Any up to date mapmaking tutorials ?

The heightmap issue can get real sticky real quick. I've only used L3DT once to import
a heightmap before I found World Machine so my knowledge base on that avenue is
very weak. If you can tell the process you used in more detail I may be able to help.
As it stands now my guess is there is an issue with the T3D settings you are using
when importing?

 

I used this tutorial (http://www.beamng.com/threads/tutor...or-beam-ng-in-depth-guide-with-pictures.2764/) but I removed the water since I didn't want to make an island. This is the heightmap I started with :

 

I used the same tutorial for my one heightmap out of L3DT back when BeamNG was different.
Unfortunately it is terribly outdated and irrelevant today. As far as L3DT is concerned any
advice I give can be taken with a boulder of salt. My current thinking is heightmap import/export
integration with outside programs is seriously outdated with what has transpired with T3D over
the last 18 months.

That being said my advice would be to get your heightmap properly exported out of L3DT
and into a folder of choice. The goal here is to isolate your heightmap and retain complete
control of where it goes and when. When importing the heightmap into Torque I like an
extremely minimalist and clutter free environment, the less to interfere with the process
the better. The above addresses nothing of your current issues and I'd like to check out
your heightmap myself before going any further to see if L3DT or T3D are the wrinkle.

This sounds all convoluted and miserable but you only need to go through it once.

More later.

 

I had to put my heightmap alone in a folder to correctly import it anyway, since the editor is dumb and doesn't search at the right place (http://www.beamng.com/threads/current-file-location-for-height-map-images-and-texture-maps.18419/), so I don't see how this can be causing the issue I'm running into.
Maybe I should have used World Machine ...

 

What are your heightmap dimensions (1024/2048/4096)? Also what are the height values you
are putting in when importing the height map via the editor import screen? Is the 2020m height
you mention a result of the map put out by L3DT or a value you entered in the import process?

 

- The heightmap is 768x768.
- I did't touch the height values and left them as default (50 for max height) since I didn't know what that was for.
- The 2020 value was already there before I edited the map so I think it's L3DT.

 

Oh boy. Simple math dictates that height map will be all out of whack right from the start.
I advise making a map that is 1024X1024 for simplicities sake and knock the max height
down to 25-30. That should give you a nice hilly terrain that looks way more realistic. Are
you creating maps from scratch in Torque or converting an existing BeamNG level?

 

Okay, yeah that's a strange size
Isn't it going to glitch out even more if I lower the max height value ?
I did this : http://www.beamng.com/threads/map-creator.17625/#post-273187
Again, thanks a lot for the help

 

I forgot about that post and it gets real close to what I was going to suggest and what I
have ended up doing through trial and error. The thing is these days is no one has the
balls or sanity to do an in depth tutorial because it will become irrelevant overnight.
Everyone is pretty much just groping around and doing their own thing and following
any 'pathfinders' that happen along.

I would suggest practicing and getting comfortable with L3DT first and foremost.
Follow Torsions scheme a few times and use GridMap as a base to work from.
GridMap is the perfect balance of stock materials and low object count. I might
put up my process for testing heightmap accuracy as well however I am terribly
wary of sending someone over a cliff or just making matters worse.

 

After a few tries, I found the issue : the altitude slider was too high, so the heighmap itself was high too, so this issue is fixed now
But because of that, now the map is mostly flat. And it's very hard to modify that in L3DT because the tools are inaccurate, or because I'm missing something ...

 

Do another fresh heightmap in L3DT at 1024X1024. Make the height half of whatever is the max is
for L3DT or half of what you had it in the previous map. I am a big proponent of repetition but that
is just me. Keep doing that as many times as you feel fit until you are satisfied with the process.

Next, practice the import process while selecting various height values in the T3D editor. An easy
and quick way to do that is having GridMap open in the editor with everything deleted except the
sunsky,physics,spawnpoint and the player. If done right you can import and delete test heightmaps
all day long as long as you never save the map. I do all this with an unzipped map in steamapps/
BeamNG.drive/contents/levels. Working from documents/BeamNG.drive/mods/levels with an
unzipped copy of GridMap shouldn't be any different. Remember if you save the map with a
test heightmap you will need to delete the cache folder levels/GridMap to get the original map
back when going back to it.

 

By doing this, I realised two things : the areas underwater in L3DT aren't in the BeamNG.drive editor, and the maxheight value was probably the cause of my issue because if I set it on a very high number (200 for example), there will be a big difference between the highest and the lowest area.
I think I can't bring my terrain higher than the highest point of the heightmap when I imported it, otherwise it glitches out. Does it work like that ?

 

I know T3D has a vertical limit of some sort. There should be a sweetspot that L3DT can produce
that will transfer to Torque. My knowledge of L3DT is minimal so I can't answer specific technical
questions about it. I am assuming it can produce a heightmap that doesn't cause problems in
T3D. Whether WM or L3DT or a custom heightmap in GIMP, starting with nice even generic
values (1024W X 1024L X 512H), I use the T3D import height slider to adjust to my tastes.

If I recall I had L3DT just export the heightmap and nothing else. I let it render up all of the
associated lightmaps,base textures, water etc. but never bothered importing them. All I wanted
was a single good 16 bit .png heightmap and nothing else. I essentially do the same with WM.

The goal here is to keep it simple and basic so you can see what is going on each step of
the way without useless interference. This is much simpler than I'm making it sound, my
teaching skills suck.

 

I really need to find the right height in L3DT to import it correctly in Torque. I don't remember why I created a 768x768 heightmap, but yeah now I'm doing 1024x1024, it's way better
To create it, I do the same thing. I only export the heightmap as a png and then I import it in Torque.
By the way, every other map maker I see is using WM like you, should I try with this instead of L3DT ?

 

WM is 99$
Get used to the terrain editor first, understand how the terrain system works in T3D.

Once you get used to this, then you should invest the money into WM.
I use L3DT, but its really only good for terrain heightmap generation.

 

Meh, @Driv3r1142 I'd hesitate to give advice on when or whether to purchase WM considering (a) you haven't purchased it and (b) you've been having many terrain issues yourself stemming from all sorts of sources. Maybe some of your own pains would be eased with the $99 purchase.. who knows.

There is a "free" Basic Edition of WM available through their website. It's for non-commercial use and the primary limitation (for our purposes) seems to be that it will not produce terrains beyond 513x513 (so 512x512 for us). That is definitely large enough for anyone who is undecided about whether the purchase is right for them to do a trial run or two. I have not used either version of World Machine myself.

 

I'm gonna try this version then (and also learn how to use it ), thanks !

 

As far as World Machine is concerned it is a little more intuitive in that it uses nodes. Make no mistake, it has a bit of a learning curve
but as Torsion says it is definitely worth practicing with the free version. The UI is much better at seeing realtime changes and quite
frankly is a hell of a lot more fun to experiment with. The bottom line with all this is you need to have patience. It doesn't matter what
the program is, there is nothing out there that is going to do it all for you.

Firepower, use tutorials and follow them. Do it again and again until you get it. World Machine has tons of tutorials and YT vids. We all got a critical piece of info from someone on these threads at some point as well.

 

Sorry to be asking so many questions, but how did you add this much plants in your maps
Is it part of the material like grass ?

 

This is the groundcover object. It can be created in the main editor scene tree under the
environment tab. I know I should be posting screens but I'm extremely tired and a bit lazy
right now.

It is fairly complicated to do a step by step on this but I invite you to just mess around with it.
The majority of the plants in Baja Hills are one multi-texture called Utah plants and that texture
is a stock beamNG groundcover material. Groundcovers need a terrain material to work.
Get and name a groundcover, copy the Utah grasses to your groundcovers folder, make
sure you have a stock grass or dirt texture and experiment. The variety of settings available
for tweaking the grass arrangement is pretty cool.

I suggest going to the Torque3D website and look up the documentation. That's where I learned
the majority of the basics on groundcovers and lots of experimenting.