Three Rivers Region

[dedgren]

I guess I'm pretty much a mad scientist at heart.



I had one of those "It's alive!" moments [linkie] when I pushed the envelope a bit torturing a BAT.

...I love to torture BATs because I'm not skilled enough to create them...

I've had this idea that I can put any hi-res sign face I want on a "green screen" blank sign BAT literally by painting it in through the Reader and then manipulating the size of the corresponding S3D file.



Guess what?



It works.  The one in the front of this view level 6 pic is the RL scale-size stop sign I just created based on what you saw in the Reader screenie.  The one in the background is the 3RR sign team's (Matt (threestooges), Ryan (burgsabre87) and me) former best effort.

Matt BATted the sign blank, which you can see the back of in this pic on the other side of the road.



Note the shadows if you don't believe that these are actually the same sign- they are identical.

The great thing about this technique is that I can now create pretty much any road sign I want to, without having to BAT anything.  I'll likely do a tutorial soon, as it's really a process anyone can take advantage of.

I'll note as well that Ryan has sent me some HD prop signs he's created.  We'll look at those in a bit.  Weekend's coming up!

Later.


David

289806

[Haljackey]

Looking great as always David!

Judging from what I have seen so far, it seems that HD props are having the biggest effects on signs.  Excellent on the stop sign, looks so much better than the original!

[metarvo]

You've officially outdone yourself, David.    For one reason or another, I never have gotten around to placing a great number of the first 3RR signs.  As a result, I have a relatively clean slate to start off placing HD signs in.  The only real side effect that I can see is in fact the shadow that doesn't match the new sign, but I suppose a small price is expected to get a great reward like this.  Keep up the good work!



EDIT:  And the shadow effect is just temporary, my friend.  It goes away with the completely MODded sign. -DE

[meinhosen]

If you hadn't mentioned the shadow I don't think most folks would have noticed that it doesn't match the sign (I count myself first amongst that group).  Great work, nonetheless!  I might actually join this ploppable road-sign craze if you all keep doing such great work 

[dedgren]

Back in the lab- based on a tip jeronij passed me along that was discovered by Brian (c.p./cycledogg) some time ago-



We can now place Chris's (chrisadams3997) greatly downsized cattails, johnson grass and reed grass much closer together.



Snapping turtles on logs?  Beaver dams?  A beached canoe with a pack tossed under it?

Who knows what might be next.

Later.


David

290115

[thundercrack83]

Snapping turtles on logs?  Beaver dams?  A beached canoe with a pack tossed under it?

Who knows what might be next.

"Who knows what might be next" is exactly right! You never know what you and the great members of this community will come up with next!

Magnificent stuff, as always, David!

Dustin

[rooker1]

Snapping turtles on logs?  Beaver dams?  A beached canoe with a pack tossed under it?

This just brought back an old memory, almost to a T.
Algonquin Park (in Ontario) Painter turtles, beaver dam and a friend and I under the canoe trying to keep a little dry.........

Thanks,
Robin

[dedgren]

Popping in let you know I figured out how to reduce the spacing between the lily pads.



Compare this with the pic of the same area in my last post.  You might note that I MODded the lily pads themselves- now dragging them doesn't leave a pad with a blossom every time.  I have emailed our great friend gizmo28, who was last at SC4D in December of last year, in the hopes that I might get permission to release the MODded lily pads on the 3RREX.  I'll keep you posted.

I'm satisfied in the mean time- now I can move on to the other things I want to do this weekend.  Have a great one!


David

290315

[thundercrack83]

Add lily pads to the list of things that I never would have thought of for SC4, but just blow me away when I see them!

And your work with them, David, is just the icing on the cake!

Enjoy your weekend, my friend!

Dustin

[Jmouse]

The lily pads, along with some other good-looking plops, are elements I've avoided because of the unnatural-looking resilts. All along, I just thought it was my lack of skill, but maybe there's a glimmer of hope after all!

Later...
Joan

EDIT:  There are (as our colleague Lora/ldvger noted) giant lily pads, though, Joan.



These some from South America in a zoo in Minnesota, and the largest pads are three feet/about one meter across. -DE

[ldvger]

Well, I posted, I thought, some ideas about the Stop signs earlier this afternoon, with the promise to check out Stop signs here in downtown Seattle on my way to the store and report back.  That post didn;t make it into the mix, but here is my report anyway:

I passed two 4 way stop intersections on my way to the store, thus observing 8 Stop signs.  Of the 8, 5 of the signs were mounted on 2" square tubular steel posts, with little 1/2" round do-hickies pre-punched/stamped at maybe 3" centers along the lengths of the posts. 

The remaining 3 Stop sign posts were 4x4 wood, painted, with pyramidal tops.  They were painted in alternating bands of red and white, horizontally placed in equal bands of approximately 7"-8", with the first band of red starting about 18" above ground level.  The wooden posts were on the smaller side streets that came into the larger/busier arterial.  All of the Stop signs facing traffc on the arterial were of the tubular steel variety.  All signs, regardless of post material, had tufts of weeds growing about the post base. 

You'd never guess I am an architect, would you?  Our motto is "God is in the details" and we are trained from day one to see details that many folks would otherwise miss...except maybe, a lawyer...

Lora/LD

[threestooges]

Amazing what can happen in a day here. For the lily pad alterations (to get them to plop closer together) was that just a matter of altering the occupant size parameter in the reader? Also, have you figured out how to alter the shadows too? That'd be a neat trick. If not, I can easily whip up an octogon, diamond and triangle for you. Let me know.
-Matt

EDIT:  No, Matt- the occupant size change only works for LOTted items.  I plan to do a tutorial on the whole range of issues created by prop object reduction to include a "how to" over the next couple of weeks.  As for the shadow, my belief is that it will change to the proper one once all the S3Ds in the object are modified.  I'll be working on doing a complete sign ASAP to check that out, so hold off on doing anything else for now.  Thanks! -DE

[mightygoose]

i need that smaller flora, you are the man, its like a scene from the film "honey, i shrunk the kids fricken everything".



great prgress from our very own SC4 Dr Strangelove.

EDIT:



"Sir! I have a plan!" [linkie] -DE

[dedgren]

Two new icons shortly to grace your "Water" submenu.



I'll also note that gizmo28 has very graciously given me permission to reMOD and distribute his lily pads.  Thanks so much!

Later.


David

290956

[Ryan B.]

Great work, David.  Ten bells to you!

[Pat]

David WOW!!!

[dedgren]

I'll be posting Part Four of the ongoing Fine Terraforming tutorial [linkie] over the next several hours.  It will get us to being able to do this.



n.b.  As of 7:30 p.m. AST (GMT-9) on the 25^th, Part Four is complete and ready for your reading pleasure.

See you over there.


David

291048

[ldvger]

Great new tool, this will really get used a lot by everyone, I'm sure.  I have two comments:

1.)  If the culverts are flat or barely sloped, there would be water visible inside the culvert itself.  The water wouldn't stop at the entrance to the culvert, especially when we can see the lower underwater sections of the culvert.  From what little I know of the process of making these tools and toys, getting water inside the culvert could be a real nightmare...it would have to match in level and color and transparency exactly with the water outside of the culvert...and not everyone uses the same ploppable water tools. 

2.)  If the new plop water is 2 meters in depth, or about 6' deep, then I think we are once again introducing scale problems with other objects you have used in the area.  The culverts, for example, appear to be about 1/3 submerged, which means 12 feet of them are above the waterline and 6 feet is below the waterline.  That's a BIG culvert, assuming the culvert bottom rests at the bottom of the pond.  Same with the boulders.  We know they rest on the bottom of the pond, 6 feet below the waterline, yet we can see the majority of the larger boulders are above the waterline.  Those are some BIG boulders and brings to mind...how did they get there? 

3.)  While I really do love the new ploppable water tool, it appears that to use it we will have to go back to gridded water courses...straight line and 45 degree angled turns.  One of the things I loved about the "old" PW was the irregular shorelines it created, because we all know water does not flow in straight line, unless it's a human made watercourse. 

Still, I see a lot of uses for this new PW, especially if it can be used in conjunction with the old PW.  I am thinking here about digging the -8 meter hole, then carefully lowering terrain around it to-6 meters, so that I can use the irregular edged PW around the perimeter of the deeper pond area.  I also like the way the old PW could be applied to slopes and that one needn't necessarily create a flat bed for it to exist in.

Great progress has been made and I'm sure that as time goes on, the PW issue will just come closer and closer to being solved to everyone's satisfaction.  I'm happy enough with what we have now to start plopping water all over the place, whereas 3 years ago I abandoned the game due to not being able to create realistic above ground water.

Excellent work...keep it up!

Lora/LD

EDIT:  I think, Lora, that some of this will become more clear in the next part of the tutorial.  Try experimenting with the bank of the trench- those straight lines quickly dissolve.  The biggest surprise, though, may be one that is at present still just an idea roaming around in the back of my head.  We'll see. -DE

[RickD]

That's a very interesting concept. Would it be possible to render the water tiles with a higher elevation on one end to make streams that flow downhill? I always have problems with placing the water on slopes.

EDIT:  Rick, I sent jeronij a PM asking him to do just that about an hour before your post.  Great minds think alike- we can tell everyone we independently invented downhill transparent ploppable water on the same day.  And, it seems so obvious now.  I can't believe someone didn't think of it before. -DE

[Glazert]

This takes ploppable water to a whole new level - water table level. The tutorials are taking us from terraforming to landscape gardening.