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June Image of the Month Competition

Announcements and chatter regarding the image of the month competition.

Postby dEaThMaStEr » Fri Jun 23, 2006 5:03 pm

*sigh* I'm suffering from hardcore artist's block. I've made and remade my coast about 3 times now, nothing I like.. Not sure if I'm gonna have an entry.. :(
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Postby DeathTwister » Fri Jun 23, 2006 9:18 pm

Hay dudes,

dEaThMaStEr Wrote:
*sigh* I'm suffering from hardcore artist's block. I've made and remade my coast about 3 times now, nothing I like.. Not sure if I'm gonna have an entry.. Sad

Doh, no no ju got 2 enter my good elf /smiles.....

Hay guys you dudes need to enter some stuff, thats not fair to the 2 of us that have so far, you guys are totally awesome artists, so where the fork are you all? Hehe maybe need to smoke a spliff, or a bowl and that would help the old Creative juices? it sure helped me. :wink:

Hay Ch3rokee good to see some entries brother, and very nice I might add. Hay if you don't mind a small Tut in Bryce if I may? you may want to update your entries after this post, Maybe!!? I am sure Aaron will let you update an entry if you re-post it as the same name/file up until the last day of the comp?
Anyway I wanted to share maybe a little known fact about Bryce. You can bring in an image of the terrain you made in L3DT directly into Bryce as a surface map.

Bring in your L3DT terrain file, I used a sandstone Texture to start with, but choose whatever maybe is closest to the Texture you are looking for. Then when you are happy, click on the texture editor and click on the Texture source editor:
Image

The click on the Load texture/picture button on the upper left hand side of the gui:
Image

And select the main Texture you have for the L3DT _TX file and bring it in. You will have to flip it but in the end you will get a scene something like:
Image

As a end product. I haven't messed with stuff much, used the default Sky and so forth, but you get the idea and WOW does it change the look and feel of Bryce don't it??? OMG I love L3DT. In my case I used the LeGalleria World terrain for this Tut since most of you have seen it in one program or another by now so you have seen it before, so good for comparison.

OK so maybe that helped inspire a peep or 2 from you dudes? I sure hope so, we need more art entries. Try and look at what you are shooting as maybe you are a tourist on safari and all you have to take home is the digi camera you bought in the store. That is all there is to it really, that and a big spliff if you are constipated. Or a 6 pack I guess if you don't smoke the herb.

OK lesson over and if you knew all that, sorry, but I thought maybe people didn't know how to bring in the Texture files from L3DT so thought to share that with you all.

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Postby Ch3rokee » Sat Jun 24, 2006 6:39 am

Hey DeathTwister, thank you for this tutorial, I always imported the L3DT texture without alpha image (using default white) and that's why my terrains looked so washed.

After you posted this, I modified Lost Island_4- to include the alpha, and some other things. If you want, you can see it here: http://www.bundysoft.com/coppermine/displayimage.php?pos=-144
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Postby DeathTwister » Sat Jun 24, 2006 12:27 pm

Hay bro,

Yes, much much better, sweet even brother. Good work. Now where are the rest of the entries????? /chuckles.
Yup, yup Bryce is a very underated program in so many ways. Even after all these years I still find it is good for so many things, that it still amazes me. Erg now for some morning coffee, meza not awake at all.

I want to see some more Me-dem stuff guys, I know you got some hidden on your comps, Coatlines are a common sight these days and with Global warming it will be seen more and more on this planet I am afraid.

DT
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Postby SeerBlue » Sat Jun 24, 2006 10:54 pm

I still plan on entering, just got to sqeeze a few more hours out of my day. Spent today getting Carol's Ninja ready for the road, and my Bianchi cleaned up,,,,she can do 160 mph, but i can put in 100 miles in a day with a good SD tailwind and not have bugs in my teeth! SeerBlue
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Postby monks » Tue Jun 27, 2006 11:32 am

Aw, I'm afraid I've got too much on with an upcoming article I'm working on for ME-DEM. In fact it details our entire workflow to date, so will consist of about 3-4 articles all in one. It's a bit of a beast but it's really what we've been working towards for over a year now: Seer is contributing heavily and no doubt Oshyan will chip in too.
The upshot is, it involves some terrain modelled in L3DT, so I'm very happy to be back using it: seems like such a long time since I first covered it for ME-DEM. I still think (if you're listening Aaron :)) that bang for buck, L3DT produces some of the best terrain around but it needs a 3D prev- even a basic one such as Wilbur's 3D tess prev.

but i can put in 100 miles in a day with a good SD tailwind and not have bugs in my teeth!

Cue a song: Don't fear the reaper

Keep up the great work fellas ;)

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Postby DeathTwister » Tue Jun 27, 2006 2:24 pm

Hay guys,

Monks Wrote:
The upshot is, it involves some terrain modeled in L3DT, so I'm very happy to be back using it: seems like such a long time since I first covered it for ME-DEM. I still think (if you're listening Aaron Smile) that bang for buck, L3DT produces some of the best terrain around but it needs a 3D prev- even a basic one such as Wilbur's 3D tess prev.


I was just beginning to think that way a bit myself. As I started to realize that unless you use the Viewer that we have you really can't see/use the textures to the best effect that the L3DT viewer does give us, and I can't get them out into a video game and have them have that same quality/or better that the viewer does give us to check our work. I can bring in the textures to other programs and they can look pretty killer, but again, I can't get them to look like what we do get in the viewer that comes with L3DT.

There is another post where we started talking about that and I think Aaron has decided to go with Ogre open source engine and build a new Viewer, plus I hope a way to add Trees and a good atmosphere and water quality to what we are building. But then again that is a Video game engine in short, so we are more then willing to chip in and help out with that if Aaron goes with a open source engine like is being talked about using. Or did I get that bass acwards Aaron? I sure would like to be able to use the textures like I see them in L3DT Viewer with the way they overlay the terrain as layers. I know I am an artist and not a programmer so I tic allot of them off and get told things can't be done, but dang it sure would be nice don't ya think?? /wry smile :wink:

Ch3rokee
I am glad you like the info I shared bro with ya and everyone, and thought it was a good idea :idea:.. Thank you very much for the compliment. I like sharing with people as so many help me with stuff. Ergo as example the TSE stuff I had trouble with a few back.
Your stuff looks awesome bro and yes it did add a deeper feel and look that gives a nice feel to your terrain in Bryce now. I will enter some in Bryce in the near future, but I almost have a TSE entry coming soon. Just trying to solve some issues and I am doing much better.

Sage that shot is awesome dude you uploaded. I would really like to see the terrain closer then we see it now and such, please please???? You should just go in with Fraps and do a few shots and submit them in the comp "takes like 5 minutes", OMG they are awesome and so much better them mine in every way from the TGE shots. Very cool, chit dude and expect a email from me with questains, HAHAHAHAHahahahaaaa..... I see you solved the water problem I am having with import of a terrain into TSE.

I am upgrading all my comps ATM from win 2000 to win EX Pro, and my EX pro to 64 bit with win EXP Pro on one machine. I tell you this as we did not expect to have to deal with hundreds of spy ware and other nasty critters that are coming through the Internet while we are trying to upgrade our comps with all the service packs that need to be done, Shesh, over 600 spyware/malwhare and 4-5 viruses have tried to get in through the Microsoft downloads. It is embedded it looks like deep in Microsoft's software as far as we can see, not from outside source at all.

So I will be on and off for the next few days while we upload then clean out our comps, upload, clean out our comps. And that is with 4 layers of protection we got as well, so we know it is coming from them, not from another source. Farging Microsoft, they suck.

I have no idea how they can get away with legally, but that goes to show that Bill did make a deal with Bush to put spyware in our computers using the basic OS to give them the back door to root in all our comps. So I will be up and down this week trying to get all the comps back to where they should be, Errggg. I wonder what Bill has in-store for us with Vista when it comes out. OK off I go into the mines of Microsoft hell........

DT :twisted:
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Postby Aaron » Tue Jun 27, 2006 3:05 pm

Hello,

DeathTwister wrote:There is another post where we started talking about that and I think Aaron has decided to go with Ogre open source engine and build a new Viewer, plus I hope a way to add Trees and a good atmosphere and water quality to what we are building. But then again that is a Video game engine in short, so we are more then willing to chip in and help out with that if Aaron goes with a open source engine like is being talked about using. Or did I get that bass acwards Aaron?


More or less correct. A new viewer is pretty much essential now, and my preference would be for one written in C++ and open-source. I'm more time-starved than usual at the moment (thesis to write), but later in the year or early next I would be free to start something like that. If anyone else wants to take the lead, I would be happy to contribute code.

DeathTwister wrote: I am upgrading all my comps ATM from win 2000 to win EX Pro, and my EX pro to 64 bit with win EXP Pro on one machine.


I'm not sure L3DT will run on 64-bit Windows. Please let me know how that goes.

DeathTwister wrote:I tell you this as we did not expect to have to deal with hundreds of spy ware and other nasty critters that are coming through the Internet while we are trying to upgrade our comps with all the service packs that need to be done, Shesh, over 600 spyware/malwhare and 4-5 viruses have tried to get in through the Microsoft downloads. It is embedded it looks like deep in Microsoft's software as far as we can see, not from outside source at all.

So I will be on and off for the next few days while we upload then clean out our comps, upload, clean out our comps. And that is with 4 layers of protection we got as well, so we know it is coming from them, not from another source. Farging Microsoft, they suck.

I have no idea how they can get away with legally, but that goes to show that Bill did make a deal with Bush to put spyware in our computers using the basic OS to give them the back door to root in all our comps. So I will be up and down this week trying to get all the comps back to where they should be, Errggg. I wonder what Bill has in-store for us with Vista when it comes out. OK off I go into the mines of Microsoft hell........


I seriously doubt that Microsoft is to blame here. I've not had a troublesome virus, worm or spyware infection on my XP box since, oh, maybe 2002. (Last time I lowered my firewall to copy a file over the LAN from a housemate.) Since then I’ve been running tightly firewalled on my PC, sitting behind a hardware NAT/firewall. Very effective.

Have you run something like Ethereal to track down the source of the chatter to/from the nasties? Just a thought, though it’s probably not worth the effort.

Oh, it might also pay to have a live CD of Ubuntu linux (or equiv.) at hand to rescue files if/when your Windows install goes to pot.

While we're at it, do you have a tin-foil hat? ;)

Cheers,
Aaron.
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Postby DeathTwister » Wed Jun 28, 2006 1:11 pm

Hay Aaron,

Aaron Wrote:
Have you run something like Ethereal to track down the source of the chatter to/from the nasties? Just a thought, though it’s probably not worth the effort.


OMG no I didn't know about that software, and we are on it now, WOW thanks for the links, my programmer says awesome dude and he thanks you as well. We think it is getting in through their pipeline somehow and this should help track it down, thanks again for the tip and info brother.

Aaron Wrote:
I'm not sure L3DT will run on 64-bit Windows. Please let me know how that goes.


Well I had it up to the wanting me to auth the L3DT, but I decided to go and put more drivers in and I tried to install my Wakem tablet driver and it locked the 64 bit software up and we are going into safe mode to get the driver out that screwed us last night, DOH :roll: :roll: :roll:

But after we fix that I will go double check L3DT and make sure it works on a 64 bit machine. I am pretty sure it will, most of the 3d software seems to be doing good. Remember Vista will come out next year and they will at least have a 64 bit version, so maybe we should look at that in the near future and the new dual core Intel processors will be 64 bit as well and they are slatted to come out next year sometime.
We have a friend that is bench marking the processors now as we speak so we getting the skivvy on stuff before other peeps just because we both live out here in nowhere. By the way those are the real 64 bit processors that she is working on right now and they are running at 5 GHZ and above, so hold on as both Storage and Ram will have 9 terrabytes and that will become the norm very soon in the next hardware wave of goodies for us. We keep her computers running is why we know what is going on, her company is a client of ours. Got to pay the bills somehow ya know /wry smile.

Drivers are a big problem, and for some reason I never really thought about it and I forgot how bleeding edge this 64 bit software is DOh again....now I have to wait for other companies to catch up, oh well I can deal /chuckles..... :lol: :lol:

As for the viewer software, hummm, sounds good. We are planning on working on the texture bank here after we release the World Market, but along with getting Le Galleria together and getting DeathLords ready for release we do have some time here and there to help out where we can, so count on us for dev when we all get going on it.

OK so where are more entries????????? :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol:

DT :twisted:
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Postby SeerBlue » Thu Jun 29, 2006 4:27 pm

hehehe, mines inwork, may just squek in before the extended deadline. SeerBlue
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Postby DeathTwister » Fri Jun 30, 2006 2:05 pm

Hay Aaron and buds,

Quick post on 2 things.

1. and most important, it seems that L3DT does work good with a 64 bit system after all. So when you guys upgrade your comps to 64 bit feel glad that it still works with L3DT. However be careful with drivers and check to make sure they are for 64 bit. Reason is I tried to install my new/old wakem drivers and just about killed the computer. It didn't like that at all and I had to roll my computer back a day just to get it back /chuckles. I am surprised that more people are not on 64 bit here, I thought I was the slow poke not the trail blazer ROTFL.

number 2. I quick update about viruses and malware and such. If you are trying to update your new windows machine with NO fire wall, or anti-virus software you are sooooo screwed dudes. We got hit with over 8200 add and mal ware software, and we got over 27 viruses trying to use the Microsoft pipeline to update software. OMG that sucked, we could not no matter how hard we tried get service pack 2 at all, to many bugs trying to get at us. Shesh, if you have no protection we are so screwed on the net these days. Having said that the comp we do have 4 layers of protection the updates went just fine.
So we have ordered the service pack 2 from Microsoft and just wait to get everything up to date on all comps. Dam they suck, and it is like a feeding frenzy at the Microsoft pipeline entrance. And I bet they could care less as well. Not sure if anyone cares atm, but we sure realized just how good our security really is after seeing what happens when you have none. We seem to be back up an all fronts now so we happy and I am downloading the new version to go play with today on my new 64 bit system and see the differences that have ensued since the older operating system that we are so used to. It is different from win XP pro 32 bit, allot different it looks like.

OH yes and glad to see there will be more entries yet to come.

DT
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Postby Aaron » Fri Jun 30, 2006 2:56 pm

Hi DeathTwister,

DeathTwister wrote:...it seems that L3DT does work good with a 64 bit system after all.


Excellent. Thanks for the good news.

DeathTwister wrote:If you are trying to update your new windows machine with NO fire wall, or anti-virus software you are sooooo screwed dudes.


You had your firewall down while connected to the internet? Bingo, there's the reason! At any given point in time, most Windows machines will have several listening TCP sockets and maybe tens of UDP receive sockets (run 'netstat -a' in a dos shell). If your firewall is down, these are exposed to the ravages of the internet, and you're boned in under 10 seconds these days.

DeathTwister wrote: We got hit with over 8200 add and mal ware software, and we got over 27 viruses trying to use the Microsoft pipeline to update software.


I'm sorry, maybe I missed this, but how do you know it was Microsoft's "pipeline"? Do you mean that the intrusion packets had a send address/port that resolved to Microsoft? (e.g. using Ethereal).

Otherwise I would be inclined to believe that you were just hit by the zillion-or-so zombies out there running endless address/port scans, which having found your computer without a firewall, took over.

Cheers,
Aaron.
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Postby Hinklemister » Fri Jun 30, 2006 3:24 pm

Hi Guys!

I've been gone for so long, and now there's like 100's of posts that I've missed :wink: . I would submit an entry but I sadly haven't been using l3dt a whole lot lately due to programming issues in my game. I'll work on submitting something next month though. And great job DeathTwister especailly, your entries look really good.

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Postby DeathTwister » Sat Jul 01, 2006 1:21 pm

Hay all,

Aaron Wrote:
I'm sorry, maybe I missed this, but how do you know it was Microsoft's "pipeline"? Do you mean that the intrusion packets had a send address/port that resolved to Microsoft? (e.g. using Ethereal).

Otherwise I would be inclined to believe that you were just hit by the zillion-or-so zombies out there running endless address/port scans, which having found your computer without a firewall, took over.


Yaya at the time we didn't have a way to get a fire wall on it, and we forgot to set up the one that is default, so by the time we got on it was to late ROTFL
:lol: :lol: :oops: :oops: :roll: :cry: :wink: :lol: :lol: Ya got to laugh at it, it was pretty funny really, and we realized just how good our firewall and protection really is and yes we got it all fixed for the most part and running like a bat out of hell now as well :lol: But for the average person buying a computer and going online for the first time to get updates and what not don't have a snow balls chance in hell of not going down and it is sad. Probably one of the biggest reason why people don't like comps is when they get hit, they have no way to get there comps fixed easy like us teckies do. As for the pipeline. maybe your right, but it just seemed like they sit there waiting for the feeding frenzy to begin ROTFL, maybe not.

-Hinklemister wrote:
I'll work on submitting something next month though. And great job DeathTwister especially, your entries look really good.


Thanks for the compliment brother and good to have you back with us creating good stuff again. Next time don't go away so long :wink:

OH Aaron, I did find a bug in the new release though, check the bug report section bro.

DT
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Postby JavaJones » Sat Jul 01, 2006 8:23 pm

More people aren't on 64 bit Windows because most people don't have 64 bit apps and the disadvantages as far as drivers and software compatibility thus far outweigh any potential advantages. Basically there is only one good reason to run XP x64 and that's if you have one or more apps that are very important to your workflow that are 64 bit optimized and actually see gains for performance or memory management or whatever under 64 bit. Very, very few applications fall into that category. In fact I'd be surprised if any of your apps do. Meanwhile all 32 bit apps are running effectively in very fast emulation, so they're slightly (only slightly) slower than under 32 bit Windows.

Frankly I'm not sure why you bothered to upgrade. I'm also not sure why you need SP2 unless you're not talking about the x64 machine, since x64 have SP2 stuff integrated into it (it came out after SP2 I believe). But perhaps you're referring to needing it for another XP 32 system, in which case I"d highly recommend either re-purchasing XP with SP2 or, more cost-effectively, slipstreaming (integrating) SP2 into a new copy of your XP install disc. I personally think MS should provide free replacement discs for people with SP2 integrated since it's a free download from their website anyway.

Finally, all new PC's that ship with XP should have SP2 integrated already, which includes the improved firewall which is on by default, as well as patches for the RPC and other vulnerabilities. As a professional computer service technician and system builder I have put together 100's of machines through an open, non-firewalls router with static IP direct connections to the 'net and using SP2 I have never had any problem with anything getting in "automatically" or before I patch things. The only real major vulnerability that gets people immediately on connecting to the 'net is the RPC vulnerability and that is just a small patch from MS. Other than that the other vulnerabilities are problematic but not an *immediate* issue. Anyway, long story short most people buying new PC's will have no problem since they automatically have a firewall on and the patches applied. They'll need to update anyway most likely, but at least they won't be immediately slammed by a bunch of stuff. Basically your experience is now, thankfully, in the minority.

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