I new to Vue and am approaching it as a matte painter. I been hearing alot of great stuff from what ILM is doing with it.

If you don't mind I have a couple quick questions about Vue and terrains.

1. Does Vue do DEM maps (satelite maps) or use pictures for displacement? (I mean super accurate displacements)

I did a test of a color photo....(turned B&W)...(and inverted)....and threw it in Vue....didnt look like anything like the photo (full of noise)

One of the great features for Z-brush is the ability to bring in an image and inflate it like a peice of bread. I did a job where we painted a giant ground plane (Nine 4K maps) of a battle feild....complete with craters, tread marks, etc.....we brought the giant plane into Z-brush and "inflated" it like a peice of bread from the color map...the detail compared to the photos were imensly acurate....(it was actually a form of photogrametry)....

Can Vue do something like this? I think the procedurals are great....I am even exploring Geocontrol (I love there errosion patterns)....BUT in the movie biz you tend to get a photo and are told "give me that!".....

So you can see why custumized "Image based" terraines are a very important question for me.

1. If so...what picture formats and how hi-rez do they have to be? Are they color satelite maps or B&W?  DO they have to be 16 bit?

...also does anyone use geocontrol2 to get better procedural terraines?

really appreciate your help

GeekatPlay has a tutorial on how to use an image map with a procedural terrain.

http://geekatplay.com/tutorials.php  Tutorial #54

Thanks Peggy...I did see that tutorial...(it wasnt that accurate actually IMO)

I was however looking for more detail . Some of the work I have been doing with hi-rez texture.....has been hyper accurate. I have been working with lets say a 4K texture map for a hand...and been getting fingerprint detail.......in the displacement.

I was wondering if that possible with Vue....

some of my high end texture work can be seen here...(if your interested in the detail level I'm looking for)....

http://paulfedor.com/texture.html

You get better results on terrains if your image is 16bit instead of 8. Chipp Walters has info on his site about it. www.altuit.com.

Regarding your 1st question, I never tried, so I dont know. Regarding your 2nd question, terrains use B&W images and, if you're after quality, 16 bit is a must. I do use geocontrol2 for procedural terrains.

What really makes a program great....is a good user base and who do good work with it.....I really appreciate all the responses and questions...

I did email Chip.....very helpful indeed...

(he mention the 16 bit as well)

Thanks again ! (I will try and post results soon)

I use a 32bit mapping system myself and with Vue I get no better results than if I used 16bit or less. Your Best Option would be to save your model or heightfield in Object format and then import it into Vue. You should retain most if not all of your finer details, but heightfields and picture based terrains only work about as well as a 60 meter DEM, ........... maybe a tad better, but not much. Vue is Impressive Indeed, but IMO it's big downfall is Finely Detailed Terrains as they look as they are exported them out of World-Machine or TerraFormer2, but even that isn't  to hard to overcome.

I am still looking for a DEM to test (16 or 32 bit)......They are very hard to procure....apparantly you have to have some converter to get it from the USGS. (I still havent figured it out yet)

I do agree Vue's down fall is the terrain editor. You can try and get detail in there with fractal and math nodes....but it soon becomes uncontrollable....FOR EXAMPLE...if you look at geocontrol...the errosion shoots of glaciers is killer detail....(Vue really cant do Glacier carved mountains)(Which leaves most mountains in LA out)

I did see an artist do Mt Mikinley for a movie...and it was pretty bad ass....even the snow mixed on the peaks of the rocks were SUPER advanced (beyond my procedural abilities).

So question is how do you get really tasty mouontains (ESPECIALLY If your not going to cover it with trees)?

I need to clarify saveing models and heightfeilds from where (and importing them into Vue)? I am a Maya user and I actually though about doing displacement in Z-brush....and bringing it into Vue.....(someone recommended geocontrol2)

So are you reommending I bring terrains INTO Vue FROM World machine, TerraFromer2, or Geocontrol2....(to get around V6 terra editor)?

Also where would I get 60 meter DEM tif file?  (These geological survey websites are really confusing)

Quote - I use a 32bit mapping system myself and with Vue I get no better results than if I used 16bit or less. Your Best Option would be to save your model or heightfield in Object format and then import it into Vue. You should retain most if not all of your finer details, but heightfields and picture based terrains only work about as well as a 60 meter DEM, ........... maybe a tad better, but not much. Vue is Impressive Indeed, but IMO it's big downfall is Finely Detailed Terrains as they look as they are exported them out of World-Machine or TerraFormer2, but even that isn't  to hard to overcome.

You are going to lose most of your Res Detail when you import a Heightfield or Terrain Generating Picture into Vue. What I am Saying is to take a Heightmap, import into your Maya and if Maya retains full or almost full Resolution on the terrain, then take that terrain and make it an Object in 3DS, lwo, obj or any of the object files that Vue will handle and Import the Terrain Object onto Vue and Hopefully you will retain more and maybe even all the finer detail of your Terrain.
**
Special Note:** World-Machine has a totally free forever version that wil create 512x512 terrains
Click **HERE
**
Terraformer is totally Free and never runs out and it will handle Terrains up to 4096x4096. It also has one of the most Powerful Erosion Filter I have seen. It is **HERE
**Look in the section marked **"**SONSTIGE" it is the first item there.

I'm thinking what you are looking for is this here tut:
http://www.cornucopia3d.com/pub/tutorial/USGS_SDDS%20Tutorial.pdf

Hope that helps...

I use Geocontrol 2 along with Vue. It enables exports of 16 bit tiffs.
Once you have the tiff, you can import it in Vue this way (taken from the Geocontrol forum):

1. create a 256*256 standard terrain
2. convert to procedural terrain
3. open the procedural tab
4. right click on the preview in the tab for opening the procedural editor
5. load the exported 16 bit tiff
6. set the interpolation for the texture map to bicubic
7. close the terrain editor
8. render the terrain

This gives really detailed terrains especially when using 2048 or 4096 resolution.
You can also use Geocontrol selectors on them.

Here is an example (using a 2048 terrain)

Checkthegate - Just trying to clarify - are you using the heightmap in the "Displacement" channel, or ar you using it as a height map in the Terrain Editor (fundamental difference - if you're not!)?

And I dunno about anyone else here, but I have noticed stepping whe I use 8-bit greyscale images, and it's nice and smooth when I use 16-bit. To overcome the 8-bit stepping, I simply click ONCE on a smoothing erosion effect, then coninue to sculpt to my heart's content.

Vue only handles what can be carved out vertically - if you have an overhang, or natural bridge type of formation, you'll have to do it in ZBrush (or your modelling app of choice - I noticed you also mentioned Maya above).

You can save out of ZBrush as an OBJ and apply ecosystems, plant vegetation, just like a Vue terrain, so think of using it in combination with your other apps in a final assembly and rendering situation so you get outdoor atmosphere lighting. You can even replace the sky with any image you choose if you custom paint your own, or take your own photographic skies like I do.

Hope this helps-
-Lew ;-)