Terrain Composer2 a next generation GPU powered terrain tool.

Hi, I have a question.

It looks like in a grass layer's filter you allow us to set an input type of image. Now I assume this means that we can distribute grass over the terrain on this image only correct? Meaning if we have splat maps setup with say three textures, we can use one of these three textures here as our grass input texture to only distribute grass on that texture.

Can you please give a little more detail how we use this, and or if it indeed does allow us to distribute grass over one particular texture painted out on terrains or not?

Thanks!

 

Option to tile in an x * 1 array instead of a square (2 * 2, 3 * 3, etc.)?

 

This will be possible in TC2 which will be released soon. As you can select images on colors now, not on channels. This is possible with TC2 and also it will be possible to directly select the splat images connected to the terrain as input.

Best Regards,
Nathaniel

 

I have this availible in TC2. Where you can choose any tile settings. Like 5x10 or 10x1, etc.

Best Regards,
Nathaniel

 

Are you still aiming for a June release for TC2? Can't wait for that update - basically you're bringing the functionality of some other much pricier unity components in one bundle...

 

TC2 upcoming features includes for example, Make custom splat textures by mixing them, creating more variation easily. Is there any examples or more information available about this feature?

 

I won't make June, It still needs about 1-2 weeks. But version 2 is going to be amazing, and yes think it has many assets combined, plus there no asset that can do what TC2 can do, I hope Unity is going to support it more when I release it. I you like I can put you on the beta team as I need people for testing it, I hope the beta version will be ready in a week.

 

I didn't make any feature examples or video yet, because I'm still programming. But I made this example quickly with 4 splat textures. What you can do with the mix feature is mixing the splat textures you assigned to the terrain into a new custom splat texture in a splat layer. So you can make it look that there's many more textures in there, but actually only use 4. In the example I mixed a sand and grass texture together, and also the other custom splat textures you see. If you have for example 8 splat textures assigned, then you can do much more mixing between the 8. You can also see the new slider system in the screenshot as well as preview windows.

There's many more features in 2, and I will update the list a bit.

 

This is exciting stuff. I bought TC but am waiting for the new version to really dive in. I can't wait!

 

I would love to be on the beta team, thanks!

 

If i want TC2.
if i buy now, update to 2.0 need extra update fee?

 

What I am missing from TC are landscape presets. Something like islands, canyons, rolling hills etc in addition to constraints like reducing/increaing height toward terrain ends would shorten prototyping a lot. Do you have plans to include something like this at some point or is it already possible with the current/next upcoming version?

 

That's a good question. TerrainComposer 2.0 update will be for free.

Best Regards,
Nathaniel

 

There are 3 landscape presets included (including the island tutorial). You can download 2 additional lanscapes, plateaus and canyons, from my forum http://www.terraincomposer.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=7&t=24

As for your question about reducing and increasing height at terrain borders. This is already possible, as TC is a blending powerhouse, it can mix whatever inputs together unlimited for all layer outputs. all you need is an image or 16 bit raw grey scale image. I recommend using a 16 bit raw image, because it has more precesion. What you can do is create a filter at the end of your last heightmap layer. Set input to raw heightmap and load your raw image. Then for example choose output substract. You can create the raw image in photoshop. Black is the area you want to keep the same height and white to fully substract. The best is to use an image size that is the same as your total terrain resolution or higher.

I will make more presets with TC2. With TC2 there's a lot more heightmap functions available, with TC2 you can create a custom island shape by using a circle combined with a perlin, and it will create a different shape everytime you randomize the offset. For now you could add a perlin to the raw heightmap to randomize it more. The advantage of using a raw image is that you can create the borders exactly as you want.

 

Thank you. TC is such a huge and complex tool. It takes a lot of time to recognize all the features and possibilities.

I am really looking forward to TC2. There are so many useful features looking at this list http://www.terraincomposer.com/upcoming-features/ and reading your replies. Considering I get so easily distracted from all these sliders already, TC2 might become my next tool of choice to kill time.

Another thing. I would like to add boundaries to my scene at runtime. It is easy to do manually, but with so many variations and possibilities, I'd like to add them via script. For that purpose I want to use TerrainNeighbors, which is only available in JS. Usually I don't want to fiddle too much with packages I buy, so moving the script to Plugins is not what I want to do, but for testing purposes I have no other choice. Do you plan to release your scripts in C#? I might have asked this questions before, or someone else. If this is the case, please forgive my ignorance.

 

TC is indeed a huge tool, and might take time to learn, but with TC2 it will be a lot more easier to learn, as you can directly see what changes in the preview windows and control them with the mouse, instead of having to move the sliders. I'm going to release a runtime extension after I release TC2 and also moving all the code to C#.

 

First of all, i love your work!
Don't want to put any pressure on you, as i know that good things take time. Out of curiosity, are there any news on the release of TC2? Also, i'm waiting for new videos

Suggestions:
Below cliffs there could be a splattexture for sliprocks and debris that came down the cliffs. I always paint this by hand but i think it could be automated somehow... Also a very cool thing would be to have flow maps like in world machine. They add so much more realism to a terrain if used properly.
Do you have any thoughts on rivers? They are so hard to do right, as there is no good way to see where rivers would run down the terrain naturally. At leas no way that i know of...

Thanks for your awesome work!

 

Many thanks . I'll have a TC2 beta version ready for testing soon. It's a lot of work to finish it as it has so many new features. I just finished the seamless multi terrain mesh converter.

As for the sliprocks, yes this can be done with TC very easily. As for flowmaps, indeed that would be great. It's part of erosion which is not easy to make. I already had the flow working erosion/texturing (test), so adding that feature I can do after I release TC2.

 

Will TC2 work with Unity 3.5.7 ?

TC2 sounds really interesting.

Especially this:
"(Extension) Create or mix terrain from Real World Data, Satellite Imagery and Elevation heightmaps. Can create multiple regions with each multiple areas, choose any resolution, tile size, zoom level within each area. I created an interface that looks like Google maps, etc."

Is the extension included with the purchase?

What do you mean by 'extension'?

thanks,

shwa

 

Yes TerrainComposer works from Unity 3.5.6 and up. You can mix any elevation data or satellite images already with TC. But with the world extension plugin it's possible to grap the real World data right from Unity, like Google Earth, it has an interface like google maps, can scroll over the entire world and select your areas, the areas are automatically saved, uses the highest quality source I could find. This is not included in TC2, but will sell it seperately, that's what I mean with extension. There's so much in TC2 for $90 dollars, I'm getting close to 40.000 lines of code, you can imagine how much work I put into it.

Also TC2 can stream directly from any size of heightmap. I tested it with a 7GB raw file of the entire world and it works great.

 

I could use something like this. Question though - it looks like in your videos you're 'drawing' with the mouse where you want trees, rocks etc placed, is that true? If not, how are you specifying how these are placed?

cheers.

 

They are not placed with the mouse. They are placed on rules which you can create unlimited through filters and subfilters. Like height,steepness, functions like perlin or a top view image where you can specify the colors where to place different objects,etc. You can combine the rules to create unique placement. In that way you can create a massive textured terrain with vegetation, etc within a few minutes.

 

This is exactly what I've been waiting for, and though its sad to hear it wont be part of the update, its totally understandable considering the current climate of the unity asset store / capability. Any chance of an ETA for the beta / update, and a general estimate of price for the real world data addon?

 

This looks absolutely amazing.
I too would like a price indication for the extension. I'm looking for a more affordable solution to get real height data into terrains in Unity.
There are 2 or so plugins for this but unfortunately both cost quite a lot.

 

The prize of the Wold extension will be about $55, the quility of my extension is behond what's out there at the moment for Unity, 10 meter per pixel elevation data for the USA and 90m for most of the rest of the world and 0.25m per pixel satellite images, fitting perfectly together. you can already sign up for a beta, I will have it ready in a few days.

For the moment TC2 is needed, but I will make it run as standalone also.

 

Is there any way to get elevation data as good as the image data? (0.25m too)?

 

Sounds good, I'm keeping an eye out for further development

 

There are not any sources out there at the moment, that offer a higher elevation data resolution. If you find any let me know . We are talking about huge data here. If height elevation would be 0.25m, 15 x 15 km of terrain would already be 15000x4 = 60.000 res for 15 km -> 60000x60000x2 = 7200000000 bytes = 6,866 Gb, the satellite image uncompressed will be 13.73 Gb...That's how big resolution it is...

Here's some quick examples I made:
http://www.terraincomposer.com/terraincomposer-version-2

If you would want more detail, with TC2 you can add more erosion look to it with perlin or other type of noise like cell noise, multifractal and billow. But especially the heightmap data from the USA looks awesome.

 

I cant wait for this update, my teams project is essentially on hold to use this. Also, $55 is still an awesome price considering the features. Do you have a donate button on your site? This amount of innovation should definitely be encouraged.

 

Aye i understand the size perfectly, i'd be fine with that (i work with 300GB meshes out of world machine with no problems before optimization at the moment, so getting good resolution real world data means i could include it in my WM workflow, if why i was wondering).

 

I too am anxious. You said we can sign up for beta on the extension already; how?

 

Yes you can add it into WM and apply erosion to it to make it more detailed for the 90m elevation data outside the US. Wow 300GB is huge. How do you get those meshes into Unity?

 

I don't. I optimize them down to 1% out of unity a most of the detail is kept still

 

If you send me an email with the request. I will add you to the beta user list.

 

Oh I will make a hurry then. Tommorow I'm going to finish the node based schematic view, which is also in TC2. And then I will make the beta's ready. I don't have a donate button at the moment. But if you want to make a donation you can send it to my paypal account which is the same as my email address: Nathaniel_Doldersum@hotmail.com

 

Amazing screenshots, cannot wait for TC2 and the extension. Only 55$ for such quality, that's really impressive. I hope you add more tutorials so we may reproduce such terrain quality.

 

Thank you. I did nothing special with it. Only selected an area, choose the export resolution, and clicked the elevation and heightmap export buttons. 1 big raw file is exported which can be assigned in a filter. And the satellite images I used as splat textures with tile size the same as terrain size. That's all...just standard terrain shader.

Yes I will make more videos and presets for TerrainComposer2 and the World Extension.

 

Very curious about the world extension. I'm very likely going to buy it.

Can you explain, in a simple way how one would use this?

E.g., can one create a scene in unity where the viewer can choose an earth location,
and then flythru that space, and continue flying for miles and miles?

Meaning, say a viewer choose the geo co ordinates of Yosemite National Park in the US.
Will they be able to fly thru it, for miles and miles?

Then pull back, and quickly fly another 200 miles somewhere else?

How would your extension deal with lakes/rivers/oceans?

thanks,

shwa

 

Shwa, if I understand it correctly, the World Extension is an editor tool, not a runtime extension. So you'd be building the stuff you describe yourself. The extension just makes it easy to create those terrains from real-world data.

 

Like Dbrian says it's an Editor tool and can you build the area yourself, customize it with TerrainComposer placing trees, grass, objects etc.

The runtime would be interesting as the code is as good as there, but you would also need approval from the source provider which is free, but if you're going to use it heavily with many users using it that way it would use a lot of calls for the elevation. It might become a future feature.

 

Thanks Dbrian and eagle.

Best for me to simply check it out, once it's for sale.

Eagle, if you haven't already, i suggest having a demo scene included in the world extension so people can see it in action before they climb the learning curve.

 

Yes that's a good idea, thanks. I will also make a short video how to use it, as for a learning curve it doesn't really have any, can be learned literally in 5-10 minutes.

 

Hey purchased it a few hours ago and so far i love it, though i have already the first question...
how do i use a splatmap that comes from unity? I have a terrain already finely painted and i want to use the splat map... basically i want to use TC to split my terrain into 64 tiles. the aim is to make use of occlusion culling and increase the resolution of the hightmap. I had no problem getting the hightmap onto 64 terrains, However, i cant wrap my head around how to reuse the normalized 4 channel PNG file that unity produces. I have some ideas but they are more work than i expect it would be with a powerful tool like TC, so i thought i ask!

Thanks in advance!

PS: I already love TC and surely will write a good review but first i have to understand more of it!

 

Thank you for the purchase. That's a good question. TC 1.04 can't read color channels seperately. So this is only possible if you would extract all 4 channels into 4 images with an external program like photoshop. So one image red, one image blue, one image green and one image alpha. Then you can use those images in a 4 filters and spread the splat map over the 64 terrains. If you contact me at Nathaniel_Doldersum@hotmail.com I can send you version 1.06, which makes selecting splat textures easier.

In the comming version 2. Splat maps can be used directly as channels can be read seperately. And version 2 includes a terrain slicer which slices multiple terrains in 2x2 each (repeatable, so 1 terrain -> 2x2 terrain -> 4x4 -> 8x8 -> 16x16, etc). All data is kept intact (heightmap,splatmap, trees and grass). I'm almost ready with releasing the beta of version 2, wich is a free upgrade. TC 1.04 is just a little brother of version 2.

Best Regards,
Nathaniel

 

Thanks! I just sent you an email about this!

 

I just spent the past couple hours watching your instructional videos and learning more about Terrain Composer. It all looks and sounds REALLY flexible... which is great, but there were a couple questions I had that have so far eluded my searching...

1) Semi Random Terrains... what I would like to be able to do is start with a lores heightmap texture to use as the base layer. Then use the awesome random noise functions to add higher res detail to that base terrain (without destroying the overall geographic features). Possible?

2) Export... being able to export the entire terrain data/splats/textures for use standalone in other Unity projects. I noticed an "export" button in your screenshots but was unsure of it's function.

3) I see road texture/geometry in some of your screens. Are these roads placed procedurally with Terrain Composer? And if so do you have any tutorials/videos/ or notes explaining the process for this?

4) I can see myself spending hours and hours exploring thesettings and features here... Is there a an overall save/load function that you can use for the entire setup which can then be loaded and applied to different heightmaps when needed? I'd like to be able to explore settings on a smaller terrain, then save and apply everything to a much larger and more complex terrain after the fact.

5) and lastly you said "Also TC2 can stream directly from any size of heightmap. I tested it with a 7GB raw file of the entire world and it works great. " when you say stream... do you mean that you can generate terrain realtime from within a running program? Because if this is what you meant then I think my head is going to explode!!!

 

Thank you for the questions.

1). Yes that is possible and much more, like blending different heightmaps, etc.
2). Unity has this feature build in, that you can export packages of terrains, textures, scripts, prefabs, etc. The export function is for exporting a heightmap/colormap/splatmap.
3). TerrainComposer cannot do an overlay road mesh. But however with TC2 you can make the terrain ready for roads, like smoothing, lower/higher terrain only where the road is. It's possible to do road splat textures. But then you have to think of a dirt/rock road without stripes.
4). Yes there are multiple load and save function. You can save/load a whole project, a group of layers, a single layer and self created color ranges.
5). Yes this is possible, can do it from editor or in runtime, as TerrainComposer works in runtime too.

 

"I tested it with a 7GB raw file of the entire world and it works great."

Wow.

/shwa

 

Awesome stuff! I'll be sure to send some extra cash your way when I pick up the update as its still pretty cheap. Cant wait for TC2.

 

holy crap man

this is going to help so much
this should be standard for unity..!