3d mesh as terrain

Started by ndeewolfwood, February 08, 2011, 09:33:25 AM

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ndeewolfwood

hi guys,
is it possible to create a terrain from a 3d mesh ?

I need for a project to create a island from a specific 3d mesh with concave shape. I can't convert it to heighmap and i need to do standard shading and population on it.

thanks for your help.  

cyphyr

You can a mesh as a terrain but you will not be able to add populations  (trees, grass etc) or perform Terragens displacements on the mesh (slight bump map is probably as far as you could reasonable go). Textures and image shaders should work fine.

However do take a look round the forum, there are quite a few examples of successful implementations of terragen to make abnormal environments. What exactly are you trying to achieve?

:)

Richard
www.richardfraservfx.com
https://www.facebook.com/RichardFraserVFX/
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Ryzen 9 5950X OC@4Ghz, 64Gb (TG4 benchmark 4:13)

ndeewolfwood

thanks for reply.

i want to import a 3D text mesh and work on it as it was a regular terrain.

It's a stupid example but think to the floating island in Avatar with a font shape. So  : population is not an option for me.

Maybe with an image map shader ? I perfectly see how to do it on the XZ axis but i cant figure it out for the ZY or XY axis.

Avatar island is definitly not good example because i can have a contact with my ground. But only with my font bottom. In this case i will just cut the ground in compositing.

Any idea ? Is it clear to you (sorry for my crappy english) ? 



 


Henry Blewer

Export a height field using the lightwave exporter. You can then use the height field to create an image mask. The image mask can remove the unwanted terrain in Terragen 2.
The exported mesh from Terragen 2 can be used in a different 3D program. You'll need to rematch the mesh with the hieghtfield in Terragen 2. The original heightfield can be used to populate the top of the Floating island. The image mask should make it possible to have the island look detached from the world.
You should probably use an image map sequence for the background, instead of rendering the atmosphere with the heightfield.

This may or may not work. The idea just popped into my head reading the thread.
http://flickr.com/photos/njeneb/
Forget Tuesday; It's just Monday spelled with a T

ndeewolfwood

i've already try a similar way to do. But it it's doesn't work because i'cant get a good mapping of my image map shader on the xy axis (even with a compute normal). I've try with a camera mapping to but it does't work too.
Can't we get a good projection on a complete vertical terrain ?

anyway thanks for help njeneb.

anybody have an other idea ?

airflamesred

I'm working on this kind of thing myself so I'll let you know if I get any startling revelations. I think this really depends on the scale of things i.e how many trees do you want on your terrain font? Is it level- do you need to take planetary curvature into account?

For me, the workflow means modeling all or part of the scene (setting up a similar pov etc) within the modeler then exporting the meshes and mat data. So putting your trees etc in via that route maybe an option. You don't quite get all the advantages of TG with this method i.e bump rather than displacement but that may work ,as I say depending on the scale of things.

I'm new to TG so still haven't got much of a clue when putting nodes together but I can't resist render.
In fact thats gonna be my catchphrase 'Terragen - You can't resist the render'!

Sorry I've rambled

ndeewolfwood

you right but like i said : population is not an option for me.
Putting tree by hand can do the trick but i need to do this fully procedural because i need to create many pictures.


Oshyan

Do you have any image examples of the kind of scene or terrain you're trying to create? I'm not really understanding exactly what your goal is so it's hard to say how you might achieve it better. But, as others have said, geometry can't currently be treated like terrain, unfortunately.

- Oshyan

ndeewolfwood

sure...
i've started an asset with Houdini. But definitly it will be easyer to me to get a descent surfacing and lighting in TG2. If it's impossible to do this il will continue my houdini setup.
anyway there's one picture out from my asset :


what did you think Oshyan : anyway to do this on tg2 ?

Oshyan

At the moment I can't think of a terribly easy way to do this in TG2 yet. You can do displacement on a horizontal plane as one idea, but you can't do populations on that anyway so that's out. As you know, you can't populate on objects yet, so that wouldn't work either. It really looks like you're doing ok with Houdini at this point so I have to recommend continuing down that path, though I wish TG2 could meet your current needs.

- Oshyan

airflamesred


ndeewolfwood

thanks for you're time Oshyan.
QuoteAs you know, you can't populate on objects yet
I like the "yet" at the end. Sound like a future kiss-ass feature.
QuoteI have to recommend continuing down that path
yes, but houdini shading-surfacing is a pain in the ass to me  to get something cool as terragen (for landscape purpose)...need to work on that a lot to get something really cool.

anyway thanks again.
 
QuoteLooks great
thx airflamesred








 

cyphyr

#12
You can populate on a horizontal plane, that's how my floating rock "Avatar" images were made. demo scene here .(hmm must post thoes some time ...)
The issue here would be that the plane would need too be vertical and displaced horizontally.
:)
Richard
www.richardfraservfx.com
https://www.facebook.com/RichardFraserVFX/
/|\

Ryzen 9 5950X OC@4Ghz, 64Gb (TG4 benchmark 4:13)

Oshyan

Yes, I meant vertical plane. ;D

- Oshyan

j meyer

How about using the exported object and some horizontal planes
in the appropriate places.A bit of displacement a la ringworld for
the right curvature and visibility unchecked.
Just a thought.