Terramaps and sim designs

OK, so we now have a sim. Have some ideas on what we want, but we're just not sure how to accomplish it. We need some mountains on one side and beach on the other. Is this done by terramap, or do I just dig in and start raising land? How do you find people who would do this?

I asked the same question (question number 4) in this thread: /327/93/232767/1.html

Keywords you are looking for are heightmap and .raw files. Also look in the sl KB, keyword island.

Thanks!

You could contact Sean Heying in world, he did some very nice SIM designs via terrain files.

Carricre Wind specializes in raw files for sim terrain. She also does design work for full sim builds

If you're on a mac, look for a program called 'backhoe' (I think)

If not er.. Dunno.

Good luck!

Depends on what you need.

For most basic sim designs, you can to pretty well just with the in-world tools, and a little patience and practice.

If you want a really detailed design, or cool features like switchback trails that ascend a mountainside, that is far easier to do with a .raw file.

Backhoe, on the Mac, allows you to edit a .raw file. I use it to preview the results of my work, but I find the tools somewhat heavy-handed for my liking. It's really easy to dig too deep or raise too high with that tool, and it has no "smoothing" tool. There are similar tools for Windows, too. And several of the external tools are free.

It's not a terribly difficult skill to learn, but it does take time and practice. The nice thing is, if you have a new sim and botch the attempt, you can always revert and start over.

There are also pros for hire, like myself, who can rapidly terraform your sim using either manual or exernal methods. The best ones can even fit new .raw file terrain in place under existing builds. My preferred method is to use Photoshop to make adetailed heightmap, and save that into a .raw file. Then I do fine-tuning by hand after the upload. The cost of hiring someone will vary a lot, based on the person's skill and experience, and how much they are in demand.

Most people havent found it yet but if ur using windows and ur looking for a RAW terain editor the one thats newley avaible is Freeworld 3d ive teraformed all 5 of my sims using it and its got every tool imaginable .

Demo doesnt allow you to save files, and its 30 USD to buy, not that it doesnt look good. Just thought I would pass the information off

Here is some info about it:
Knowledge base: https://secure-web2.secondlife.com/community/support.php?id=288
Software: http://www.spinmass.com/bailiwick/
Desginer: http://nicocreations.wetpaint.com/page/Island+Designs+Page+4

I talked to a couple of people this morning about it, and intend to contact more if the quotes are too breathtaking. With the stores, and the new club, I'm already spending as much time in-world working as I possibly can - to the point where fun is a luxury item instead of the top priority. Better just to pay someone to do the work, even though it'll stretch my budget, but at least that way it'll get done.

Thanks all

Thanks for that. Not on that page, but on another one, I found something that may work, of course, I'd have to see it in-world.

Honey, IM or PM me and tell me what it is you want to do.

I'm not conversant with terrain files, but I'm a wizard with a pick and shovel.

If you can...

(a) draw a top view of what you want, no matter how basic in a paint program,
(b) tell me where to send it,

I'll make a .raw for ya - it takes me maybe 5-10 minutes to make almost anything. You can mod the daylights out of it later; even something not too accurate will save you hours of work.

Though it might be later, as I don't think I've got my tools handy on this cpu (I'm at the office).

Or just describe it really well. Natural coastline all around, or 'mountains right to the edge?'

I don't want anything for it. I do this for people all the time.


Edit: literally 10 minutes later - I made one. In fact, I went to Cadroe Murphy's spinmass.com, downloaded Bailiwick, drew a greyscale heightmap in photoshop, gaussian smoothed it, imported into bailiwick, and saved. Yep, that fast. Cadroe's stuff is awesome.

Lindal and Desmond - you guys rock! What generous offers, and someone else offered their terramap as well!

I'm at the office, so no graphic views for me right now, and tonight, I'm being interviewed by a SL magazine right before the club's 6pm event, so I'm gonna be very tight on time tonight.

Desmond, I'll send you a PM though and describe as well as I can what my hubby is scribbling on a notepad

Thanks for the offers all, you guys are so generous!

Edited for stupid font thingy

Incidentally, here's another tool to consider. You can use Google Sketch-Up to rough out the terrain topography, and share ideas on-line. I converted a Sketch-Up topo map that a client made into a very nice .raw file, in fairly little time.

Sure thing

I'm kind of 'off and on' here sporadically (I'm at my own office too, have errands to run, yada yada) but I'll keep an eye out for it.

Ping desmondshang 'at' gmail 'dot' com with an addy that I can send the .raw file to; they are typically about 900kb or so.

I'm sure Lindal could fix up anything from there. Oh, and hit 'bake terrain' on the region estate controls just after terrain upload. Just in case

You can also check out Jade's Jazz Lounge. She's recently moved everything to her own island, and the topography really fits the description of what you are looking for. Even if you can't find out how she did it, you'll be able to see a great example.

Thanks for asking this.
I have yet no means to own a island but I have friend say if I can draw as well as I do I should consider making raw files but I have no clue how to get started.
Any suggestions for some one who is starting out and has no means to test this out in world?

Well FD, if you have a Mac you can load the heightmaps you create into Backhoe (a freeware app for viewing and editing .raw files), and can look at what you created in a small version. There are similar applications out there for Windows.

Try a Google search on "Second Life raw edit" to find viewers and editing tools for .raw files. Also go into the LL Knowledgebase and search for "raw", to find a good article on what .raw files are and how to edit them.

But when it comes right down to it, the only way to really see the results of an attempt to create a .raw file is to find someone who has a new sim and get them to try uploading your .raw file into SL. There is no substitute for seeing exactly how SL will interperet a .raw file.

At a smaller scale, there are some areas in-world that will allow you to practice terraforming, or if you own your own land you can play with the terraforming tools there, to the limits allowed in your sim.

I have a PC.
I have been drawing land elevations,etc by hand for a while here for personal purposes but often wonder if their is a better way to do this. My hand doodles are often very sloppy but few months back I drew with adobe photoshop a image of city on a mountain and its made me wonder if I could actually find a use or improve upon this skill in sl.
The image is below, please excuse the lack of detail sometimes it won't show up at the size it was saved for the web. I really love to see this image or what I started here with full details some day as actual region...not sure how many sims I would need to do it right though but I can't afford it at this point.
The image is of mountain region with waterfalls, and fast moving rivers leading to a bay. There a fortress on top of mountain, with trails unseen and huge waterfall with the rock cliffs hidden by trees or water, or some of trails are hidden by image size.

One sim is 256 Meters by 256 Meters in size (Just under 843 feet on a side, or roughly 16 acres). To give you a sense of scale, you can fit a football stadium and a small parking lot on one sim. Or roughly one city block's length and maybe two block's width, since in a lot of towns, a block is twice as long as it is wide.

Heightmaps are 'painted' as a greyscale image, looking straight down from above, with the grey value of each pixel being evaluated as height. Black is zero Meters, pure white is 255 Meters, if you have a height multiplier layer at the default 1.0 value. It's a very different thing from painting a nice landscape. More like doing a topographical map, and using the shade of grey to indicate height, rather than contour lines.

So for example I was drawing on topographical map on some paper with grid what size in inches or pixels would i need for one sim? I am trying to figure out how to translate this.
The image was meant to be pretty image but it was based on some doodles I had on topographical images.
Also when I look at raw files they come in two colors, how do I distinguish between height, trails, rivers, etc? I am so confused.
Wonders now about all the possibilities of gray tones and how to create this....

Look up Nico Creations in places we have ready made raw files and we also do customs. IM me in world if interested.

A scale of one square = 4 Meters is handy, since a 4M x 4M square is the smallest one can select with the in-world tools. so a 64 x 64 square grid does nicely, since 4 x 64 is 256.

When you translate that to a computer generated heightmap, the final image should be 256 pixels by 256 pixels.

Heightmaps are greyscale, not in color. Some people may prefer a different color than a black to white gradient, but black = 0 and white = 255 is how it gets translated, regardless of how the image may be colored. In Photoshop if the Red, Green or Blue valies all match, you get that shade of grey, and the Brightness in the HSB scale will also be that value. Any other RGB mix will have a different Brightness value, and it is the Brightness that gets interpreted.

Simple example = A heart-shaped island.

Draw a heart. Fill the area oitside the heart with a RGB value of 0,0,0. Fill the area inside the heart with RGB value 22,22,22. Resize to 256 pixels on a side. Use whatever tool you wish to load that map into the channel 0 layer of a .raw file. Upload the file. You'll get a heart shaped island with very steep edges and a flat surface at 2M above the water line.

A ramp is an area filled with a gradient, lighter getting higher, darker getting lower.

A raised path is an area that is a little lighter than the surrounding land.

A groove or stream bed is a selected area a little darker than the surrounding land, and an RGB value less than 20,20,20, so the Linden water at 20M default will fill the depresion.