How to make large areas of grass look realistic??

[bassist118]

Hi all

I wonder if anyone can give me some tips on making large areas of grassland look realistic.

One texture looks too plain so I tried torandomly click around with a different texture and the result was grass with chicken pox, I tried larger areas with a different texture, result chicken pox now look infected.. Everything I try doesn't have the sane affect as the wonderful creations from Iceman, Emo etc.

FMA and JVC go someway to making the grass look realistic but it the base textures I'm having trouble with.

All help greatly appreciated
Thanks

:Y:

Andy

 

[HiBaller]

When I place large areas of grass of any kind, I HOLD DOWN either the "[" or "]" keys, wait until the dial starts spinning, and then hold the mouse button down and "paint" the area with grass. The constantly spinning applicator breaks up all the "sameness" that you see. You can do this with the aperture set tiny or large, the result is still the same. It takes two hands to do this, but the results are just fine.

Bill

 

[bassist118]

When I place large areas of grass of any kind, I HOLD DOWN either the "[" or "]" keys, wait until the dial starts spinning, and then hold the mouse button down and "paint" the area with grass. The constantly spinning applicator breaks up all the "sameness" that you see. You can do this with the aperture set tiny or large, the result is still the same. It takes two hands to do this, but the results are just fine.

Bill

Thanks for the advice (I never knew [ and ] span the direction dial) but I don't think I made my self very clear, I ment when trying to overlay another texture to highlight lighter areas, darker areas and dead grassy areas in the same field, hill or park. I think what I mean is how do I get a nice blend between 2 textures and is there anyway to slow down the spray texture speed in 2010 (I'm sure you could with 2004) as you need a very very very light touch on the mouse to get a nice blend.

Thanks



Andy

 

[sparky15]

Also, pick another texture or two that matches and randomly click here and there with them. Breaks up the monotony. I'll usually use a grass/dirt texture that is close to the original. Sometimes spots of yellowish grass to simulate dead spots.

Dave.....

 

[JCitron]

As Sparky says click similar textures and place them randomly. If you swish your mouse cursor lightly on the screen when placing textures, the texture comes out lighter and this makes them easy to blend them. You may also want to adjust the sizes of the textures too. Some look better large - full scale and others look better at small scale.

By far texturing, landscaping and building placing is one of the longest aspects of the route building, and is the most time consuming aspect of the process. Getting the textures and object placement right in the first place makes the route more realistic and more interesting.

John

 

[HiBaller]

No problem Andy. I forgot to mention what John brought up. Swooshing your mouse across portions of the terrain at varying speeds will indeed lighten or darken the amount of texture you get. And, as Dave says, intersperse your single texture with something similar once in a while. It breaks up long stretches of grass with splats of color.

Bill

 

[Vern]

Swishing, [ ], and light tapping like a salt cellar (banned on our table at the moment due to my blood pressure :'( ) in one smooth movement gives good results. As recommended, try blending two or three textures which are fairly close in terms of shade and type. I find for general ground cover the German Gras textures are very good and TBH in many cases the default Auran terrain textures still work and blend well. Depending on the terrain being modelled you can then put some random rock or gravel patches on the surface to represent stony ground.

Don't forget once you've achieved a good blend on an area you can copy and paste/rotate that to avoid painting every section individually (unlike Railworks ).

Finally bear in mind the finished result will be viewed from the train cab or external view close to the ground, not necessarily at the height you're working in Surveyor.

 

[sparky15]

Don't forget to look at the final picture. It may not look right at the moment, but once you add a few trees and shrubs, along with a darker texture under them, it will break it up even more. I like to put a darker brown type texture under the trees.

Dave....

 

[Approach_Medium]

I like the TS09 textures. They're much higher poly count, and may affect performance more than the low poly textures do, but I have not found any adverse effects from using them, even on my 5+yr old single core system.

Other than that, I do pretty much what has been said. After a while, you get an idea and a feel for what works, and make those textures your favorites by placing them into the pick list.

I have to be in the mood to do texturing. It does get a bit tedious sometimes.

FW

 

[paulzmay]

And once you get an area you like (say half a board), you can always copy/paste to save time filling up your route...

Paul