SC4Terraformer, a tool for regional handterraforming

[Pixelrage 34]

has anyone tried using it for a huge region? When I tried it, the horizon cutoff was too close. In other words, it would clip out the top quarter portion of the map with blue.

[jplumbley 5]

@Pixelarge    Yes I have experienced that aswell... Its ok because it doesnt erase any work done there and the global tools will still affect the "cut off" area... I am not 100% sure but I think the reason this is, is because to make the Terraformer run smoothly and faster it can only show a maximum amount of area for it to work well. And on HUGE regions the areas may get cut off by the maxium view depth to save memory. It is perfectly normal is what I am trying to say.

@Nonfactor    Well, with the extensive testing that I have done with this program I have found a few little tricks.

First I will start with rivers.  What I do is use the DRAW tool and set it to the level I want below sea level.  I then use CTRL+the arrows keys to rotate my view so that I am looking straight down on the region and I zoom out to view the whole region.  Then I draw my rivers.  Along the edges of the rivers I will then use the smooth tool to make them smoother, I find 10 is too strong for this so I use 6 or 7 strength.

Second I will explain hills in the plains.  When making hills in the plains I look for a isometric view onto the region and then use the hills tool at strengths 3-6 and varying sizes as low as 5 and as high as 25.  And then I click around.  Do Not click and drag  for this trick.  Make individual clicks all over the place with each size you want.  I use 3 or 4 sizes when I do this and then go across with some valleys here and there and then I use the erode tool at strength 10.  This will give your plains a very nice textured look.

Third trick is for mountains.  I take the new mountains tool with a strength of 10 and around 20 to 30 size depending on the size I want .  I click and drag where I want the mountain range to be and make a few little peaks while I'm at it.  Next I take the same tool with a Strength of 5 or 6 and a Size of 7 to 10 and draw some ridges down the sides of the peaks  to give them thier bulk.  And finally I take the same tool again and use Strength 5 and size 4 or 5 and  click and drag in the crevases.  Doing this takes a bit longer but when raising the land in the crevases make circles with the tool to kind of randomized the hieght changes this will give it texture aswell.  The final word on making mountains is to make the mountains come out nice without big ugly tall ridges that are suppose to look like a mountain range is too grid rid of most of the brown spots and make the mountain look mostly green.  This will make your mountain ranges look realistic in game.

JPlumbley

[wouanagaine 84]

I will second jplumbley on thoses issues . We have a good experienced user here !

So to sum up, yes the far clipping is normal, else SC4Terraformer will run jaggy, and you can experience zbuffer fighting bug between the land and the water. I set the clipping plane to 12km, and that is the max I can allow, with this far limit, on a slow pc or slow GFX card, it is already lagging

For the landscaping, great explanation ! I will try to make thoses repetitive things automatics in some next release. As the core engine is close to finish, I will have more time to do better tool. So if anyone has tricks like that, I'd be glad to read them to find if I can make them directly in thoses tools.

Good to have you by my side JPlumbley

Take care and thanks for your feedback and interest

[prince_of_sims 0]

i second using the draw tool to create rivers. VERY VERY useful. but when smoothing, remember to use a small brush with not a lot of power, and remember to smooth just the edges.

hmmm... i have to try that mountains explanation.... i've been trying to create a good mountain range for a region i plan to do my first CJ on, and it hasn't been turning out too good...

EDIT:

Some preliminary testing and experimenting with jplumbey's method yeilded surprising results! It's tedious work, yes, but the results have the potential to be very good looking.

[Rayden 7]

Originally posted by: wouanagaine Karybdis,pos,killerbyte

That makes me think of adding DEM importing to the wish list

...quote>

 

That would be the icing on the cake.

[jplumbley 5]

Here are some teaser pictures of my region which will be uploaded to STEX when we have a way to do it....  But this is also to demonstrate how my mountains explaination will come out in SC4 from the Terraformer.

SC4Terraformer.... This is how I finish in SC4 Terrafomer.

SC4 Region View of mountains

SC4 City Tile View of mountains

I hope this helps with my  little torturial on making mountains.

Thank you very much for those nice comments wou!!!  I couldn't have been any help if you hadnt made this amazing program.  I will be around to help out and answer questions as often as I can and I hope for this program to become a great success in the SC4 world.

JPlumbley

[mtbrocket 2]

Here are my thoughts on the program so far. This is great start. I see it will be a valuable tool not just for creating and changing landscapes but also for taking images of them for use in CJs. I am already putting it to use in my CJ. Here are some suggestions:

1. The move and zoom functions are not obvious without the help from the forum. I would put in a compass or a system similar to the one on mapquest.
2. A start button would be good or at least some way to load and reload regions.
3. Instead of a bright blue background I would use the same background as SC4. Another idea is to use a color that can be easily selected and removed by Photoshop.
4. Some way to save the views would be nice, instead of relying on print screen.
5. The contrast of the different heights is not detailed enough. As you can see on the pictures below the hills in the east virtually disappear. I would make sea level ground green, gray at low levels, brown and then orange at mid levels, and beige at high levels. These are the colors I have on a map on the wall. By having very different colors at neighboring levels the elevations are easier to see.

Whole Region.

Picture 1

Eastern Hills.

Picture 2

I also notice that the point of view is different than the SC4. Is that deliberate? Will future versions of the program allow different point of views? It is very interesting.

Picture 3

Thanks for all your hard work. This is a great program. :-)

-Dan

[MarcosMX 222]

I really missed this fantastic program. What else can I say, this will be the Tool/mod of the year.

[Karybdis 34]

mtbrocket: if I can address your points here

1. The readme pops up after the program is installed, and has a detailed list of movement controls. They are virtually the same as the game on many accounts, but the rest of them are listed there, and are in the programs directory. Personally I am against the compass because Simcity doesn't need it and operates in the same manner.

2. I'm afraid I'm not sure what you're talking about... if you just mean a load function, I would like that too personally.

3. interesting idea if possible.

4. nice idea if possible.

5. Check the last page, next version already has this.

And the view is completely changable. Check the readme.

[Lord Kronos 0]

One thing that I would like to see in this program is a set of views that you can just click a button and have the camera move to that angle, i.e. Top Down, SC4 East, West etc. I think that would be very useful, and perhaps (if possible) when clicked again, the camera returns to the position it was before you clicked the change view button. This could also be used to quickly switch between to custom viewing angles. Just a thought!

This really is a revolutionary tool for Simtropoolis and the SimCity Community as a whole. I hope to see this become as an essential download as The NAM now is!

LK

[MarcosMX 222]

hmm I trying to open the SC4Terrainformer but after that a window pops up saying that DirectX can't be loaded.

Does anyone knows whats happening?

[prince_of_sims 0]

check out the readme of the program. if you still cant get it to work after that, post your system specs.

[jplumbley 5]

@MarcosMX  in the installer when it is asking you to accept this agreement there is 2 links part  way down in the scroll.  Both of those links are too the DirectX files needed.  That should help you.

@LordKronos  that is a very interesting option.  I am sure it will be put in the wishlist but I have a feeling it will be a little memory intensive for the program and make it more of a problem for those with smaller computers... I think we are lucky enough to get a one level undo in the version in testing right now.

@mtbrocket and karybdis  Karybdis thank you for answering questions.

      1.  I think Karybdis has it right but I will post the directions here.

                    Arrowkeys - movement around the region

                    CTRL+Arrowkeys - rotates view in 4 axis

                     Mouse scroll - zooms in and out

       2.  There has been a option integrated into the new version in testing for Loading a region.

       3.  Again in the next version in testing,  new colors for the ground have been integrated, background may come later or not. The new colors also provide your contrast in different hieghts.  Picture shows new color scheme:

         4.  This I believe is not going to be easily done for a normal machine.  I could be wrong but I believe it will be put into the wishlist and wouanagaine will have to decide to look into this one at a later time I think.  It is an issue with memory I would suspect.

Thank you all for your comments we will work hard and try to figure out ways to do some of these requests.

JPlumbley

[wouanagaine 84]

Wow, wow, some greats ideas here

First I'd like to thanks karybdis, pos, and jplumbely for answering questions !

and again a great pic by jplumbely, just missing shadows and I love your mountains

mtbrocket

Some nice ideas, mainly everything have already been replied, so I 'll just confirm

1 : Putting a radar, is not that usefull and would take too much memory with huge region

, Putting a compass can be done, but I think I will follow Karybdis advice , or will be made when other higher priorities task will be done. Take no offence

2 : Yes v.07 have this in the menu, you will be able to load a region once already in SC4Terraformer

3 : Ok , this will be in the next version, I will add this option to the color configuration

4 : I'll take a look, it is easily feasable, just I want to know what are the cons of using PrintScreen ?

5 : Colorisation is on v.07 and easily ( hum hum ) configurable to suit your needs

MarcosMX

first post, thanks for your nice comments

second post, as I am in a good mood, I'll only say , Read the Readme.html. it should normally pop up in your webbrowser even if you not have the correct directX installed

Lord Kronos

This will go to wish list, as it will require some GUI modifications and I need to find some place to put the button, good idea

So I hope the v.07 will be ok for testers, and may be uploaded today.

A big thanks for your feedback, comments and support

Take care!

[bat 6]

Awesome programme!!

But I have a question to jplumbley(not to this programme):

"Where do you get the background at the second picture of the post, which you posted on the 06/12/2006 10:04 PM???"

Thanks for the answer!

bat

[Karybdis 34]

The con's of printscreen.....hmmm

In my opinion it's because for most people, the only option that printscreen gives is to bring the image into Windows Paint and save as a BMP which are huge and inefficient.

For those who have Photoshop, its not much of a con having to use printscreen, but like with the game, anything that saves time is better.

[jplumbley 5]

@bat That is the default background that comes with downloading rudeboy's menu divider package.

JPlumbley

[DarkLoki 0]

Sc4Terraformer 0.7c has been released!

A message from wounagaine:

Changes from v.06

* Open region option (v.07c)

* Add a new valley tool ( much lighter ) (v.07c)

* Water rendering in region view updated (v.07c)

* One level undo ( v.07b)

* Colorization ( v.07b)

* Program now exit properly when config.bmp is not correct ( v.07)

* Less memory usage ( v.07)

* Mouse freezing when camera too high is fixed ( v.07)

* Region view thumbnails updated ( v.07)

* Isoclines tool with user interface ( v.07)

known bugs :

* disapearing mouse cursor

A note about the new feature 'Open region'

Opening a huge region, while already have one huge region loaded may consume to much memory for your system.

quote>

Before downloading please read the following information:

DirectX - Microsoft directx team releases a new version about every two months so you should be sure you have the latest version. If you get an error about d3dx9_26.dll you do not have the latest version installed.

You can download directx from the following locations:

http://www.softwarepatch.com/windows/directx.html

or

http://www.microsoft.com/windows/directx/default.mspx

MSCVP71.DLL - Some users may need this file. It can be found here:

http://www.dll-files.com/dllindex/dll-files.shtml?msvcp71

Instalation - All you have to do is open the downloaded installer and follow the instuctions on screen. After the installer you can open the program in the start menu like this:

Start->All Programms->SC4Terraformer->SC4Terraformer v.07c

This is an external program and does not change anything within simcity.

Please note you use this program on your own risk, you should make a backup of your region and read the included readme.html

Now you can download SC4Terraformer .

{Outdated version}

I only provide hosting for the program and i'm one of the testers but all the credit should go to wounagaine as he is the one who coded Sc4terraformer.

Have Fun!

[freedo50 1]

wow cool stuff the new tool is great!!!!!!!!

great work wounagaine and co.

[MarcosMX 222]

I don't know if this problem has already been answered but here is my question, when I save a region on the SC4Terrainformer, and I start the game, some tile are filled with water, is ther a way to solve this?

[wouanagaine 84]

Karybdis

Ok, I see, I'm lucky enougth to get Photoshop

Hope this one will get ride of your bug

Ynterboy

Thanks for hosting and taking time to upload while you're buzy

And putting great efforts in the warning !

freedo50

Hope you'll be pleased by this one.

As I said, I think the core engine is ok ( well let say 99% ). So now I will have time to make it more easy and user friendly.

So yes, I'm not alone on this, thanks to Ynterboy, Jplumbley, prince_of_sims, SC4Boy, CDB and Karybdis ( even is Karybdis is not a tester, I thank him for all his knowledge )

MarcosMX

Use the last one (v.07c), there won't be any more water tile ( I hope )

---

and I will second Ynterboy on READ THE README.HTML!!!!!

Questionning for things that are answered on the readme.html is like treating me as an idiot so I will do the same with you.I have put efforts in the README.HTML so read it carefully and you may find your answers.

But of course I will always be glad to answers your questions that can't be answered in README.HTML

I know this may sound rude but I prefer make things clear on that point.

---

Thanks all for your support and comments.

[Battlecat 14]

Excellent!  I can't wait to try this out!  Sorry I haven't had time to give you more feedback, life has been beserk of late.  Sadly, I'm not sure it's going to get any better, but I'm itching to get my hands on this program! 

[MarcosMX 222]

mmm now I have a new problem, I have created a new region but whenever I open Simcity I notice this.

Click Here.

 

[Karybdis 34]

Marcos: what's the problem? Looks more or less normal to me.....though the shoreline is a bit rounded.

If you mean the colouration, its supposed to be like that.

[shawnie 0]

ahh! i cant get it to work...this always pops up! "Direct X. Can't be loaded. CHeck the readme & see logfile" what am i doing wrong?

[Battlecat 14]

MarcosMX as far as I can tell, the updated screenshots in the game itself are taken from the SC4 Terraformer.  As such, the initial views when you load the region up in Simcity 4 will have the same texturing style as in SC4 Terraformer.  Once you load up the city, the actual in game textures will be applied to the tile. 

[prince_of_sims 0]

Originally posted by: shawnie

ahh! i cant get it to work...this always pops up! "Direct X. Can't be loaded. CHeck the readme & see logfile" what am i doing wrong?quote>

 

have you checked the readme? it's all in there...

Originally posted by: wouanagaine

and I will second Ynterboy on READ THE README.HTML!!!!!

Questionning for things that are answered on the readme.html is like treating me as an idiot so I will do the same with you.I have put efforts in the README.HTML so read it carefully and you may find your answers.

But of course I will always be glad to answers your questions that can't be answered in README.HTML

I know this may sound rude but I prefer make things clear on that point.quote>

[koffee 0]

wouanagaine, you are my hero!

 

I mean, the program is wonderful and all that, but this is a classic:

Questionning for things that are answered on the readme.html is like treating me as an idiot so I will do the same with you.quote>

 

I'm going to paraphrase that the next time I write a readme!  Of course, that's a bit Catch-22 since that will mostly apply to people who never see it. 

[baabaaloo 0]

i can finally make a good region

Thank the lord, sorry, umm... I mean you.

[Pokemen9103 0]

On the next vesion, can you make it mac compatible?