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UltraScenery [Commercial]

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  • ArtiniArtini Posts: 9,462

    Amazing and well done, Barbult.

    Does JSON files are a normal text files or you need some special tool to deal with them?

     

  • barbultbarbult Posts: 24,245
    gitika1 said:
    barbult said:

    Since HowieFarkes invited us to "hack the JSON files", I gave it a try. In the Woodland 2 ecology, I swapped out the Aspen trees for the Beech trees from The Harpwood Trail for Daz Studio (one of the other HowieFarkes landscape products). I also modified the pond image maps to make the pond more irregular. As I look more "under the hood" of UltraScenery, I am amazed at the creativity and detail that went into the architecture of the system, and the shaders for the various types of ground.  

    Here are two renders of my modified woodland pond. I used the Canary's Cameras I mentioned in a previous post. The HDRI is from HDRI Haven and is called Green Point Park. I was pleasantly shocked at how well the UltraScenery grass and the HDRI grass blended in color. That was pure luck!

    Wow! I must have missed that post. (Then again my employer is keeping my life pretty hectic while trying to cope with COVID-19) I have many of his other products and would love to use trees from those as well! 

    His post is right here, for reference.

  • Doc AcmeDoc Acme Posts: 1,153

    OK. Color me impressed.

    I picked up the UltraScenery a few days ago and have got to say I'm impressed on a few levels.

    First off, it just looks great.

    I usually export my DAZ assets out to Lightwave as I'm more comfortable with it's interface & toolset I've acquired over the years.  I wasn't really expecting to do that with the way USC works but had to test.  I could do it in pieces, but even so the resulting geometry was not going to work in LW due to amount.

    I decided to see how far I could push things in DS.  So, I created a medium complex scene in USC then merged with a raccoon using LAMH fur. The converted raccoon model + fur is 1.2 Gb alone, most of that is hair geom. I could load the model but would crash Layout just trying to preview.

    Back in DAZ, it took me awhile to place him, but did not only did he load into an already geom heavy scene, it rendered in 9+ mins at 2K. That was using the Sun-Sky mode.  Going with an HDR really increased the time and didn't look any better.

    I have World Creator it's a hoot to play with, but it's not as intimate I guess as USC.  WC's minimum size is 512 where as USC is set at 64 and that's plenty.  Really looking forward to see how this product develops.

    BrookMeadow+Rocky_9+mins.png
    1920 x 1080 - 4M
  • barbultbarbult Posts: 24,245
    Artini said:

    Amazing and well done, Barbult.

    Does JSON files are a normal text files or you need some special tool to deal with them?

     

    I use Notepad++. The JSON files are text, but the contents looks more like a programming language (since it is) than plain readable text. If you've used UltraScatter a lot, you will recognize some of the concepts used to control the scattering of the props. Then you can play around and see what you come up with. It was a lot of trial and error for me - make a change - see what happens - oops syntax typo - try again... There are a lot of {} and [] to keep straight. After you spend a few hours in the editor, you will be eager for commercially available addons! But if you are a tinkerer with lots of patience and time, you can have some fun with the JSON. I appreciate that he made unencrypted files available and said it was OK for us to "hack" them (for our own use, I assume!!!)

  • ArtiniArtini Posts: 9,462

    And below is the link to some general information about JSON format:

    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/JSON

     

  • alexhcowleyalexhcowley Posts: 2,386
    barbult said:
    Artini said:

    Amazing and well done, Barbult.

    Does JSON files are a normal text files or you need some special tool to deal with them?

     

    I use Notepad++. The JSON files are text, but the contents looks more like a programming language (since it is) than plain readable text. If you've used UltraScatter a lot, you will recognize some of the concepts used to control the scattering of the props. Then you can play around and see what you come up with. It was a lot of trial and error for me - make a change - see what happens - oops syntax typo - try again... There are a lot of {} and [] to keep straight. After you spend a few hours in the editor, you will be eager for commercially available addons! But if you are a tinkerer with lots of patience and time, you can have some fun with the JSON. I appreciate that he made unencrypted files available and said it was OK for us to "hack" them (for our own use, I assume!!!)

    I admire your courage and fortitude. I spend most of my working day deep in the bowels of an IBM RPG IV compiler so the last thing I want to do when I get home is do battle with another computer language!

    Cheers,

    Alex.

  • ArtiniArtini Posts: 9,462
    barbult said:
    Artini said:

    Amazing and well done, Barbult.

    Does JSON files are a normal text files or you need some special tool to deal with them?

     

    I use Notepad++. The JSON files are text, but the contents looks more like a programming language (since it is) than plain readable text. If you've used UltraScatter a lot, you will recognize some of the concepts used to control the scattering of the props. Then you can play around and see what you come up with. It was a lot of trial and error for me - make a change - see what happens - oops syntax typo - try again... There are a lot of {} and [] to keep straight. After you spend a few hours in the editor, you will be eager for commercially available addons! But if you are a tinkerer with lots of patience and time, you can have some fun with the JSON. I appreciate that he made unencrypted files available and said it was OK for us to "hack" them (for our own use, I assume!!!)

    Thanks a lot for this information - so it is not that easy.

    I have some nice height maps created in Unity, that I would like to transfer to Ultra Scenery.

    The only problem is - they are in .raw format and I still have to find a way to convert them to .png

     

  • ArtiniArtini Posts: 9,462

    Another thought - does anybody tried generating height maps in Bryce and transfer them to Ultra Scenery?

     

  • MelanieLMelanieL Posts: 7,384
    edited March 2020

    Actually this one was a terrain height map exported from Bryce (not that it is very obvious that it came from Bryce, nor very exciting): https://www.daz3d.com/forums/discussion/comment/5433421/#Comment_5433421

    It worked fine.

    Post edited by MelanieL on
  • SimonJMSimonJM Posts: 5,982

    So far I have 'cheated' by using a displacment map from anotehr product (a trecnhes and ... um, anotehr one) and been pretty happy with the results

  • scorpioscorpio Posts: 8,419

    This is quite handy for generating height maps

    http://terrain.party/

  • MelanieLMelanieL Posts: 7,384
    Artini said:

    Another thought - does anybody tried generating height maps in Bryce and transfer them to Ultra Scenery?

    Another couple of examples I just did using Bryce-generated height maps.

    USC-BryceMM-1.jpg
    1024 x 768 - 980K
    USC-BryceMM-2.jpg
    1024 x 768 - 603K
  • barbultbarbult Posts: 24,245
    MelanieL said:
    Artini said:

    Another thought - does anybody tried generating height maps in Bryce and transfer them to Ultra Scenery?

    Another couple of examples I just did using Bryce-generated height maps.

    Very nice! Kind of a river valley look.

  • Shield WolfShield Wolf Posts: 53

    Hi Everyone,

     Got this the other day and I like everybody else love Howies creations..  My machine is top of the line Asus creation water cooled with 128 gig and Nvidia 2070 RTX card I-9 cpu 64 bit, 3.00 GHZ.. I read the product pdf and it says that it should roughly take

    " It can take 10-15
    minutes to build the average scene (tested on 3.7 GHz Quad-Core Intel Xeon E5 and Daz Studio 4.8)"

    I am running the latest Studio version and it's taking like forever to build a scene. I am not doing anything wierd just following the 4 steps outlined in the product pdf.  What's up? Why is it taking forever to build a scene? My seed is at "0"

    Please help.....

    Shield Wulf...

  • barbultbarbult Posts: 24,245

    When I run the UltraScenery script with a height map and then rerun the script on the existing UltraScene, it doesn't remember the height map I had used, or even that I used a height map. It goes back to Noise. @MelanieL, are you having that problem?

  • Shield WolfShield Wolf Posts: 53

    No I don't think so. It just takes forever to generate a scene. The first one I created finally finished at a woping 40 minutes to build it. Now I am not using a imported heightmap in the build process. More or less just choosing the defaults in the 4 point selection process.  What are you using to create the heightmap if anything? I have all kinds of terrain generating software, world machine, terragen and Vue.

  • Shield WolfShield Wolf Posts: 53

    It looks like I did not have instance optimation set correctly to memory. It was set at "auto"  doh.......... It does look like it is operating so much better, without pausing between screen's during the build process. I'll let you know in a bit when it's done building.

  • barbultbarbult Posts: 24,245
    Shield Wulf said:

    No I don't think so. It just takes forever to generate a scene. The first one I created finally finished at a woping 40 minutes to build it. Now I am not using a imported heightmap in the build process. More or less just choosing the defaults in the 4 point selection process.  What are you using to create the heightmap if anything? I have all kinds of terrain generating software, world machine, terragen and Vue.

    You aren't trying to run the script with your viewport in Iray Preview are you?

  • HowieFarkesHowieFarkes Posts: 607
    barbult said:

    When I run the UltraScenery script with a height map and then rerun the script on the existing UltraScene, it doesn't remember the height map I had used, or even that I used a height map. It goes back to Noise. @MelanieL, are you having that problem?

    This should be fixed in the update going through testing now.

  • barbultbarbult Posts: 24,245
    HowieFarkes said:
    barbult said:

    When I run the UltraScenery script with a height map and then rerun the script on the existing UltraScene, it doesn't remember the height map I had used, or even that I used a height map. It goes back to Noise. @MelanieL, are you having that problem?

    This should be fixed in the update going through testing now.

    Great! What other changes should we be looking forward to?

    I saw some "road" images in the runtime/textures folder and the user guide mentions "roads" as well as tracks, streams and ponds in section 2.2. Is there supposed to be a road feature choice in the script? I only see No Features, one pond, two streams and two rivers. A paved road would be a nice alternative.

  • Shield WolfShield Wolf Posts: 53

    Yep the preview was in Iray mode. Now turned to wireframe.  More to come. Thanks so far.

  • barbultbarbult Posts: 24,245
    Shield Wulf said:

    Yep the preview was in Iray mode. Now turned to wireframe.  More to come. Thanks so far.

    If your viewport was in Iray preview mode, you are lucky Daz Studio didn't completely crash! That is what happens for some of us when we try to use Iray Preview, even with optimization Memory, after the script completes. Your hefty computer must handle it better than my less powerful one.

  • HowieFarkesHowieFarkes Posts: 607
    barbult said:
    HowieFarkes said:
    barbult said:

    When I run the UltraScenery script with a height map and then rerun the script on the existing UltraScene, it doesn't remember the height map I had used, or even that I used a height map. It goes back to Noise. @MelanieL, are you having that problem?

    This should be fixed in the update going through testing now.

    Great! What other changes should we be looking forward to?

    I saw some "road" images in the runtime/textures folder and the user guide mentions "roads" as well as tracks, streams and ponds in section 2.2. Is there supposed to be a road feature choice in the script? I only see No Features, one pond, two streams and two rivers. A paved road would be a nice alternative.

    Nothign too exciting at this stage - it's mainly just some bug fixes and few "behind the scenes" things for content creators.

    Just the dirt road the moment (althought it's named a track) - but stay tuned.

  • Shield WolfShield Wolf Posts: 53

    barbult I love you........ This time it took only like approx 10 minutes. If I was there I would buy you a coke or your beverage of choice.. 8-)  Thanks again.....

  • Shield WolfShield Wolf Posts: 53

    Howie  Thanks again for creating such wonderful things for us Studio users......

  • barbultbarbult Posts: 24,245
    Shield Wulf said:

    barbult I love you........ This time it took only like approx 10 minutes. If I was there I would buy you a coke or your beverage of choice.. 8-)  Thanks again.....

    We're all here to help each other! I'm glad its going smoothly for you now. You won't be able to stop once you get going with this product.

  • MelanieLMelanieL Posts: 7,384
    edited March 2020
    barbult said:

    When I run the UltraScenery script with a height map and then rerun the script on the existing UltraScene, it doesn't remember the height map I had used, or even that I used a height map. It goes back to Noise. @MelanieL, are you having that problem?

    Yes I am - I have to reselect the height map each time I rerun the script. (At least I assume it needs to be reselected because it shows blank each rerun).

    ETA: OOPS! I should have read the rest of this page before answering - I see Howie is on to it already.

    ALSO: Thanks for your comments on my latest experiments.

    Post edited by MelanieL on
  • barbultbarbult Posts: 24,245
    HowieFarkes said:
    barbult said:
    HowieFarkes said:
    barbult said:

    When I run the UltraScenery script with a height map and then rerun the script on the existing UltraScene, it doesn't remember the height map I had used, or even that I used a height map. It goes back to Noise. @MelanieL, are you having that problem?

    This should be fixed in the update going through testing now.

    Great! What other changes should we be looking forward to?

    I saw some "road" images in the runtime/textures folder and the user guide mentions "roads" as well as tracks, streams and ponds in section 2.2. Is there supposed to be a road feature choice in the script? I only see No Features, one pond, two streams and two rivers. A paved road would be a nice alternative.

    Nothign too exciting at this stage - it's mainly just some bug fixes and few "behind the scenes" things for content creators.

    Just the dirt road the moment (althought it's named a track) - but stay tuned.

    While considering changes for content creators, it would be nice to facilitate InstaEdit, so it can easily and accurately figure out proper rotation, scaling and position of instances.

  • Shield WolfShield Wolf Posts: 53

    Yep I think so.....   Nire to come for real indeed,

    Ultra Scenery 01.jpg
    1500 x 1000 - 964K
  • Fae3DFae3D Posts: 2,560

    I am having so much fun playing with this product.  This may very well be my best Daz purchase so far!

    I do wish it came with a few sample height maps, just so I could see what they are.  I'm afraid I really don't know anything about them or how to make them.  But I would love to make some hills, valleys or steps!  Maybe an idea for one of the future add-ons?

    Thank you so much for UltraScenery, it's amazing!

     

This discussion has been closed.