WIND EROSION MACRO? a new cool macro idea

Macros and Plugins
#1

Hey… someone needs to make a macro that imitates wind erosion… parts of the terrain blasted by fast moving winds creating lengthy stripes and turbulent patterns… look at satellite photos of the sahara desert and you will see what i mean… look up (STS026-43-98.jpg) on google… i do not think it would be to hard to do and it would be very essential for those wanting to make desert terrains… it could take a selected part of any device and warp those parts into smooth straight lines as they blend into other parts of the local terrain with the device connected to it… the type of bands can be controlled, how many bands, the randomness, the direction, the turbulence, the length and how much it blends into the other device terrain… this would be an very neat macro and i know some very neat ones have been made already but this would be unlike no other…

Sethren

#2

I think you mean this image:
(http://earth.jsc.nasa.gov/sseop/images/efs/lowres/STS026/STS026-43-98.jpg)
Well, that is… how should I say… impressive!.. As to how it would be done as a macro, I think it can’t… Or at least not the complete efect… One approach would be to make use of Rhalph’s method, in his zooming macro, to use a displacement with a gradient, but only in one direction… this will cause the terrain to look stretched in one direction… That could be the result of the wind!.. But somehow I think it would be desireable to apply this effect to the lower regions of the terrain with more strength than in the higher regions… (just a thought)

The effect however, resembles one of a painter programm that imitates oil paintings, or aquarel painting… Unfortunately, the only program I know that does that is Painter… And is not very affordable or easy to come by…

Another problem would be if the direction of the wind was not constant… Then I don’t know how to do it in a macro… because of making a mask that would say where the effect would be, in a way that would depend on the varying direction of displacement…

#3

As Fil said, actually simulating this would be difficult, but simply getting a similar effect might not be so hard. If you got the right displacement working - and you could even use an imported image, to get it just right - it might work in WM. You’re more likely to get reasonably good results in another application though, likely one that has a “fibre” or “painting” filter, as Fil mentioned. There are actually quite a number of applications, some of them even free, that have such functions. Take a look at Dogwaffle and The GIMP for example (I think the free versions of both can do similar things). What you would probably do is create terrain, import it into the imaging app and filter it, save it in a format to be imported again in WM then use the altitude constraints and blending to get it looking right. You may also want to use some erosion, different blending methods, etc. to get the right effect.

I am very interested in seeing the results of this if anyone gives it a shot. I probably won’t have time to play with it any time soon, but post results here if you do.

  • Oshyan
#4

Well certain displacement types may work out… i was thinking the same thing… but i noticed how the wind does effect certain elevations making a very complex pattern… it almost reminds me of a fluvial water run off effect… i had done some really good ones at one time but i wish the details were not so fuzzy and more sharp… perhaps this will be fixed in WM 1.0… also i would like the global scale of the terrains to be larger then 120 kilometers because i very much would want to make global scale terrains which would be another reason why i wanted this effect… let’s say for a desert planet!.. piecing 120km seamless squares together is no picnic… Maybie terragen 2 can do something like this from a WM import… those TGD Alpha teaser images certainly blew me away… it seems to have unique ways of shaping the terrains using types of displacement i have never seen before so if i can beta test it then maybie it can produce what i am looking to do… but in the meantime if i can get very close to the wind effects i will post an example for all to see… thanks for the suggestions…

#5

Sethern, you just live to side track me. Now my head is caught up in just how to get this effect in WM; using WW textures :wink: . Right now I’m working on multipul flow masks on a single terrain; splitting a single terrain to run it through several different erosions, then over lay the masks in terragen.

Not sure why you want your point spacing so high. I like to work at 60km so I don’t lose terrain detail when I rais my mountains to 7000m; I input the terrain to TG at 60, drop it to 30, then rais my mountains to 7000. At 120km all I get are vast plains. Which are actually perfect for planetary renders.

#6

Sethern, you just live to side track me.

noooo… honestly i don’t… can’t help it dude… i think i think to much… to much caffine… but seriously if you get it into a macro or atleast a preset that would be too cool… the world size with is maxed at 120 kms… not good for planets… you’re right it loses detail which hopefully that will be fixed soon… we need thousands of kms which i am hoping v1.0 will do… the overall effect should be a bigger terrain in the sense of smaller distant details but that requires something like a zoom out and high res finish in other words lots and lots going on while still being able to identify mounatain ranges, plains, coastal syclines, highlands, plateaus, structural land forms divided by plate techtonic displacement… i try these things but it is very hard without larger land areas and turbulent displacement procedures dividing the regions apart…

Sethren

#7

Still working on it. This is what I have done so far, but I don’t think it’s what you want http://www.terranuts.com/photopost/showphoto.php?photo=7349&sort=2&cat=546&page=1

This may be a job for Super Fil.

#8

it is very close… very neat terragen render… good start… how, may i inquire did you do this? Go Super Fil! … darnit i need to install world machine to see if i can do this wind erosion thing… i wonder how close we can get to the real thing… hmmmm… :?

Sethren

#9

You don’t have WM instaled? :slight_smile:
It’s well worth the regestration fee for the full version. Nothing like a 4079 at 129km to show mammoth. Although I don’t have the patiants to work it.

Actualy its multipul erosions with the erosion flow output added back to the terrain, very lightly. And of corse the masks and textures; WW. This one dosen’t have many texture layers for me; only 7, but each layer has a texture over lay and a mask. I’ve got the TMD, but can’t post it here.
I’ve also reworked it a bit for artistic reasons, I raised the hieght on the flows.

#10

Forgot to select the auto log in the last time I logged in… :lol:

#11

i registered it a long time ago and had done 2 CDs worth of terrain presets… thanks for the info… COOL!.. something i can mess with… i need to redo my PC before i re-install it… i have this crap dell and it seems i always need to re-do windows arrrggggg…

Sethren

#12

I have the same problem with my gateway. About every three months I have to reinstall windows. I intend to build my next computer myself. The biggest problem I’m having with my gateway right now is having listened to the sales rep. " oh no you’ll never need 512 k , or use 80gig". Now I wish I had a gig of ram and 120gig HDD. Of corse a pent 3.2 would be better then the 2.4 I have now.

#13

Super Fil? hmm… My name is actually Filark Flent, and I am a news reporter for the Daily WM-Plannet :smiley:
I think I know that Super Fil guy… I can try t talk to him to see if he can do anything :wink: but he has been on vacation for a while, maybe he can come up with something :). I just don’t know how better will it be comparing to Manley’s attempt.

“Super” Cheers,

#14

odd, Just got back on after having my brother and family over for brunch. The kids had to have the TV on the cartoon network and they sat there watching the old superman cartoon from when I was a kid. Then got here to fil’s post.

Hope noone gets upset if I burn a little band width here.
http://www.terranuts.com/photopost/showphoto.php?photo=7365
the latest version. And they say a picture is worth a thousand words so…

Almost looks like the render. I’m thinking about replacing the combiners with choosers and inputing the Dunes macro. ???

#15

OK i installed World Machine… could not resist… will redo the PC later… messed with the devices all day… close but no cigar… world machine just can not do that type of pattern… basically it is a very very long fluvial-like erosive pattern that is kind of wavy and that it does not effect the local rough terrains but just sweeps over it with the blown sands effecting the lower less rough elevations… very neat but do not think it is possible currently in this version… oh well… i tried!

Sethren :cry:

#16

Didn’t say I was done. Still therorizing. Too stubern.

#17

in case i get really bored i suppose i can have one more go at it! well… good luck!

Sethren

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#18

OK… i know it can not be done and i will explain why… the kind of erosion we are talking about here sweeps at a generally level plain of motion displacing the loose dirt, soils and sands over very long distances… in other words the wind being blasted across far distances at high speeds is not the same as fluvial erosion types were it comes from above and goes downward from water flow seeking lower parts of the land which is what we are getting every time… sorry but unless one can edit a simular effect in a seperate application then import the hieght map into world machine it can not be done… i hate importing images because world machine does not save that image import with the file preset… maybie v1.0 has some goodies that can bring us closer to that wind erosion… who knows?

Sethren

#19

Hmm… Well, over here, results aren’t spectacular either… Based my approach on that Angled Strata idea, where the terrain is “tilted” by add a gradient, then terraced, and the subtracted the gradient again… But instead of terracing it, I eroded it… This way I would “control” the flow of the erosion… Sounds nice doesn’t it? :slight_smile: well, It’s all theory :stuck_out_tongue: in practice it didn’t look as nice… Basically the river erosion takes too much land out of the ground… what we want is more like getting land out of walls… So that gave me a socnd idea… to use the slope selector, in conjunction with the select angle and apply some glaciation transformation to it (transform device). I can’t say I am happy with it!.. So instead of using the transform device, I used the expander device set to tighten… I lost a bit of detail, but the end result was better…
The glaciation would lower the height of a wall, past below the ground’s height… It’s rendering now…

#20

Ok, in order to commemorate breaking the psicological barrier of 100 posts in this forum, I present you the images resulting from my attempt at making wind erosion… ta-da!


As you can see, they don’t look much like wind erosion :frowning: but I do like the “streaks” effect… they do seem like short dunes… I’m now wontdering what would be the result if a certain noise was added to displace them… somehow…

I would very much like to thank Oshyan for lending me his mastering genious in quickly applying a texture and rendering them in TG… (these are only test images with a quick texture… noting really hard to do in less than 2 minutes)

Cheers,