Minimum LOD Height

[cogeo]

Does the upper side of LODs need to be at some minimum height above ground for the model to draw without rendering problems?

If you want to model say some pavement and you want to be possible to place props on it you need custom LODs. Here is a pic:



This LOD was made as following:
- First made a simple LOD for each individual object (or group), ie one for the main building, one for the shelter and one for the pavement.
- Attached the LODs for the shelter and the pavement to the one for the main building.
- Converted to editable mesh. Btw, does it make any difference converting it to a poly instead (it has fewer faces)?
- The individual LODs were as simple as possible, ie boxes with one segment for all three dimensions.

Also I have a rendering problem, the texture for the pavement gets very darkened, much darker than if the building had a simple box as a LOD (encompassing all objects of the model). Another strange thing, the texture is OK (not darkened) in night view.

Such LODdding is necessary if you want to place props close to the building (on the pavement). Also nightligting is much better, as you get a surface to light.

So is there something wrong in the procedure I have taken?

Any help would be highly appreciated.

[Diggis]

No, I have found this too.  A height of around half a meter seems to work, but does make placing props a bit of a pain. 

[cogeo]

Thanks Diggis!

Somey more observations:
- The textures inside the model file are OK, either if viewd individually or through the S3D file.
- This must have to do with shading, if you scroll the screen the texure looks OK (while scrolling), but when stopped it gets dark again.

So the solution is to experimt with various heights? Exhausting testing can maybe suggest the "correct" value. As far as I know SC4's network textures (roads, rails etc) are displayed through a model that has its upper face at 0.2m above ground. Base and overlay textures must be at 0 heoght I guess, but I have no idea about BATs.

[Chrisadams3997]

I've found with various models .3 meters to be adequate most of the time.  The 'darkened' texture is from it actually sitting underneath it's own shadow .  For models (like my sportsfields) where it's completely flat, there's no need for a shadow, but in you're case where it's attached to the rest of the model, it'll be necessary.  This might require the LOD be at about .4 to .5, or you can place the model up a tick or two in LE as well if it's close and you don't want to rerender.

Also, it's perfectly fine to have the LOD's as poly's, I always edit them as such.  They have a lot more options than meshes .

Chris

[cogeo]

Thank you all!

I have verified that a minimum LOD height od 0.5m is required to get rid of the display problems. With a height of 0.45m some few lines are still visible. So I wonder if 0.5m is really safe (eg on sloped terrain).

My model looks OK (on flat terrain) with this setting. But what's really weird is that if I render the pavement part alone (which is a simple box), it looks OK even with values like 0.2 or 0.15 - though the more distant zooms may suffer.