Quick Terragen n00b question...

[Superchaz]

Ok, last time i tried making skyboxes, the edges has black lines on them ( which made the skybox look stupid). So, i asked how to get rid of those, and i heard u had to stretch the picture out EVER SO slightly.

Can anyone tell me how much u stretch the image? Ive been going at it for almost an hour, and i still have black lines.

Also, do u stretch it out IN terragen, or an art prog ( PS, PSP, etc)

[Borat]

I haven't used terragen, but I beleive the technique is to import them into UnrealEd, and then when they are placed onto the skybox walls, just set the surface properties scale (by using U and V) to be 1.01 (or whatever streches them out enough)

It would also be possible to crop the image slightly in PhotoShop, and then strech it out to a size to the power of 2 (128, 256, 512 etc)

[3DTexturizer]

Ok, last time i tried making skyboxes, the edges has black lines on them ( which made the skybox look stupid). So, i asked how to get rid of those, and i heard u had to stretch the picture out EVER SO slightly.

Can anyone tell me how much u stretch the image? Ive been going at it for almost an hour, and i still have black lines.

Also, do u stretch it out IN terragen, or an art prog ( PS, PSP, etc)
Go to this page it will tellyou what to do.
http://udn.epicgames.com/Two/ExampleMapsSkyZones

[King Mango]

Chazzy you ever get this working to yoru satisfaction? Did you use tc_clamp?

[Superchaz]

I never touched terragen again. Its still installed on my comp, but ive just been using stock skyboxes for maps.

[King Mango]

Go to camera settings>Zoom/Magnification set that to "1"
Set your image size to something square
Uncheck fixed hieght above surface for target position
There are three fields for camera orientation
Set the first one, "head" to "270" or "-90"
Set the middle one, "pitch" to "0"
Set the right one, "bank" to "0"
Render your image
Save as "West"
For the next image simply change the "head" to "0"
Make sure pitch and bank are still at "0"
Render, save as "North"
Change the head to "90"
Make sure pitch and bank are still at "0"
render, save as "East"
Change head to "180"
Make sure pitch and bank are still at "0"
Render, save as "South"
Now, leave the head at "180" and for pitch enter "90"
Make sure bank is still at "0"
(doing it this way for the top and bottom sets the render up so it imports at the right rotation to UED)
render, save as "Up"
Set the pitch to "-90"
Make sure head is still at "180" and bank at "0"
Render, save as "Down"
Do whatever post processing you need to make them importable
Once you get them into myLevel you will want to open the properties of each tex and change Texture>UClampMode and VClampMode to TC_Clamp
This stretches the border pixels of an image and will remvoe the white seams.
Now I like to make TG skyboxes 1024,1024,1024 so for sake of simplicity this is what I will tell you to do.
Set the grid to 4096
Make a cube 1024 all three dimensions
Right click it, reset>all
Now slide it somewhere to the left out of the way
Subtract, select all faces align>to face, then pan ONE unit U and ONE unit V
flag unlit
Apply the textures using the top down view as the orientation would be if it was a map. Left=West, Right=East etc...
voila

[Superchaz]

Ooooohhhh, tnx mango! Ill have to check that out on my new Rochester map!

(im not telling you what my Rochester map is though. Trust me.... I got a theme that is going to pwn your socks off)

[King Mango]

Rochester?
The mayo clinic? hehe ;)
You've got good visual skillz Chazzy. Looking forward to the unveiling.

[Kantham]

wow king mago , that was hell of a help post. I will read some tuts for it to get the hang around and come back here to import it in UED :)

Any suggestions on how to get a Nice and Fast render as possible?

[Superchaz]

Why thank you Mr. KingMango. That was very kind of you to make such a remark. I too look forward to unveiling the BETA to you guys, hopefully within the next month. It will be a merry map indeed.

And yes, KingMango's tutorial seems to look like it will help greatly. I may use it on my next map. Oh what a pleasant day it will be!

Good day to you two.

[King Mango]

lmao. Chazzy is in Monty Python mode today :weird:
and fast renders=lower quality.
There are SOME things you can try to reduce render times. turn on backface culling. Make the sky size as small as possible although unless you have lots of light effects and 3d clouds, the sky renders fast enough anyway. The bumpier your surfaces are the longer the render, but bumps are what make the impression of trees... I think you just have to learn to wait. To render a set of skybox textures usually takes me an hour to an hour and a half depending on settings...
Outpt.co.uk has a skybox script that works well enough if you want to set it and forget it. But just remember to open the script in notepad or something and make the cam orientation settings match the tute for best results.

[Kantham]

Your help worked perfecly King mango. Lotsa thanks :cool:

I just wonder if it is normal that my textures become compeltely one color when i put them on TC_Clamp. Or Maybe it do that only in UED and IN-game i don't need to worry about it....

I have the Cube done , i just got these damn lines. Teragen is AWESOME. I will use it more.

[King Mango]

yeah clamp stretches the border pixels of an image. That's why you need to follow the instructions for placing the skybox cube and the texture alignment instructions as well. clamp in conjunction with align to face is picky but for me is the best method. Because when you put the cube in the proper orientation in the ed, then you only need to click one unit U and V pan to get them to align. And all align to face does is let you make the cube bigger or smaller than your textures if you want. Like if you have emitters you want to put in the skybox but need more room etc...

[Kantham]

Ah well , the unregistred version don't alow images bigger than 1000 pixels, sigh

So i thought i could :

-Put the grid to 512
-make the cube a cube
-Reset-> ALL
-Subtrac
-Aling-> Face
-*adding the textures*

Then, if i would have cliked on U = 1 V =1 it would look even worse, same goes for U = -1 V = -1

And there is no way i will work with a Sigle color skybox in ued. I will screw it for sure :o

EDIT: well , last night i was asleep , and i just worke up right now. I will make the textures 1000X1000 and scale it about 24 pixels in Photoshop.

[Kantham]

There is a clear example of what i got when i play with TC settings

[Eira]

The Max its lets you render is 960x960, What i do, is render a 960x960 box then stretch it out inPS

[Kantham]

yeah , that's what i did too. For the skybox , i used my old technique wich is aling the textures at 1.01 for U & V and aling them gentily. It looks clean now, thanks again KM.