After months (literally!) of experiments, I think that I have found a very simple recipy for creating pretty detailed rendering of terrains with Vue 7. If you go to my DeviantArt place you will find both an example render of a eroded terrain created with World Machine 2.1 and a rendering with Vue 7.2.

It is neither perfect nor artistic, but the result is (at least for me) good enough to classify this quest accomplished... obviously somebody in this forum will find improvements and I will be glad to incorporate in the informations on my new place.

Bye!!!

Nice work Alex, the image has come out really well also!

that looks awesome!! Good work!

Like I told you and demonstrated in another thread, in Vue7 there is no difference between standard and procedural terrains in what concerns detail, unlike what you say in your deviantart page. If you create a 4096x4096 standard terrain and use a 4096x4096 16bit tiff map, you get exactly the same result as if you use the same map with a procedural terrain. This was the thread:
http://www.renderosity.com/mod/forumpro/showthread.php?message_id=3327891

Furthermore, with Vue7, the 1.01 trick is no longer necessary, as far as I know (at least I don't see any artifacts with 1.0 scale).

Quote - Like I told you and demonstrated in another thread, in Vue7 there is no difference between standard and procedural terrains in what concerns detail, unlike what you say in your deviantart page. If you create a 4096x4096 standard terrain and use a 4096x4096 16bit tiff map, you get exactly the same result as if you use the same map with a procedural terrain. This was the thread:
http://www.renderosity.com/mod/forumpro/showthread.php?message_id=3327891

Furthermore, with Vue7, the 1.01 trick is no longer necessary, as far as I know (at least I don't see any artifacts with 1.0 scale).

In a couple of days I will post a render which shows:
a) the dramatic difference between standard and procedural terrain resolution and...
b) the ghastly side artifacts which disfigure procedural terrains unless you shove them under the rug with the scaling trick.

Dear Rutra, YOU are one of the reasons that made me decide to leave the Vue community. Your faithfulleness to the True Cause is just unbareable for someone who values rationality and truth.

I will only add in the very near future the recipy for creating clay renders in Vue (a standard 2 minute task on any other renderer, a gruesome trial and error activity on Vue) and then I will simply remove Vue forum from the list of the forums I visit here on Renderosity.

Bye... working to convert into a adieu as soon as possible.

Quote - "In a couple of days I will post a render which shows:
a) the dramatic difference between standard and procedural terrain resolution and..."

In Vue6 the difference was dramatic, as we all know. In the thread I mentioned I showed you that I couldn't see any difference in Vue7 between standard and procedural. If you can see dramatic differences, please show them, I would love to see them and discuss the terms of the comparison (if I'm allowed to discuss anything with you...).

Quote - "b) the ghastly side artifacts which disfigure procedural terrains unless you shove them under the rug with the scaling trick."

In the tests I made, I found no artifacts. This is simply what I stated. You may find cases with artifacts in your tests. That is ok, from my point of view. We would simply then arrive to the conclusion that artifacts exist in some situations and don't exist in others. Is this a problem to you?

I also value rationality and truth. It was precisely because of this that I tried to correct the imprecisions of your text, from my point of view. Am I not allowed to disagree with you?

Like you, I also made tests. I simply told you what the results of my tests were. Is it wrong to compare test results?

I always assume (maybe wrongly) that when someone opens a thread it's to discuss about something because it's from discussion that discoveries are born, IMO. Do you not want discussion?

Quote - "I will only add in the very near future the recipy for creating clay renders in Vue (a standard 2 minute task on any other renderer, a gruesome trial and error activity on Vue)"

In a modeller I see the need to have a clay render (to see the details of a model in an unbiased way). In Vue (a landscape creation tool) I personally don't see this need. Why would someone need a clay render of a landscape? Maybe someone needs it, I personally don't.

Quote - "and then I will simply remove Vue forum from the list of the forums I visit here on Renderosity."

You already did it once, remember? ;-)
Anyway, I think you're overreacting to my post (and to my posts in general). I must say I don't understand what's so wrong with my post. I disagreed with you. Do you always turn your back when someone disagrees with you? I remember you doing just that with me in at least two other threads.

Well, if you don't want me to disagree with you, I guess the only way would be to leave the forum, as I have no intention of leaving and I surely have no intentions of not speaking my mind just so that you are satisfied. Sorry...

Quote -  Bicubic smooths so much the data that you are not much better off than with standard terrains while Bilinear and Normalized are the sharpest, and, to my personal perception, almost visually equivalent. Therefore, make sure to select either Bilinear or Normalized as interpolation mode;

(quote taken from your recommendations)

Not sure about that.

When working with high resolution terrains I found bicubic interpolation to work fine. Interpolation between pixels is really smooth while the details of the terrain are retained.

See picture below.

Quote - I will only add in the very near future the recipy for creating clay renders in Vue (a standard 2 minute task on any other renderer, a gruesome trial and error activity on Vue) 

Do you mean clay renders like this?

They are pretty easy when you use Environment Mapping. Here's the scene.

best,

Chipp

Quote - > Quote - I will only add in the very near future the recipy for creating clay renders in Vue (a standard 2 minute task on any other renderer, a gruesome trial and error activity on Vue) 

Do you mean clay renders like this?

They are pretty easy when you use Environment Mapping. Here's the scene.

best,

Chipp

Good, an occasion less for quarrels (actually my solution based upon Spectral atmospheres and ambient occlusion renders much faster, but at this point I could not care less).

W.r.t. to Retra patronizing comments I have to upload another render, write a comment post and then I can really turn page with Vue (and its community).

 Yes, I updated the image and scene file with GI instead of GR, and added a small negative number to artificial ambience which creates more pronounced shading, and rendered in around 2 minutes on my QuadCore.

-Chipp

Just a reminder I'm watching this topic, I don't want to see anything get out of hand so let's remember the rules please on being civil.

pardon the probably obvious question but whats a  clay render?

My conclusions:

• I don't see any artifacts, despite the 1.0 scale
• There is a slight difference in detail between the renders but I would say the standard terrain is very good, much much better than Vue6 terrains in the same type of comparison. IMO, your statement "standard terrains are totaly inadequate as they severely smooth all the tiny details of the terrain." is a gross exageration.

Again, these are only my opinions which happen to differ from yours. I still fail to see why diverging opinions would make anyone abandon a forum, but who am I to judge?

I can provide the Vue scene file if anyone is interested in doing some further tests.

Just to add that the standard terrain rendered in 44 seconds whereas the procedural rendered in 1 min 5 sec.

it's called clay render, from what I've heard, because it's like when a sculptor makes an initial model, in clay rather than bronze, so all same texture, to test.

my usual way of doing that for some time has beens to simply use a scene lit by an HDR (Image Based Lighting), and turn the exposure to maximum

And for goodness sake Alex, in life one should NEVER runaway, unless there's damn good reason. Your insights and thoughts are valuable, and like everyone who actually contributes: useful, important and you deserve respect. :)

It's very easy to get uptight and take things badly on the internet, as I've repeatedly said, because you don't see the other person isn't an ogre, that different languages and grammar styles do not mean they are an enemy.
In real life I swear like a trooper and say outrageous things...but anyone who can see my face and know me, realizes it's in genuine good hearted jest :)

Smilies aren't chidlish, as emotional content and sincerity are vital to add to bare, cold text.

If folk disagree with ya, too bad, long as they ain't causing bother or plain getting in the way of things by talking crap.

But each to their own!
:)

clay render, my system, 30 sec render time

thanks silverblade!  I think you now qualify as Rich Potters Guide to the Galaxy :P

Rutra,  I think the reason you don't see them is that you've got Zero edges turned on. If you turn that off, you'll see artefacts, I'm fairly sure. Anyway, they are removed by setting the scale to 1.01 (I haven't shown that but can do if anyone wants to see it).

As to whether there's any real difference in quality between the two images... frankly, I think not.

Quote - "Rutra,  I think the reason you don't see them is that you've got Zero edges turned on. If you turn that off, you'll see artefacts, I'm fairly sure."

No, I don't have zero edges in Vue. If my terrain is made in GC2, I always zero-edge there, as I have more control there. In Vue, there's only one button to zero-edge and that's it, whereas in GC2 you can specify some more settings.

Would zero-edge in GC2 also remove the artifacts? I don't know. I very rarely use non-zero-edged terrains, my experience is limited there.

I suspect it would. What might be happening is that if the height at the edge of the map is zero, whether that's due to the terrain editor setting or done in another app the artefacts don't appear.

Either way, it gives two methods of avoiding artefacts - either use a zero-edged terrain or use the scaling trick.

Quote - "It's very easy to get uptight and take things badly on the internet, as I've repeatedly said, because you don't see the other person isn't an ogre, that different languages and grammar styles do not mean they are an enemy."

Wise words. I'm surely not an ogre. :-)
English is not my native language and 95% of the time I use it is for business purposes, where I have to be precise and direct and surely I cannot use smilies nor other emotional hints. So, I never gained these habits. When I use them is when I force myself to do it, it doesn't come naturally.

Furthermore, I also don't master all the innuendos of the english language, precisely because it's not native to me.

So, yes, Silverblade is very correct and when reading things in forums one should always have this in mind.
 

Rutra -

Is there a special setting in GC2 for zero edging? If so, could you point it out to me? I always "zero" edged by using the dark blue lowest altitude setting around the front edge or side edges.

I appreciate all your testing. Thanks.

Hey, if I was was actually wise, I'd charge Karma Lessons by the hour!!  :thumbupboth:
I have an acute case of "Put Foot In Your Own Mouth At Inopportune Moments Syndrome" :lol:
(which I hope translates ok!)

Anyway, great testing and info, everyone!! :) I suck nuts at terrain work so all this helps a ton.

I have added two images in my gallery which provide facts about:

1. standard vs. procedural terrains performance (sorry but bilinear vs. bicubic interpolation are different... I am not going into a discussion which would require some knowledge of signal processing, as I assume not many people here around crunch signals since 1985) and...
2. ...an image which shows that the procedural terrain edge bug is not only alive, but kicking (well, why should E-On spend time fixing bugs when they can add new ones?).

More than dwelving with these petty subjects, I'd like to make some final remarks about the reactions to my post.

In the past I had complained about Vue performance with this kind of feature (and the reason was that I would have liked it to stand well to Terragen competition) but had offered no advices, so a "shut up, you bloody whiner" remark could have been appropriate (even though not terribly polite, but respect for others is not a tradition of this forum, so I wouldn't have complained).

Now, I have found a wonderfully simple way of handling the problem (which actually amounts to little more than selecting another kind of interpolation) and... well, I did not expect people to dance and chant Kumbaya... or may be yes because it was clear that now I would not keep beating this "horse"... and instead...

...instead a got the usual rabid reaction from the usual suspects.

It does not make sense, does it?

Not even solutions are right?

Well, the answer is contained exactly in that word: solutions. A solution implies that there is a problem and therefore hits the sore spot: Vue has problems, bugs and not all its tools work equally well.

It is a demented conclusion, because no program is bug free and a significant part of the internet is about program users communities in which people exchange techniques and information about bugs and workarounds but, apparently, the world around Vue is different.

There is a moderator on Cornucopia forum who has this signature: "Vue has no bugs, it just develops random features" or words to this effect. I have come to the conclusion that, in that Twilight Zone called E-On Software, denizens do really think so. Vue has no bugs, it just develops random features, Vue has no bugs, it just develops random features (add the Hypnotoad buzzing sound).

Sorry, but the Hypnotoad has no effect on me, so it is time for me to go to other avenues, like, e.g. using a program which:

1. is more than reasonably priced w.r.t. to Vue (the Pro version costs less than Vue Complete), developed by a firm well known for its rock bottom prices (and that looks like it is not going to change its policy in the future);
2. this firm is legendary for missing deadlines but, at least, when new versions come out are not Kathrina-like disasters like Vue 7.4/7.5 "patch";
3. a program in which creating a sharp terrain is not the result of painstaking tests, but the result of just checking off an (obvious) option in the terrain editor;
4. a program in which, a perfect newbie like me creates his first, picture perfect clay render in 10 minutes (5 to read the manual, 4 to setup scene/lighting/shading/rendering options and 1 to render);
5. a program which can create renders both in the sharp TG2 way or in the "Constable" way (see DOM1 gallery here on Renderosity to understand what I mean);
6. a program in which, should I ever reach this level of competence, I can do everything, from modeling to texturing to rigging to animating;
7. a program which has no obnoxious copy protection scheme, not integrated with Windows security features in place since the early 1990's (well, from the programmers who create stupid wrap-around bugs like the terrain one, would you expect to integrate into Windows security?), ready to explode at any moment, preventing me from keeping using what I have legaly licensed for an unlimited time with my credit card;
8. ... I could go on, but this would become a Silverblade33-like post (dear Silveblade33, you are one of the few people here that I will miss).

...were you expecting a Bye? Sorry, no. Byes are for friends, or, at least, for people with whom there is mutual respect. For everybody else, there is that wonderful option in the forum list page: [hide].

P.S.: should you do not know who the Hypnotoad is, google for it and have a look at some relevant videos on YouTube.
P.P.S.: what is the "program" I was wrinting about? As a hint, have a look at this site.
P.P.P.S: sorry thefixer, but in a couple of minutes time I will steal you the pleasure to ban me from this site (I am evil, am I not?).

Am I the only one who cant see what the problem is here?

So your saying that becuase someone has a different opinion to you, everyone hates you?

Your comparing a somewhat buggy patch release to a natural disaster which ruined thousands of lives, and killed as many?

Seems a little bit like you WANT people to disagree with you.

The fixer said- Nice work Alex, the image has come out really well also!

I said - that looks awesome!! Good work!

not exactly tearing you apart are we...

Look at rutras work, its awesome, hes practically e-ons picture of the week every week, maybe instead of assuming hes being hard on you listen to him and try to learn from him?

Ah well,

alexcoppo, let's be rational about things, shall we? You wrote you like rationality, so apply it to this situation.

In the images you posted now you proved your points. Let's focus on the artifacts thing first. I wrote in one of my posts:
"In the tests I made, I found no artifacts. This is simply what I stated. You may find cases with artifacts in your tests. That is ok, from my point of view. We would simply then arrive to the conclusion that artifacts exist in some situations and don't exist in others."

So, your recent image (and also the one of spedler) showed that indeed these artifacts still exist in some situations and don't exist in others. Like I said, and it's true, I don't find artifacts. All this discussion showed that it's my workflow which prevents me from having artifacts (the fact that I practically always zero-edge terrains, either in Vue or in GC2).

So, you see, we learned something from the discussion. This is what discussion is good for. If you run away from discussions, you'll miss chances to learn.

Let's focus on the standard vs procedural. You wrote "standard terrains are totaly inadequate as they severely smooth all the tiny details of the terrain."

I wrote in another post that indeed the standard terrains seem to have slightly less detail but, IMO, your statement is a gross exageration. Don't forget that in your recent image in your gallery, you stated yourself that you used a "highly zoomed view". How many Vue images have "highly zoomed views" of mountain-like terrains? Very, very few. The vast majority of Vue scenes have these kind of terrains in the midground or background. So, why test things that are not useful in practice, for the vast majority of situations?

We already had a similar discussion, when you made 1 pixel terrains a few months ago, remember? Why the heck should we test Vue with 1 or 2 pixel terrains if in practice that is never used? Why should we demand from Vue a certain response if it clearly wasn't built for that, and isn't used for that by anyone? How many times does anyone use 1 pixel terrains? None! So, why test it? Likewise, why test "highly zoomed views" of mountain-like terrains if they are not used in practice?

I prefer to keep discussions in a pragmatic and useful way. I personally have little patience for academic discussions that serve no practical purpose. But that's me, of course.

Just a word about your "discovery" of terrain sharpness, the original reason for this thread. In fact, your "discovery" is not new. You basically use a 2048x2048 or 4096x4096 16 bit tiff of a terrain, apply it in Vue to a procedural terrain, use scale 1.01 and apply bilinear interpolation. That wraps it up, I think. All this was already discussed in many threads and tutorials before. None of this is new. I've been using this exact same technique since Vue6, for many months. So, excuse me if I didn't seem too excited...

You do what you like, of course, leave or not leave. I personally think it's absolutely non rational (the rationality you like) to leave because someone disagrees with you and/or doesn't feel terribly excited with something you "discover". I personally would prefer that you stay because you contribute to the forum, despite your frequent sarcasms about Vue and e-on, which not only serves no practical purpose but rather serves to irritate those who, like me, love Vue and, consequently, their makers, creating a climate which is not good for discussion.
 

Alex, before you go, any chance you might take CobraEye with ya? Just wondering ;-)

I believe I was one who never agreed with the supposition regarding significant differences between bitmaps placed in the terrain editor directly vs as proc functions. If there ever was any difference, it was so very slight I couldn't see it. But, with the new work eonite and ArtPearl are doing integrating terrain maps with functions, there does seem to be good cause for using bitmaps in the function editor now.

Well, regarding what Alex maybe using in future from his hint, Carrara has a LOT of upset users, so, hey, grass is always greener...but different strokes for different folks.

the latets update has screwed my 7.4 Vue Infite ocmpletley, lol, deleted the exe file when I tried to roll back...crap happens. This is life.  Least I still have 7.5 working, though SkinVue is kaput currently and I have SUCH a fun drow I was working on and SKinVue was makinghim look really good with some shade tweaks.

wishes Alex well on his journey :)

Anyway, this thread does have useful info and the other one with Eonite and Artpearl is a cracker!!! surely tutorial material I think?

Attached Link: "could not reproduce" - so funny!

Thanks for the compliments about the terrain integration. It was enjoyable. It's funny, becuase it doesnt have too many applications for myself since I cant produce them - no Geocontrol for Macs :(

Tutorial? didnt eonite and I cover everything in the thread? hmmm. I always think if I understand an issue surely everyone else does too..

Quote - "Is there a special setting in GC2 for zero edging? If so, could you point it out to me? I always "zero" edged by using the dark blue lowest altitude setting around the front edge or side edges."

I zero-edge in GC2 like this: Filter tab -> Add -> General forming -> Zero-edge.

After this filter is applied, you can change and experiment with "general strength" and "Border", both in the Settings tab of this particular filter. With "border" you can define how gradual the effect is applied.
You can also go to tab "level control" of that filter and play with all the levels and again obtain completely different results.

If you make selections on your terrain, you can also apply the settings depending on your selection. This is a general possibility for all filters, including this one, although I never used it for this one.

Pnina, regarding reproducible bugs, I can perfectly understand e-on. I was a programmer, you were a programmer, so we have similar life experiences in this respect, it's interesting how we see this situation in a completely different way. :-)

There are several general tools/processes available for a programmer to find a bug. By far, the easiest is to reproduce the situation and execute the code step by step in that area until (s)he finds the culprit line. Generally speaking, if you can't find something, how can you fix it?

If the bug is not reproducible at all, this could mean many things. It could mean an influence of the user's particular system in the program, it could mean that the user didn't exactly transmit the programmer all the bug context (like steps he did before or settings he changed), it could mean a non-initialized variable (producing random effects, or no effect depending on what was done before), etc, etc. In these situations, it's theoretically possible that the programmer double checks the code line by line but this, depending on the situation, can be close to impossible (it's impossible to double check thousands or millions of lines).

Thanks Rutra,

I use the filters and never noticed zero edge. I quickly tried it and want to hit myself over the head for not seeing it right here. This is worth its weight in gold. Thanks again. It's these small things that can make such a difference.

I really appreciate your help and input in this forum.

You're welcome, Paula. :-)

Hmmm. I thought the comic was funny. Even if I was the one using the CNR expression, I would still think its funny, I guess humor is a different thing for different people.
Actually, Artur, I'm not disagreeing with your statements about bug fixing. Mostly you're stating the obvious - they can be harder to find  in some situations then others. The thing is it is way too easy and tempting to use the CNR  as a crutch. Even if you cant reproduce it you can ask yourself   'what circumstances could lead to this error while doing this task' or 'how would this error message appear' and perhaps asking clarifying questions from the user. (And it is never the case that you need to check the whole program, there will always be just a limited set of functions/routines which could theoretically contribute to a reported behavior. )
Just an small example:
I reported
"I tried using the 'export terrain' button. I chose 'tiff', and clicked 'oK'. I get a message
'unable to export terrain'. It works if I chose the 'obj' format. It works OK in v6."
I was told 'CNR'. What they should have done was ask themselves 'how would I get this message while exporting a terrain?' when I did more digging I discovered the answer to that and the bug. You get this error message when you try to write to an 'illegal'  place on the disk. This happens when a path isnt defined by the user and there is no default defined by the programmer.  I didnt select a path for the file and apparently for this specific export  there is no default.(most exports do have a default and even this one has a default in V6, so I didnt think its mandatory).  I imagine they did define a path when trying it, although my instructions didnt include it, and thus could not reproduce the error.
The moral of the story - the checks to 'reproduce' were shallow. There is more that can be done than immediately throw it back to the user saying CNR. In my experience this is not an isolated case. Other people may have less occasions to report bugs and maybe have more luck getting them fixed. I'm happy for you, and  I guess for you the comic was irrelevant, I appologize for that.

PS as Paula said "I really appreciate your help and input in this forum."  I agree with this sentiment whole heartedly , doesnt mean we must agree on everything, does it?

Quote - I zero-edge in GC2 like this: Filter tab -> Add -> General forming -> Zero-edge.

w00t!! so that's how you do it.  Thanks Artur I didn't even know that was in there :)

 So Pinina,

You reported the bug as the inablility to export a terrain as TIFF, but exporting as .obj did work.

After they responded to you they could not reproduce the problem, you went back and saw where the path had not been defined. So, your sleuthing actually found a work around and allowed you to provide a much more accurate recipe for the new bug back to e-on. Good job!

I supposed it has been fixed now, as it works as it should on my version. Like e-on support, I can't make it 'not work' given your original recipe for the problem. But, once you provided the information about having a bad path, things made more sense. Even so, if I delete the path, it still offers me an error condition, probably due to the fact the issue has been fixed since your bug report.

My thinking is this is basically how things with computers and tech support are supposed to work. A productive back and forth with help on both sides to find the answer.

A funny supposedly true story: A person calls tech support and tells them they can't get their CD to load, the tech support guy is confused and after a long back and forth, finds out the user is using the CD tray as a cupholder!

It wasnt fixed, I discovered this bug after installing 7.4 they havngt even acknowledged that they will fix it. Last I heard it was considered a future enhancement. (I also think now that  it only happens the first time I tried to write it out, now it remembers where I wrote last).
I'm not complaining about the bug itself here, just using it as a demonstration that if the programmers cant reproduce a bug immediately they should try and think about it a bit more before throwing  it back to the user's court. If I could find what the bug was without having any knowledge whatsoever about the program, so should  they.I would have liked them to put a bit more effort in before shifting the responsibility to me, after all I'm not paid to fix the program, why should my time debugging it be free? I'm not even getting the program  for free  as the beta testers do:)
Pnina

This is a useful topic with some great information from everyone, let's just keep it that way and on topic people, I wouldn't want to lock this thread, because the information is good and I hope to see more good info posted!