I'm sure I'm missing something very simple here.

I'm trying to paint rocks into a streambed, and want them to be embedded in the ground. When setting up the eco, I set them to be 55 - 65% below the surface relative to object size. But when I paint, they still "float" on the surface. I've tried changing the % below surface, but no difference. I have the "use ecosystem rules" box checked in the paintbrush dialogue, and I've clicked the limit to selected object icon. I make sure the "populate" brush is checked. I did this in Vue 10.5 with no problem, but now with the new brushes, I can't get it to work. What am I missing?? Appreciate any guidance.

Did you turn off fast population mode?

Mazak

Mazak

Quote - Did you turn off fast population mode?

 

Mazak

Thanks for the responses, Mazak.

Where is "fast population mode?" I looked in the manual and can't find a listing for it. 

The rest of my settings look the same as yours.

Never mind, found it. Yes, it's off.

Fast population doesn't act on the EcoPainter. Rocks are always painted/populated half buried, so using rocks isn't relevant, I'm afraid... Are you sure this offset  setting is part of population rules, MNArtist? And how about using the Lower brush with the Population  brush? Should work.

Okay, so this is interesting.

I originally had a number of faceted and rough rocks in the mix I was painting. I deleted those and switched to the lo res ones Mazak used in his example, and a mix of smooth and stones, and now they're showing up where I'd expect them to.

Wondering if one of you can try on your system with the rough and faceted and see what results you get.

Made some tests, and offset from surface doesn't seem to be part of the population rules, as I thought. So use your Populate area brush in conjuction with the Lower effector, or use the Lower brush after you're done with the Populate brush.

I'll check it tomorrow, off to bed now!

Faceted rocks and rough rocks make no difference. But they are heavy resource hungry, maybe that cause a difference?

 Mazak

Same as Mazak here, low rez are easier to use and manipulate, but otherwise, it's the same.

Hey Guys -

Thanks for the guidance and the time you took. I'm rendering now, but am going to do some experiments after this finishes and will post the results. Using the lower brush helped, though it still seems there are some strange things happening.

Why didn't you just populate the object that is underneath the stream?

I wanted the rocks to appear on the slope of the shore as well as under the stream, if that makes sense. Frequently, if I have a flat surface, I'll just create a transparent plane, populate that with rocks, and then position it, but this time I wanted the sloped surface to be populated as well.

Ok, I see, I would've carved the stream in a terrain, and populated the terrain material, according to altitude.

I figured out what the issue is. 

If you change the scale of the rocks in the brush palette, it appears to 'override" the offset. I had scaled my rocks up to about 2.5 in the scene. If I leave the scale in the brush palette at 1, they go below the surface, but if increased, they float on top.

Interestingly, if you change the scale in the material editor under overall scaling, it impacts the position as well, though seems to be to a lesser degree

Maybe it's a bug? Might be useful to let e-on know.