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Re: Creating height.tga file
Posted: Tue Jun 26, 2018 7:06 am
by Davinci
Well, the first map was actually 2.5 miles of terrain that I stretched to just get a proof of concept.
Understood!
The second one is 5 miles of terrain. I am not sure what I did different.
When Saving, check the file size, that will usually let me know if something is wrong, or not saved correctly.
You can find the correct file size by comparing it with other height maps that are the same size, located in different maps.
davinci
Re: Creating height.tga file
Posted: Thu Jun 28, 2018 8:22 am
by georgerutherford1861
Okay, hopefully this zip file will work better. I still have not mastered the saving as 8 bit thing, I will have to keep trying.
One thing I am curious about is how the other mapmakers determine their grayscale color range, as I would imagine that the more of a range in shades there are, the greater the elevation change is in the game map. If I could get that piece of info, that would help settle my mind some more that I may be on the right track.
Thanks again.
Doug
Re: Creating height.tga file
Posted: Thu Jun 28, 2018 9:38 am
by Davinci
It Works!
What exactly do you want Me to do with it, Re-Save it as 24bit?
Answer to Question - the rivers and streams would be the Lowest-Level-GrayScale Color, something like 0, or 5, or 10.
Then the GrayScale Colors would go up around 3 or 5 from the streams, and onto the terrain.
The highest point would be in the 200-255.
Probably not the best way to explain it, but you want the terrain to be smooth and not have Jagger-Edges.
SO - it the GrayScale goes from 0 "the lowest point" - with a color of say 20 "next to it", this would create a sort of Block in the terrain.
To put that another way, "Any" color in the GrayScale that is next to "Another" color should be only a few colors up or down from that color.
File below - Saved as 24bit.
The attachment height_2018-06-27.rar is no longer available
davinci
Re: Creating height.tga file
Posted: Thu Jun 28, 2018 5:59 pm
by georgerutherford1861
Thank you again davinci.
Well, that is just plain weird. I tried opening it in lstudio before I uploaded it and it crashed. Are you saying that it worked as soon as you downloaded and extracted it? The version that you uploaded works perfectly, so there must be something in between that I am missing.
I will mess around with that part later, but for now it is on to the bmps I think. I will start with the road network, once I have that in place it should make it easier to reference the vegetation areas, fences, walls, buildings, etc.
Doug
Re: Creating height.tga file
Posted: Fri Jun 29, 2018 7:01 am
by Davinci
Are you saying that it worked as soon as you downloaded and extracted it?
Hmm, Not Sure if I Saved it first and then tried it, can't exactly remember!
For now it is on to the bmps I think. I will start with the road network, once I have that in place it should make it easier to reference the vegetation areas, fences, walls, buildings, etc.
The "Mapname.bmp" is probably the hardest part of the whole Map-Making-Process.
The "SOWGB.log" file located in the Work\Folder - will record any road-errors, along with any bad-colors in the mapname.bmp file.
So, that will help you out and alert you of any errors.
davinci