Wamasus Hills Development

[Ibsen's Ghost]

I started assembling items for the Wamasus Hills. It shouldn't be too hard a task from the design point of view as it will be a fairly barren preset compared to the dense landscapes we have elsewhere. However, as my colour sense is utter crap, I could really use some help in establishing the overall look for this one.

I figured I'd go for a preset based on the Colovian Highlands but thought I might try reddening the textures for a unique look. I attached the textures I adjusted here but feared that this might be too red and garish and may conflict with other items that I planned to use such as the rock and tree textures in the last shot.

I can, of course, darken what you see here but I have no idea about 'conflicting colours' due to my colourblindness.

For my own reference, I added a 'colour burst' of red with saturation set to 45.

[Koniption]

Maybe you can use trees that have a more reddish tree trunk?

The rock already has some red undertones, that should blend ok with the terrain/land textures you posted up.

I know the giant redwood trees of California grow in reddish dirt:

http://www.image-archeology.com/Tunnel_D...P41527.jpg

Tree vs Landscape Textures:
If nothing else, leave the tree trunk textures as they are. But when you do the terrain landscape blending , use "terraingrass01" or "terrainmoss01" directly under the trees & somewhat around them, so that the green in those terrain textures helps blend the transition from mossy tree trunk to green-ish terrain.

Also, when you do landscape "vertex shading" under and around the trees, try to use a shade of green that is on the moss in the tree trunk texture itself, since the tree's trunk is a brighter and darker shade of green than what is in the terrain textures. This will help further blend things in. Use this layer of darker/brighter green under the tree first..then afterwards, you can use a darker black/grey shading immediately under the same trees, but not as far from the tree trunk as the brighter/darker green vertex shading extends.

In the open land area, where the trees are not standing, use the other textures.


Rocky Textures:
Also, use "terrainrockydirt01" and "terrainrockymoss01" under and near larger rock/cliff objects, so that it give the impression that those rocks/cliffs have pieces chip off them from time to time, that fall down around them.

Koniption

[Ibsen's Ghost]

Some of that is a natural feature of the region editing anyhow as the textures that appear near rocks are very likely to be the rocky ones. Also, the moss and grass textures are perhaps the most common, certainly in the grassy, flatter areas where the trees occur so that should be fine. I like the point about vertex shading with a tinge though....I'll bear that in mind.

I'm not sure if I can change the tree's texture though. I tried doing that with the charred trees so that their trunks were aged rather than burnt. I found out it couldn't be done as the tree always sticks to the original texture that it was created with. Weirdly enough, it remains even when I delete the original texture from the tree texture files.

I sent MD a PM to see if I can get more varieties of this tree. If he can then I might consider asking if he'd be able to adjust the branch texture too. I'll be taking a look at options for Reaven Fenlands as well so more on that one soon too...

[Koniption]

Only use the green tinged vertex shading if you stick with the type of mossy, non-red tree bark in the screenshot you uploaded in OP. Otherwise, if you use a tree with red-tinged bark, don't worry about the green tinged vertex shading.

Yeah, you can ask MD about different trees with different textures. I still need to make that cocoa ingred model and cocoa tree trunk model for him, now that you mention it....

Koniption

[morcroft]

Just PM'd Ibsen before I read this

Basically the time consuming parts are texture and billboard creation. And selecting the seed for a good looking tree - but that's mostly about not falling asleep while you look a 200 deformed trees.

If you just want a different shape then I can create new seeds fairly easily. New bark textures means new billboards as well as correct leaf-texture conversion so it's a bit slow.

Not quite sure how the bark texture is stored, but yes: the file is defined in the spt.

[Ibsen's Ghost]

Thanks folks. If the file is defined in the spt, does that mean it's possible to just switch the old texture with a newly tweaked one? I'm pretty sure this doesn't work as I think I remember trying it before...but do you know any different?

Failing that, I think I may actually opt for the idea of creating new seeds, if that's okay with you. Doing things like vertex shading for this region shouldn't be too hard with the specifications that KP suggests. After all, there won't be too many trees around on the landscape to begin with and I'm pretty sure there won't be that many clipping issues.

[Ibsen's Ghost]

I sent a PM to MD about the trees. :check:

I decided to go ahead and use the Colovian Highlands as a preset for the Wamasus Hills. I can't imagine finding another more suitable layout. Other than the ground textures and trees, however, I think I pretty much have everything I need. I'll nevertheless be taking a good look at the initial region generation once it's done but we remain quite well-stocked in terms of trees, flora and the like.

[Ibsen's Ghost]

I managed to sort out the rocks and textures for this region. They look a lot better than what I had originally planned as I decided to go for making use of some of the stuff inside the Sheogorad landscapes. These and other pieces fit together rather well. :yes:

[Mizreg]

I was wondering, does the landscaping happen by hand or with region generation and heightmaps and stuff. Which as the matter of facts are all way to much for my pc to handle.....

[Ibsen's Ghost]

Yes, it is a task generally negotiated between myself and sandor. I set presets such as the models, choose a vanilla landscape to base it around, find the editor IDs for each model to replace items with and so on. Sandor then generates the landscape and switches the models around.