[WIP] Lighthouses mod

[gap]

Originally Posted by Kendras

Hi !

I can't wait to see how your rocks and reefs look like !

Just found a good tutorial on how to generate a mesh from a grey-scale heightmap using Blender.
It might come in handy for creating natural-looking small islands, rocky reefs, skerries and shoals

Originally Posted by gap

Just found a good tutorial on how to generate a mesh from a grey-scale heightmap using Blender.
It might come in handy for creating natural-looking small islands, rocky reefs, skerries and shoals

Fantastic !!! This will help us a lot ! Just have to find good maps.

[gap]

Originally Posted by Kendras

Just have to find good maps.

Yep, real or fictive

Let me know if you find any which might fit our purposes, otherwise I will see if I can generate any using Photoshop

[Jeff-Groves]

Take into account that the terrain in SH3 is pretty much a guess and limited by how it is created and edited.

Wonder why the Kiel Canal is not perfect?
It's the limits of the Game Engine.
You can not change that.

For every 3D model you create, depending on where you place it?
You will need to make more.

I can see editing of the terrain as a partial fix.
Just gonna depend on where you put them.

Originally Posted by Jeff-Groves

Take into account that the terrain in SH3 is pretty much a guess and limited by how it is created and edited.

For every 3D model you create, depending on where you place it?
You will need to make more.

I can see editing of the terrain as a partial fix.
Just gonna depend on where you put them.

Not at all.

PROS/CONS :

Originally Posted by Kendras

Location unit

+ icon is visible anywhere on the map, it's also possible to add colors to the icon
+ always placed at the same altitude, whatever the depth of the sea

- 3D model placed into/under the ground if the land is higher than 5 meters.
- not possible to custom the LH with an .eqp file

Land unit

+ no problem if placed on a land with altitude (will always be placed on the ground)
+ possible to custom the LH with an .eqp file

- altitude depending on the depth of the sea (the 3D model can be submerged)
- visible on the map only when in visual range, always green icon (for neutral units) but this can be solved by this trick : a land unit with no icon + in the locations.cfg file (at same placement) with no 3D model but with the icon of LH visible from everywhere !

Originally Posted by gap

Yep, real or fictive

Let me know if you find any which might fit our purposes, otherwise I will see if I can generate any using Photoshop

Did you see that ? : http://forum.simutrans.com/index.php?topic=2210.0

[gap]

Originally Posted by the_frog

I think, SH3 supports ambient occlusion OR normal/bump maps. There are some models with either ambient occlusion or normal channels but I am not aware of any with both ambient occlusion AND nomal maps. Some have ambinet occlusion and bump maps.

Hi the_frog, I am quoting this post of yours from another thread. Can you please point me to a SHIII object, either from stock game or from a mod, which is using an ambient occlusion map?

I need it for Kendras reefs. My idea is to map a seamless rock texture on the diffuse channel (making its UV projection bigger than the texture space, so that the texture will be mapped n times on the object), and AO shadows and fouling on the AO channel.

Once a get this peace of information I will be ready to hand over to Kendras

[gap]

Originally Posted by Kendras

Did you see that ? : http://forum.simutrans.com/index.php?topic=2210.0

I did, but I think the 90-m resolution stated in that tutorial is too low for our rocky reefs... 90 m is about the size of an islet, and I think in game we need something of the same size, or even smaller, but not totally flat.

On the web there are many heightmaps of real or fictive islands and mountains that with some resizing can be used as reefs in game. As we speak, I have one almost ready (see my post below)

[Jeff-Groves]

The Red flairs were done by TheDarkWraith/RacerBoy as I recall.
Check your mod installs.

Originally Posted by gap

I did, but I think the 90-m resolution stated in that tutorial is too low for our rocky reefs... 90 m is about the size of an islet, and I think in game we need something of the same size, or even smaller, but not totally flat.

On the web there are many heightmaps of real or fictive islands and mountains that with some resizing can be used as reefs in game. As we speak, I have one almost ready (see my post below)

Great !

[gap]

Originally Posted by Jeff-Groves

The Red flairs were done by TheDarkWraith/RacerBoy as I recall.
Check your mod installs.

Thank you Jeff, are they included in GWX?
SHIV units use the unified render controlled where you can enable/disable bump, specular and ambient occlusion maps, but I doubt this is compatible with SHIII

Originally Posted by Kendras

Great !

Here's a preview of the upcoming rocky reef; from top to bottom: a wireframe render, the model with diffuse textures mapped on it, and the same with AO shadows + underwater fouling textures. You should overlap the two textures mentally while I find a way to physically do it within a SHIII-compatible dat file:



The mesh has a resolution of 6,794 faces and it is ca. 30 m high (from top to bottom) with a base of about 180x240 sqm, though the emerged part will be much smaller (how much depends on where you will put it in game). I have set the base vertices to have a 0 heigth, so that they will always lay on the seabed if you set "place on land" as true.