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VirtualKitten
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If you are using Blenders Particle system to position, orientate and scale your twig image planes then you will probably run into a few problems like :

1:  end up with quite a high number of vertices.

2:  end up with a lot of twigs/branches to close to or passing through the platforms and walkways.

3: .............

 

I would suggest that you go back to your reference tree and see how the twigs/branch billboards are made and positioned.

(  Billboards are images on planes.  )

Instead of using particles and converting them to mesh start by carefully creating/finding a good image to use on the billboards then create a billboard object of 4 planes in a form like in the image below:

204806461_Xbillboards-min.thumb.png.5713aa8816b621535360ac33ca99f997.png

Don't forget to check the face normal orientation on this model before you start making copies !  🙂

Then duplicate the original billboard model and manually position the copies (for variation with different rotations and scales) around the tree so that they will avoid all the platforms and walkways:

1847472568_positionbillboards-min.thumb.png.de46da157b189644b5e7ba6ade48aeb9.png

 

When finished select groups of the billboard models and join them to be a single object with Ctrl J. 

 

Note:  As your tree is so large it is not images of twigs with a few leaves that you should be using in the billboards but images of whole branches with hundreds of leaves.

Do a quick test upload before starting to position all the billboards to check that the scale of the leaves are approximately correct.

 

Edited by Aquila Kytori
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55 minutes ago, VirtualKitten said:

So the particle system is no good then ?

It's harder to position leaves with a particle system than manually, because

1. It's yet another Blender feature that you have to learn how to use from scratch, and

2. Like many features, it is better at building a scene that looks good when Blender makes pictures from it but not very good at making an object for Second Life that has low LI and looks good to other residents.

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Yes Quarel I am as sure the particle system in Second life is just he same , Who would have thought leaves would be so complicated to represent. Lots of questions come to mind  .

1) big or small texture small is faster to rez but more detail can be placed if its 2048 x 2048  for example a full tree can have its branches  cut off and be used to create a texture  .  However Aquilas model was two planes I have seen 3 biscuits or cards in world with six faces meaning 6 planes otherwise transparency comes in to play . So first question i don't think i need a twig  but a bushy texture instead  at good resolution 128x128 , 256x256 , 512x512 or 1024x1024?

2) The leaf models' in world move  or wave is this by linden script positioning or by armature animation?

3) What is the lag ratio from large  faced prims to many smaller ones  occupying the same space. Is it efficient to have one big texture  on one large object or lots of little ones how des the browser cope with similar or the same model does it downloads every occurrence and or just one and reposition it 

{{Hug}} D

Edited by VirtualKitten
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3 hours ago, VirtualKitten said:

So first question i don't think i need a twig  but a bushy texture instead  at good resolution 128x128 , 256x256 , 512x512 or 1024x1024?

I'd probably go for 1024x1024 or 512x512 for an oak foliage texture and make it so that the leaves are at RL size on a pane somewhere between 2x2 and 3x3 m. I use a 512x512 across a 4x4-6x6 m pane for my birches, aspens and poplars but those don't need nearly as detailed leaves as an oak does.

I don't have an oak foliage texture yet (working on it) but here's a maple one as an example:

image.png.98007c244e8ca886c189ffd784b73994.png

It's not a good texture for several reasons but it should demonstrate the general principle. One important thing to notice is the random differences in shading and color nuances across the leaves. This is vital because without it the foliage will look flat and lifeless. Such shading baked onto the texture itself is actually more efficient than normal an dspecular map for adding life and depth.

Also note that the leaf coverage isn't very dense. Remember that the texture will be duplicated several times on overlapping sheets so if there are too many leaves on it, you soon end up with an opaque blob rather than a lovely open foliage. This is the main problem with the leaf texture in the original video and in Aquila's quick demonstration. I know that texture too well myself; I've spent hours trying to make it work but it's hopeless.

If you want a ready made texture and are willing to spend a few L$ on it, you could check out the textures from Ani Davidov's and Cordts Baxton's old sculpt oak package. The sculpts are of course way outdated by now but the textures are still very relevant today. I use them for my own mesh oaks and I know several others do too. Not just the foliage textures btw, the bark ones are really good too.

I hope it's ok if I post this to show the style (the actual textures are of course with transparent background and without the red text) :

image.thumb.png.d09a11b2a5f6cf31b1243812eca73651.png

 

3 hours ago, VirtualKitten said:

2) The leaf models' in world move  or wave is this by linden script positioning or by armature animation?

There are several ways:

  1. Flexiprims: This is the method that gives the most realisitc wind movement; or rather the least unrealistic - there's no such thing as realistic leaf/branch movement in SL. But not really an option for a big tree for obvious reasons, I just mention it for the sake of completeness.
  2. Frame based texture animation: Can give a nice "rustling leaves" effect but very render heavy and it limits the effective texture resolution. It also requires special textures that are rather cumbersome to make. I don't think anybody uses this method anymore.
  3. Texture rotation with custom textures: This is the method that popularized animated trees in SL. I'm not too fond of it partly because the animation inevitably is too slow and looks too mechanical, partly because you can only use about a third of the texture surface.
  4. Animesh: Similar problems with slow and mechanical as #3 although not nearly as pronounced. Apart from that, the usual pros and cons of animesh in general.
  5. Rotating/moving panes: Included just for the sake of completeness. I don't think anybody actually uses this method and I hope I'm right.
  6. Texture rotation with standard textures: This is my favorite. It can be used for nearly all plants and only requires a simple script. The downside is that it only works with very subtle movements but msot of the time that's all you really need and want.
4 hours ago, VirtualKitten said:

3) What is the lag ratio from large  faced prims to many smaller ones  occupying the same space. Is it efficient to have one big texture  on one large object or lots of little ones how des the browser cope with similar or the same model does it downloads every occurrence and or just one and reposition it

The rule is always, the more vertices and triangles the mesh has and the more pixels the texture has, the more render lag you get.

But a single simple mesh copied in-world will only be loaded ones so it will be downloaded faster than a single more complex mesh.

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14 hours ago, VirtualKitten said:

Yes Quarel I am as sure the particle system in Second life is just he same

It's ENTIRELY DIFFERENT. The only thing that's the same between the two is the word "particle".

The particle system in Blender is a way of generating a swarm of starting points across the entire surface of a mesh or in a cloud around some single spot in your model, and then using those starting points as the roots for hair strands or auto-generated child copies of a 3D child object.

The particle system in Second Life is a way of making 2D sprite images fountain out of the middle of a prim.

Quote

2) The leaf models' in world move  or wave is this by linden script positioning or by armature animation?

I think that the original system trees built into the terrain editor sway because of a special feature that we can't access. It's similar to flexiprims though, and most of the swaying trees I've found that residents created use flexiprims.

Edited by Quarrel Kukulcan
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Thank you for the sculpt package ChinRey that is really super and a nice find . Quarrel  I am not following , the terrain editor now just moves ground about how did it affect or effect trees. I am not sure flexiprim would work  . That is why I asked in regard to particle hair its rather nice feature of blender but the sheer  number of child or siblings  on 13 links made my model slow to open in blender so i think it would be even more laggy in Secondlife.

i made an attempt at larger biscuits I will try the textures later thank you .

616a28eed6da25afef951c6d895e5d21.png

Edited by VirtualKitten
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2 hours ago, VirtualKitten said:

i have a weird shimmer o my faces any idea please?

That looks like perfectly normal Blender behaviour to me. You shuoldn't have that problem in SL but just to be sure, try a test upload on the beta grid r on an opensim grid.

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Chiney

I did what Quarrel kindly suggested duplicating  and flipping faces and moving .05 but it looked the same unrealistic thing. Also tried modifier

4146d9c4cf2598cee0033992e4e43e9e.png

 

745e05f9c546e1be5544f3127a2cb8b6.png

 

411232a73a9f2438c0cdf3996b314b72.png

And this didn't change anything 

efaa4e087a5156bdd09964b83ee49c31.png

so went back to single faces as it made no benefit to its shiney look and just does not  look natural at all can you suggest something else please as you seem to be the wisdom in these matters :) 

526fa95c389b937e2150ac2d1a30ce60.png

Edited by VirtualKitten
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I made my normal found a super article https://www.tutorialboneyard.com/gimp-normal-map/#:~:text=To use the Normal Map,layer into a Normal Map. this is super I haven't and wont post it :

e5190c1391b597680095bfc142b9da72.png

Have not worked out how to make bump or the light image  I found some links to the bump but nothing hat did anything like  expected. the specular light i have not looked at 

Any pointers would be helpful 

bd4c5eab43d75cc54d3ae35ca0ad6c95.png

Edited by VirtualKitten
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2 hours ago, VirtualKitten said:

I did what Quarrel kindly suggested duplicating  and flipping faces and moving .05 but it looked the same unrealistic thing.

Making your billboards double-sided has NOTHING TO DO with the shininess problem. It fixes an entirely separate issue.

A one-sided billboard will be invisible from the back after you import it into Second Life. It will act like this:

quickleaf.gif.88aabd00d6ecd5e721b03195d0e4cd0c.gif

 

If you make your billboards in pairs (and make sure they face opposite ways), you won't have this problem.

 

Okay. Now I AM going to talk about the shininess problem.

DON'T TRUST HOW SHADERS MAKE THINGS LOOK IN BLENDER. If you want to know how something will really look in SL, you have to do a test import and look at it in SL.

Blender is good for checking that the UV map is correct, but most shader settings don't export automatically and many of them won't work in SL anyway. The leaves won't be shiny in SL unless you fully import the object, rez it, go into the Build Menu and manually turn on its shininess settings.

Don't use a normal map. If the shininess in Blender bothers you, just increase the Roughness setting for that material.

 

 

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I am trying to find specular plugin for gimp 2.10 and better instructions on Bump . The normal looks much better than it did before as it adds better definition. The bump is confusing in   Gimp and doesn't work how i expect like the brilliant normal map. The bump Map comes with no presets does anyone have any ?

2f52d3c2dbbf879236c0be0339910da9.png

The Specular map is a little focusing i read you had to start with a black background but that is as far as i got so far i know its supposed to be the reflective parts .

I have now made normal map for tree trunk too 

 

 

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On 5/2/2022 at 12:34 AM, VirtualKitten said:

Quarrel  I am not following , the terrain editor now just moves ground about how did it affect or effect trees.

I thought when owners edited their land, they had a special way to place official Linden trees, and that way is different from rezzing objects. I could be wrong.

Quote

I am not sure flexiprim would work 

It works for other people. You'd have to build a single leaf clump billboard cluster in-world with SL's build tools -- NOT in Blender -- and then rez multiple copies of it and move them into position on your bare tree trunk and branches, then link them.

Quote

That is why I asked in regard to particle hair its rather nice feature of blender but the sheer  number of child or siblings  on 13 links made my model slow to open in blender so i think it would be even more laggy in Secondlife.

SL's particle system is made for an entirely different purpose than Blender's. It's only for fancy graphical effects.

Second Life cannot place particles in a custom shape, like along a twisty branch.

Second Life cannot use child meshes as particles. It can only use floating images. It also can't make those images line up in 3D with the object they're coming from. SL's particles are specially programmed so they auto-rotate toward the camera and always have their top either toward the sky or pointing toward the direction they're moving.

 

Edited by Quarrel Kukulcan
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20 minutes ago, VirtualKitten said:

I am trying to find specular plugin for gimp 2.10 and better instructions on Bump

SL doesn't take bump maps. It can only take normal maps.

If you already have a normal map, there's no reason to make a bump map. The only thing you could do with it is convert it into a different normal map and use that one instead of the one you already have.

You don't need a specular map either. These are just leaves.

Edited by Quarrel Kukulcan
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Hi Quarrel, thank you but you said 'SL doesn't take bump maps. It can only take normal maps'. I presume you are aware bump maps can be used to create better quality normal map . I have been creating more leaves and branches to try make it more natural and have sectioned of these branches that are support for platform I am hopefully going to do same thing for bits hidden in foliage so i can zero LOD0:
c91c9bc2d157bbad985656d669a92ffd.png

I have got to start trying to get this in to Secondlife alt low li

Hugs D

Edited by VirtualKitten
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9 hours ago, VirtualKitten said:

Hi Quarrel, thank you but you said 'SL doesn't take bump maps. It can only take normal maps'. I presume you are aware bump maps can be used to create better quality normal map 

You said you already have a normal map, though. You even showed how you were using it in your Blender shader screenshot.

I was pointing out that if you also make a bump map, the only way you can use it in SL is to convert it into another normal map and use this new one instead of your current one. It will be a waste of time unless the new one looks a lot better.

Quote

I have got to start trying to get this in to Secondlife alt low li

Are you going to try the Animesh trick or are you going to divide the meshes into pieces? You will have to do a lot of things differently depending on which way you try.

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Well I imported this morning and one branch lost the shader which was applied in blender . The Planar setting did paint it but the faces was not properly drawn the shader  is perfect in blender:

362d49b038f5c2f9c47450bf500f84d1.png

c9f987fd6407323d830a1fe8062ddc0a.png

 

I also wonder if i should join my foliage to its branchlet?

Edited by VirtualKitten
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  • 2 weeks later...
On 4/28/2022 at 2:09 PM, Aquila Kytori said:

The problem is when I enable the Edit Linked in the build floater and have the Animesh Tree model selected and then try to move the arrows up or down the Animsh Tree does not follow along. Selecting the Tree Physics model moves both the Tree Physics and the Animesh Tree models together.

Some updates on this.

1. I did not have this problem. I could make a 2-item linkset with the static physics tree the parent (100% transparent, "prim" physics shape) and the animesh appearance tree the child ("none" physics shape) and drag the animesh tree with "Edit linked". I didn't need a third prim.

2. I've discovered you can prevent animesh objects from jumping to a different offset by placing your armature so mPelvis's head is at the center of the bounding box...at least, in certain circumstances which are uglier and less predictable than I'd like. :/ And this alignment can be broken and/or fixed by playing an animation that translates mPelvis. So I could keep the physics shell aligned and not need to spend 9 more LI on an invisible second tree.

flashtree.gif

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