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morcroft · 06-03-2010, 05:33 PM,

OK - if you want to send me a list of trees you're not happy with, and why, I'll take a look at them. It was recently pointed out to me that Speedtree is not that hard to "get hold of." Ahem.

Moving swiftly on - I'm sort of getting the hang of it so may be able to help out. Stilltrees are just depressing me at the moment, and while Speedtrees can't be decorated in the same way I think they generally just look better. I'll post more in the Stilltrees thread when I'm further along.

Ibsen's Ghost · 06-03-2010, 05:55 PM,

That's just the problem. 'Hanging stuff' is basically the order of the day for the moment as we move into the mainland. Koniption's mossy trees will come in very useful but if you could manage the loblolly (or whatever they're called) then that would be great!

Having said that, a speedtree expert on the team would still be a major asset! If we can end up with jungles looking anything like the first pic attached then it would be a major achievement. Before Senten went, I had requested a tree that is something like the second pic. I lost the original concept pic for this tree but if you imagine a proper jungle tree in that shape that stretches out its foliage then it would be a useful item to help with creating proper tree canopies. I also attached a pic of the 'pop ash' which is similar to what I'm trying to achieve with the Talu Swamp.

Other than that, check out the speedtree catalogue on their website to find the 'fantasy tree', the 'Bogtower' and maybe the 'Chinese banyan'. They're a bit like my favourite vanilla tree, the snowgumtree, and it proves that 'hanging stuff' is still possible but that you may have to make clever use of textures (hanging the snowgum texture off other trees looks very bad!). I had Speedtree once (ahem!) but didn't have the time to fiddle with it. Murkwood is sort of ready although I'd certainly relish having a really, really gnarled, ugly and threatening tree to replace the 'charred oak' (which doesn't fit all that well).

Edit - Btw, your jungletree03 billboard looks fine in the body of the thing but it has this really weird glow round the edges (see pic 4). Any way of fixing that?

morcroft · 06-03-2010, 06:42 PM,

Most of your Talu Swamp concept art looks to me like the Louisiana swamps, which are mostly Water Tupelo and Bald (or Swamp) Cypress - but it's the aquatic, broad-boled form rather than the straight-trunked form of the vanilla Swamp Cypress. Watch this space: I've been playing.

If we can do the hanging stuff on static nifs but hide the upper branches in speedtree canopies we may get the best of both worlds. For that purpose, the wider the canopy the better, of course - I'll look at your pic 2 request.

Unfortunately, it looks like all the Speedtree catalogue stuff is version 5, which allows all kinds of extra mesh manipulation. If I've worked this out correctly, Oblivion basically supports version 3, and not all features of that.

I think the snowgum texture is doing something clever: I tried hanging it from another tree and it looked as wrong as you said. I think Oblivion is breaking the one image up and using it in separate pieces. If I can work out what it's up to I'll be happy, but it's not obvious.

The jungletree03 billboard was just knocked up in an hour as a concept when I was supposed to be doing client work. For a deadline. Tomorrow. Ooops. Now I know you like it in principle I'll take a proper look at it soon - I'd put money on it being the alpha channel - Speedtree seems to use the alpha channel in a bit of an odd way.

Koniption · 06-03-2010, 07:13 PM,

Quote:Originally posted by Ibsen's Ghost
[...]
Murkwood is sort of ready although I'd certainly relish having a really, really gnarled, ugly and threatening tree to replace the 'charred oak' (which doesn't fit all that well).
[...]

I know that The Filthy Spaniard over at Bethesda forums has made some really knarly & leafless trees - they look like something out of a nightmare. He made them for his mod: The Terror of the Deepwoods, and he has a thread over at Beth devoted to that WIP mod.

You might can ask him if you can use a few of those trees of his in Blackmarsh.

The Filthy Spaniard was the guy who helped us with the quicksand setup and the scripting for the one relic.

Koniption

morcroft · 06-03-2010, 11:33 PM,

I finally understand the SnowGum - it's using a composite texture, something not supported in my Lite version of Speedtree. Don't see much of a way around that.

Ibsen's Ghost · 06-03-2010, 11:58 PM,

Okay, morcroft...looking forward to seeing what you're working on, nevertheless. I didn't know that part about the versions supported (or not) by OB. That's worth remembering so I don't bark up the wrong tree. Don't worry about the billboards. They can wait for now...although if you get them sorted, let me know.

@ Koniption - Ideally, I'd go for gnarly and leafy. The ones I saw on his thread were some nice adaptations on the SI mushroom trees. They could prove very useful but for Murkwood, I'd prefer to have maximum canopy. That's partly why I'm not that keen on the charred oak ones.

Anyway, I need to get back to TFS about the quicksand. Has he finalised it? In other words, does he now have a more workable copy of the item?

morcroft · 06-04-2010, 12:15 AM,

Hah! Oh yes!

I just managed to edit the snowgum without breaking the composite texture!

I've got a grove of long-trunked snowgums with mossy leaves!

That means in principle I think I can morph the snowgum and retexture it into anything - as long as it has 3 leaf-shapes and a dangling thread of moss.

More later....

Ibsen's Ghost · 06-04-2010, 01:59 AM,

Awesomeness! :eek:

Very well done, morcroft!

In the meantime, here's a little more progress. A far view from the mountains in good weather followed by (temporary) immediate access to the mountain shrine via an underground door that leads up to a door inside a hollow log jutting out from an Argonian stone head.

Then you're at the Shrine itself. Bear in mind that this creation is missing the most impressive feature: SG's gate with the accompanying ornamental symbol. This will be added later. Inside you will find living space for a shaman and lighting from oilplants (this would probably look much better at night, actually). The bed is an animated rootbed from Koniption.

Turn the corner and you'll see the watchful stone heads, one of which serves as a fountain. The far end is dominated by Senten's Hist tree saplings with sacred sunflowers. I also added an animated Hist gate to the side but I'm not sure whether I'm going to continue with using this gate model just yet...

...oh, and this is just a mini-shrine. The next will be much bigger.

Edit - You may see some graphical glitches. That's just my screwy graphics card. It won't be a problem for anyone else.

Koniption · 06-04-2010, 05:17 AM,

:bananarock:

KP

morcroft · 06-07-2010, 03:01 PM,

I found the tick-box provided specifically to solve the white-outline problem, so here's a new billboard. And I see what you mean about disappearing foliage, so I've fixed that in the accompanying .spt. And the excessive polys wasted inside the foliage where you can't see them. It's all still a bit George of the Jungle, but I can't fix that without a complete rework.

Let me know if these work better.