Terragen Documentation from Planetside Software - User contributions [en]

User Generated Content: Terrain

2009-05-30T06:07:24Z

Kaltook:

[[File:1Terrain.jpg]]

= Heightfield =

A heightfield is file that describes altitude. In a visually interpreted file it is shown in black and white. White represents the highest point, and black the lowest. Various shades of gray are everything in between.

Heightfields can be modified by various factors including, but not limited to: Colours, fractal noise, vertical height, erosion and rivers.

== Heightfield (load file) ==

Here you can import an externally made file to serve as altitude cues.

Terragen uses the following files.

Terragen Heightfield - *.ter
Bitmap - *.bmp
Targa - *.tga
Any - *.* -- jpg for instance, though not recommended as it's inaccurate

Example of a custom height map:

[[File:FootHM.jpg]]

Result

[[File:Footrender.jpg]]

== Heightfield (generate) ==

As the name suggest, this is a heightfield made within Terragen. The advantages to this:

* Stay in Terragen
* Easier to scale
* Can be adjusted by the same modifiers as the rest of the program

= Fractals =

Fractals (in this context) are how Terragen generates terrain that goes to the horizon.

== Power Fractal ==

[[File:PowerFractal.jpg]]

* Quicker to calculate and draw
* Based on Perlin Noise
* Can look more unnatural

== Alpine Fractal (Slow) ==

[[File:Alpinefractal.jpg]]

* Controlled mainly by scale and deposition (building up layers of sediment)
* More natural looking
* Slow

= Displacement Shader =

Various shaders which modify the underlying terrain.

*Fake Stone Shader -- Can be used in place of said object

*Crater Shader – eliminate the need for custom heightmaps for holes

*Twist and shear shader – windblown look, can create overhanging terrain

File:PowerFractal.jpg

2009-05-30T06:03:35Z

Kaltook: Power Fractal Example

Power Fractal Example

File:Alpinefractal.jpg

2009-05-30T06:03:09Z

Kaltook: Alpine Fractal example

Alpine Fractal example

File:Footrender.jpg

2009-05-30T06:01:28Z

Kaltook: Footprint Render

Footprint Render

File:FootHM.jpg

2009-05-30T06:00:54Z

Kaltook: Footprint Heightmap

Footprint Heightmap

Layman's Tutorial

2009-05-28T15:35:17Z

Kaltook:

This a very bare bones, (over-?) simplified primer to Terragen 2.

It skips a lot of stuff, generally when the defaults are fine. Hits all the main points though, and there's a few little tricks I picked up that some might have missed (even if you know 99.9% of the stuff here)

== Terrain ==

[[File:1Terrain.jpg]]

1. Terrain - To begin with, you'll need some terrain. We'll use Power Fractal here, since it's a good way to get it to go all the way to the horizon with a minimal amount of effort.

You can pretty much use the default values here - but feel free to play around with them.

== Camera ==

[[File:Camera.jpg]]

2. Camera Movement - There is a good chance that your terrain fractal will leave you under the surface (if you see a lot of black, that's what happened). If you click the strange symbol in the top right, it expands to this. I've labelled the buttons, but they're pretty straightforward.

Red text means - don't use this. Tilt view does what it sounds like, and while it may have 'artistic' merit ... meh. Zoom in/out isn't so great - In isn't so bad, but Out causes some very strange stretching (which shows up on the final render).

It's much better to use the centre controls and go closer/further with those. It's a digital landscape, so you won't get tired from 'walking'.

[[File:3BaseColours.jpg]]

== Shaders ==

3. Shaders - The base colour is the main part of your landscape, you can eventually cover it up with surface shaders (more on that later) but you should usually pick your main colours here anyway.

You'll notice that on the different buttons the main window only show a preview of everything to the LEFT (there are some exceptions). If you're on the "Shaders" tab, you won't see "Atmosphere" or "Water" - even if you've already put them in your scene.

[[File:4SurfaceLimiting.jpg]]

4. Surface shaders - can be limited by Altitude, Slope and a lot of other things. We'll start with just Min Alt. There is a trick to finding the right altitude which I'll get into when doing "Water".

== Water ==

[[File:5Water.jpg]]

5. Water - Not every render needs water, but it's worth covering here. It's somewhat limited (at least through this tab) so I've cropped out the top part ("Lake" is the only thing listed)

The important thing here is determining the altitude. Note the highlighted areas - the mouse is at a certain point, the y value at the bottom is where that is, and I've set the "Water level" accordingly.

You can also trial and error, but it takes longer. You can also assign a water shader at step #4 if you don't want a flat surface (and are prepared to wait)

== Clouds ==

[[File:6Clouds.jpg]]

6a. Clouds - as you can see there are a few types. If they are going to be prominent/close in your image I'd reccomend 3d. But 2d aren't too bad either.

Like water, you have an altitude, but you also have a depth.

I'm skipping over the "Atmosphere" bit for now, but feel free to play with the variables. Any of the changes here are noticeable quite quickly (Redsky, Bluesky, Decay etc).

[[File:6CloudsB.jpg]]

6b. Quality - Among the many (many) options for clouds is "Quality". It defaults to about 0.43 -- setting it up to 1 will make a rather noticeable difference in the final image (more or less 'grain' at the edges), but won't actually increase render time by much. Not that clouds are all that long to compute anyway (compared to rough water).

== Sunlight ==

[[File:7Sun.jpg]]

7a. Sunlight - the main thing here is Heading and Elevation. "Up" is the way the camera is facing. The yellow dot is the sun (duh?)

You can have multiple suns for that Tatooine render if you wish. Cheesy

[[File:7SunB.jpg]]

7b. Changes - Sun moved to "Up" and a lower Elevation - quite noticeable even in the quick/rough end of the preview render.

== Render ==

[[File:8Render.jpg]]

8. Render - There are 2 choices here for rendering, but you can add more, or tweak the ones that are already up.

The demo is limited to 800x600 and a quality of 1. Careful as the default, even for "Full Render" is much lower than this.

One other thing to note here - The button highlighted at the lower right - "Copy this view to Current Render Camera" if you more the view at all - DO NOT FORGET to click this.

== Final Image ==

[[File:9Final.jpg]]

9. The final image (that you saw in little clips above)

File:Zoomback.jpg

2009-05-28T05:46:40Z

Kaltook: Comparative shot of moving back

Comparative shot of moving back

File:Zoomout.jpg

2009-05-28T05:45:55Z

Kaltook: Illustration of zoom out

Illustration of zoom out

Terragen Tutorials

2009-05-28T05:35:11Z

Kaltook: Added Kaltook's Layman's Tutorial

== [[Beginner Video Tutorials by Neuspadrin]] ==
Some beginner video tutorials hosted on youtube, along with some helpful files, links, and tips.

== [http://nwda.webnode.com/news/creating-a-dof-in-tg2/ Creating And Applying A Depth Of Field Mask] ==
by Martin

Ever wanted to give convincing depth of field to your Terragen-renders?
Tired of laborous manually masking of fore- or background elements for depth of field?

Terragen 2 offers accurate rendering of Depth Of Field masks.
An extensive tutorial + example-scene + video can be found in the TG2-articles section here:

[http://nwda.webnode.com/news/creating-a-dof-in-tg2/ Creating and Applying A Depth Of Field Mask]

Enjoy!
Martin

== [http://nwda.webnode.com/news/terragen-2-atmosphere-clouds-tutorial-in-3-steps/ Cumulus Clouds Tutorial In 3 Simple Steps] ==
Beginner level tutorial by FrankB

Learn how to create nice looking 3D cumulus clouds in just 3 simple steps.
[http://nwda.webnode.com/news/terragen-2-atmosphere-clouds-tutorial-in-3-steps/ Cumulus Clouds Tutorial In 3 Simple Steps].

== [http://nwda.webnode.com/news/distance-shader-magic/ Distance Shader Magic - An Introduction] ==
by FrankB

This tutorial explains how to make use of the Distance Shader in various situations.
[http://nwda.webnode.com/news/distance-shader-magic/ Distance Shader Magic]

== [http://nwda.webnode.com/news/making-of-wilderness/ Making of "Wilderness"] ==
by Franck

This is a "making of", step-by-step tutorial on how the beautiful render "Wilderness" was created. It covers many areas of TG2 from procedural terrain creation, over to fake rocks, object populations and atmosphere.
[http://nwda.webnode.com/news/making-of-wilderness/ Making of "Wilderness"]

== [http://www.terragen.org/index.php?action=tpmod;dl=item258 Making of "On the Road"] ==
by old_blaggard

This is a tutorial that describes the entire process in creating my "On the Road" image. It includes a PDF tutorial and the file for the scene. It is an excellent beginner resource for those who want to follow the logic of an entire scene being constructed.

== [http://www.ironworld.org/mr_lamppost/TG2/guides/paintsky.htm Using the Painted Shader to “Paint” clouds into the sky] ==
by Mr_Lamppost

An easy to follow step be step tutorial showing how the Painted Shader can be used to control the positioning of clouds in a scene; effectively allowing clouds to be “Painted” onto the sky.

Please note the the Mr_Lamppost pages are very much under construction so many of the links to other pages are not working yet. Everything needed fror this tutorial works fine though.

== [http://nwda.webnode.com/news/intersect-underlying-explained-videos-/ Intersect Underlying Explained (with videos)] ==
by FrankB

Through two animations / videos, this tutorial explains and visualizes how intersection shift and intersection zone works in the "intersect underlying" feature of the surface layer. The tutorial focuses on the "displacement intersection" algorithm. This is particularly useful e.g. in creating convincing snow, that should cover up smaller terrain features.
[http://nwda.webnode.com/news/intersect-underlying-explained-videos-/ Intersect Underlying Explained (with videos)]

== [http://www.archer-designs.com/tutorials/terragen2/working-with-gis-data/ Blending Terragen 2 with GIS Data] ==
GIS Data primer by Ryan Archer

One of the greatest benefits of Terragen 2 is that you can quickly and easily import and use real world data and information in any of your renders. There is a great deal of data available for free download on the internet, but it can be fairly confusing to both find what you need and then figure out what it is you have. I will try and make sense of a few basic ideas and you can take it from there. Some knowledge about geographic information systems would be of benefit, but should not be totally necessary.
[http://www.archer-designs.com/tutorials/terragen2/working-with-gis-data/ Blending Terragen 2 with GIS Data]

== [http://www.archer-designs.com/tutorials/terragen2/splitting-objects-with-poseray/ Splitting Objects with PoseRay] ==
How to Split Objects into Multiple parts by Ryan Archer

This is a partially obsolete tutorial on how to split Object files into multiple pieces using PoseRay. Still of use for removing any elements of an object you do not need to see or waste resources rendering.
[http://www.archer-designs.com/tutorials/terragen2/splitting-objects-with-poseray/ Splitting Objects with PoseRay]

== [[Parting Sea Tutorial]] ==
By Mohawk20

This is an unfinished, quick and dirty tutorial to create your very own Parted Sea in just a few minutes (and then wait a long time while it renders).

== [http://forums.planetside.co.uk/index.php?topic=6511.0 Wet Shores Tutorial] ==
By Kevnar

A very nice and simple explanation on how to get shores to look wet in a scene.

== [http://www.mediafire.com/?mqnttk0tn2z Intro to the Fake Stones Shader] ==
By Neuspadrin

A intro into how to use the fake stone shader with other shaders to make boulders. You can also download my [http://www.mediafire.com/?1mmmjg54mzn final tgd file]

== [[Layman's Tutorial]] ==
By Kaltook

Confused? Never played with a terrain rendering program before? Might want to start here

Layman's Tutorial

2009-05-28T05:30:59Z

Kaltook: Very simple guide to T2

This a very bare bones, (over-?) simplified primer to Terragen 2.

It skips a lot of stuff, generally when the defaults are fine. Hits all the main points though, and there's a few little tricks I picked up that some might have missed (even if you know 99.9% of the stuff here)

[[File:1Terrain.jpg]]

1. Terrain - To begin with, you'll need some terrain. We'll use Power Fractal here, since it's a good way to get it to go all the way to the horizon with a minimal amount of effort.

You can pretty much use the default values here - but feel free to play around with them.

[[File:Camera.jpg]]

2. Camera Movement - There is a good chance that your terrain fractal will leave you under the surface (if you see a lot of black, that's what happened). If you click the strange symbol in the top right, it expands to this. I've labelled the buttons, but they're pretty straightforward.

Red text means - don't use this. Tilt view does what it sounds like, and while it may have 'artistic' merit ... meh. Zoom in/out isn't so great - In isn't so bad, but Out causes some very strange stretching (which shows up on the final render).

It's much better to use the centre controls and go closer/further with those. It's a digital landscape, so you won't get tired from 'walking'.

[[File:3BaseColours.jpg]]

3. Shaders - The base colour is the main part of your landscape, you can eventually cover it up with surface shaders (more on that later) but you should usually pick your main colours here anyway.

You'll notice that on the different buttons the main window only show a preview of everything to the LEFT (there are some exceptions). If you're on the "Shaders" tab, you won't see "Atmosphere" or "Water" - even if you've already put them in your scene.

[[File:4SurfaceLimiting.jpg]]

4. Surface shaders - can be limited by Altitude, Slope and a lot of other things. We'll start with just Min Alt. There is a trick to finding the right altitude which I'll get into when doing "Water".

[[File:5Water.jpg]]

5. Water - Not every render needs water, but it's worth covering here. It's somewhat limited (at least through this tab) so I've cropped out the top part ("Lake" is the only thing listed)

The important thing here is determining the altitude. Note the highlighted areas - the mouse is at a certain point, the y value at the bottom is where that is, and I've set the "Water level" accordingly.

You can also trial and error, but it takes longer. You can also assign a water shader at step #4 if you don't want a flat surface (and are prepared to wait)

[[File:6Clouds.jpg]]

6a. Clouds - as you can see there are a few types. If they are going to be prominent/close in your image I'd reccomend 3d. But 2d aren't too bad either.

Like water, you have an altitude, but you also have a depth.

I'm skipping over the "Atmosphere" bit for now, but feel free to play with the variables. Any of the changes here are noticeable quite quickly (Redsky, Bluesky, Decay etc).

[[File:6CloudsB.jpg]]

6b. Quality - Among the many (many) options for clouds is "Quality". It defaults to about 0.43 -- setting it up to 1 will make a rather noticeable difference in the final image (more or less 'grain' at the edges), but won't actually increase render time by much. Not that clouds are all that long to compute anyway (compared to rough water).

[[File:7Sun.jpg]]

7a. Sunlight - the main thing here is Heading and Elevation. "Up" is the way the camera is facing. The yellow dot is the sun (duh?)

You can have multiple suns for that Tatooine render if you wish. Cheesy

[[File:7SunB.jpg]]

7b. Changes - Sun moved to "Up" and a lower Elevation - quite noticeable even in the quick/rough end of the preview render.

[[File:8Render.jpg]]

8. Render - There are 2 choices here for rendering, but you can add more, or tweak the ones that are already up.

The demo is limited to 800x600 and a quality of 1. Careful as the default, even for "Full Render" is much lower than this.

One other thing to note here - The button highlighted at the lower right - "Copy this view to Current Render Camera" if you more the view at all - DO NOT FORGET to click this.

[[File:9Final.jpg]]

9. The final image (that you saw in little clips above)

File:9Final.jpg

2009-05-28T05:22:49Z

Kaltook: Final render of Layman's Tutorial

Final render of Layman's Tutorial

File:Camera.jpg

2009-05-28T04:51:39Z

Kaltook: Camera controls labeled

Camera controls labeled

File:8Render.jpg

2009-05-28T04:50:40Z

Kaltook:

File:7SunB.jpg

2009-05-28T04:50:21Z

Kaltook: Sun Settings Changed

Sun Settings Changed

File:7Sun.jpg

2009-05-28T04:49:41Z

Kaltook: Sun Settings - Default

Sun Settings - Default

File:6CloudsB.jpg

2009-05-28T04:49:12Z

Kaltook: Cloud Basics (2 of 2)

Cloud Basics (2 of 2)

File:6Clouds.jpg

2009-05-28T04:48:41Z

Kaltook: Cloud basics (1 of 2)

Cloud basics (1 of 2)

File:5Water.jpg

2009-05-28T04:47:51Z

Kaltook:

File:4SurfaceLimiting.jpg

2009-05-28T04:47:09Z

Kaltook:

File:3BaseColours.jpg

2009-05-28T04:46:38Z

Kaltook:

User Generated Content: Terrain

2009-05-28T04:45:47Z

Kaltook: Inital info

[[File:1Terrain.jpg]]

Terrain - To begin with, you'll need some terrain. We'll use Power Fractal here, since it's a good way to get it to go all the way to the horizon with a minimal amount of effort.

You can pretty much use the default values here - but feel free to play around with them.

File:1Terrain.jpg

2009-05-28T04:43:38Z

Kaltook: