Roads and rivers in ODS

[Polak]

Here are 2 shots showing my progress with ODS. In fact I have accomplished little more than just desert, but no matter.

I am showing this to tell that I am quite satisfied from the way the roads and river beds look from close up, however from the distance and altitude IMHO they are not too appealing (roads are so so, rivers not so so). This is the reason I have introduced the other topic of roads in general in Terrains.

I appeal there for serious help and consideration.

One note. As I fully realize that making any farm and rock tiles on the road bends is the recipe for trouble, in the version I have now they are already gone. Still, I have them somewhere else because IMHO they introduce some interesting variety if only placed smartly.

[Snake Man]

Yeah those road curves indeed looks repeating badly when flying high up. Perhaps if we make 2-4 road sets and randomize the tiles, it would mask the repeating look... but dunno if its still on plain desert background, it might look out of place. Hmm.

Besides the repeating look, the road and river tiles look real nice.

[Polak]

To make few different sets of road tiles is not a problem. But no matter what you put on those tiles they STILL look repetitive and unnaturally winding like a snake. And roads are not as bad as dry river beds. From close up they really look pretty naturally, but from the altitude not at all. There are just too many of them and they are constantly winding. Even more of the straight longer runs would perhaps be slightly better.

As you can see there is some potential, but suddenly I see that I am hitting the wall.

[Snake Man]

Perhaps random desert tiles will change the look enough so the roads and rivers aren't so sticking out from the terrain.

[Polak]

It is not really about roads and rivers , but...

Here I try to show where IMO the problem of Falcon 4 terrain rendering is and perhaps we could counter that with new way of distributing patches of variable terrain over the homogeneous nature.
Below an example of the desert terrain with "variables" introduced into the mix. I believe that there are around 8 variable textures here , but this does not prevent them from being unnaturally repeated (sometimes in immediate neighborhood). Also what is noticeable is the impression of grid. From higher altitude that is even more pronounced and downright ugly


It is progress shot and the river tiles for that type have not been yet found , but the shore is made and in more than one variation. Notice some tiling anomaly caused as I believe by the river proximity to the shore.

Going back to point of this post ......
Instead of variable tiles my suggestion is to counter this with small patches of another type of the terrain which can be introduced as a some noise in CATE background template. This would be no more than few pixels/tiles per patch, and only in the areas free from roads and rivers. Desirable, there should be quite few types of such patches over homogeneus terrain , but all should be rather not too far as far as look and color are concerned.

I envision that the effect of such a patchwork will add a lot of realism to terrain and can be looking something like this:


IMO variations to terrain various in size (larger than a single tile) as well as texture and content will give as desired results.

[Sherlock]

Polak,
the 2nd pic is outstanding! Introducing the noise provides a wonderful non-repetitive effect to those tiles. I say that is exactly what we are looking for.

As to the roads and rivers, how about the idea of making 6, 8 or even 10 different sets of roads and rivers that can be substituted throughout the theater to cut down on the repetition? I'm not talking about drastic changes between the different sets of 10 lets say, but instead subtle differences; just enough so that at high altitude the repetitiveness is cut way down. Would that work better?

[Polak]

I have "burned" fully through the 3+rd nature. Sea , coast, low (sandy) desert, high (rocky/rough grazing ) desert. I have many other natures well advanced, but not to the point that all related tiles (rivers, roads , transitions) are made there. I have also basically all airbases , however , thy are "waiting" for finalization of the natures so appropriate borders could be added.

At this point I call for the following in order to improve the looks as well as realistic feel of those parts of the terrain I completed:

a. there is just too many rivers and I call to reduce the numbers of them to those which are really "filled with water" all year round. (Google) and other sources (Vmap) have them marked on their maps. Waadis can be still present (tiles are even ready), however they should be accordingly differentiated on the main BMP template.
b. I have several coast sets which I would like at this point have introduced into terrain.
c. The same pertains to the rivers. I would like to make additional sets to the rivers so they look more natural and not so repetitive.
d. I would like also to edit BMP template to include those occasional spots "braking" monotony of the generic nature.

I admit that this is quite monumental task to just redo all the tiles, so my hat is off to the original author for making them at the frst place.

[87th_striker]

Could we maybe do an effort all of us, then get some variation tiles also ?

[Polak]

Could we maybe do an effort all of us, then get some variation tiles also ?

Most certainly , 87th_Striker,
just grab your favorite paint program and you are in business. Even if you catch and separate some interesting man built objects for the start it will be a great help. Thank you for the offer to help.

[87th_striker]

Hi Polak, have Photoshop, so send over the files to my email addy, and I''ll try to make something. Check personal.

[Polak]

Pretty soon I will upload all tiles I made for all to make tests and assist in troubleshooting if anyone wants it.

What I wanted though is to get through all the natures so the airbases could be part of this too. I am going now to work on arables and other green stuff which are the only missing tiles from this repaint Project (mountains I basically have) . Variations and some of the transitions will be 2nd phase of the Project depending how the implementation of what has been accomplished so far progresses.

Rivers were not really scaled properly. They need to be contained in the single tile and I wanted to include some of the adjacent stuff on the banks before I transitioned them to ...whatever under. So they basically can be about no more than 250 m in width.

If we to increase that to say 500m I need to make another set. I can gladly still make another set NP of wider rivers with less transition. Maybe we should for the lower runs.