New Mapping Tool - "SpringMapEdit" - r321

[Frostregen]

Hi,

I will be back working on this in January 2009.
Too much other work to do atm.

Sorry,
see you then.

[SeanHeron]

Sweetness! I'll be testing real soon, for sure.
[Edit:] I didn't notice this was up to four pages before I posted, I thought it was just release! Anyway, definitely excellent work :).

[Mightylink]

Is there any way to get this to work on opengl 1.x cards, I cant run it... but I can run the game fine minus the shaders.

[dizekat]

intersections at right angles could be made automatically rather easily, anything else is still doable but hard. shorelines are easy since they blend well, roads can but need not to (stripes and whatever else is there on a road.) I'm not a photoshop pro, so don't know how exactly I'd do it by hand either if it wasn't a right angle intersection.

Any angle is not so hard actually, if you have just simple symmetric stripes on road, and some repeating stones at the road edge or w/e. First make distance function that gives distance from closest road line (x), and distance along that road (y). Then take colour from road markings texture at x,y . (Road texture have to be symmetric relatively to center line, however.) . The asphalt texture has to be separate, tiled over whole map, and blended in by a value from marks texture. (so that asphalt doesn't stretch where road is making a turn).

[Frostregen]

Had some unexpected free time today, so a small update:
-added sm2 import (needs extracted smf/smt/smd. Features need to be copied into SME folder)
-settings saved through sessions (config/settings.cfg)
-keys customizable (without gui though... config/keys.cfg)

have fun :)


@Beherith:
Source will definitely be released, just when I do not know

@Super Mario:
Map area limit? Do you mean "Map->New Map"?

@Mightylink:
About openGL 1.x support:
1. This editor needs huge amount of VRAM, which old cards are missing.
2. I would need to implement multiple renderpaths :-/
3. I don't know if JOGL supports this at all. (I think it is a requirement, but I may be wrong)

[smoth]

<3s, this forum needs a heart smiley.

meh I'll use the one from my site...

[Pressure Line]

@Mightylink:
About openGL 1.x support:
1. This editor needs huge amount of VRAM, which old cards are missing.
2. I would need to implement multiple renderpaths :-/
3. I don't know if JOGL supports this at all. (I think it is a requirement, but I may be wrong)

you cant always cater to the lowest common denominator. a cheap OGL2 capable card is like $50US.

[KaiserJ]

thx for the update, frost!

tbh, from all of my asking for various features etc to be added to this program, i can only think of two things that it really could use... a custom interface for the texturing, and an easy way to include more models into the feature editor.

now that i'm used to using it, all of those other little points of detail seem moot, because the bottom line is that the program is very functional and efficient already... i'm just used to all the bells and whistles of commercial applications i think

merry christmas!

[Argh]

I'm going to finally sit down with this tonight, and see how much trouble it will be, to get roads done.

I have road sections and textures... so, other than having to get a scalar model done... hmm.

I'll get back to people with a report on this.

[Argh]

Ok... took a quick look.

1. Stamp needs to use the brushes. Can't do soft contours without it. Add changes the color values, at least over here.

Sorry in advance, if this is some oddity of my drivers, etc., but that part doesn't seem to be working.

2. What is the relative value in units between brush size and actual pixel size? Pretty important, if I'm going to make roads with this. I assume that the numbers are in heightmap units?

3. When lining up two squares, the edges didn't meet cleanly.

It's the non-power-of-two issue. Tested a bit more... and you can set the Typemap, etc., properly, just not the texture.

And for roads... I need to see both at once, typemap faded onto texturemap, or vice-versa, preferably with a mask. I'm sure that would be "fun" to program.

4. I'd really like a POV where it's locked to overhead and straight down, and the camera pans as the mouse moves. The free-look is pretty inconvenient for general work.

Overall, though, this is really cool, it's a lot faster than I expected, even on this old thing

[Frostregen]

@KaiserJ:
Interface for custom texturing will come.
My main work will continue in january

@Argh:
Don't bother with texturing right now, as the current features are quite limited.
Semi-automatic road generation is definitely something I will inlcude, as this is a point most other tools suck. (typemap + texture)
(yup, texturepainting needs to account the brush...will be done)

About 2:
Pattern brushes (heightmap stuff) are 1 brush pixel == 1 tile
for textures it was 1 brush pixel == 1 texture pixel. (1/8 tile)

About 3.:
Could you make images for me to show this? I do not understand it...

About 4:
Some other camera types will be implemented.
Maybe even plugin based.

About faded views:
I'm currently testing this, as it annoyed me when placing metal spots.
My current idea is a toggle:
"blend 50%(or a custom value) of texturemap onto current map"
Btw, this is quite easy, as i compute the rgb-texture values myself anyway :)

The performance surprises me too, as this is completely java.
(Ok, i have to ignore OO-programming quite a lot(arrays are your friend), but hey - it's fast )

Thx to all replies!

-Frostregen

[imbaczek]

java 6 has a jit that produces devilishly fast code; the price you pay in memory and startup time. if you're working with long-lived objects and pure, simple arrays (which you do in this kind of a project), there's no reason for java to not be as fast as C.

[Argh]

About 3.:
Could you make images for me to show this? I do not understand it...

Sure.

Here, I'm placing a texture:


Note that the square seems to be lining up, exactly, with the first square.

Now, this is what actually happens:

See how it's off by a little bit? Happens every time.

It's really, really essential that it doesn't do that, or you can't do stuff like roads or other man-made features, where things will need to get lined up exactly.

[Frostregen]

confirmed - left&upper row are missing.

thx!

[Argh]

NP, thanks for putting so much time into this tool thus far! I really hope you keep working on it, I think that combining this with L3DT could lead to some really nice maps.

[Frostregen]

small update again:
-fixed brush-texture alignment
-use alpha from texture when stamping now (useful for metalpatches&road)
-small speedup when loading .smt from SM2 map
-fixed "transparency from PNG was loaded premultiplied" (resulted in black Features...)
-added "Blend in Texturemap into other Views" Default Key: F6

Brush Size of 1 equals 8 pixels in texturemode. (just for reference)

as always:
have fun :)


PS: If someone could supply me with .s3o models & textures for the 15 default trees and a good geovent model I would be thankful!

[Noruas]

http://spring.jobjol.nl/show_file.php?id=1649


Noruas Liek!

[Pressure Line]

PS: If someone could supply me with .s3o models & textures for the 15 default trees and a good geovent model I would be thankful!

the Springtrees are procedurally generated

afaik standard geovents dont have a model, i think its usually drawn onto the map texture, then you just tell the engine "this here is a geovent, smoke gonna be pourin' outta here." (done on the featuremap iirc)

[ralphie]

this geovent graphic is pretty much standard, i guess nobody has bothered to make a better one

[Pressure Line]

thats from OTA :/