L3DT users' community
Large 3D terrain generator

Downhilll Snowy Mountain

Got a problem or need advice?

Downhilll Snowy Mountain

Postby METEMEDO » Mon Feb 27, 2012 9:48 pm

Hi, i'm new here and i've just started to use L3DT, which i found awesome, but now i want to make something more specific:
I'm planning to make a simple snowboard game, with very basic mechanics, for a university project.

I need to make a terrain that is something like a ramp. The point is to start on top of it and end at the bottom, just like any snowboard game out there.
The ramp must have, of course, some relief at each side, but should flat (or almost) in the middle.

How can i achieve this? So far, in L3DT, i only used the "wizard" thing, in which you choose your properties and it generates a terrain for you, but i can't make such a specific thing as this.

Thanks in advance for any help you can provide.
METEMEDO
New member
 
Posts: 6
Joined: Mon Feb 27, 2012 9:35 pm

Re: Downhilll Snowy Mountain

Postby Aaron » Thu Mar 01, 2012 11:27 am

Hi METEMEDO,

I apologise for the delay in my reply. It's a fairly tricky thing you've asked about, and it involves quite a few steps. I'm putting together a tutorial on this now, and I'll post back here when it's up, probably in a day or three. Sorry again for the wait.

Cheerio,
Aaron.
User avatar
Aaron
Site Admin
 
Posts: 3696
Joined: Sun Nov 20, 2005 2:41 pm
Location: Melbourne, Australia

Re: Downhilll Snowy Mountain

Postby METEMEDO » Fri Mar 02, 2012 11:34 pm

You don't have to apologize, nobody here is obligated to reply! :P

Anyway, thank you very much for your response. I'm looking forward for your tutorial!
METEMEDO
New member
 
Posts: 6
Joined: Mon Feb 27, 2012 9:35 pm

Re: Downhilll Snowy Mountain

Postby Aaron » Sun Mar 04, 2012 11:42 am

Hi METEMEDO,

The first draft of the tutorial us in-line here:

http://www.bundysoft.com/wiki/doku.php? ... dt:ski_run

Please let me know if you find any problems with it or if you would like to suggest changes.

Cheerio,
Aaron.
User avatar
Aaron
Site Admin
 
Posts: 3696
Joined: Sun Nov 20, 2005 2:41 pm
Location: Melbourne, Australia

Re: Downhilll Snowy Mountain

Postby METEMEDO » Mon Mar 05, 2012 11:09 pm

Wow! You've made an amazing tutorial, thank you very much!
I've just learnt A LOT about your software with that tutorial.

I don't think you need to change anything for now, i will try making a mountain like that for my game and if i come up with any ideas, i will let you know.

Oh and by the way, my nickname is METEMEDO :mrgreen:

Thank you!
METEMEDO
New member
 
Posts: 6
Joined: Mon Feb 27, 2012 9:35 pm

Re: Downhilll Snowy Mountain

Postby Aaron » Tue Mar 06, 2012 10:18 am

Hi METEMEDO,

Sorry about messing up your nickname. I've fixed all instances in the tutorial and this thread.

Best regards,
Aaron.
User avatar
Aaron
Site Admin
 
Posts: 3696
Joined: Sun Nov 20, 2005 2:41 pm
Location: Melbourne, Australia

Re: Downhilll Snowy Mountain

Postby METEMEDO » Thu Mar 08, 2012 2:00 am

Hehe, it happens a lot.
I've made a simple terrain and exported the layers, but i only know how to import the Height map and Texture, so it seems very low-poly. I think it because it misses the Attributes map.
Do you know anything about the matter?

Thanks.
METEMEDO
New member
 
Posts: 6
Joined: Mon Feb 27, 2012 9:35 pm

Re: Downhilll Snowy Mountain

Postby Aaron » Thu Mar 08, 2012 2:38 pm

Hi METEMEDO,

Can you post screenshots of what you mean by "low poly"? Does it look 'low poly' in L3DT's 3D renderer, or in another program?

Also, could I ask you to explain your workplan a bit more? By "export" do you mean from L3DT or from another program, and likewise is "import" into L3DT or another program? (I assume the former and latter respectively, but can't be sure) What file formats were used? What map sizes were used? (heightfield size in pixels, heightfield horizontal scale, texture map size in pixels, etc.)

The heightfield and texture should be all that's required for high-resolution 3D rendering, plus or minus some detail maps. The attributes map is generally not useful for 3D rendering; it is just an intermediate piece of data that is convenient for generating normal-, light-, texture- and alpha maps.

Best regards,
Aaron.
User avatar
Aaron
Site Admin
 
Posts: 3696
Joined: Sun Nov 20, 2005 2:41 pm
Location: Melbourne, Australia

Re: Downhilll Snowy Mountain

Postby METEMEDO » Thu Mar 08, 2012 10:26 pm

I'm sorry that i didn't make myself very clear.

I'm trying to export the maps from L3DT and import them in Panda3D engine.
I used the GeoMipTerrain library from Panda3D to import both the heightmap and the texture, but in Panda3D the terrain is very low-poly.
I used 2048x2048 for both heightmap and texture, with 1m per pixel. I've then exported them in png format.
METEMEDO
New member
 
Posts: 6
Joined: Mon Feb 27, 2012 9:35 pm

Re: Downhilll Snowy Mountain

Postby Aaron » Fri Mar 09, 2012 1:37 pm

Hi METEMEDO,

By using a 2048x2048px texture on a 1m res heightfield of the same size, you've set the smallest size of a colour pixel on the terrain to be 1 square metre, which is pretty huge when you're standing on it. This is probably why the terrain looks blurry and low res.

In the tutorial I used 4x texture resolution (i.e. 4096x4096 texture for 1024x1024 heightfield), and even that seemed a little more blurry on the cliffs than I'd prefer. Game-quality stuff should probably use 8x texture res or higher, or else use alpha blending.

You can see the affect of different texture resolutions on appearance in this tutorial:

http://www.bundysoft.com/wiki/doku.php? ... gatextures

Regards,
Aaron.
User avatar
Aaron
Site Admin
 
Posts: 3696
Joined: Sun Nov 20, 2005 2:41 pm
Location: Melbourne, Australia

Re: Downhilll Snowy Mountain

Postby METEMEDO » Sat Mar 17, 2012 4:16 pm

I'm sorry i didn't answer lately, i had to do some other stuff in the last couple of weeks.
So, i increased the texture resolution a bit and now it looks better.

My next priority is to limit the player's movement, so he will only be able to move inside the track and not climb the mountains, but i think you can't help me on that, since it's not L3DT related :wink:

So, at least for now, i think this thread will be dead.

Thank you for all your amazing help!
METEMEDO
New member
 
Posts: 6
Joined: Mon Feb 27, 2012 9:35 pm

Re: Downhilll Snowy Mountain

Postby Telarus » Sun Mar 18, 2012 11:23 pm

Aaron, can L3DT generate a slope map? That might help him find areas to block with the blocking geometry his engine uses.


Also, Metemedo, I recommend exporting the alpha-maps for each part of the climate and using them to build your own mega-texture material in your engine. If it supports this, you can usually get away with a lot more detail by inputting your own textures (rock, snow, etc) and letting the engine blend them with your alpha maps (as opposed to a huge2048x2048, 4096x4096, or ++ texture).
Last edited by Telarus on Tue Mar 20, 2012 12:49 am, edited 1 time in total.
Telarus
Doyen
 
Posts: 112
Joined: Mon Jun 01, 2009 12:34 am

Re: Downhilll Snowy Mountain

Postby Aaron » Mon Mar 19, 2012 1:38 pm

Hello,

Telarus wrote:Aaron, can L3DT generate a slope map


Yes indeed. Unfortunately, I forgot to add an option in the user interface. However, you can generate the heightfield gradient map using this script:

http://www.bundysoft.com/wiki/lib/exe/fetch.php?media=scripts:hf_calcgradient.zs

The output of this script for my demo ski run map looked like:

HF_Grad.jpg
HF_Grad.jpg (67.69 KiB) Viewed 23926 times

The pixel values are the rise/run slope ratio, where for example a 1 in 10 slope will have a gradient value of 0.1. Flat areas will have a value of 0, and will therefore be black in the image.

You could also use the mask generator feature to directly calculate an accessibility map. Using the 'Operations->Mask maps->Generate masks' menu option and the 'TraversableSlope' mask, you will get something like this:

HF_GradMask.png
HF_GradMask.png (75.28 KiB) Viewed 23926 times

In the above map, all terrain with a slope greater than 45 degrees (1 in 1) was set to black, and all terrain with a lower slope was white. The threshold values for the mask generator are accessible using the 'Resources->Masks->Edit mask' menu item.

Cheerio,
Aaron.
User avatar
Aaron
Site Admin
 
Posts: 3696
Joined: Sun Nov 20, 2005 2:41 pm
Location: Melbourne, Australia


Return to Help and support

Who is online

Users browsing this forum: No registered users and 5 guests

cron