Animated grass - test map

[Arcturus]

The truth is I don't expect people using more 3d modeling applications. I just wanted to show some possibilities that lie in Doom engine and what people do with it it's up to them.

[nbohr1more]

Don't feel bad Tels.

 

Arcturus is an artist of such caliber that any output from him would be noteworthy. Think of how much acclaim Super Mario Galaxy got even though the hardware and rendering methods were essentially DX7. Art work will always have a perceived edge. Yes, the demonstration is a little disingenuous because the LOD portion is broken but the intent was to use it and the end user can use this to model the intended use of the technology.

 

What you have created will allow mappers like BikerDude, Sotha, Melan, etc... who are not (AFAIK) Blender experts to achieve something similar. It will also shorten the build process and optimize in scenarios where other optimization efforts are very difficult or impossible.

 

And... point taken about dynamic object distribution but if the the mapper can do what Arcturus did and has the entity budget for it then "why not" unless it performs poorly.

 

Your SEED system will get a proper introduction eventually. It would be cool if Arcturus had used more of the features but I imagine that another mapper will step forward to help you demo the stuff if not use it throughout a real mission.

 

Anyone wanna volunteer for "SEED boot-camp" and help get a nice demo done?

[AluminumHaste]

I've been trying with my canyon map. I manually placed about 2000 trees, but the SEED system is perfect for this so I tried getting it to work. I failed.

But that was a while ago, when SEED was just being introduced to the code base, so I'm going to try it again.

[Sotha]

volunteer for "SEED boot-camp" and help get a nice demo done?

 

Well, my WIP is gonna use SEED with randomly generated vegetation.

 

The learning process reported here

http://modetwo.net/d...post__p__255491

 

But yeah, this is simple usage, but usage nonetheless. BTW: Did anyone know that those SEED entities slow down the delay between clicking the "mission loaded" dialogue and the start of the mission something like 1-3 seconds? This might be very significant for missions with a lot of SEEDy things. Just givin' the heads up.

[fllood]

I practically abandoned this map... I was able too finish this map only because I new how much was left and the fact that from the begining it was supposed to be only a small, test map was motivating. Right now I'm pretty burned out when it comes to mapping. Sorry.

 

Arcturus, is this "practically abandoned" work the map you passed on to Bikerdude to complete??

 

If not, please consider commiting it here for adoption.

Edited August 11, 2011 by fllood

[lost_soul]

Really cool looking map! I get very good performance on a GTX460 OC and Phenom 2 X6 1075t.

 

The only thing that kinda detracts is the full-bright splashes when the player dives in the water. I wonder if the ambient light can be applied to that effect... but it really is a very minor thing.

[Arcturus]

Arcturus, is this "practically abandoned" work the map you passed on to Bikerdude to complete??

 

If not, please consider commiting it here for adoption.

I'll consider.

 

The only thing that kinda detracts is the full-bright splashes when the player dives in the water. I wonder if the ambient light can be applied to that effect... but it really is a very minor thing.

Yes, splashes should be toned down. It should be easy to do.

[Springheel]

It should be easy to do.

 

I'd like to see that as well, but I have no idea where it is located.

[Mortem Desino]

It should be easy to do.

I'd like to see that as well, but I have no idea where it is located.

I looked into that some years ago. Right now, they're all particle effects (so they're fullbright: light does not affect particles).

 

In retrospect, it would be better to create a Doom 3 FX (light + particle), and/or a dynamically stretching model, but I'm no 3D artist.

[demagogue]

Haha, I showed this to my girlfriend and she was blown away by the little castle and stairs and door and water, but then wondered why everyone seemed to care so much about the stupid grass.

I tried to explain about poly & entity budgets & FPS, but I can see her point from a player's perspective.

[Arcturus]

I looked into that some years ago. Right now, they're all particle effects (so they're fullbright: light does not affect particles).

 

In retrospect, it would be better to create a Doom 3 FX (light + particle), and/or a dynamically stretching model, but I'm no 3D artist.

One can change transparency of the particle. It should be somewhere on the list in particle editor. Ideally it should be 'heat haze' effect, but I think it would be obvoiusly square despite having a proper normalmap. Someone could try that.

 

Haha, I showed this to my girlfriend and she was blown away by the little castle and stairs and door and water, but then wondered why everyone seemed to care so much about the stupid grass.

I tried to explain about poly & entity budgets & FPS, but I can see her point from a player's perspective.

Delete all the grass from the map and ask her if she sees a difference.

BTW, I recently played Crysis. Man, now that's a good looking flora. And fauna too.

[Tels]

Delete all the grass from the map and ask her if she sees a difference.

 

 

BTW, I recently played Crysis. Man, now that's a good looking flora. And fauna too.

 

Oh yeah. I wish we had more and diverse florr models, and maybe animals, too. (little songbirds might not fly+sing at night, but some squirrels and what they are called etc).

[Springheel]

Right now, they're all particle effects (so they're fullbright: light does not affect particles).

 

Particles don't have to be fullbright do they? Didn't Dram make particle trees that were affected by light?

 

If the texture is using an additive blend (which is what it looks like) then at least darkening the texture file could take the edge off.

[lost_soul]

For a laugh,

be sure and spawn some AIs while you check out the map. The guards that are already walking around will attack them but not you! Also, he has equipped you with tuns of gear. This is a great map for just fooling around on.

[demagogue]

Delete all the grass from the map and ask her if she sees a difference.

 

Or just look at any other FM, almost none of them have grass. But she wasn't saying the grass didn't look good; it looks great and wouldn't be near as cool without it, no doubt. That's kind of missing the punchline. She was just looking around and thought the castle & water were amazing, then she comes to the forum and wonders why everyone's talking about the grass and not that, haha. It's just funny because she's looking at the map with a completely different perspective of what's "amazing" in terms of beauty & achievement than we as mappers have, who know the tech.

 

E.g., It may be "just grass", but having it rendered all in one scene makes it a big deal to us; and that door may look awesome, but it's still just normal door with a pretty photo & shaders pasted on; the walls & stairs are special because they were hand modeled (I think), but having modeled arch itself isn't new; and the water *is* cool, but all we have to do is set a few settings & the engine does the work; etc... That's why you can have this beautiful scene and the name of the thread is: Hey, check out this GRASS, haha... which, so there's no confusion, I personally love. I've been wanting good outdoor scenes in TDM forever. And yes, Tels, I was in love with the screenshots of your little SEED'd grass testmap too <3 <3

[Flanders]

I like the demo even though it doesn’t run well for me. But using animated models for grass doesn’t sound very flexible. If you use a shearing texture you can do all kinds of things with shaderparms, making it moving faster or slower, maybe even making the swaying time and place dependent so you can have wind rolling over a field of grass. You can even add a sound shader to it and make the grass sway with the sound of the wind automatically. But I must admit I haven’t tried this extensively, making up a formula for the swaying is difficult enough, I tried some simple sinusoids but that makes it look pretty robotic.

 

 

[SiyahParsomen]

terrific!

 

I wish there was beyond after that door.

[Bikerdude]

I wish there was beyond after that door.

Something is being done about that...

[SiyahParsomen]

Something is being done about that...

 

nice to hear that biker

[Glyph Seeker]

Great stuff Biker - you're a power house of mapping. =-D

[Bikerdude]

Heh, its gonna be a castle compound with lots of nooks and crannies. Think of that T2 mission a few months ago called "When still" and you get the idea. But its gonna be a while as I haven't even started it yet.

 

I will however be releasing an very much updated version of my very first map "Business as usual", think of "Rttc" and "A score to settle" - v2 will be a mini homage version of those.

 

[lowenz]

Happy birthday to my preferred techdemo map

 

Edited August 9, 2016 by lowenz

[NeonsStyle]

WOW that is amazing. It just looks sooo good, be amazing to have that in levels. I know my level is in need of grass lol.

[Arcturus]

Thanks It's been 5 years already? You have rather low fps there. It could be optimized a bit more today. Back then there was no LOD for animated models.

[peter_spy]

I know I'm late to the party, but this is fantastic Also very useful in terms of scale for nature / outdoor sections.