Terrains

[Bensta]

Correct, greyscale heightmap terrains, i can only import 8bit greyscale terrains. Not 16bit as i would like.

[ross.rockafellow]

Okay. To be honest what I would do is build the terrain using GameCore's terrain editor that exports in 24 bit. Then import into whatever project you want.

But I did find this for you for conversions, but I haven't tested to verify it works:

http://www.imagemagick.org/script/index.php - program

http://www.imagemagick.org/discourse-server/viewtopic.php?f=1&t=15793&start=0 - process

Takes a little code, but it seems the only line you need is:

convert orig.tif -evaluate multiply 16 -depth 8 orig-8.tif

Hope that helps

[Bensta]

I think you have lost me again... I have no problems converting images, i use photoshop cs3. Im trying to get a terrain built and textured from an external program into gamecore. Now as i said before, gamecore will only let me import a 8bit grey scale image (editible terrain selected-import terrain) Ive tried many diffrent formats.

[ross.rockafellow]

Unfortunately there is no support for what you are looking for at the moment. Best bet would be to rez down your Heightmap. Well not really...


Best bet is to build the heightmap as 8 bit and bring that into gamecore and adjust the divisions of the terrain past 256x256 (we support up to 1024) and edit the terrain from there. But here's the issue, a 16km terrain with 1024 divisions will take over 200 megs of geometry. It will be difficult to get anything else in the scene and maintain 30+ fps. Its about finding that happy balance of optimization.

The engine will not lower the divisions on the terrain at a LOD, its best to use multiple terrains at the divisions you need. For instance, the center "city" is high division (512x512) and low resolution, the surrounding prairie (a separate terrain) is very big resolution and sparsely divided (like 64x64). I have an FPS map that is 0.3km with about 10 different terrains at various divisions and I find that to be the most optimal, both for editing and gameplay optimization.

[Bensta]

Right thanks for the info

[Siu]

Thanks for the tutorials. Helped me get more familiar with the terrain editing.

One thing worth noting, besides using the Height slider (though is great for a quick random blend), you can also change the Brush Mode from "Raise/Lower" to "Layer Opacity" to bring out the second or extra layer on specific areas as if you were painting; great for creating walking paths and whatnot.

Tried with 3 layers and working like a charm.

[Steely Dane]

Something that should also be mentioned for newer users.
It was brought up in this thread a while back....

http://www.gamecore3d.com/forums/index.php/topic,592.0.html

I'm talking about "stitching the terrains together" to get matching edges in large worlds.
This is not necessary as you can overlap terrain pieces to blend your landscape, like so:

[Steely Dane]

Up close view of the edges...

[Steely Dane]

I suppose you could spend countless hours trying to line up the vertices, but if you blend your terrain well enough, blend your textures right, and add a little camouflage with props like trees, boulders, fences, walls, etc....
By far one of the more efficient ways of making large terrains without it having to be flat....

[ross.rockafellow]

Bonus for optimization:

Your terrain sections that are "under" another terrain section can be made transparent to give render speed a little boost:

Edit your terrain
Select your main layer (under layer tab)
Select Layer opacity brush mode
Change the Opacity to 0
"Erase" the hidden parts of your terrain



<3,
~Ross

[Steely Dane]

That's bloody brilliant...I never thought of that.
That would be especially useful for water too as it gets that weird shimmering effect that comes from doubled up poly's.
Does the layer opacity work on the water layer?
I've never tried it for that....

[Steely Dane]

I noticed this is now in the docs as well...I really need to visit them more often, now that you guy's are focusing a little more attention on completeing them.
I usually avoid them out of fear of disappointment.
Nothing more depressing than opening a page to find a title and nothing else  ......