Making some boulders

[Dinorius_Redundicus]

As a way of practicing normal-map textures, I'm thinking of making some boulders as scenery. Would it be more useful if I made;

(a) a series of boulders of different size (eg. 1m - 10m) but all using the same kind of texture (eg. all derived from one master sandstone texture), OR

(b) a series of boulders of similar size (eg. 5m), but each with a different texture (eg. a sandstone, a granite, a limestone, a basalt).

In either case, I would vary the shapes a little from one boulder to the next, and I would make them rotatable/tiltable/height-adjustable.

~ Deane

 

[Euphod]

I'll go with (a) a series of boulders of different size (eg. 1m - 10m) but all using the same kind of texture (eg. all derived from one master sandstone texture)

 

[OldEric]

Hi Deane... could use both (a) and (b), particularly (b) could be most useful.

Eric

 

[Dermmy]

OK - I will break the deadlock by saying that - erm - well - both would be useful....

Andy

 

[Dinorius_Redundicus]

I only want to do one of the two, not both. If there's no clear favourite, well, I already have a preference. I just wanted to be a little democratic.

 

[H222]

Different size ones please

Jamie

 

[Euphod]

I only want to do one of the two, not both.

I'm sure glad I thought better of what I was originally going to post. It was complicated, and rather greedy!:hehe:

 

[Shortline2]

Hi Deane,

My view say option A as that makes it real easy for you, someone else later on if you allow reskinning to make all kind of colors and texture looks by just replacing the one master texture.
It sounds like option A is using a mesh-library and I love those for just the kind of models you talk about.

Great idea, love boulders!

Linda

 

[Deano5]

I too would go with option A, but, can I just add a thought before you start.
Most of the boulders, if not all that I have at the moment are either bright cartoons or just plain far too bright. I'm sure you understand what I mean as you have created so many fantastic assets in your Trainz time so far. There are a few rocks/boulders that look like the4 kids have stuck luminous stickers on my screen. :hehe:.
I'm well aware that these are very old assets and looked great in their time, before my time too.

 

[mezzoprezzo]

Stone me!

Hi Deane,

I would suggest option (a).

These sound like they are going to be very useful assets whichever way they are going to be finally built.

The fact that the boulders will be individual rather than groups, fully rotatable in two planes is a great idea. It will make it much easier to place identical asset boulders side by side and give the illusion that they are quite different pieces of rock.

It’s going to allow much more creative freedom to put together realistic scenes. They have the potential to look much more unique than some of the rocky outcrop assets which are already available in pre-arranged groups.

Presumably the larger sized boulders will have the same scaled detailing in the texture as the smaller ones.

The reason for mentioning that is because I have some trees where the identical model seems to have been used for small and large. They look as if they have the same mesh which has simply been increased in size. The same image file seems to have been used, so with the larger versions everything appears much more blurred. The texture always looks relatively sharper on the smaller ones, so for those reasons they cannot be used realistically side by side.

I can already visualise lots of these boulders being placed in various angles and rotations, with one or two possibly partially sunk into the ground with some of the existing foliage assets sprouting from underneath ... and possibly some cows grazing!

I’m sure they will be perfectly made with exemplary texturing and useable in landscapes throughout the World. Many of us will be looking forward to seeing these released.

Of course there is always the hopeful possibility that option (b) might become an extension to the original theme. I remember your cows being a single breed to start with!

Cheers
Casper

 

[steamboateng]

I say option b. as different locations have geological elements specific to the location. Looking forward to some granite rocks smoothed and shaped by ice age physics.
Yes, I'm greedy; but since you offered.................
Regards

 

[817TAYLOR]

i say go with (B)

 

[JackieG]

Well, umm, wow thats a hard decision! But I think i would like to see boulders of different sizes, even if theyre the same texture, we could rotate them to infer that they are different textures. So option A.

 

[Dinorius_Redundicus]

OK, it's option A - the same type of rock but in different sizes (and some variance in shape). Look, I may do another series for a different rock type later, but as I said at the start, this is just me practising normal-maps but I may as well publish the results if they turn out OK.

I was intending to make 1 large 'master' texture image from which I can cut different sections to make textures for individual rocks. In that way, each would be unique in detail, yet each rock would sit naturally with the others since their textures are sub-samples of the one master texture.

Linda (Shortline) if you're still reading this, can you tell me what a material library does and how to set it up? Can you point me to some existing asset(s) on the DLS that I can copy from? I'm not sure of the method or whether it applies given what I'm trying to achieve.

Casper (Mezzoprezzo) - these will be trainz-build 3.3 assets unfortunately.

Points made about colour brightness (Deano) and shape (Mezzo) duly noted. I agree and will do my best not to make those mistakes.

 

[paulzmay]

As there is no TrainzDev wiki page for mesh libraries, the best option is probably to download and examine the way someone like Linda (shortline) or myself have used them, especially in terms of config files.

From a modelling point of view, all of the meshes should be in the same directory in the mesh library asset, they should use identical material set up and names (of the name.m.xxxxxtex format), and that they are exported with up-to-date exporters (actually the 3DS exporter hack for GMax works).

So you would set up each model with an identical material set-up (using save-as when one rock is completed is a good idea), and just re-map to different sections of the texture as required with each rock. I got about 100 buildings out of this strategy... (search 'ML1' on the DLS).

The other nice thing about this method, is that a whole new set of rocks of a different colour can be generated by just replacing one texture, and changing some references in the referring assets' config files.

Paul

 

[BobCass]

Deane: This sounds really good to me..It would fit in my current layout of course it would fit most any where ..I would like too express my opinion too about it..I personlly think that using sandstone would be a good choice..sand stone is the softest of the three types of rocks(sandstone,metamorfic,igneous) Of course now you understand there is difference in hardnest in sandstone too..Sandstone is no doubt is probably the most scenic rock you can have..The texture finish I think it should be kept on the dull side, I think it would blend better with surrounding scenery and look more natural and if you can make them stackable..Color should be on tan or neutral side..My opinion..

 

[Dinorius_Redundicus]

Paul, thanks for that general description, it sounds like a material library is exactly what the doctor ordered. I will look at those examples and try to learn the ways. What a surprise this isn't in the Wiki eh?

...sandstone would be a good choice....

Bob, I agree. Layered sandstones do present some difficulties when texturing spheroidal objects (like boulders) though. The texture boundaries caused by just about any mapping scheme are often quite obvious and hard to hide if all sides are visible through rotation/tilting. Less structured rocks like massive basalt or granite are easier to do from that point of view. I will just have to see how it goes.

This should all be quite a learning experience for me. Thanks to all for your input, it has made for a very useful thread from my perspective.

 

[narrowgauge]

Deane

Libaries are easy to set up

In the config/mesh-table the first line under 'default' is 'mesh-asset <kuid:xxxx:xxxx' followed by the normal 'mesh xyz.im'

mesh-table
{
default
{
mesh-asset <kuid:44700:38852133>
mesh "vr_na_body.im"
auto-create 1

Make sure the library kuid is in the kuid table

The library has it's own folder and config.
Category class is 'BR'

Make sure there is a mesh table entry for one (any) of the '.im' files

mesh-table
{
default
{
mesh "invisible.im"
auto-create 1
}
}

All the other entries are just the usual ones.

 

[Dinorius_Redundicus]

I thought BR was for "Building Railway". That doesn't sound at all right for a mesh library. Does it matter?

 

[Dinorius_Redundicus]

Need advice on a normal-map problem

I made my first little boulder in gmax today but I got a wierd problem when applying my normal/specular map texture to it.

As you can see from the picture, the bumps on one side become valleys on the other. The side shown on the right-hand boulder has the "correct" appearance.

I was using a planar mode to apply the material so it should put the texture symmetrically on both sides of the rock. I thought it would intelligently know how to mirror the bumps properly. I know you can invert the green channel of the normal map to invert the bumps, and I've done that as a matter of routine. If I flip green the other way, I think that would just put the problem on the reverse side of the object.

So how can I get bumps to show consistently on both sides of a planar-mapped object? I'm sure I can't be the first person to come across this problem, but a forum search didn't locate anything useful.

~ D

p.s. I should add that I'm using PEV's Listener/Exporter to make the mesh.