breaking up repetition with bitmap scale variations
gmsh
Newcomer
Somewhere in my tutorial reading/watching, I came across a technique for breaking up large stretches of repetitive texture bitmaps by drawing in patches of the same texture at different scales. Unfortunately I can't find the spot where I read or watched this bit of advice.
In trying to figure it out myself, I adjusted the scaling value in the fill style properties dialog, but that affected existing instances of the texture, which I don't want, since the goal is to draw in patches of the same texture but bigger or smaller.
Is anybody on the forum familiar with the technique I'm talking about? Is there any way to adjust a bitmap's scale on a new entity without affecting old ones?
Comments
Yes, I remember there being something myself but I can't find it now either. We must both be using the same 'wrong' search words.
But never mind - I can possibly help you here.
Make a new sheet immediately above the one with the repetition issue (under it in the sheet listing because the sheet listing is upside down to most people's way of thinking).
Either:
It's more effective to use similar textures rather than the same one. For example if you have several shades of grass use one of the other shades of grass to patch the original grass.
It can take a little practice to get the second method to work correctly, but I've found it more effective than the first one.
...
EDIT: It is also worth remembering that repetition becomes far less obvious when there are more objects in the map, so if you are staring at just the background with nothing else at the beginning of a map you will inevitably see the pattern. It might be worth finishing the map before you decide to go through the process of patching.
It looks like the edge-faded similar texture is going to help a lot. Unfortunately this is a pretty sparse map, but maybe with your technique there will be enough other objects to keep the pattern from being overwhelming. Thanks for your help!
You're welcome, gmsh :)
To create the same texture at different scales, you need to make multiple definitions for it.
Simply find the relevant fill in the fill style dialog. With the desired fill selected, hit the new button, and give it a nice name. Now you have two copies of the same fill definition, and you can change the scaling for one of them. Make as many clones as you need to set up various scales.