No easy way to export a ter file?

Started by pokoy, November 08, 2012, 06:34:15 AM

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pokoy

I'm looking for an easy way to export a ter file of a terrain in order to load it in World Machine. It's funny that many applications export a ter file which can easily be imported in Terragen, but I'm seeing no way to export it out of Terragen.

The last time I needed to get height data into WM, I exported lwo files, merged them and converted to obj in another app, imported that obj in 3ds max and then rendered out a height map. All these steps could have been avoided if I had a way to export the terrain directly.

Alternatively, is there a way to easily render a height map of a terrain with exactly defined coordinates in Terragen and save that out as a 16bit tif?

Thanks for any suggestions!

pokoy

OK, just found the 'save file as...' option in the right-click menu. Wonder why I haven't seen this yesterday...

Oshyan

The option you found is exactly the way to go about exporting heghtfields. If your terrain is procedural, you need to convert to a heightfield first, then Generate, then right-click and Save As. You can save as TER or EXR. Here's info on converting a procedural to heightfield: http://www.planetside.co.uk/forums/index.php?topic=15238.msg148282#msg148282

- Oshyan

pokoy

Thanks Oshyan, great.

Is the TER format saving out 16 or 32bpc?

I have obeserved that TER files and corresponding 16bit TIFs almost have the same filesize, is TER just a wrapper format with additional coordinates information?

Oshyan

I believe it's a 16 bit format but it includes an offset or something that can help it represent *relatively* greater accuracy within the bounds of the height ranges described. Here's the full format definition in our documentation Wiki: http://planetside.co.uk/wiki/index.php?title=Terragen_.TER_Format

- Oshyan

pokoy

Thanks, more info than I'm able to comprehend  ;D