We haven't heard from you for a long time 
Arf ! … Having picked the project up again from scratch, I’m working, like a fanatic for 5 months now, at something big. Bigger than you and me.
Nothing is really finished, I’ll need several other months, if ever there’s an end, but, yeah, I’m enough advanced for a solid update so: welcome to …
…
ArizOna, State Of Mind; an adventure in Ultra High Definition.
Most of the following pictures are 1600x900, viewable full size by clicking right / display picture.
ArizOna Terrain Mod;
ArizOna Terrain Mod + SonOra Tree Controller, zoom5;
Zoom6;
Zoom CtrlX SizeOf 5;
Zoom CtrlX SizeOf 8;
Both are extremely simple; the Terrain Mod consists of a single ground texture associated to a rock texture. The Tree Controller is composed of a single brush uniformly applied almost everywhere (kSC4FloraPreferencesProperty) and having 21 stages to display as much various desert grasses, bushes and shrubs. The 3 Palo Verde(s) being the 3 last stages, it tooks some time to see them appear and, due to the fact that I applied the same kSC4FloraParametersProperty than my MMPs, new sequences start almost endlessly so all stages coexist densely and the result only depends of the patience while using the brush at the same place… not for « in a hurry » people so. I will add some textures to the Terrain Mod but I’m considering the Tree Controller as finished.
To complete that striking and iconic landscape, I’ve MODed a general staff of 15 MMPs to spread an army of 525 UHD cacti;
5 Ocotillos;
20 Organ Pipes;
25 Prickly pears ;
60 Barrel cacti;
85 Jumping chollas;
The story of Saguaro #118:
Saguaro #118 and its 329 brothers in arms:
These saguaros have 1024X1024 uncompressed FSHs, such format provides nothing more at classical zoom 6 like shown above, it’s even rather counterproductive with too much contast.
Benefits start at CtrlX SizeOf 5;
Then, details are magical at CtrlX SizeOf 12;
I’m adding new saguaros almost daily, I can’t resist; they have something I can’t define, a kind of personality… and the fact that they are real and stand (or stood) somewhere in the Sonoran desert add an emotional dimension to SC4. I will probably reach 500 saguaros during the coming months.
Other stuff, other MMPs; 30 desert bushes and shrubs (Palo verde, IronWood, Mosquite…)
8 various desert grasses and flowers (Buffelgrass, Brittlebush, Creosote bush, Lupins, Californian poppies ...)
Works about sonoran fauna; rattlesnakes, Gila monsters, tortoises …
Find them all on that view CrtrlX SizeOf 12;
A set of UHD rocks, assorted to my rock texture …
… and some petroglyphs from Signal Hill (Tucson);
No good Arizona « state of mind » without a thought for the natives, the pre-Columbian
Hohokams,
And their descendants, the
Tohono O’odham nation;
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A few words about Saguaros (Suh-waa-row) - Carnegiea gigantea ; second biggest cactus of the world (just behind Pachycereus Pringlei, its mexican cousin named Cardon), it is native to the Sonoran desert, can grow over 12 meters (40ft), weight over 4 tons and live over 200 years.
Old Grandaddy;
Old Granddaddy was about 300 years old when it started to die in the 1990s.
Old Granddaddy is the oldest known cactus ever in the world. Not only was Old Granddaddy old, it was a giant at over 40 feet tall and had 52 arms just before it died.
Now immortalized in SC4;
Gand One;
Grand One, damaged by a bushfire in 2005, survived for two more years before to fall and die in 2007. This old saguaro cactus was estimated to be between 180 – 300 years old and was named the world’s largest known saguaro. The Grand One was measured in at 46 ft (14 m) in height.
Oro Valley Saguaro;
In 2002, the town of
Oro Valley (just north of
Tucson, Arizona) decided to save a more than 200 year old saguaro cactus from being destroyed through a road expansion. It died in 2003; although the transplant was successful, the ancient saguaro stuck by lightning a year after it was moved.
Saguaros grow very slowly, it may take between 20 and 50 years to reach a height of 1 m, they start to flower around 35 years and produce their first arms around 50 years. A Saguaro is considered as an adult at 125 years. The Destruction of a Saguaro is illegal in Arizona.
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A few words about Saguaro National Park; the 92,000-acre (37,000 ha - 370 km2 ) park consists of two separate areas - the Tucson Mountain District about 10 miles (16 km) west of Tucson and the Rincon Mountain District about 10 miles (16 km) east of the city. Created in 1933 as National Monument it became National Park in 1994 to protect the Sonaran desert native flora and fauna. Saguaros estimed population: 1,8 million. That seems to be a lot, before to have a look at these photographies, seemingly all taken from roughly the same perspective:
After have discovered these meaningful pictures, I searched for information about what’s happening there. I found and read many serious and scientific publications on the subject-matter, the reasons for the Saguaros population decline are multiple and complex; despite the harsh appearance of these giants…
A 2 years old sagauro;
…they are fragile plants, very sensitive to their environment and weather conditions. Multiple reasons are evocated but I think that weather conditions are the main one. Regular catastrophic freezes since 1937 decimated them, whatever their generation ( babies, juveniles, adults, seniors) but even light freezes or too long summer drought periods can wipe out the younger generations, seedlings of the year particularly. The years preceding 1959 and following 1993, include some of the driest decades in centuries in southern Arizona .Whatever the picture from the park you look at, you can notice that only 5 to 10 various generations, in the best case, are represented. I read somewhere that currently there’s no younger Saguaro in Saguaro National Park than 15 years old. In fact, the picture from 1935 indicates that these conditions have been favourable for such development during approximately150/200 years, which maybe happens once a millenary, maybe less often, who knows ?
Classical vandalism observed in
Saguaro National Park;
… sad. But to put things into perspective, a picture of
official vandalism, a much more destructive;
Construction of the border wall, here crossing
Organ Pipes Monument.
Furthermore, each year dozen of Saguaros are being illegally dug up and sold across the world. They can range anywhere from $20 to $200 for a 1m high saguaro.
Now the big question is the climate change. I read somewhere else that the 2020 Arizona’s summer has been so hot and dry near Phoenix that many Saguaros collapsed or lost their arms ...
« An underwhelming monsoon season and high temperatures are among the reasons why the young cacti are dying. Just over 42% of Arizona is under an extreme drought », according to the S
Drought Impact Reporter,September 2020. Whatever the questions, what is sure is that none of us and none of the children being born today will have a chance to see the Saguaros forest like it was in 1935.
Very first ingame pics of
Saguaro National Park;
Other works in the pipes, Sonoran super bloom like in 2017;
Snowfall on Saguaro National Park,
(… only the beginning.
)
Old Tucson Movie Studio ;
I started to rework FSHs from
WolfeZ wild west BATs (
River Junction pack 1 & 2. I , in a way, miraculosly downloaded them 48 hours before their removal from the STEX...
)
Wolf’s general store original version:
Mine (also resized down like all other WolfeZ’s BATs) ;
Ingame with already revamped Wells Fargo;
Next on the list, the saloon …
You can also notice a mix of
Riptide’s carriages rezided down and props extracted from
justforfun’s horse-drawn automata, resized up and with reworked FSHs for a less victorian but more wild west look.
Old Tucson Movie Studio is also a theme park , that’s a nice SC4 challenge.
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... it sounds like you're at a point where you're set to realize a lot of long-held ambitions!
You’re right
Noah, as you can see
… I’ve opened a window, now the risk is that all others are definately closed for me; that’s a one-way road. (Thanks for the +1.)
... giant cacti and giant freeways--two of my favorite things.
-Alex
Thanks
Alex, I’m glad that we have a common interest for cacti
… that’s not the case with highways.
Alejo, if ever you would release a proper set of HD hikers, it would be a blessing for me …
C.
