glowbal 13 Posted February 4, 2011 Hello there. I recently started on a small island myself, my first project for Arma 2 mapping. Now I tried converting my satelite image to a height map, didn't turn out that well. So I was wondering if it was possible to draw the height map yourself, with a program such a Photoshop or GIMP? I'm using a real world satelite image as the template for it. This is an example of what I mean: (this is very early stage, not even near final result. And only a part of the entire image, in case someone wonders about the size) Would that be possible? Or rather, would it work? Regards, Glowbal Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Willoughby 10 Posted February 4, 2011 Yes, it's possible - in fact I prefer creating my height maps by hand using PSP7, gives me much better control about where to place rough terrain, gullies, smooth areas for roads, etc. just remember to save the image in 16bit grayscale (PSP7 only saves in 8bit so after saving in PNG format I re-open the image in Wilbur terrain editor and save as 16bit). Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
bushlurker 45 Posted February 4, 2011 (edited) For the second time today I'm recommending L3DT Standard version... Purely as a heightmap designer/editor the Free standard version of L3DT is hard to beat... it has a great variety of heightfield editing tools - a great 3D view, and the free version works without restrictions on heightmaps up to 2048x2048! All of which make it an essential free tool... Sure - you could draw your heightmap entirely in greyscale in Photoshop - but it's not very intuitive... L3DT's purpose built "design map" functions are much more logical and intuitive - plus you can see your results in 3D at anytime - even sculpt and edit in 3D if you want... One word of warning about this 8 bit / 16 bit thing Willoughby mentioned.... AVOID 8bit!!!!! This has been mentioned before and its not immediately obvious how important it is... lets think about it for a second.... An 8bit greyscale file has 256 possible shades of grey - thats it - 256 maximum... Your heightfield is a greyscale where the shades of grey represent the heights of each individual cell... 256 possible shades = 256 possible height values - thats all... Lets say you want to model a terrain where the sea floor is at -50m, and the highest peak is around 300m - you already now need 400 possible values for height! - and thats assuming you'd be content to have the terrain "step" in big, obvious "staircase" fashion for hills, etc... ...its gonna look like Legoland! With 16bit there's 65535 possible shades of grey - 65535 possible values for height... since your hills aren't likely to be a maximum of 65535 meters high, you can see how you could use this extra resolution to reflect much finer variation in height... every cells height value can now be much more precise... Pretty obvious really.... but whats less obvious is that if you convert your heightmap to 8bit anywhere along the way - you'll force it to "dumb down" to that heavily stepped and crude 256 possible values.... Converting it back to 16bit afterwards is a waste of time - the damage is done... Photoshop - specially earlier versions - is notorious for not liking 16bit greyscales... I think the Gimp is OK - as is MS Paint ;)... So - you really want a more task-specific design tool than Photoshop for actual terrain creation anyway - take a look at the Free L3DT Standard - plus, for any kind of image processing/cropping/whatever reason you could possibly have for putting your heightmap into an art package - watch out for that 16 bit thing! - keep it in definite 16 bit ALL the way!... **Small generalised PS about L3DT Theres a new version out - both Pro and Standard... main points of interest for us terrain guys are..... x64 support! yay! - whooooosh! (all plugins rewritten to suit) XYZ output plugin is now standard and included with the default install... Well worth upgrading if you're a regular user... it's faster now! - 'nuff said... B Edited February 4, 2011 by Bushlurker Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
glowbal 13 Posted February 4, 2011 Thanks, awesome help there! I have been using GIMP for it. Not sure, but I think it is 8 bit right now. So I probally have to redo it in 16 bit, I assume. Though luckly the difference between the lowest point and heights is around 20-25 meters max I'd say. Anyway, thanks for the tip. I will defindly take a look at L3DT. Seeing it directly in 3D would be quite usefull. Thanks! Glowbal Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Gnome_AS 10 Posted February 5, 2011 Just to second Bushlurkers suggestion regarding L3DT. Personally, for the specific task of developing maps for this engine, I've not run across a more intuitive or useful application. ;) . Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
shezan74 11 Posted February 7, 2011 Just to second Bushlurkers suggestion regarding L3DT. Personally, for the specific task of developing maps for this engine, I've not run across a more intuitive or useful application. ;). +1 Also making a hand-made heightmap requires smooth transitions between colors along grayscale. If not properly drawn the map will have big cliffs and unrealistic smoothed terrains. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
commander1985 10 Posted February 7, 2011 +1 for L3DT Cant do without, take a look at it and you will see why everybody talks about it when it comes to heightfield generation. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
icebreakr 3101 Posted February 7, 2011 There are many ways... I recommend l3dt, then photoshop custom hardwork and import back into the l3dt engine ;) Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
bushlurker 45 Posted February 7, 2011 (edited) Flag-waving all round for L3DT - and rightly so... you'd almost think it were made for Visitor heightmap production - especially with the "climates" basic mask & sat generation capability! The free demo limitation of 2048x2048 is very generous too - look no further unless you're planning an insanely big terrain... I try to avoid recommending paid or bought software whenever possible - Photoshop being the one obvious exception since everybody and their cat seems to have it, usually more up to date copies than mine too! But since we're discussing heightmap tools, I should really say a few words about Daylon Leveller... I'm not entirely sure about current deals or packages, but the two recommended/provided(?) external tools for professional use with the dreaded & unmentionable Visitor 4 and VBS terrain creation are - Global Mapper and Daylon Leveller... We've seen Global Mapper showcased in ZeroG's ongoing tutorial series - it's easy to see how handy that can be... a pity its so expensive, but it IS feasible to get what you need done with just the demo if you plan ahead and you're prepared... However, I haven't really seen anyone mention Leveller much at all... probably since it IS just so damned expensive - $200 is an entirely different prospect from whatever a full L3DT license is nowadays ($35 or so???)... Also - more importantly, until recently at least, the "demo" that was available was heavily limited - 150x150px heightmap maximum... This may have changed recently... Just last month, the Daylon website got a complete revamp, a new version was released and the old original heavily limited downloadable demo vanished - in its place it now says this..... Try before buyingWe don’t want you to risk anything. To get a free trial version, just contact us. All we need is your name and the name of the PC on which you want to run the software. This sounds kinda promising!... it could be that they've introduced a different demo, available by personal application - just like L3DT... this might mean it'll last for longer, or be less limited, or both... or neither... I dunno - but it might be interesting to ask sometime..... What's all the fuss about anyway? is it any better than L3DT??? Yes - and no - but mostly yes... ;) Recently, thanks to some enormous generosity on the part of a community friend, I was given a license for Leveller!! My current project is technically past the heightmap edit stage, but of course, I couldn't resist just playing with all the tools & facilities... redoing some of my beaches, etc - so now I've had a chance to try it out a little, and I have to say - it's truly awesome! What Leveller doesn't have is that whole climates, attributes and texturing thing - its a heightmap editor, pure and simple... You have essentially two windows - a 3D view like L3DT and a 2D - its like L3DT and Photoshop side-by-side... and the tools mimic photoshop too, so, for example, you have "magic wand" selection tool - you can select an area on the 2D map - say an area where you want a "lake", have it autodetect the "bank" height, then taper the banks - concave or convex, at whatever angle you want down to the basic lake "depth" (a built in lake tool basically :)), or you can selectively smooth or raise or otherwise treat areas - this is a whole lot better than L3DT for example, where all these operations are either handtool or completely global - area select for subsequent treatment is one of Levellers biggest strengths, and it looks and works exactly like Photoshop, so its all very familiar... You can have the heightfield "brush" tools only affect an area once, or brush continuously, hook up a pen and tablet and literally "draw" features - brushes can be linear (for riverbanks, etc), rather than just L3DT's "sphere"... More exotic facilities include Adobe illustrator and ESRI shapefile import - you can make simple vector shapes - even in 3D - in Illustrator and import them as actual ground features (haven't thought of a use for that - yet), and ESRI shapefile import means that - theoretically, you could import a road network and then just say - smooth those areas please! (haven't tried this yet either but it's on the list)... Anyhow... general wow's all round for Leveller... it ain't cheap, which makes the new "actually apply for a demo" thing all the more intriguing... it would be interesting to see if the "new demo" is any less limited than the old one... if so, it might finally bring the leveller demo into the same bracket as the Global Mapper demo - free, and useable for Arma 2 terrains, if you can get the job done within the time frame!... still can't beat the L3DT demo for permanent and free though, and for general Arma 2 terrains it's ideal... B Edited February 7, 2011 by Bushlurker Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Yuval 29 Posted June 17, 2014 Flag-waving all round for L3DT - and rightly so... you'd almost think it were made for Visitor heightmap production - especially with the "climates" basic mask & sat generation capability! The free demo limitation of 2048x2048 is very generous too - look no further unless you're planning an insanely big terrain...I try to avoid recommending paid or bought software whenever possible - Photoshop being the one obvious exception since everybody and their cat seems to have it, usually more up to date copies than mine too! But since we're discussing heightmap tools, I should really say a few words about Daylon Leveller... I'm not entirely sure about current deals or packages, but the two recommended/provided(?) external tools for professional use with the dreaded & unmentionable Visitor 4 and VBS terrain creation are - Global Mapper and Daylon Leveller... We've seen Global Mapper showcased in ZeroG's ongoing tutorial series - it's easy to see how handy that can be... a pity its so expensive, but it IS feasible to get what you need done with just the demo if you plan ahead and you're prepared... However, I haven't really seen anyone mention Leveller much at all... probably since it IS just so damned expensive - $200 is an entirely different prospect from whatever a full L3DT license is nowadays ($35 or so???)... Also - more importantly, until recently at least, the "demo" that was available was heavily limited - 150x150px heightmap maximum... This may have changed recently... Just last month, the Daylon website got a complete revamp, a new version was released and the old original heavily limited downloadable demo vanished - in its place it now says this..... This sounds kinda promising!... it could be that they've introduced a different demo, available by personal application - just like L3DT... this might mean it'll last for longer, or be less limited, or both... or neither... I dunno - but it might be interesting to ask sometime..... What's all the fuss about anyway? is it any better than L3DT??? Yes - and no - but mostly yes... ;) Recently, thanks to some enormous generosity on the part of a community friend, I was given a license for Leveller!! My current project is technically past the heightmap edit stage, but of course, I couldn't resist just playing with all the tools & facilities... redoing some of my beaches, etc - so now I've had a chance to try it out a little, and I have to say - it's truly awesome! What Leveller doesn't have is that whole climates, attributes and texturing thing - its a heightmap editor, pure and simple... You have essentially two windows - a 3D view like L3DT and a 2D - its like L3DT and Photoshop side-by-side... and the tools mimic photoshop too, so, for example, you have "magic wand" selection tool - you can select an area on the 2D map - say an area where you want a "lake", have it autodetect the "bank" height, then taper the banks - concave or convex, at whatever angle you want down to the basic lake "depth" (a built in lake tool basically :)), or you can selectively smooth or raise or otherwise treat areas - this is a whole lot better than L3DT for example, where all these operations are either handtool or completely global - area select for subsequent treatment is one of Levellers biggest strengths, and it looks and works exactly like Photoshop, so its all very familiar... You can have the heightfield "brush" tools only affect an area once, or brush continuously, hook up a pen and tablet and literally "draw" features - brushes can be linear (for riverbanks, etc), rather than just L3DT's "sphere"... More exotic facilities include Adobe illustrator and ESRI shapefile import - you can make simple vector shapes - even in 3D - in Illustrator and import them as actual ground features (haven't thought of a use for that - yet), and ESRI shapefile import means that - theoretically, you could import a road network and then just say - smooth those areas please! (haven't tried this yet either but it's on the list)... Anyhow... general wow's all round for Leveller... it ain't cheap, which makes the new "actually apply for a demo" thing all the more intriguing... it would be interesting to see if the "new demo" is any less limited than the old one... if so, it might finally bring the leveller demo into the same bracket as the Global Mapper demo - free, and useable for Arma 2 terrains, if you can get the job done within the time frame!... still can't beat the L3DT demo for permanent and free though, and for general Arma 2 terrains it's ideal... B I went to the sites of both programs. Leveller seems to be 50 dollars (200 dollars is some golf thing, I'm not sure if it's needed). But hell, Global Mapper is more than 400 dollars - I am not willing to rob a bank any soon! (at least, not in real life). Daylon Leveller seems pretty good, for some reasons editing heights in L3DT seems pretty awful and laggy for me. I'm pretty sure you already got the grip on Leveller, could you tell how it feels when you map? I mean, does it have more options, better smoothing, raising and other elements that L3DT isn't so good at Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
