Posted: Wed Jun 29, 2016 7:36 pm Post subject:
Terrain editing
As everyone is likely aware, I'm making my own mod after, well forever. I was originally just going to use RA1's terrain and do the SHPs for the units/buildings myself, but Agent Z offered to help out with some voxels. Also in the process, I found the size of RA1 SHPs, while easy to model, aren't as detailed as I'd like. So I'm probably going to convert my mod to be isometric in view, like TS. At the very least, I'll be making a Orthographic mod with double the tile size.
However, that brings the problem of terrain. TS's terrain is too alien for the setting and RA2's is too cartooony for the setting. I figured I'd make a TS-like tileset named Wasteland but I want there to have RA2 style grassy temperate terrain. I'd do it myself but I don't really have any experience with making terrain.
So I'm looking for someone that can either help out by making a basic tileset or two for my mod or at least help me learn how to do it myself. QUICK_EDIT
creating the TMP files is the least (even if somewhat annoying inconvenient due to the tools available) problem
my advice
-get a 3d modeling program
-create/download a scene which has the right camera/light settings
-play with textures to create a good looking terrain (bumpmaps and displacement maps can make your texture pop and look 3D, not only a flat image on a flat plane)
-you can of course do the same with photoshop and 2D only, but then getting the perspective and lighting done right can be difficult
Well ORA can just use SHP files I believe. I guess I'm going to try using DonutArnold's blender template for this then. I wasn't sure if that was the ideal way of doing it though. QUICK_EDIT
Joined: 22 Nov 2010 Location: Iszkaszentgyorgy, Hungary
Posted: Wed Jun 29, 2016 9:27 pm Post subject:
Uhm, those are exported to yaml from the TMPs by the terrain importer, so your comment doesn't apply. _________________ "If you didn't get angry and mad and frustrated, that means you don't care about the end result, and are doing something wrong." - Greg Kroah-Hartman
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Past C&C projects: Attacque Supérior (2010-2019); Valiant Shades (2019-2021)
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WeiDU mods: Random Graion Tweaks | Graion's Soundsets
Maintainance: Extra Expanded Enhanced Encounters! | BGEESpawn
Contributions: EE Fixpack | Enhanced Edition Trilogy | DSotSC (Trilogy) | UB_IWD | SotSC & a lot more... QUICK_EDIT
Well I'll have to figure out how to go from model to SHP to ingame, but DonutArnold sent me an awesome example of terrain being done in blender. So yeah, blender is crazy versatile and DonutArnold is awesome. QUICK_EDIT
Just as a final question, what's the best way to create the palette for a custom tileset? I could've sworn that XCC mixer would create a single palette from multiple 255 colored files, but I do appear to be mistaken. Other than making the palette beforehand, what would be the best way to go about creating a palette for a selection of tileset pngs. QUICK_EDIT
i would copy all pngs into one big image. (the advantage of using 3d, you can render your entire terrain in one big image)
then use photoshop or any other graphic editor to reduce the color depth of the big image down to 256.
then use the resulting colors for the palette _________________ SHP Artist of Twisted Insurrection: Nod buildings
Joined: 22 Nov 2010 Location: Iszkaszentgyorgy, Hungary
Posted: Thu Jun 30, 2016 6:55 am Post subject:
GIMP is better for this role though, it doesn't flatten the image before converting it to 256 colors, but force all layers to share the palette. _________________ "If you didn't get angry and mad and frustrated, that means you don't care about the end result, and are doing something wrong." - Greg Kroah-Hartman
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Past C&C projects: Attacque Supérior (2010-2019); Valiant Shades (2019-2021)
=======================
WeiDU mods: Random Graion Tweaks | Graion's Soundsets
Maintainance: Extra Expanded Enhanced Encounters! | BGEESpawn
Contributions: EE Fixpack | Enhanced Edition Trilogy | DSotSC (Trilogy) | UB_IWD | SotSC & a lot more... QUICK_EDIT
Joined: 26 Apr 2003 Location: Somewhere in Germany
Posted: Thu Jun 30, 2016 10:42 am Post subject:
Darkstorm wrote:
Just as a final question, what's the best way to create the palette for a custom tileset? I could've sworn that XCC mixer would create a single palette from multiple 255 colored files, but I do appear to be mistaken. Other than making the palette beforehand, what would be the best way to go about creating a palette for a selection of tileset pngs.
I guess it's easier to work with a single palette, but keep in mind OpenRA allows to override the default palette for each template.
So depending on how detailed your original terrain art is, you might want to use one palette for flat ground (grass, desert sand), one for shores and water, one for cliffs and maybe a few more.
In that case you should keep each of these rough categories in a separate png and then derive the palette for each of them using either LKO's or Graion's method.
One of the primary advantages of this approach is that it allows you to make a single monolithic terrain set containing grass, desert, snow etc. all at once without being forced to compromise on quality. QUICK_EDIT
Ok thanks, I should've thought of that. And a thanks again on the information about multiple palettes, I might definitely consider that. I know I said that was my last question, but I've had issues getting my squares to tile properly. How does one go about that? QUICK_EDIT
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Terrain editing
