Three Rivers Region

[dedgren]

You folks nailed me on the "game" water.  I spent some "couldn't sleep" time the other night tweaking Adam's (Ennedi) nifty Columbus Terrain terrain mod exemplar.



The "beaches" are greatly reduced in number and distance from the shoreline.



I'll post the details later today, but the guesses have been close to the money.



I'd still like to lighten up jeronij's plop water a bit, but the transitions are still pretty nice.



Should be a good long post tonight- I'll make sure to include some "on the road" content.  Hopefully some FAR/FARR news, too (and anyone is welcome to be a beta tester- we received great feedback from the last go-round).  Chris (Chrisadams3997), you could be describing my struggles with the LE, as well.  Great to see some new 3RR Regulars*, we're looking forward to getting to know you better.

Later.


David

^*  A 3RR Regular is one of the ever-growing number of folks who have posted here or over at 3RR-ST at least once.

96020 - 4K short of 100000

[Simpson]

Really good David your lake is superbe 

[stewart_garden]

Funny how almost every visit to 3RR I make I find something that I hadn't thought of before but immediately want!  Great work on the water and the culvert David (and Chris).

[Patricius Maximus]

This is a great project. You people are preparing the next generation of modding. With the RHW v21 and v22, the 3RR projects, and the NWM (on hiatus), we'll have lots of more stuff to toy around with.

Good work going on all over this site. I'll be back later...

[Ennedi]

David, your experiments with streams were always a pioneer work and I think they were one of the most important impulses encouraging me to play with landscapes.

I don't know exactly what are your ideas now, but seeing your last pictures I uderstand you are thinking about TPW/ingame water transitions.
I made a few experiments too, maybe they will be interesting for you?

1. An old ploppable water can be placed under the ingame water without any problem (it doesn't work with every water mod, but it works with the PEG's Brigantine for example). This way we can achieve very soft river/sea transition and many other nice effects. I use these effects in Shosaloza, I will show them in a special update.
But the TPW (both Jeronij and Chris' versions) works in a different way: it is visible at the sea (river) bottom only if the ingame water depth is less than TPW height.

2. The first thing we should do to make TPW/water transition is to place some TPW in water. But some careful terraforming is necessary - see point 1.

3. To hide the transition we can use two things:
a) Water ripples - I would like to prepare the special version of ripples which would work good in narrow streams. I attach two zips to this message: "Ripples unchanged" - for you David to see original values and maybe make your own experiments, and the first version of my "stream ripples" modification.
b) Water opacity: It is good to change two parameters in the Terrain Properties exemplar: WaterMinAlpha (I made 0) and WaterDepthForMaxAlpha (I made 0.7 m). I suppose you modified these parameters too.
I attach to this message the terrain mod which I use for testing now (it has some textures changed on higher altitudes, you can look at it at this occasion, maybe you will have any suggestions?). This mod has water parameters modified as I described above.

I must say I'm not quite satisfied, but I see the researching direction. I would like to achieve some complex results, but it will need a lot of work and much time - maybe a few months 

And now my stream:

The mouth


Here ends an ingame water (slightly above logs)


The general view


The mouth again (you can see the where TPW ends)


You can see some graphic glitches, but they can be hidden with a bit of additional work.

Adam

[girlfromverona]

Love those water pics, David and Adam! Superb work. 

[thundercrack83]

Lot of action around here today, David! That's what I like to see!

As others have said the bridge with the culverts looks great, and so does your tweaking of the Terrain Mod. Can't wait to see what you have for us next, my friend!

Dustin

[dedgren]

Heh!  I'd actually forgotten, Marisa...



That's where, of course, we're currently working.

Heather and I walked a bit today-



A large very stiff G&T on our return along with an overdose of Vitamin I [linkie] has me about out for the count.  Let's see what I'm up for- otherwise I'll do the early wake up call thing- I have lots to post about.

Later.


David

96171

EDIT: Fixed your link. Sorry for intruding, my friend! - Dustin

[girlfromverona]

Oh, wow! That's my region!!! Can't wait to get my hands on it. 

That photo's amazing - look at the colour of those rocks. Beautiful.

[bat]

Great work there, David! Wonderful pictures of your region!

⁹⁶³¹⁵

[dedgren]

Well, yet another little change of plans...



We spent some time planning out our day, so I didn't get the SC4 stuff in a form to post- we'll do that tonight, as there's not near so much walking today.

Saw a bunch of these yesterday.





Yellowstone has made an amazing recovery from the fires of the late 80s.  The burned over areas, while still apparent, are gradually blending in.  The new growth is abundant and lush.



I've visited the park about every 10 years since 1978.  This is the best one yet.

Later.


David

96397

[Simpson]

Beautiful nature 

[thundercrack83]

Yellowstone looks beautiful, David. I've never been there myself, though hopefully one day, I'll get there.

Hope your trip is going well, my friend!

Dustin

[deathtopumpkins]

Hey David.
I've caught up now, so I figure I'll go ahead and become a 3RR Regular (need I say it too?  )

First of all, reading this is significantly changed my playing style (for the better  ), and has proved to be a highly informative and entertaining read. I'm not exactly sure, however, if there's a good enough word to sum up everything you've done. (I had no idea you were the one behind the smooth road curves!  )

Second, if you still want beta testers for FAR/FARR, I'm willing, and my email address is on my profile. (They look awesome, by the way!)

Third, I have one small request. Could you possibly show a shot of the region view of all the quads? I think it would be stunning to see all this scenery from that satellite-style view, even if there're still incomplete areas.

I'll be following along with this, as it seems a really cool project, so see you around. 

[threestooges]

-David: I remember taking a trip to Yellowstone with my family not too long after the fires (late 80s as I recall, couldn't have been much older than 5 or so) and from what I remember, the area seems to have sprung back nicely. I wonder if we could impose on Jestarr for some ploppable buffalo to compliment his cows? Great pics as always.

-deathtopumpkins: Let me be one of the first to welcome you as a 3RR Regular and also, as I noticed by the bottom of the board, happy birthday too.

[bat]

Some beautiful new pictures there of that area!!!

Looking forward to more pictures..........

[dedgren]

I'm just being bad...



We got in about 10:00 p.m. yesterday after a great drive up to the Mammoth area.



We just took it easy.  Break's about over though- we're headed back today.




David

96642

[Shadow Assassin]

Wow, the pictures look really good.

Hopefully you're having a great time in Yellowstone.

And these pictures should provide you with great ideas for 3RR, too.

Oh well, I'll just make #4099.

[deathtopumpkins]

Thanks for the happy birthday and welcome Matt.

David: I wish I got to travel like that. It looks really pretty, but I've never been off the east coast. It does look like those fires took quite a toll on the forest though. 

EDIT: SA, thanks for opening the door for 4100 to me! I was going to be happy with 4099! 

[jacqulina]

great pics there