Tangled-Universe on March 09, 2009, 07:05:59 AM
Quote from: Oshyan on March 09, 2009, 04:11:03 AM
Nice rock formations! We're currently investigating these displacement rendering issues. I do think it may be helpful to send your TGD in. You can use the support address, support AT planetside.co.uk

- Oshyan

Thanks for your response oshyan.
Yesterday I spent about 5 hours solving this, from which 2 together with FrankB. We were unable to resolve the responsible nodes.
Therefore I sent an email to Matt himself. However, next time I will send it to the appropriate address.

Martin

That's fine, he is the one working directly on it anyway. :)

- Oshyan
Title: Re: Artifacts- Atmo appears through terrain
Post by: rcallicotte on March 10, 2009, 08:50:41 AM
TU, thanks for doing this.  I'm assuming you have been working on the package for Frank's site.  Whether yes or no, your work will benefit us all.  Thank you.
Title: Re: Artifacts- Atmo appears through terrain
Post by: Tangled-Universe on March 10, 2009, 10:45:09 AM
Quote from: calico on March 10, 2009, 08:50:41 AM
TU, thanks for doing this.  I'm assuming you have been working on the package for Frank's site.  Whether yes or no, your work will benefity us all.  Thank you.

How did you guess?  ::)