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Progress on v2.4 beta3

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Progress on v2.4 beta3

Postby Aaron » Tue May 23, 2006 1:13 am

Hi All,

I've updated the news weblog with a progress report for the upcoming 3rd beta-release of L3DT v2.4. Comments and suggestions are welcome.

Cheers,
Aaron.
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Postby Joshua » Tue May 23, 2006 2:54 am

This is some very exciting stuff Aaron. This is the place to be for cutting edge terrain creation. :D

I do have a question regarding payments however (PayPal sounds fine). How often will a new version of the software require a new purchase?
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Postby Aaron » Tue May 23, 2006 3:21 am

Hi Joshua,

Joshua wrote:How often will a new version of the software require a new purchase?


Ooh, a very good question, and probably one I should've answered by now. How does "free upgrades for 18 months" sound? I'm open to discussion on this.

Cheers,
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Postby Joshua » Tue May 23, 2006 3:26 am

That sounds great actually, especially due to how productive you are with updating the software on a regular basis. And I'm not sure if everyone else is afraid to say it, but your asking price is a steal. :wink:

I would also be interested to know whether customers could pay something like an annual fee to get all updates and betas for a fixed rate. As a small development company, this is something I know we'd be interested in (unless of course the betas will simply be public). Just an idea.
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Postby Aaron » Tue May 23, 2006 7:54 am

Hi Joshua,

Joshua wrote:And I'm not sure if everyone else is afraid to say it, but your asking price is a steal. :wink:


I'm glad you think so. It's my intention to keep L3DT Pro in the 'very affordable' range for most prospective users. I figure that $25 will cover my web-hosting costs, infrequent compiler upgrades (ouch!), very-infrequent computer upgrades (double-ouch!), and hopefully have enough left over for a nice Danish pastry every now and then (I always program better after a Danish, for some reason). So there you are; the pricing of L3DT is indexed to the price of pastry, blueberries and custard.

Joshua wrote:I would also be interested to know whether customers could pay something like an annual fee to get all updates and betas for a fixed rate...unless of course the betas will simply be public.


I'm disinclined to restrict beta-access any time soon, as I've found that having a large beta-testing community is a Very Good Thing [tm]. Basically, anyone with a paid-for Pro license will be able to download and run betas of the Pro edition, and betas of the Standard edition will be publicly available.

Cheers,
Aaron.
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Postby Joshua » Tue May 23, 2006 10:33 am

Well, I certainly can't argue with that. :wink:

Although I do admit you're the first developer we've had to wrestle with to raise the price on his software!
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Postby DeathTwister » Tue May 23, 2006 11:08 am

Hay all,

You know I had been having so much fun with L3DT I kinda forgot that I was going to have to pay for it soon one day. ROTFL I sure am glad that this poor boy can afford it as well. We as well are a very small company and are at the moment at least "feast and famine" here sometimes.

Joshua wrote:

Although I do admit you're the first developer we've had to wrestle with to raise the price on his software!


ROTFL ROTFL
Even though I am poor Aaron (at the moment), I would at least charge & pay 50 bucks at least maybe? I wouldn't want you to go under being a good guy. Your software is just 2 awesome. Hay but if ya sell to us for 25 WOO HOO bro!!!!! Hay don't shoot me guys for suggesting he raise price some if he does, it's just a idea ROTFL.

I'll get my duckets ready :wink: :lol: :)

DT :twisted:
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Postby trollfiddler » Tue May 23, 2006 12:14 pm

Aaron, looks great to me. Personally I'm not interested in the scripting, so I'm glad we got other features instead. Anything that adds to the stunning landscapes is cool with me.

Anything that makes climates easier would also be good and you seem to be working on that as well. I've figured out the basics of climates, but something like a floating window with the attributes map updated in real-time as you change params would be a great visual aid.

I've only really started playing with the software, but so far it's ease of use and great results beats the hell out of anything else I've tried. The "next" button is my greatest friend :-)

Anyway, the whole point of this is that it's great software for a great price, the updates are going in the right direction for me personally, and when I need the commercial version I'll happily pay up via pay pal!

T.
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Postby SeerBlue » Tue May 23, 2006 1:54 pm

I agree whole heartily, I haven't posted anything here in the gallery yet, but L3DT gets alot of use, and it is definately an excellant program. SeerBlue
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Postby DeathTwister » Tue May 23, 2006 2:49 pm

Actually I have 2 requests if possible,

Since I am a dumb artist, could you get that import to the TSE Torque engine information maybe in the beta 3 release? It sure would help me about now, and the main reason ATM why I haven't entered a post on the competition yet. I can't figure that leafe shit out at all, the math, makes my head hurt and my programmer is way to bizzy to help ATM, and he don't understand it exactly yet either anyway. New math to learn here.

And 2, you said in a post that you would try and get a variance on the brush sizes for finer terrain editing???? For me those are the 2 most important add-ons that I would wish with all my hearts desire. HAHAHAHA ROTFL. Oh ya and the putting in road/rivers feature maybe? /ducks down in case stuff starts flying............. HAHAHAHAHAHa:wink: :roll: :lol:

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Postby trollfiddler » Tue May 23, 2006 7:19 pm

Hey DT, what information is that? Has Aaron written it up somewhere? What do you mean by "include the information in the next beta"? Or is there going to be an exporter of some kind (he says hopefully).

If you are having probs with TSE import, there is a simple GUI available in the resources section at GG. Just fill in the boxes once you have the GUI installed! There is a button to calculate leaf size for you, so you don't have to worry about it.

As for the other params, I usually find that an error metric of 2 and a tree depth of 6 does for most terrains. If you have really huge ones you might need to up them .

<edit>I was poking around to find the info you were talking about and I guess it was that thread where you were having probs with the import a couple of months ago. If you've got it all figured out now just ignore the stuff above.</edit>

T
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Postby JavaJones » Wed May 24, 2006 2:51 am

Hmm, I didn't see the price listed, but $50 would be fine, and $25 is extremely nice! Sounds like some good features coming. Maybe not everything I personally am hoping for or wanted from 2.4 (the games artists have to be extatic though :D), but good stuff nonetheless. I'll be standing in line to pay gladly, especially if 2.5 casts another glance over at the ME-DEM feature request list. ;)

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Postby Aaron » Wed May 24, 2006 8:37 am

Hello,

DeathTwister wrote:could you get that import to the TSE Torque engine information maybe in the beta 3 release?


Sorry DT, I don't have enough information on this to rush-in a change (I know nothing about leaf size, etc). I'll have a look at this once the dust has settled after v2.4.

DeathTwister wrote:And 2, you said in a post that you would try and get a variance on the brush sizes for finer terrain editing????


You wanted finer control, right? In that case it's not just a matter of changing the brush size - I have to re-jig the terrain algorithm to support different DM/HF size ratios. This one is too-big to rush into beta3, and it would extend the beta-testing phase for another few months in any case. I'll look at this for 2.4a (or 2.4b, or 2.4x).

DeathTwister wrote:Oh ya and the putting in road/rivers feature maybe?...
/ducks down in case stuff starts flying.


Hmmm...

JavaJones wrote:...especially if 2.5 casts another glance over at the ME-DEM feature request list. Wink


Maybe, but I can't promise anything just yet - my plan for post-v2.4 is still very vague. Scripting isn't going to be ready for v2.4, so that's the natural candidate for 2.4a. Other than that, I'll probably try to work my way through the back-log of minor file I/O and user-interface requests, and maybe revamp the painting interface (including new HF/AM/TX tools). I do have to release that SDK sometime too.

Anyway, it's probably more important that I actually complete v2.4 before planning what to do afterwards. Back to the compiler...

Correction: Time for dinner.

Cheers,
Aaron.
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Postby DeathTwister » Wed May 24, 2006 12:51 pm

Hay guys,

WOW I didn't know there was a leaf calculator?

Trollfiddler wrote:
If you are having probs with TSE import, there is a simple GUI available in the resources section at GG. Just fill in the boxes once you have the GUI installed! There is a button to calculate leaf size for you, so you don't have to worry about it.


Could you give us a link to that baby? I never have seen that one.:wink:
And to answer your questain, no I didn't get one in yet as my comp crashed, had to re-build, then had other stuff to do, now I am full circle and about to try again today or tomorrow to get one in. If I have trouble, beleave me I will post often and loudly, TeHe :oops:
Going to try and get my gallery world in and enter in Aaron fun and games if I can get my act together.

I need to get it in soon as my Associate has been working on a new way to page realistic forests that are more real then what we have now. So I need to get my end done here for my associate here soon anyway. We still have allot of work yet to do there, but we are on a path I think will get us there for what we want.

Aaron Wrote:
Sorry DT, I don't have enough information on this to rush-in a change (I know nothing about leaf size, etc). I'll have a look at this once the dust has settled after v2.4.


Hay bro, I understand and will wait as I know you have so much to do, and many requests in the Queue.

Aaron wrote:

You wanted finer control, right? In that case it's not just a matter of changing the brush size - I have to re-jig the terrain algorithm to support different DM/HF size ratios. This one is too-big to rush into beta3, and it would extend the beta-testing phase for another few months in any case. I'll look at this for 2.4a (or 2.4b, or 2.4x).


Hay I am happy that you are going to put that together, and the way you work, I know it wont be to long. You have allot on your plate and I for one can wait as I know all the goodies we want and need will come. Your awesome dude and a good egg besides.

[b]Aaron Wrote:

Maybe, but I can't promise anything just yet - my plan for post-v2.4 is still very vague. Scripting isn't going to be ready for v2.4, so that's the natural candidate for 2.4a. Other than that, I'll probably try to work my way through the back-log of minor file I/O and user-interface requests, and maybe revamp the painting interface (including new HF/AM/TX tools). I do have to release that SDK sometime too.


SDK? drools my programming Partner says, when when drools...all over the studio, dang now I got to clean that mess up, yuk yuk...

DT
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Postby DeathTwister » Wed May 24, 2006 1:28 pm

Hay a quick note here.

We have downloaded a couple from GG on the simple gui part. But none that calulated the leaf size for us, so we could never get it to give us a chunk file to bring in. And I don't understand the math at all in that depth/leaf size stuff yet at all. But I will try to do it again by myself first before I bug ya'll..

So after I get a link to the one your talking about I will try again and then maybe if I am still having trouble I could get some help? maybe send the file? or something? that is if I am totally brain dead and don't get a clue? hahaha, thanks if anyone has the time, if I need it in advance /chuckles.

It can be hard to be a artist with not a ton of math skills in this field, but dang I love this stuff so much, I will learn :lol:

DT :twisted:
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