30 replies to this topic

[scottpussehl]

Hello All, 

I am in the process of creating the golf course that I work at. Thank goodness for me it sits on a coastline of michigan and NOAA decided to Lidar map the full coast line of the Great Lakes and make that data public. So I FINALLY figured out how to accurately get the heightmap into unity of the plot. I downloaded the "ortho" imagery with the Lidar data and have tried to place this over the top in photoshop and also in unity and they are just not lining up over the full plot of land. I have seen several post on these forums that other members have overlays of the course. I am i missing some sorta of trick or do i just paint it on as a texture and hopefully I stumble upon the perfect numbers in the texture "size" and "offset"?

Scott

[Larrykuh]

In Unity, add the satellite image as the first paint texture and make sure it is sized the same as the terrain. For instance if your terrain is 2000x1800, the texture x: would be 2000 and texture y: 1800. Leave the offsets to 0. This will overlay the paint texture to your entire terrain.

[scottpussehl]

Well after monkeying around for about 2 hours + I have the terrain and the texture ALMOST working. On one side of the property my overlay is perfect and on the other side I am prob. off by about 5 yards.  But the real interesting this is my terrain has to be 4314 is size for the distances to be correct and as for how you were talking to place the overlay that did not work, I sorta followed what you said but I had to monkey with the size of the texture until it would line up, It ended up being 4252 by -1695. Unity is so weird and confusing.

[Larrykuh]

Can you create a package of your terrain and overlay images and create a link where I can download them. That way I can take a look at what you have and see if there is a solution.

 

Did you capture the overlay image at the same time you captured your terrain data? The overlay has to be the exact same size as the terrain.

[scottpussehl]

I have both the overlay that i downloaded with the lidar data and also the a seperate file with more resolution that i downloaded seperate and then overlayed in photoshop to make both the same dimensions. I will attempt to package up everything I have and send it your way if I can figure that out.

 

Thanks for you effort on helping me!

 

I am going to owe you something big for all this. 

[scottpussehl]

I finally got it. Your method worked. I think my problem was I did not create a square plot and even though the dimensions matched up between the overlay and the plot unity did not like the non square plot. So that being said I redid everything for what seems like the millionth time but made it a square plot and everything seems to match up to within a foot. (good enough for me)

Thanks for all your Help

BTW I am working on Bay Harbor Golf Club

[DPRoberts]

I finally got it. Your method worked. I think my problem was I did not create a square plot and even though the dimensions matched up between the overlay and the plot unity did not like the non square plot. So that being said I redid everything for what seems like the millionth time but made it a square plot and everything seems to match up to within a foot. (good enough for me)
Thanks for all your Help
BTW I am working on Bay Harbor Golf Club

What is your final terrain size? I'm worried based on your previous numbers you will find that you don't have the resolution to properly contour a green or bunker. A terrain typically needs to be 2000mx2000m or smaller. Looks good from your picture though.

[scottpussehl]

DP,

 

My Terrain Stats

 

Terrain Width                         3723

Terrain Length                        3723

Terrain Height                        79.27

Heightmap Resolution            4097

Detail Resolution                    4098

Detail Resolution per patch     8

Control Texture Resolution      2048

Base Texture Resolution          2048

 

I dont really know what most of this means outside the width/Length/Height

[DPRoberts]

I think, at those settings, you will find that only players with the latest graphics cards will do ok but most will struggle. The heightmap resolution has been recommended at 2049 and detail resolution at 2048.

You can find some exact descriptions of the terrain settings here

Conceptually, the heightmap resolution means to me the number of triangles that will make up the terrain mesh. The larger the number, the more triangles. However, too big and most will not be able to handle it from a graphics processing standpoint. Now, if you divide your terrain width (3723m) by your heightmap resolution (4097px) = 0.9m/px, you get what I refer to as a terrain resolution factor. This would be fine for building. It means 1 pixel is roughly 1 meter in Unity.

Your next thought should be to decrease your heightmap resolution to 2049 and your detail to 2048. However, at the current size of your terrain, 3723m, you will now see a terrain resolution factor of 1.8m/px (3723m/2049px). This will then negate your ability to create fine detail. Now, I know this may be babbling nonsense but you will get it as you start to build.

My suggestion is to try and reconstruct/layout your course and lidar map in a different manner so that your dimensions of your terrain are at 2048x2048 or less. I have done the same with Kiawah is it runs linearly instead of boxy. It is a problem for trying to do real course creation and Unity/CF need for a square terrain as the main building terrain. If you do this, you will see a terrain resolution factor of 1 or less and be able to happily contour your course.

What I have done on Kiawah is stack the front nine and back nine. It looks fine in game and you can use trees and hills to prevent view of the other nine should you choose to do so. (Red line present so you can see how I stacked the two nines. You will have to perform an identical split and stack for your Lidar heightmap.) An even better way may be to run the nines diagonally and you could potentially condense the course to an even smaller square and thereby improve your terrain resolution factor.

[Mike Jones]

DP,

 

My Terrain Stats

 

Terrain Width                         3723

Terrain Length                        3723

Terrain Height                        79.27

Heightmap Resolution            4097

Detail Resolution                    4098

Detail Resolution per patch     8

Control Texture Resolution      2048

Base Texture Resolution          2048

 

I dont really know what most of this means outside the width/Length/Height

 

There is no problem with these numbers but just be aware as DP said that it will run a little slower than a 2049 heightmap and the other numbers you have ramped higher than the tutorial project's settings.

[johnmeyer]

Interesting methodology on the stacking of nines DPR, 

 

Ive just run into the same problem trying to help Hens with terrain for TPC Southwind, so will look at your method for future projects.

[scottpussehl]

DPR love the idea of stacking the 9'same like that, it should work perfectly. Even if players can see the other nine that does not bother me more important to me is the lake side with the view.

Thanks for the explanation of the settings.
Before I get too far one of the holes is a downhill par 3 with a Harbor in full view from there. Would it be easier for me to model this or add it in using a panorama or some sorta of back drop. I just don't want to get the course down and then find out I should have included that part of the height map in my terrain.

[DPRoberts]

DPR love the idea of stacking the 9'same like that, it should work perfectly. Even if players can see the other nine that does not bother me more important to me is the lake side with the view.

Thanks for the explanation of the settings.
Before I get too far one of the holes is a downhill par 3 with a Harbor in full view from there. Would it be easier for me to model this or add it in using a panorama or some sorta of back drop. I just don't want to get the course down and then find out I should have included that part of the height map in my terrain.

I would say it depends how close the harbor is to the hole. You can add/sculpt peripheral terrains in addition to your main terrain. Your CF course is built on the main "Terrain" (never change the name of this in the hierarchy!) but several other threads discuss how to manage the periphery. If it is going to be close in view, sculpting a peripheral terrain with lower resolution such as 1024 or 512 will be fine to "achieve the effect." You can even use 3D models to fill in the look. I think the billboard panorama would be last on my list but maybe I'm just not good at that. The resolution of the image makes it look a bit fake. If it's way in the distance, it may not matter. 

 

K11 has a good discussion of managing the periphery somewhere in his original "Show and Tell" thread, I believe, but I cannot locate it at the moment.

 

When I was in my CF beta infancy, I had some more complicated ideas on achieving a maximum terrain resolution factor. K11 helped return me to earth. I have ultimately settled on the simplest solution, for me, which is stacking and actually not directly mentioned in that thread. If the following thread is not password protected, you can read some of my random thoughts on how to manage compressing a course into a box. 

[Larrykuh]

DP, I was surprised when you mentioned that Unity/CF/JNPG required a square terrain. As you found with Kiawah, many courses just do not fit very well  in a reasonably sized square terrain. I just created a heightmap for BarnBougle Dunes that required a 3000x1400 terrain to enclose the course. Just for a test, I built  one hole that included three tees, a fairway and green. I added the shot point, three pins and OB.

 

I then built the course and played the hole in JNPG with no problem.

 

Maybe Mike can respond with the pros and cons of square versus rectangle terrains. It just seems like it's a lot of precise work to piecemeal the nines of a course just to fit it in a square terrain.

 

BTW, keep up the great work. Your courses are some of the very best.

[DPRoberts]

Hopefully, someone will chime in if I'm leading you astray, but I was under the impression that heightmaps need to be imported as a square. My thought is the heightmap resolution establishes a set number of squares or triangles that will make up your terrain.

If you deviate, and import a rectangular map, the terrain will then be made up of rectangular/stretched faces. This will likely make terrain shaping a bit of a challenge as well as placement of grasses, objects, and terrain painting.

I cannot find a specific reference but I recall this being ingrained into my brain early on. Maybe look at your wireframe and see if the terrain is made up of rectangles. I would think that could be problematic.

[Larrykuh]

I believe you are correct about the wireframe shapes. They appear as rectangles, but once you start sculpting, they become squares. It seems that you should always strive for square terrains. To get a rectangle shape, it would mean creating adjacent square terrain segments. The downside to that is when sculpting, you have to have the appropriate segment selected.

 

I do try my best to always have square terrains, but there are many courses that just do not fit nicely into a square. I am wondering if terrains built with neighbors will work in CF. Hopefully Mike will chime in with a good solution to these oblong course layouts. It just seems like so much tedious work to cut up a course to force it into a square. It becomes even more tedious when the front and back nine holes intermingle.

 

[johnmeyer]

I would also add a CF spline cannot transcend terrains, or at least it cant in my little experience. 

 

I.e. if you had a fairway that went from one "terrain square" to the next, the spline cannot continue from one to the other, so ya kinda stuffed

[Larrykuh]

That was my thought too. I guess I could give it a try, but I'm thinking you are correct.

[DPRoberts]

CF will only build meshes on the "Terrain" at position 0,0,0.

[Mike Jones]

I'm not a fan of breaking course into the component parts and stacking them. Invariably the wind will be wrong in that holes that should be playing both in the same wind direction would end up being different and the views from the individual holes would also be compromised. I would still recommend using the larger correct plot ehen crestong resl courses and making the terrain resolution higher.