The perfect mix of mathmatical and artistic tools ;)

[BPauba]

I am wondering how much stylus (wacom) implementation will be added into Terragen2 over the long run. I certainly do not expect much of any in the coming year, but do the developers have any concrete plans for the future? My predictions for Terragen2 were a mix between Terragem0.09 (by this I mean a  mathematical variable approach to creating scenes) mixed with a Zbrush style of modeling/creating. I love the idea of sculpting out the geometry and then using algorithms to give it the natural diversity that is hard to implement with a brush (or even traditional modelling),  ???and with sort of concept I believe we can really get accurate images from our imagination.

As of right now I see a huge improvement on the mathematical side, but will the more artistic side of Terragen2 be seen in the coming years? I would like to hear other people's thoughts on the matter as well: D. I personally don't believe we will see the true power of Terragen2 until both the artistic and mathematical sides are brought together ☺.

Zbrush 3.0:
http://www.pixologic.com/home.php

[RealUser]

Yeah, a kind of ZBrush like tools could be a great addition to TG2. But i don't think Planetside is going to implement such tools. I do agree that the more artistic approach of a designer should be thought of very well. You could do fine art work even now, but with very much effort. TG2 isn't really intuitiv in many areas of the GUI or the way shaders are build up. Men are very visual animals and as a german proverb says: An image says more than thousand words. I really do miss some visually representation of what some nodes are doing or what they contain. This would be of great help and ease.

[BPauba]

Yeah, a kind of ZBrush like tools could be a great addition to TG2. But i don't think Planetside is going to implement such tools. I do agree that the more artistic approach of a designer should be thought of very well. You could do fine art work even now, but with very much effort. TG2 isn't really intuitiv in many areas of the GUI or the way shaders are build up. Men are very visual animals and as a german proverb says: An image says more than thousand words. I really do miss some visually representation of what some nodes are doing or what they contain. This would be of great help and ease.

I really think it would be simple to start, I really do not execpt anything crazy in the coming year. They could start out with some simple uses such as painting in layer masks. Man, how nice would it be to paint in layer masks for lets say [strata shader]. By adding functions to the brush we could also get a pretty realistic diversity within our brushstrokes. I just think it would be a very innovative and POWERFUL tool, but then again we have to understand that it has been stated that tg2 will be a renderer first and a modeller second....

I totally agree with you on the visual aspect in the GUI, but then again ( I know we alllll have heard this a thousand times) it is a tech preview. I think that sort of stuff will come out for the commerial version and it does need to be left till the last minute to implement because there are more important technical aspects that need to be dealt with and solved before we make the software nice and pretty .

[Oshyan]

We do intend to implement some form of painting tool for creating masks and the like within the UI, probably through the realtime preview. It will likely be basic but it should be functional and fairly easy to work with.

Although our focus is on rendering as has been stated, I think it's reasonable to say that we would like to also provide powerful editing tools, along the lines of what you suggest. Whether those will be possible in the finished version of TG2 later this year or whether they will have to wait is debatable. Basic realtime editing tools should be possible.

Companies like Pixologic (Zbrush) and Skymatter (Mudbox) have put in tremendous amounts of development time using whole teams of developers to get systems that are as responsive, capable and easy to use for modeling as their respective products. We certainly won't be able to create something on that level any time soon. But I believe we will make a start and it is something we are interested in improving over time.

- Oshyan

[jo]

Hi,

I would also like to say that when we do implement the sorts of things Oshyan is talking about, tablet support is very definitely something we would consider. I was on the verge of adding tablet support to TG Mac v0.9 in the View & Sculpt window when we changed our focus to TG2 development. You could already use a tablet for basic drawing of course, but I was going to add support for stylus pressure etc. I have a Wacom Intuos 2 tablet, and when you're doing something involving painting/drawing a tablet is of course pretty hard to beat. Certainly on the Mac supporting tablet input is pretty straightforward, Apple have worked closely with Wacom and it's built into the OS. I'm not so sure what the situation is on Windows, but I imagine it's reasonably straightforward.

Regards,

Jo

[RealUser]

Any tablet support would be great!

[DeathTwister]

Yes yes, I as well need to use my tablet now.

DT

[BPauba]

Hi,

I would also like to say that when we do implement the sorts of things Oshyan is talking about, tablet support is very definitely something we would consider. I was on the verge of adding tablet support to TG Mac v0.9 in the View & Sculpt window when we changed our focus to TG2 development. You could already use a tablet for basic drawing of course, but I was going to add support for stylus pressure etc. I have a Wacom Intuos 2 tablet, and when you're doing something involving painting/drawing a tablet is of course pretty hard to beat. Certainly on the Mac supporting tablet input is pretty straightforward, Apple have worked closely with Wacom and it's built into the OS. I'm not so sure what the situation is on Windows, but I imagine it's reasonably straightforward.

Regards,

Jo

Ah, both Oshyan's and your comments is exactly what I wanted to hear! I appreciate the quick response, thanks. Any other input from the users about tablet integration?