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Posted by: Frank Silas Jan 7 2006, 10:32 PM

Ok, I needed to post this so that the Director can see where I'm at on developing my take on a version of trees and other vegetation for TWO. I'm using A:M ver 13 Alpha 3.

Problems:

1. There is no shadows being cast by the pine branches onto eachother. Consequently there is no
depth shadowing going on with the volume of leaves/pine branches. (working on a solution for that...it makes a big difference)

2. Pine branches/leaves are not casting believeable shadow on the ground or on tree trunk. (The branches/leaves are patches with 'cookie cut' images on them. They should still cast the appropriate shadows since this is how I've done hair in A:M ver 10.5 and it renders nicely.)

I'm working on solutions for these things, but I needed to post this WIP so you guys can see where I am as well as give me some insight on how to create or fake solutions for these effects. I'll continue to post here on this subject until I've arrived at renders which the Director feels are good enough for TWO. (Right now though, I have to work on my animation assignments first so here's what I have on trees...the technique so far. This is not the disired outcome so I'm still working on it.)















I used the Treez Plugin in A:M to create the tree trunk. Then I created the leaves/pine branches and rigged them. This model also has normal maps which don't seem to be doing much at the moment.

Frank Silas
http://www.franksilas.com

Posted by: Kamikaze Jan 8 2006, 03:14 AM

Super trees Frank, Hope you figure out the shadow problems your having, Ive been having a few problems with shadows on transparency map decals where the outline on the patch (and transparent area) shows a slight shadow-ish effect on nearby geometry.

Michael

Posted by: Paul Forwood Jan 8 2006, 05:41 AM

Thanks for posting, Frank.

It is helpful to see someone producing hair foliage in version 13. So far all my attempts to display my hairy trees in A:M13 have failed. They were all created in 11.1 and refuse to show their hair/leaves in A:M13.

I guess I will have to do more experimenting to see whether I will need to remake all the materials, or worse. Has anyone else had any luck getting A:M13 to display hair, particularly earlier versions of hair? I have just tried making new geometry and materials in A:M 13 but particle hair is still not working for me. Is there a new property somewhere that I may be missing?!

Keep up the good work, Frank!

Posted by: KenH Jan 8 2006, 08:08 AM

Nice tree! I'd suggest hiding the ends of all your foliage in the decal as some of them appear to be floating in air. It depends how close we get to them though.

Posted by: mtpeak2 Jan 8 2006, 09:17 AM

Paul, Frank is using cookie cutouts for the leaves, he's not using hair. Hair doesn't work for me either. I've sent in a report to Hash.

Posted by: Paul Forwood Jan 8 2006, 09:22 AM

Ahhhh!!! Cookie-cut patches!

Good to know it's not just me.

Thanks for making me focus, Mark!

Frank, regarding the shadows, have you tried using ray traced shadows from a klieg light? (Just guessing 'cause I haven't tried it yet in A:M13.)

Posted by: Frank Silas Jan 8 2006, 03:00 PM

Michael,
thanks. I'm sure I will have solutions for the problems mentioned shortly. I'm not having the same problem with the outline area casting shadows on nearby geometry. My problem is that the cookie cut out
texture should cast shadows on any geometry behind it including other cookie cut outs. This is not happening. I think I have a way to fake that though...working on it.

Paul,
I'm not using hair particles for the leaves. I'm using patches with cookie
cut textures on them, as Mark said. Each leaf patch has a bone which has an aim at constraint to a null. I constrain this null to the camera so that from the camera view the leaves/branches always display correctly. Since there are a lot of leaves/branches the effect is subtle. And yes I've tried using raytraced shadows from a klieg light. That's not working for me as expected in A:M ver 13. I need to send it into A:M reports.

Ken,
I agree. This is easily fixed by moving the decaled patches around. Also,
the tree trunk itself is rigged so that you can bend and pose the tree in different ways and the leaves will stay with the tree. That way you can make many different looks for (in this case) a pine tree.

Thanks for all of the comments and suggestions. I appreciate it.

Frank Silas
http://www.franksilas.com

Posted by: Frank Silas Jan 11 2006, 11:48 AM

Paul,
you were right! My klieg did not have cast shadows on. Now it does and the leaves cast shadows on eachother as expected which makes a big difference. It took me a while to find that setting. I guess it was off by default. I tried all kinds of things to to fake the look that did not work. I'm such a bone head. Anyway, I'm happy with this outcome as far as lighting goes, except I'm not getting the shadow on the ground quite the way I like it. But this is headed in the right direction now. Here are screenshots with the shadows on the leaves working.





I'll tidy up the leaf placement a bit (per Ken). Then I'll render a turn table movie so you guys can see
it in action and oh, here is a shot of the rig setup.


This tree is only 665 patches.

Frank Silas
http://www.franksilas.com
[/quote]

Posted by: Paul Forwood Jan 11 2006, 02:34 PM

It looks pretty good, Frank, but if you are going to use this technique of having cookie-cut cards, constrained to face the camera, how about making a middle card, or two, to carry the image of branches.

Posted by: zandoriastudios Jan 11 2006, 02:42 PM

Since the production needs of TWO are supposed to drive the features and bug priorities on V13--why do you have to do all of this work-around to do what you SHOULD be able to do with HAIR????

Posted by: Paul Forwood Jan 11 2006, 03:04 PM

Hair is fixed in the next version of A:M12/13. In the meantime I am using 11.1.

Posted by: KenH Jan 11 2006, 03:06 PM

I would assume hair would only be used for the close up trees. This is a nice solution for almost closeup to background.

Posted by: Frank Silas Jan 11 2006, 06:13 PM

Paul,
you're absolutely right. I'll throw some branch chards in there!

William,
this method is not a work-around, per say. This tree model is only 665
patches. That should render faster than a tree with particle leaves. Also,
it is easier to art direct this type of tree to get it to look more like the trees in the concept drawings and paintings. Also, the tree is totally animateable and the leaves can blow in the wind (rustle). On top of that you could have a lot of these trees in one scene. I'm putting together a test scene that I'll post shortly. There are advantages and disadvantages, but I think the prior far out wieghs the later.

Ken,
this works in close ups, too. For the far far background trees we can use a cookie cut image of a render of a tree on a patch and rig it like the leaves on the tree. I'm putting together a test. If it works I'll post all the files and project as well as instructions on how to work it. That way other people can play with it and take over from there, so that I can get back to animating.

Frank Silas
http://www.franksilas.com

Posted by: brainmuffin Jan 11 2006, 09:29 PM

If the patches are constrained to face the camera, it will look weird if the camera moves.

Here's an experiment of mine, using cookie-cut patches that are simply scattered around (I duplicated them by hand).



I also rendered a flyaround, where you can see that it needs to be a little denser in some spots.

It renders almost twice as fast as hairy trees, though.


Attached File(s)
 treetest2.mov ( 417.37k ) Number of downloads: 110

Posted by: Frank Silas Jan 12 2006, 01:10 AM

"If the patches are constrained to face the camera, it will look weird if the camera moves. " --Brainmuffin

That is only the case if you use large patches for the decals. They will rotate to face the camera and the rotation will be very visible. If you use a larger number of smaller patches for the leaves then the rotation will be very subtle. Here's a test render using my tree;



http://www.franksilas.com/twotree/frankstree.avi

Now this is just a WIP and I made it go fast enough so that you can actually see the rotation of the leaves. Even at this speed its extremely subtle. Now the method you show above that has the leaf cards not rotating to face the camera at all is the old school video game method of intersecting cards. The problem with that is at certain angles (top down) you don't see anything and at other angles you can see the 'X' made by the two intersecting cards. The method I'm showing here is the new video game method that is supported by both Microsoft for the Xbox 360 and Sony for the Playstation 3. It's also used in feature film work for special effects. All I've done is apply the technique in Animation Master. As you can see here it works fine. even at extreme close ups. Now the camera move I made in this test animation is an illegal camera move. I've 'crossed the line/broken the 180 degree rule' by doing a 360 degree rotation around the tree with the camera. So even though it does hold up under this camera move it is not even a realistic camera move to have. But if a little care is taken this type of tree will hold up from all angles with all camera moves. Once again this is just WIP to see if it would work in Animation Master. I need to take more care of my leaf placement, use a procedural texture on the trunk, paint in some more lighting effects directly into the leaf texture, and add a few cards that have branches on them.

Frank Silas
http://www.franksilas.com

Posted by: higginsdj Jan 12 2006, 01:14 AM

QUOTE(Frank Silas @ Jan 12 2006, 06:10 PM)

Posted by: Frank Silas Jan 12 2006, 01:50 AM

Thanks David,
On top of that this tree is totally customizable and animatable. Just create a new pose or action and you can have this one tree look like many different pine trees. You can bend the trunk and the leaves will follow to match the new form and they will still behave correctly for the camera. So we can have the trees swaying in the wind and have the leaves rustling too! ...with the characters walking through the woods with a hundred of these trees...all animated. And the Director could say I want these trees over here bent like this, and I want this tree's leaves to do that when the character walks by it...and we could do that for him.



...and this one was just a test. With this method the plants and trees can be more easily art directed to look exactly like the concept artwork.

Frank Silas
http://www.franksilas.com

Posted by: higginsdj Jan 12 2006, 03:01 AM

This topic is one of those forums that needs to be captured permanently!

Posted by: brainmuffin Jan 12 2006, 08:22 AM

Posted by: bob Jan 12 2006, 08:39 AM

QUOTE(Frank Silas @ Jan 11 2006, 11:50 PM)

Thanks David,
On top of that this tree is totally customizable and animatable. Just create a new pose or action and you can have this one tree look like many different pine trees. You can bend the trunk and the leaves will follow to match the new form and they will still behave correctly for the camera. So we can have the trees swaying in the wind and have the leaves rustling too! ...with the characters walking through the woods with a hundred of these trees...all animated. And the Director could say I want these trees over here bent like this, and I want this tree's leaves to do that when the character walks by it...and we could do that for him.



...and this one was just a test. With this method the plants and trees can be more easily art directed to look exactly like the concept artwork.

Frank Silas
http://www.franksilas.com

Posted by: zandoriastudios Jan 12 2006, 10:37 AM

QUOTE(Frank Silas @ Jan 12 2006, 02:10 AM)

Posted by: Frank Silas Jan 12 2006, 12:00 PM

Bob,
thanks! We can use this method to create trees who's look and animation are easily directed.

Brainmuffin,
the method that you are showing has been used in video games since the PlayStation One. So it's a valid, but older video game method. It does not hold up well on film, except maybe in still shots. The 'X' that the intersecting cards make can be seen from different angles. If you look straight down the 'X' (top down) then no textures on those two intersecting cards can be seen unless there is another texture at either end of the 'X' which simulates viewing from that angle. Hopefully by comparing the .avi I posted with the .avi you posted you can see the pros and cons of both methods.

William,
If that is possible how would you then animate the tree blowing in the wind and have the leaves also rustling after having 'frozen' the speed of the spriticles and held them for the life of the shot? Also, would the sprites behave the same way (always face the camera) if being 'held' for the duration of the shot? Add to which sprites are part of a particle system. Particles are invariably more expensive than simple geometry. I don't see any advantages of your theory over the method which I've demonstrated here.

Frank Silas
http://www.franksilas.com

Posted by: zandoriastudios Jan 12 2006, 12:56 PM

OK, I was just thinking it might be quick--but that is true about not being able to blow in the wind, but it could be a guick way to throw vegetation onto a distant landscape (though I like the hair system for that).

Posted by: 3DArtZ Jan 12 2006, 01:16 PM

Hey Frank, I'm just reading up on this stuff today.
I love the look of the trees, but I'm interested in seeing a forest of these that have leaves that always point at the camera.
I think it might be visible effect..... however, I don't know if it would be negative or positive....
have you run a test?

Mike Fitz
www.3dartz.com

Posted by: martin Jan 12 2006, 02:07 PM

QUOTE(zandoriastudios @ Jan 12 2006, 10:56 AM)

Posted by: 3DArtZ Jan 12 2006, 02:48 PM

QUOTE(martin @ Jan 12 2006, 12:07 PM)

QUOTE(zandoriastudios @ Jan 12 2006, 10:56 AM)

OK, I was just thinking it might be quick--but that is true about not being able to blow in the wind, but it could be a guick way to throw vegetation onto a distant landscape (though I like the hair system for that).

I missed the argument here? Hair is affected by wind, and Hair can be made to always face the camera. What's the advantage of this method?

Posted by: Paul Forwood Jan 12 2006, 03:03 PM

It's an interesting technique, Frank, and I think that you should persue it. I would at least like to see some examples in motion. The only thing I am struggling with is the relatively high patch count for a background tree. I know the patch count is not astronomical but when you add a few dozen it is probably much heavier than we need.

Have a look at the Oak tree wip that I just posted http://www.hash.com/forums/index.php?showtopic=18781&st=45&#entry154873 (Post 55). It is 332 patches and I'm sure that I could pare that down to about TWO hundred patches without anyone even noticing.

Anyway, Frank, keep up the good work. I look forward to seeing your progress.

Posted by: Frank Silas Jan 12 2006, 03:16 PM

Martin,
hey there. :-)
Some clear advantages of this method over using particle sprites for leaves is that is uses less geometry (including each particle as a piece of geometry that has to be rendered in that statement). Also, isn't using a particle system more expensive (render wise) than not using a particle system? Carrying on from there, less geometry per tree correlates to having more trees in a scene. Also the geometry is light wieght enough such that you can get real time playback which includes the leaves. (Great for the Director) Furthermore, since this method uses a texture that simulates clumps of leaves instead single leaves it is easier to create a texture set which looks more like the concept artwork using these cards than would be to get the same look with the sprite particles. I'm sure there are more advantages, but a picture is worth a thousand words so I'll post a .avi with a full scene filled with my trees and if someone else could post a .avi with a full scene filled with trees created using particle leaves then we can compare the two, and the render times. (Right now I'm at work so that won't happen til later tonight.)

Hi 3DArtz,
ditto. And in the meantime if you want to see some movies and stills using this technique in realtime enviroments click on the link here and
check it out http://www.speedtree.com/ if you go to downloads check out the Zera and Gothic III screenshots and movies.

Frank Silas
http://www.franksilas.com

Posted by: Frank Silas Jan 12 2006, 03:33 PM

Paul,
I don't think your 332 patch count includes all of the particle leaves. I'm not trying to fight with anyone. I love the work you've been doing with trees in your thread. We should probably use both techniques together where it would serve us well and seperately when the shot called for it depending on the strengths or weaknesses of each technique. I do apologize if I offended you by my robust espousal of this technique. If I offended you that was not intentional. I posted a motion sample on page one of this thread;

http://www.franksilas.com/twotree/frankstree.avi

When I get the chance I'll post a forrest animation.

Frank Silas
http://www.franksilas.com

Posted by: martin Jan 12 2006, 03:45 PM

Frank, keep up the good ideas. I'm simply hashing them around.

Per your example of "clumps" of leaves vs. individual "Hair" leaves - the bitmap for each "Hair" leaf could be a picture of a "clump" of leaves instead.

I think there is a "control" advantage to your method, if someone can just articulate it.

Posted by: Paul Forwood Jan 12 2006, 03:47 PM

Not offended in the least, Frank!
I am really happy to have your company in this quest for the perfect solution, especially from someone with your experience. Of course there is no perfect solution yet. That will come when we all have super computers that can handle a forest of fully detailed tree models in realtime. Until then we can do what everyone else does and take it one shot at a time. Add the detail where its needed and thin it down elsewhere.

The technique that you are exploring is just as valid as any other. I was only concerned about the patch count.

Onwards and upwards :-)

Posted by: Frank Silas Jan 13 2006, 09:53 PM

Paul,
thanks for your support. This commicating through writting alone is tough. I can't read anyone's face or body language to know if I'm communicating badly. You are doing some phenominal work over in your thread on trees and vegetation using the particle leaves. Truly great stuff.

3DArtz,
here is a quicktime of a Forrest of 50 of these trees. Please excuse the jerk in the camera toward the middle, and the lighting is my crappy three lights thrown in there for this test. Otherwise I think you can see that this holds up in a forrest of trees far away and extremely close up. This rendered in 12 hours on one 3Ghz Pentium 4 with 1Gig of RAM. I have 10 computers in my renderfarm so if setup I could render this scene in about 2 to 3 hours. Also, I want to test swaping out this version for a lower res version when the trees are not within a certain distance the camera's visible area so I can have a forrest with 2 to 3 times this many trees in a .cho and still have a workable realtime playback. I ramble on...here's the quicktime.

http://www.franksilas.com/twotree/franksforest.mov

Oh, I think you only see 30+ trees in this shot, but there are actually 50 in the entire scene. I'll move them all into camera view and fix the pop, then rerender. I'll post it next week. I really have to get my TWO shot animations in to the director first.

Frank Silas
http://www.franksilas.com


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Posted by: KenH Jan 14 2006, 07:25 AM

That looks good, but the camera is always pointed in the same direction. So, the leaves won't switch direction. I'd be interested in seeing the camera rotate round the forest.

Posted by: Paul Forwood Jan 14 2006, 07:42 AM

Sorry, Frank, I can't view this format. QT goes looking for a component and reports back saying that it can't find it.

Posted by: Frank Silas Jan 14 2006, 11:39 PM

Hi Paul,
It uses the H.264 Quicktime 7 format.

Frank Silas
http://www.franksilas.com

Posted by: Zaryin Jan 14 2006, 11:46 PM

Hey Frank, this method look very promising. I would also like to see a fly-around of the trees when you have the time.

Posted by: Frank Silas Mar 23 2006, 12:28 PM

I've rendered more scenes using the tree. I'll post those shortly. I also started testing a new way to construct the tree, which has lead to a different looking tree. Here's the WIP for that.

Frank Silas
http://www.franksilas.com



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Posted by: KenH Mar 23 2006, 01:04 PM

That's looking good! And it doesn't even have shadows yet!

Posted by: alweb Mar 24 2006, 11:19 AM

Nice tree frank !

Can you make some natural pose ? to use with it.

Also some with less branches , like pine...other with more higher trunk like Sequoia or this kind of tree they got on the west coast...

great model
Al

Posted by: alweb Mar 24 2006, 01:04 PM

Hi
I've just updated tree proxie into the props/tree svn dir.
Some of mine and Bod's

Franks, it would be really cool to see some of your technique over Bob's proxie tree.
kind of tall pine... the pine trees have less branches so it would be easier to deal with
...just a suggest

And what about a kind of "canope" with a trunk assembly going up ?...like the one used in the loonville proxie... it's a good idea and need to be explored further

Also I've notice some nice nature model into the prop\ misc dir...flowers and bush etc
it would help...for your nature setup (Jody and Fabrice )

I'm still waiting for Paul's landscape files...those available in the SVN are not reliable.
We need someone to get it from Paul and update the SVN with it.

Paul need a place to upload his files...any ftp available somewhere ?
(Paul doesn't have an access to SVN at this time )
Is there someone who can help us with that ? Noel ? Jody ?

Paul have quite nice pieces of landscape that we must look at.


thanks
Alain

Posted by: Frank Silas Mar 28 2006, 01:14 AM

Hi Al,
these trees are pose-able. So anyone can tweak them in the .cho for every shortcut if they wanted to. These are just my tests to see if it worked. Seeing that it does work I'll make some final versions of the different types. That won't happen for at least a week though. I'm also animating and I need to get my shots in this week.

Frank Silas
Animation Director TWO

Posted by: alweb Mar 28 2006, 09:35 AM

yes good

thanks Frank

Al

Posted by: Frank Silas Apr 5 2006, 02:59 AM

I'm working on getting a new scene rendered. In the meantime here is a ver 13 alpha 11 render.

Frank Silas
http://www.franksilas.com





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Posted by: ddustin Apr 5 2006, 03:12 AM

Frank,
Very nice work!
David

Posted by: KenH Apr 5 2006, 05:06 AM

Nice work Frank.

I hope John Henderson gets his Jack and the beanstalk short done soon because he's got some great trees and landscape in that from what I've seen.

Posted by: alweb Apr 13 2006, 08:35 AM

Hi
Great trees Frank! really!

I wondering the trees have a leafy profile/shape but got thorny leaf ?
the trunk is straight like on thorny trees but the overall tree shape isn't the usual triangle profile.
so I'm a bit confuse about the species of those trees.

Note that the modeler can re-shape your models to get the species they want...

BTW If someone would give a try in that direction...so we can pick a couple of species into SVN .
it would be very helpfull ...
( distorted trunk pine tree , straight grand sequoia, spruce, straight trunk white pine etc etc)

ok bye
Al

Posted by: smwolke Apr 14 2006, 02:38 AM

All,


I have been asked to post my work for the WIP garden giant plants on this thread. The design I am working off of are at:

http://www.hash.com/forums/index.php?showtopic=21286&st=0

Here is a first attempt. I will continue with the theme of variegated and well manicured plants in pots for the garden unless objections are raised.

Thanks,

Steve


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Posted by: KenH Apr 14 2006, 05:37 AM

Good stuff! You're pretty advanced for a "newbie".

Posted by: alweb Apr 14 2006, 08:31 AM

Nice Steve!
Please go ahead , we need more plant to fullfill the garden.

what about some vegetable ? pumpkin(your look great !) would be nice on the ground with their leaf
tomato plants ? raisin ? all this should be cool

thanks

Al

Posted by: smwolke Apr 18 2006, 12:27 AM

TWO Crew,

Here are some more previews of plants for a/the garden. I will continue to work on plants for gardens unless directed elsewhere. If I should attach the models and maps to these posts, in a zip file, please let me know. Also, thanks for the encouragement.

Steve


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Posted by: alweb Apr 18 2006, 05:36 AM

Nice stuff Steve!

If you can upload your files to SVN, put them in that dir.

data\Shared Data\Models\Props\Trees\Steve_plants

if not , you can zip and post them here... I'll upload them for you


BTW, you had a good idea to add a basic bone setup to your props so we can pose them easily

Thanks
Al

Posted by: Paul Forwood Apr 18 2006, 05:54 AM

Nice work, Steve!

Posted by: KenH Apr 18 2006, 07:53 AM

Wow! Keep it up!

Posted by: smwolke Apr 26 2006, 10:53 PM

All,

I would guess that I do not have permissions on the SVN, nor do I know the url of the SVN server, so you will find all the models that I have done, so far, attached. Included is a new tomato plant. Plants in spring how they grow so well!!!! Also please let me know if you have problems with the models.(Referenced materials, images,......)

Glad to help,
Steve


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Attached File(s)
 tomatoplant.zip ( 107.3k ) Number of downloads: 27
 pumpkin.zip ( 300.95k ) Number of downloads: 26
 tree.zip ( 289.15k ) Number of downloads: 25
 giantplant1.zip ( 144.04k ) Number of downloads: 23

Posted by: alweb Apr 27 2006, 08:15 PM

Ok thanks Steve,
Your files are uploaded to SVN... they're now v13

Al

Posted by: KenH Apr 28 2006, 07:48 AM

I'm really loving these Steve. Here's some more ideas for you to consider:

Carrots
Potatoes
Corn (for scarecrow to scare the crows from)
Cabbage
etc

On a side note, I remember seeing someone did a lovely sunflower recently.....

Posted by: zandoriastudios Apr 28 2006, 12:25 PM

There are some Bark materials in the TWO Library on the SVN that you can drop on the trunk. Nice work!

Posted by: alweb May 1 2006, 05:37 PM

Hi ,
Here a 360 movie of Frank's douglas pine tree.

I've lock the aim null to a stationnary one so the tree (map) bones always point to the camera.

Thanks
Al


Attached File(s)
 tree2.mov ( 284.24k ) Number of downloads: 64

Posted by: alweb May 3 2006, 10:52 AM

Hi
Frank, I've look at your single tree named: douglassfir.mdl
It use massive tga map.... up to 14 mb ! ( 4mb +4mb+3mb+3mb+193 kb)

This is really big isn't it ?...I mean for a tree.
Do you have a lighter map model of it ?

Thanks
Al

Posted by: alweb May 3 2006, 08:50 PM

Hi

I've worked since a couple days on a pine tree WIP.

I've uploaded my files into ...\data\Shared Data\Models\Props\Trees\Al_Trees
There is a .mdl and a .cho

pine_tree_Al1.cho
Pine_tree_Al1.mdl

load the .cho to get everything...force , light , action etc.

The tree use Marlin studio bark material
leafs are hair, I've brushed the leaf with the brush tool and other hair manipulation tool ( cool)

I've set bones so you can create other of the same species only with an action.
Also a choreo with two trees and a force to fake the wind blowing on trees( see the anim)

-the force magnitude is quite high (start at 8000 and full blow at 250 000)
-the root hair material force is -2000 at Y axis
-the choreo force is -100 on Y so other stuff would react normally...I guess

let me know what you think of this

thanks
Al





---------------------------------

This choreo show some bug: if you can confirm some of thoses :

1-the magnitude property data doesn't update as you move into frame...
you got to deselect the force in the psw and select it again to see the update d data of property

2- some rendering artefact appear here and there....the realtime render ar often more accurate than a progressive render

3-the camera color don't show up in final rendering

4-the hair map doesn't support blur...or greyscale in the cookie-cut map ( alpha channel ), only black and white


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Attached File(s)
 treewind.mov ( 343.89k ) Number of downloads: 48

Posted by: zandoriastudios May 4 2006, 08:59 AM

Nice work, Al!! That is the way I think we should be doing trees, especially for up close

Posted by: KenH May 4 2006, 10:59 AM

You're definitely onto something there Al.

Posted by: mtpeak2 May 4 2006, 03:28 PM

These were made using Marcel treez plug-in and hair. This was rendered in v11 so I don't know how well they will render in v13.


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Posted by: KenH May 4 2006, 04:02 PM

Wow. They're good close up too.

Posted by: Paul Forwood May 4 2006, 05:12 PM

These trees all look great!

Mark, have you tried giving those pines more height? The branches seem too close to the ground, or the branches too heavy, for such a short tree. Just stretch the trunks and see what you think. The needles and cones look really good.

Has the problem with dancing hair been fixed or are these not going to be used with a moving camera?

Posted by: zandoriastudios May 4 2006, 05:38 PM

IMHO, the trees made using Hair for the leaves are the best way to go for any trees in the set area (anywhere where the characters and props are going to be), beyond that we could use trunks emitting Hair "branches", and beyond that we can emit forests of hair "trees".
That give us 3 levels of detail that we can use based on the distance from the immediate area of action.

Posted by: alweb May 4 2006, 06:52 PM

Hi Mark
Those trees are cool
Where is this Marcel treez plug-ins ?
Is those trees can be uploaded to the prop\tree\mrX_tree ?

So we can look at it and play with the plugin


keep us posted about that
Thanks
Al

QUOTE(mtpeak2 @ May 4 2006, 01:28 PM)

QUOTE(zandoriastudios @ May 4 2006, 03:38 PM)

Posted by: alweb May 4 2006, 08:01 PM

here a "Q" render of the pine_tree_Al1.mdl

It look much better with hair than a progressive render (shift Q)

Al


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Posted by: zandoriastudios May 4 2006, 08:39 PM

I just finished uploading over 200 image files to SVN. These are alpha-masked trees,branches,leaves,plants,grass,hedges,etc. from Marlin Studios Foliage and Texture CD. (yes, Tom Marlin gave us permission to use this stuff for TWO).
I updated the TWO Library also, so you can pick them from there. So any materials of Forests or Trees with leaves that you make will be ready to go if you use these from the Library

So everyone start experimenting!

Posted by: Fab May 5 2006, 03:14 AM

Thanks for sharing William !

Posted by: mtpeak2 May 6 2006, 08:55 AM

Thanks Will and Tom, these are great. Here's a close-up using the branches from Marlin Studio.

Will, is there anything for conifer trees (branches)? I didn't notice anything, except the full trees.


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Posted by: alweb May 7 2006, 10:03 AM

Hi Mike

Put your tree-nature stuff into prop/tree/mike-tree as you work so we can get it too.

Thanks
Al

Posted by: zandoriastudios May 7 2006, 01:32 PM

Nice Mark!!

Posted by: mtpeak2 May 7 2006, 05:04 PM

Thanks Will.

Added folder to svn with 4 trees, bark decal and base hair material for leaves (edit shortcut in groups folder). Ill work on adding more.


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Posted by: KenH May 7 2006, 07:08 PM

Ooooo...now we're talking. For close ups, the trunks could use more individualisation.

Posted by: mtpeak2 May 7 2006, 07:41 PM

Not sure what you mean Ken, are you talking about the bark or the trunk itself? The bark is decaled it can be swapped out for another image.

Al, I hope you don't mind, I changed your hair image to something that I had. I didn't save it or upload the image to the svn. If you like it I'll upload the image and make the changes to your tree model.




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Posted by: KenH May 7 2006, 07:54 PM

That looks better IMO. What's that using....hair? About the trunks, I mean the very base where the roots grow. They just need some variety in that area with splines.

Posted by: mtpeak2 May 7 2006, 08:22 PM

Adding geometry will screw up the decals, there's only one decal and two stamps, these were applied by Marcels plug-in. so I don't know how well the the UV maps can be edited with adding geometry. Give it a try Ken, it's not my thing.

Posted by: KenH May 8 2006, 07:47 AM

If there's enough geometry it might not be necessary to add more splines (and break the uv setup). I'll have a look at it in a as soon as I can.

Posted by: alweb May 8 2006, 08:37 AM

QUOTE(mtpeak2 @ May 7 2006, 05:41 PM)

Posted by: zandoriastudios May 8 2006, 09:06 AM

I have been using the bark material, which is tileable. The Treez plug-in makes a decal?[I need to read up on that].

I like the direction that the trees and vegetation are going!
I'm rendering an animation right now that is of a "Woods" material that grows a forest of trees [5 emitters, but could be more...] using 20' tall hairs with some of the Marlin Studios tree images.
Set the overall tree height in the Hair system properties, and the length % in the emitters properties to a suitable height for each plant. Also--BEFORE YOU APPLY THIS--set the density of the system to something like .0005 (it will show as 0%, but it will behave as expected).
What I like about this is how easy it will be to populate a landscape with vegetation--you only need one material for a type of area, and you can just drop it on

TIP on Hair leaves,branches and trees:
Set "Direction variation" to 0%. If you don't, the hair seems to want to change it's orientation from the emitting surface as you rotate the view or move the camera [this is probably a bug--I will report it].

Posted by: mtpeak2 May 8 2006, 05:12 PM

Will, Marcel had a project setup with a gradient decal applied somehow to the base group of the test model, when the tree got generated in the action, the decal was applied to the whole tree, keeping the orientation of the decal in the correct direction (following the branches), then all you had to do was swap out the decal with the bark image. The model also had poses setup for thickness, branch length, locality and regularity to use in the action to change the shape, giving you alot of variation for one model (target group and action). This is the model I use and all I do is change the target group, adjust the poses and the action to create the trees. Finding a good target group is the hardest part.

Posted by: alweb May 8 2006, 06:49 PM

What are you talking about ?
Is this tree available on SVN ?

I would like to look at this too !


Thanks
Al

Posted by: mtpeak2 May 8 2006, 08:28 PM

OK, did a little experiment, this is easier than I thought.

Al, I think the treez plug-in is part of A:M now. This is what you do, from top view create a 4 cp ring, group select and name it base. Import bark decal, now from the front view (I don't think it needs to be the front) right click on the model in the PWS and choose new decal (do not apply). Create a canopy target, go to bones mode and add a bone to the target. Now create a new action (30 Frames, give or take) with the model, translate the canopy on frame 5 (up in the y axis), on frame 10 scale the target bone. Go to frame 0 and right click in the action window and choose plug-ins, wizards and treez. Go to modelling window and delete the canopy target, you now have a tree with an applied decal automaticly. The only thing you'll have to do is go to the image under the decal folder and go to it's properties and set the repeat on the y axis to between 20 to 50 or so (this can be set before you create the tree in the action), til the scale of the decal looks correct. Apply hair to level0 in the groups folder. BTW, my name is Mark.

Posted by: pdaley May 8 2006, 08:33 PM

There are several pages worth of manual at Marcel's site that give a complete desc on how to use Treez.

Posted by: alweb May 9 2006, 09:09 AM

This look cool !
I'll look at it asap

thanks Mark

Al

Posted by: mtpeak2 May 9 2006, 05:45 PM

Here's another tree I uploaded to svn. Al, I also uploaded you modified pine.


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Posted by: KenH May 9 2006, 06:44 PM

That's a fine pine. (Always wanted to say that) You've really nailed the leaves. This is the way to go for close up trees IMO.

Posted by: mtpeak2 May 11 2006, 04:31 PM

Here's another, it more of a shrub than a tree. The flowers aren't the right kind, but that's what looked the best from the svn.


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Posted by: zandoriastudios May 12 2006, 05:23 PM

Here is the test project I was using for a woods using hair trees... The motion-blur wierdness along the bottom is because I didn't know I needed a background rotoscope for the blur, but the particle trees look pretty good even full frame.


Attached File(s)
 tree5_7_06.zip ( 4.88k ) Number of downloads: 16
 woods.mov ( 925.51k ) Number of downloads: 43

Posted by: alweb May 13 2006, 10:28 PM

Hi
I'm trying to setup some hair-grass for the winkee-village.
I got some difficulty to achieve some result.

I want something fast to render with enought resolution for
a range of 10 feet view to large open view

...brief :a general purpose hair-grass who render fast

If someone have a WIP to share on this , I'll get some use of it.
... but it must render fast (around a minute for 640X480 for a valley of grass )

Thanks for any help

Al

Posted by: KenH May 14 2006, 07:50 AM

There have been good examples of grass. I think Paul F had one. Also, I remember an image in the contest of Homer Simpson running through some nice grass.

Posted by: zandoriastudios May 16 2006, 11:03 PM

Making a lot of different plant materials here at the Hash Bash....these will be easy to drop on a group and get instant vegetation


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Posted by: Paul Forwood May 17 2006, 03:24 AM

Very nice! That is the best mix of meadow grass that I have seen so far. Yes, I do remember the grass in the image that Ken speaks of, Homer chasing the doughnut, as being particularly lush.

It seems that something changed, some months ago, in the way hair arranges itself. I noticed this while working on tree foliage and grass that suddenly, after one update, it was harder to avoid an obvious repeating pattern especially if the hair covered a large area, as with trees and fields.

In the picture on the right this repetition is just slightly noticeable in the distant field. Though not too bad at this resolution what happens when TWO is projected on a large screen or displayed on a large television?

It is good to see that the Hash Bash is bearing fruits! Those trees look excellent!!!

Posted by: KenH May 17 2006, 05:43 AM

Well done guys. Looks like the Hash Bash is bearing fruits.

I also noticed that repitition that Paul mentions....

And I wonder how we'll handle the sky in the finished movie. To me the above sky is obviously a real photo.

Posted by: alweb May 17 2006, 08:33 AM

Nice plant and grass!
Cool!

On my latest grass-hair WIP of the winkee village , I've used the property driven decal diffuse color to get the color of the ground map to the hair grass, I've also use a special map for the density so plant grow where I want...a lenght map can be use too

I think those option are a must for large area...

The result is nice even if the overall look is a bit realistic.
If you can upload your WIP into the prop/tree/zandoria_nature
We would try them on the village to test ...

Maybe at a point in time, we will have to make a compromise between hair density/realism and computer rendering/performance...think of it in your WIP

Thanks
Al

Posted by: Zaryin May 17 2006, 02:59 PM

Even with the repitition that is fantastic looking. Great stuff.

Posted by: zandoriastudios May 21 2006, 09:37 AM

QUOTE(alweb @ May 17 2006, 10:33 AM)

Posted by: alweb May 21 2006, 10:22 AM

Hi Will

I know, but if you can put your WIP (model,action and/or cho) somewhere like in prop.
we would be able to look at your techniques and settings , like the image library and choreo layer.

Some aspect of a hair setup depend on WIP setting like the landscape dimension. decal property and other setting .... so having a material is good but having the wip where the material is put on is better...

About moving files, don't worry, I move only misplaced files, trying to keep thing in order
in my task area...

Will you can PM me at any time for specific discussion.
or let set a chat session on our AM13 community
I'm not very comfortable with skype...remember that I'm french, everybody speak so fast that I lost myself easily...

later
Al

Posted by: alweb May 22 2006, 11:49 AM

Will
I've look at the files you've make available on the SVN.
look good to me...I see some Paul's work on nature
...finaly Paul find a way to update the SVN with it ?coool!

The grass.prj (Paul's work )seem to use the same approach we had set on the Winkee-village.
...and The "decaled tree map" technique would look fine for mid-distance trees.

I'm searching for some "layer" choreo sample ?...
Is this stuff are in the animation area of SVN ?

Can you give us a status of what you've uploaded ?

Thanks
Al

Posted by: zandoriastudios May 22 2006, 12:30 PM

Paul used layers in the shots rendered at Hash Bash, so those shots in sequence 2 are what you should examine.

Posted by: alweb May 29 2006, 09:07 AM

Hi

How to make the hair patches to face a target like a sun , a null or bone and not the camera ?
Is it an option of the hair material to set ?

Thanks

Al

Posted by: KenH Jun 25 2006, 08:08 AM

QUOTE(mtpeak2 @ May 8 2006, 12:04 AM)

Posted by: mtpeak2 Jun 25 2006, 11:25 AM

As far as I can tell, translucency does not work with image based hair. Since the outer edges of the hair is masked by an alpha channel from the image, there is nothing visible to be translucent. In my tests all it did was add alot of render time with no visible difference in the leaf images. So, unless we model, lets say a branch with modelled leaves and assemble a tree in an action to make things a little easier, I don't think this will be possible, though I could be wrong. As for bugs life, I'm sure the leaves were models since they were so large and not a cookie cutout, which is basicly what image based hair is.

Posted by: KenH Jun 25 2006, 12:59 PM

Oh well. It's be a nice touch....probably added at the end if possible at all.