Geordie 0 Posted February 25, 2009 Hi all, Let me just start off by saying what a great modding community the OFP/ArmA scene is, some very cool stuff going on in here! I've been getting familiar with the process of buidling maps. Specifically real world places. I would like to finish this map, which will hopefully be geared towards strategic gameplay, with lots of transporting and working away from base. Not sure about the missions, but just gettingthe map finished would a great start. I have been using this system so far: 1. Google Earth, capture satellite view @ 1000m 2. Create masks and layers in photoshop, merge sat images. 3. Create a terrain in L3DT and use my sat image as a transparency layer (sort of like a template, drape as its called in L3DT), I then create a design layer alongside the satellite layer, following the contours and geographical height information gathered on the net (USGS info) 4. I then use the sculpting tool in 3D with reference pictures to finish up the terrain. 5. im ready for importing to visitor but i need some crucial info before i go there...... Q: I would like to know the maximum, safe (real world) map size i can use, that will not lag the game. ie: --km x --km? I was hoping to use 40km x 40km, with a large area (about 15-20km wide) of sea seperating two land masses with mountain ranges to the north and south west. Plenty of space to make naval and air to air missions in there! The idea is the have objects (city's) spread out with lots of space in between them, which could be used for infantry and ground operations. so, is this map too large, or will it be ok to use as long as i keep the objects to a minimum? Thanks, look forward to meeting you all. PS - i will be updating this thread with my progress and screenshots. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Thrash 0 Posted February 26, 2009 A 40km x 40km map is possible, There are 2 limiting factors i know of. 1. If you want to have a full-res sat map (40960px x 40960px) on an island this big, you're gonna have like 10Gb of working files to produce a 2gb final sat. If you go half sized sat (20480x20480), which is what i'm working on right now (just waiting for files to load into PS), it still takes 10 min to load and save the thing in photoshop, and about 8 hours from .pew stage to ingame (each time we make changes to the objects). The sat file is still something like 500MB when ready. 2. 4096 x 10m maps have a bug where you cant move the objects on half the map. I'd recommend going with 20480 x 20m. You get the same sized land area, but the cells on the ground are 20m x 20m.. which also helps with frames. The only thing is you can get to detailed with you ground. All in all it's do-able, and really really time consuming.... Just think, you have to plaster 1600sq/km with objects. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Auss 208 Posted February 26, 2009 As thrash says, and from good experience dont bother trying to build a 4096x4096 map your brain will explode and your wife/girlfriend will divorce/leave. On a technical note Visitor doesnt like maps this big as thrash has mentioned in point 2) theres a bug where the Objects arent selectable on half the map (we found this out the hard way) Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Geordie 0 Posted February 26, 2009 Many , many thanks fellas. I think you have positively save d me some headaches and nights on the couch I am currently working with about 8GB of files so far, which was a bit dissapointing, and got me started on a system upgrade, which is in progress and half completed. I should be finished that by middle of next month. 20km x 20km will work, I might try and scale down the sea area, which would take away some of the accuracy of the location, but whos gonna notice areas of sea shrunk a bit right! Ill have a go at rescalling it tonight and report back. Am i correct in remembering that there is a free image editing program that can do batch resizing? its name is escaping the tip of my bloody tongue right now Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
beton 2 Posted February 28, 2009 On my map, which was my first one i changed the grid from10x10 to 5x5 to have the possibility to model the height in a smaller scale which might be nice sometimes. In fact i got anoyed when editing terrain in bulldozer with a large grid because it didn´t want to fit the way i wanted it.So i have 5x5 with 2048 = 10x10km and it works fine for me. If you choose 4096 maybe it will work for you... Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
jojimbo 0 Posted February 28, 2009 bigger the map,bigger the cell grid,bigger the sat map,bigger the headache. Think about what you want to do,have aircraft? youll need a good sat map,and a big terrain like you want. I use a 5km square map as I dont have aircraft and for me is the way to go,it's managable,loads quick,gives you a decent cell grid for terrain deformation,and you can lovingly make a completely original map in a realistic time.Also its very mission maker friendly. You find alot of the bigger maps,anything over 20k are whopping cell grids,not unlike OFP 50m sizes and most of the content will be copy and paste as it is virtually impossible to manually move stuff around as to depict human habitation so really its just a small worked area repeated over and over. If you're making an air based mod,larger is better and ground terrain not so important,but bigger cell means the simplest hill will resemble a large pyramid. If I wasn't making something specific,I would definately make an Island,that's what V3 is all about,and here is a really good tip... leave your full resolution sat maps till last,make a "lite" version,My full sat is 16384 x or something like that,it didn't take me long to dump the idea and make myself a 2048 version for quicker working loading times,once you got all the ground objects in there and everything set up,go ahead and import the full sat/mask. Also,do you really want people to sit there while your 40k map takes 5 minutes to load,when I test something in ArmA i NEVER LOAD sahrani,its always porto or Rahmadi or my own map. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Thrash 0 Posted February 28, 2009 Basically every time you double your map size you quadruple your work load. Eg: A 5km x 5km map (25sq/km) to a 10km x 10km (100sq/km). It's not actually that time consuming making a basic island. I can pump out a standard 10km x 10km island (no objects, 4-6 textures, full sat/mask) in about 2 hours, starting from nothing. I've got a about 15 islands sitting in my P: drive half full of objects which i cant be bothered finishing. I've got standard grass, rock and sand textures in a template file which i grab when i need to use and it's a matter of cutting them out in the right shapes to match the mask. So what i'm trying to say is its the placing of objects which takes 95% of your time.... Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Geordie 0 Posted April 21, 2009 Ok, everything has been on hold for a short time while I finished a PC upgrade. Started reinstalling all my editing tools, and I'm getting an error when i try to connect to Bulldozer in Visitor 3: Any ideas what could be causing this? Windows Vista x64 Ultimate SP1 RAID 0 Install ArmA 1.15b Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
