UltraScenery - new territory [Commercial]

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  • AnEye4ArtAnEye4Art Posts: 761
    edited February 2023

    I did a little "sweetening" to the image by adding a glowing keylight off-camera to the left, some ash / snow and some more deer.

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    Post edited by AnEye4Art on
  • hacsarthacsart Posts: 2,025

    Just picked this up.. Has anyone had issues with scene build speed? Running current versions of UltraScenery and Accelerator, and the process seems to stall at "building terrain" - DAZ 4.16. Other Ultrascenery features sets load and build just as fast as always..

  • memcneil70memcneil70 Posts: 4,042
    edited February 2023

    Really great @barbult and @AnEye4Art

    This is my first render, rendered three times. I hadn't really used Predatron's Four-wheeled cart and LoREZ Horse 2 before with a person, so this was a learning experience totally. The reins and hooves were in the wrong places in the first render. And as I composed it I kept wishing I had already downloaded and mastered @Code66's new release to use the Move tag. But after fixing the first issues, I used the tag on Oso's Fox, and it worked great. Picked the rail then the fox, moved the rail. Undo, pick the fox, then the rail, fox moved from 0,0,0 to just next to the railing two in front of the horses. Then it was just case of shifting him where I wanted him and the pose. Render. Where's the hair? Forgot it. And the Fox was at 138%? Took him down to 100%. Third render with hair. And this was all on my MacBookPro M1, so it CPU rendered.

    If I was totally fussy, I would pick Nikolai 9, dress him, simulate the pose, then tag him to the bench seat. (And hope the MBP M1 didn't pitch a fit.) His outfit was partially converted to G9 and partially auto-fitted.

    The guy is either headed to market for goods or headed home after selling all, in the early morning or late afternoon. HDRI Radiant Skies Golden Hour.

    Mary

    UST Tk 6 LR Horse 2 Cart Nik 9 Fox w fur.png
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    Post edited by memcneil70 on
  • GoggerGogger Posts: 2,379

    hacsart said:

    Just picked this up.. Has anyone had issues with scene build speed? Running current versions of UltraScenery and Accelerator, and the process seems to stall at "building terrain" - DAZ 4.16. Other Ultrascenery features sets load and build just as fast as always..

    When it was just freshly released I bought, downloaded, and installed it as fast as I could. The first landscape I tried to generate stalled so long I thought the Accelerator had botched on me. I ended up having to crash out of DAZ Studio and upon restart everything worked as I expected.  So, uh, "have you tried turning it off and back on again?"

  • memcneil70memcneil70 Posts: 4,042

    Each time I built a scene, it did seem to take a bit long. But I chalked it up to the MacBook Pro. Things do seem to take a bti longer sometimes. But when I reloaded the scene to fix it, it loaded very quickly, even with a G9 in there.

    Mary

  • barbultbarbult Posts: 24,017

    Gogger said:

    hacsart said:

    Just picked this up.. Has anyone had issues with scene build speed? Running current versions of UltraScenery and Accelerator, and the process seems to stall at "building terrain" - DAZ 4.16. Other Ultrascenery features sets load and build just as fast as always..

    When it was just freshly released I bought, downloaded, and installed it as fast as I could. The first landscape I tried to generate stalled so long I thought the Accelerator had botched on me. I ended up having to crash out of DAZ Studio and upon restart everything worked as I expected.  So, uh, "have you tried turning it off and back on again?"

    The new product worked perfectly out of the box for me, and consistently fine since then. I've probably done a dozen builds without trouble. I am using the latest 4.21 Public Build, though. I don't have 4.16 available to try.

  • memcneil70memcneil70 Posts: 4,042

    The update for Road Markings and Potholes is in DIM now.

  • hacsarthacsart Posts: 2,025

    HMM... looks like it works fine under 4.21 but saving a scene and attempting to render it causes an immediate crash under 4.16. I'll keep it, as I may upgrade one day..

  • Anyone know how to make the terrain flat? Also how to make it bigger? Atm I'm just using multiple terrains generated to connect them but its a pain because the edges are uneven

  • ArtiniArtini Posts: 9,344

    Shadowz said:

    Anyone know how to make the terrain flat? Also how to make it bigger? Atm I'm just using multiple terrains generated to connect them but its a pain because the edges are uneven

    Have you tried to change the height to 1 meter.

    Size of UltraScenery is 64 meters by 64 meters.

    To have a larger terrains try UltraSceneryXT:

    https://www.daz3d.com/forums/discussion/523766/ultrasceneryxt-large-terrain-landscape-generator/p1

     

  • There are a few ways to make it seem bigger.

    1. The first is to tick the 'Extended Forest' option. It doesn't add terrain, which is limited to 64m square, but it gives the impression of there being more because the way you can see trees further away.
    2. Add an extra terrain as you've obviously tried - probably worth using a seamless height map if you're going to do this.
    3. Use UltraScenery XT which is designed to be a background terrain with US as the foreground. The thing against this is that there is sometimes a visible boundary & the vegetation does not always look similar between US and USXT. [I wish there were more options available for USXT - hint, hint]

    There is one I have just thought of, and never tried, is to use a seamless terrain height map and then do a linear array of the entire US environment object. It's entirely possible DS will curl up & die, but it may be worth trying once..! If I remember, I may try it this evening.

    Regards,

    Richard 

  • davesodaveso Posts: 6,809

    Shadowz said:

    Anyone know how to make the terrain flat? Also how to make it bigger? Atm I'm just using multiple terrains generated to connect them but its a pain because the edges are uneven

    I feel this uneven edging is a very serious problem with USC. I used to tile terrains in bryce all the time. They had a method which allowed ach tle to match perfectly, on all sides, to create very large terrain segments. It would be real cool if this could be done in USC. I have tried to align paths, rivers, etc, and its near impossible to  get it to look right.

    I have not tried the deal with height maps stated, I'm not sure how to do that actually. Or would you have one large height map and then divide it equally, into 4 quadrants, as an example, then use each to generate 4 USC terrains and then connect them?  

  • MelanieLMelanieL Posts: 7,347
    edited February 2023

    daveso said:

    Shadowz said:

    Anyone know how to make the terrain flat? Also how to make it bigger? Atm I'm just using multiple terrains generated to connect them but its a pain because the edges are uneven

    I feel this uneven edging is a very serious problem with USC. I used to tile terrains in bryce all the time. They had a method which allowed ach tle to match perfectly, on all sides, to create very large terrain segments. It would be real cool if this could be done in USC. I have tried to align paths, rivers, etc, and its near impossible to  get it to look right.

    I have not tried the deal with height maps stated, I'm not sure how to do that actually. Or would you have one large height map and then divide it equally, into 4 quadrants, as an example, then use each to generate 4 USC terrains and then connect them?  

    One thing to make sure is that you remove the noise from terrain generation - it's a long time since I did it, but I think you have to set the contrast to zero (or maximum minus setting) to get rid of noise when you are trying to use heightmap in this way.

    ETA: Actually it seems I set Brightness to -100 to get a purely black noise map.

    Some time ago I generated a bunch tiling terrain height maps in Bryce and used them to create several USC terrains, but never quite managed to get the edges to line up perfectly. With luck the greenery will conceal the joins but the more up-and-down-sey the terrains are the worse it will be.

    Post edited by MelanieL on
  • barbultbarbult Posts: 24,017

    Could your computer render 4 UltraScenes at one time? You need to keep in mind that most features adjust the terrain. Also, most features are not designed for tiling. You cant put two dirt track features end to end and expect them to line up, because the start and end X Axis locations are not the same. Techniques for creating flat terrain and for preventing UltraScenery from adding noise to height maps have been discussed in this thread several times. I don't have links to those discussions, but you could search if interested.

  • davesodaveso Posts: 6,809

    it appears that someone really good with USC , the available tools, etc, needs to write a real good video tutorial laugh . There are so many possibilities and techniques. 
    Searching here in the forums is nearly futile unless you get lucky. I was trying to find some stuff on XT just yesterday and gave up. Nothing even came up with what I was looking for on a google search. I ended up scanning each page and gave up on that too as there are just too many posts to go through. Same here.  Anyway, maybe someday I will just actually concentrate on trying stuff and different techniques to see what happens. My system probably cant render 3 USC instances, I know it can do two for sure. plus an XT. 

    Maybe someday someone will figure out how to tile these so the roads line up, and the terrain edges.

  • davesodaveso Posts: 6,809

    bummer. I installed Bryce and realize I cannot remember anything about it. Its been years. I used to be really good even at weird advanced options. Memory loss. Susan Kitchens comes to mind and her great book. 

  • barbult said:

    Could your computer render 4 UltraScenes at one time? You need to keep in mind that most features adjust the terrain. Also, most features are not designed for tiling. You cant put two dirt track features end to end and expect them to line up, because the start and end X Axis locations are not the same. Techniques for creating flat terrain and for preventing UltraScenery from adding noise to height maps have been discussed in this thread several times. I don't have links to those discussions, but you could search if interested.

    IIRC, those discussions are in the USC Experiments thread.

  • barbultbarbult Posts: 24,017

    DoctorJellybean said:

    barbult said:

    Could your computer render 4 UltraScenes at one time? You need to keep in mind that most features adjust the terrain. Also, most features are not designed for tiling. You cant put two dirt track features end to end and expect them to line up, because the start and end X Axis locations are not the same. Techniques for creating flat terrain and for preventing UltraScenery from adding noise to height maps have been discussed in this thread several times. I don't have links to those discussions, but you could search if interested.

    IIRC, those discussions are in the USC Experiments thread.

    I know I responded to your question about flat terrain and you were successful in making your tulip gardens image, but I don't remember which thread it was in. I can't go looking right now. I think you are right, though.

  • Strictly from the FWIW department ... I use multiple USC objects all the time, but the secondary/tertiary/etc USC objects are at a distance - maybe I'm creating some sort of sense of distance (for which USXT is not really the right tool for that occasion) or I want a transition (like a grassy field here, transitioning to a more tree-filled area there). In cases like that, the joint between the objects is not important, so long as it's not visible to the camera, so I don't worry much about it. In fact, that bicycle scene I just posted a page or two ago uses two USC objects with a joint that would be pretty ugly if that's where the camera was focused. 

    Though I'm not sure how useful it is, here's a flat joint between four USC objects: Contrast = -100, Features = _No_Features, with a block made of 4 USC objects using the Oaks 02 ecology. The horse is standing with one hoof in each of the four USC items.

    Getting something more interesting than flat grass, as a mere proof of concept ... well, that's the whole tileable heightmaps/features conversation broached already.

     

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  • richardandtracyrichardandtracy Posts: 5,536
    edited February 2023

    I tried doing an array of US landscapes, and as I rather expected, my little Linear Array script wasn't sophisticated enough to be useful:

    Regards,

    Richard

    US Linear Array Trial.png
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    Post edited by richardandtracy on
  • Allright, the Experiments thread is here.

    For flat terrain, don't use a Height Map and set Contrast to -75. Note that it can't be used on all Features.

     

  • markusmaternmarkusmatern Posts: 558
    edited February 2023
    Post edited by markusmatern on
  • ArtiniArtini Posts: 9,344
    edited February 2023

    ​Roads 3 preset

     

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    Post edited by Artini on
  • ArtiniArtini Posts: 9,344

    Another image made with Roads 3 preset

  • paulawp (marahzen)paulawp (marahzen) Posts: 1,331
    edited February 2023

    A somewhat different take on Road 1.

    Freighthoppers.jpg
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    Post edited by paulawp (marahzen) on
  • Artini said:

    Shadowz said:

    Anyone know how to make the terrain flat? Also how to make it bigger? Atm I'm just using multiple terrains generated to connect them but its a pain because the edges are uneven

    Have you tried to change the height to 1 meter.

    Size of UltraScenery is 64 meters by 64 meters.

    To have a larger terrains try UltraSceneryXT:

    https://www.daz3d.com/forums/discussion/523766/ultrasceneryxt-large-terrain-landscape-generator/p1

     

    Yeah I tried to 1m & 0m for height but that still doesnt make it evenly flat. I think I need a custom height map thats flat but idk how to make custom height maps either :s

  • ArtiniArtini Posts: 9,344

    How to create a flat terrain is described at the beginning of:

    https://www.daz3d.com/forums/discussion/408551/ultrascenery-experiments-and-experiences/p1

    Look at the "Experiment: High Contrast Terrain"

     

  • davesodaveso Posts: 6,809
    edited February 2023

    I like old looking BW photos, so have been trying that out a bit. Not always sure it looks all that good or not. This render actually initally had fog applied, thus it makes it look hazy instead of sharp. 2 horses, neither DH3. There are 2 USC units with new landscape Dirt 7, but both are different foliage,  and an XT. Earlier it was discussed a bit if a system could handle 4 USC figures, so from this I would think mine can. Its actually a bit old, 32gi ram, 2070super graphics and an AMD 3800x CPU. 

    One thing this BW image brings out though is the repetition of the materials on the path. I had not noticed that in the color render. 

    2 horses classi2-1200x.jpg
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    Post edited by daveso on
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