marcomios restarted 2048 groundtextures

[marcomio 0]

Here are some pics of new started 2048 texturing projects. Agent Smith's Afghanistan Island for OFP will be the first, to test the new created textures, because of development circumstances. Everything is still in work -and its a lot to do till release.

Rgds

marcomio :)

Just some more simple screens to ask all of you, if you like the more pale/grey textures or the more saturated/brownish textures. Viewing many pictures about Afghan Landscape, there is every colour-variety enclosed. Very often the ground looks more grey than brown and in this case, the more grey version seems to fit better most of the buildings (which must have been made from the surrounding material). But at least - as everytime - it is a question of taste.

http://www.mediafire.com/imageview.php?quickkey=mlynzyemjgd

http://www.mediafire.com/imageview.php?quickkey=ztiir1yldmy

http://www.mediafire.com/imageview.php?quickkey=z5tiw1myn53

Edited November 20, 2009 by marcomio
Pictures to compare different colour schemes

[stgn 39]

Looks nice!

STGN

[Fuzzmaster 21]

Really nice!

[-martin- 10]

Awsome work man

[marcomio 0]

First post edit with some screens of the grey (pale) version of textures. Take a look and let me know, which you prefer. Afghan landscape contains so many different ground-colours, so I decided to make a second set, which might fit better to the buildings.

Take a look at the links in the first post, if you like.

Rgds :)

[riffleman 20]

Try to build kargil hills?

[rellikki 7]

Personally I prefer the version with the clutter on it, as it gives the ground more "life" and would probably make camouflaging, blending into the terrain easier.

[Joona 10]

This somewhat reminds of Arrowhead. :D

[marcomio 0]

Nothing great, just some new w.i.p. screens, showing a new added, more grey coloured stony groundtexture. I will complete the pack in its default colour scheme = the brown one. The more pale version might follow, if there should be some tool available to batchconvert pac file values like saturation etc..(and without crashing the system). It is too much work, despite you can convert the tga's in one batch. Afterwards, you have to convert them into pac-format one by one again -and there are hundreds of them......

Take a look, if you like.....

http://www.mediafire.com/imageview.php?quickkey=u0mnywnxnzn

http://www.mediafire.com/imageview.php?quickkey=0yfzkwiyjmo

http://www.mediafire.com/imageview.php?quickkey=mzzicmtljyz

:)

[marcomio 0]

Just some new pictures of recoloured cliffs (now brown instead grey)...

http://www.mediafire.com/imageview.php?quickkey=rz3zln23m4y

http://www.mediafire.com/imageview.php?quickkey=hnm0z2ziwm0

http://www.mediafire.com/imageview.php?quickkey=unonl2z21ht

[Fuzzmaster 21]

Really nice work!

[-martin- 10]

Looks excellent :) Just some textures are a bit streached on the cliffs :)

[marcomio 0]

Here are some pre-release screens. It is nearly done, I only have to battle with some textures. It will be the first version in 2048 resolution, so you should expect some bugs and some patches to come. Something, which is very hard to get ridd off, is the pattern-efect, once you reach a far distance to the groundtextures. The smallest difference in brightness or saturation you barely can notice from the ground will getting a pattern, when looking from a specific direction or distance. I try my best to erase such artefacts, but it will last some time more. so I will replace the concerned textures with a patch in the future. Maybe, some other things too,....lets see.

As you can see from the map, there are plenty new roadconnections in comparison to the default version. Some parts are flatten or were smoothed to have a better driving-capability. So you can go fast to your area of duty without to use the airtaxi all the way...and as fast, the enemy is on his way too. Because of this and some new placed objects, I can't guarantee the 100 % functionality with all the campaigns or missions out there. I have only tested the DMA Dynamic Mission ("Dynamic Afghanistan" with VDV-troops) and didn't encounter any problems so far.

Edited January 17, 2010 by marcomio
Forgotten some explanation

[Fuzzmaster 21]

It's good to see you back. Very nice work as usual, I'm waiting for the release :)

[marcomio 0]

Hello, Everybody.

Before I think about uploading the texture pack (700 MB) and the Island (40 MB), I'm gonna show you some more screens of the textures and their look from different distances.

Reason for this:

The more structural aspects in a single tile, the more pattern-look will occure, when looking from special distances and angles. Similar view you will know from some OFP-forests or other textures: When looking at them from a far distance, they slightly become rectancles. I tried my best so far to correct those visual patterns without to rework the whole TGA-texture set of appr. 4 GB (a single base tga texture for reworking things is 16 MB in size = 4 times bigger than it's pac-format with 2.7 MB) but the result is not the way it should be.

Dont get me wrong, as long as you stay on the ground, you barely will take any notice of that. The little stratification on the mountains is basically more right than wrong because of the geolocical sedimentation-process most of the mountains run through (nice excuse, isn't it).

So please take a look at the last screens before I decide to release this package, decide for yourself, if it is worth or not! It is my intention to prevent people from beeing disappointed about a possible "worthless" 700 MB download. Also I can't promise any renewal of those texture set in the next month for the moment.

One thing, I could do without too much work, would be the replacement of a lot dark sand textures with the lighter grey-brown one. This at least will screw down the variety of textures on the island, but it would be a kind of compromise......

Okay, enough written. Take a look at those pictures and let me know, what you think! Also ideas/suggestions/solutions to get rid of those "far distance-pattern-problem" will be high apreciated!

[rellikki 7]

Such patterns are impossible to avoid, no matter how much you work on the texture, unless you'd use a totally different texture for every grid. That's just how the eyes work - They can easily detect a repeating pattern. So personally I can live with it and it doesn't even look too bad from those screenshots. :) So I think you've done a good job.

[marcomio 0]

Thanks, Rellikki.

Would you host it, once I have uploaded it to a temporary download-page? Your help is always appreciated! :)

Edited January 24, 2010 by marcomio

[Fuzzmaster 21]

Very nice, as usual. I wasn't shocked by the "far distance-pattern-problem", so it isn't a problem, you can keep it like that :D

[-martin- 10]

You have to release this island man :bounce12: and the texture patterns can't even be seen that well :smile:

[marcomio 0]

Last W.I.P. - pictures before first release (I hope :D )

Working hard on the completition of the Island. Before release, I want to show some more added objects of Tonal Redux, OFPD-Afghan Everon (by REMO) and by DMA-Libya. Also I have retextured some Tonal Redux Roads as Sand or dirt tracks for better matching my groundtextures. In the moment, I have to repair some road courses as well as adding a bit more dry vegetation. Some things I'd like to amend or to change will follow in the next version. E. g. I'm thinking about screwing down a bit the saturation of the Afghan-buildings to better fit the colour of the environment. But therefore I have to contact REMO of OFPD-Mod before. I know, that there is a permission for using their addons on own maps, but I will reassure myself if it is o. k., when changing the colour of those houses. There still might be some bugs in texturing or road/objects placement. Things like that will be cleaned up in a later version.

So take a look at some last "before release" screens:

[Macser_old 0]

Looks great Marcomio.Very nice work.And as was already said,getting rid of any noticable pattern is impossible with tileable textures.The only effective way to combat it,is to add enough interest with "clutter",so the viewer isn't focused on it.

You've done very well with the project so far.Looking forward to trying it out.

:)

[-martin- 10]

Those roads are excellent, this island looks realy good, this is how Arma 1 was meant to look :) nice work dude waiting for the release

[sanctuary 19]

The pattern in the distance does not look that bad to me. Keep up the good work.

[marcomio 0]

Thanks guys, for nice comments. :)

Something, I'd like to know before uploading my bunch of files in a few days (I hope):

Using 7z-format, which compression rate is recommendable without getting too much qualitiy losses but also a nice downsized file? If I only would save my texture pack without any compression, it is appr. 600 MB in size, using the "normal" (standard) compression rate, it is about 150 MB. Any tip?

[-martin- 10]

Thanks guys, for nice comments. :)

Something, I'd like to know before uploading my bunch of files in a few days (I hope):

Using 7z-format, which compression rate is recommendable without getting too much qualitiy losses but also a nice downsized file? If I only would save my texture pack without any compression, it is appr. 600 MB in size, using the "normal" (standard) compression rate, it is about 150 MB. Any tip?

I don't think the quality is an issue, after all this file will only be compressed once and then just decompressed so definitely make it as small as you can, use 7z I think that it is more solid then RaR, sometimes I get a message saying that the Rar archive is corrupted. .zip doesn’t offer enough compression don’t even think about using it :biggrin:

But I’m no expert in compression I’m sure other members of the forums have more experience in this and will be able to give you better tips then me :smile:

Good luck, we are waiting soldier!