FRACTAL TERRAINS urgent questions from beginner
Hello everybody. It's my first message in your place and hope it's not the last. i advice i'm foreigner and i'm sorry for my english !! Long time i dont practice it .
So i've just install the DEMO version of Fractal terrains. I have 15 days (now 11) to decide if i buy it, and i need help
First i don't succeed in making a new virgin world where i could draw. Impossible to understand wich of the four options i must choose and what can i do to have this virgin and "waiting for painting" planet
Second (and most important for me), I need to know if FT can import drawings from external file... I explain :
i have already drawn my world with photoshop before i discover a publiciti of FT . It is a planet double of circunference of earth. quiet good resolution (about 40000 x 20000) but not enough for me. Each borders continents and each terrains (mountains plains forest desert ...) have his own layer.
So, is it possible to import each layer in FT in order than this drawing layer will define the new ... mountains if it is the layer of the mountains, borders of continent ... ans so on ....
I imagine that, if is possible, you will have to manually enter many parameters like altitudes of each mountain for example) ... but is my request possible to do ?
If it is, can someone here give me an idea of the way to do it ? ... in order i can estimate how long and difficult will be this work to remake my world on FT ?
Thank you for help
So i've just install the DEMO version of Fractal terrains. I have 15 days (now 11) to decide if i buy it, and i need help
First i don't succeed in making a new virgin world where i could draw. Impossible to understand wich of the four options i must choose and what can i do to have this virgin and "waiting for painting" planet
Second (and most important for me), I need to know if FT can import drawings from external file... I explain :
i have already drawn my world with photoshop before i discover a publiciti of FT . It is a planet double of circunference of earth. quiet good resolution (about 40000 x 20000) but not enough for me. Each borders continents and each terrains (mountains plains forest desert ...) have his own layer.
So, is it possible to import each layer in FT in order than this drawing layer will define the new ... mountains if it is the layer of the mountains, borders of continent ... ans so on ....
I imagine that, if is possible, you will have to manually enter many parameters like altitudes of each mountain for example) ... but is my request possible to do ?
If it is, can someone here give me an idea of the way to do it ? ... in order i can estimate how long and difficult will be this work to remake my world on FT ?
Thank you for help
Comments
Maybe this link can help you: http://oldguygaming.com/recreating-an-existing-map
Well, ... it seems (nearly) everybody use FT only for random world , and what i want to do is too much work.
Look what Mike Summers told me :
"However, if you want to use it to recreate an existing world, it will take a great deal of expertise to learn how to use the program well enough to do so. It can be done, but it would be difficult."
BUT ... perhaps this long work worth it...
In fact, I have still 8 days to study the software, and there is one thing i saw in the publicity of FT ... that i dont 'find in the programm...
When you look at the first image on top right of this page http://www.profantasy.com/products/ft_details.asp you can see ... exactly the thing that interest me in FT
As well, it is writen "Then export that world as an image, animation, icosahedral, to Google Earth or CC3."
I need precisions about this google earth possibility. So, is it possible to turn around and zoom +/- as i believe when i see this image ?? Is it really possible to go and zoom where you want ... make your world turn right or left, get nearer ou more far ... you see ?!!
... but HOW ?!! I'd really like to see it before the end of my demo version...
While i'm here, i have questions for CampaignCartographer:
Can I make a BIG flat map of a planet with CC and, most of all, is it possible - as i wanted to do with FT - to import layouts in order to defined the layouts of my continents and island (on one map) , and same thing to define the areas of mountains, forest and so on ? ... or it is as difficult as FT ?
In that case, as well, FT would not be able to take this work , but it interest me anyway to have informations as well about CC ..
PS commercials questions
If i buy FT and/or CC, are there others softs that can be considered as "nearly indispensable" ?
Is there a ... "bundle" with lower price if you buy FT and CC ... and perhaps other ... together ? ... like a kind of "CC suite" you know ?
Thanks for your help
I return on FT help topics
You can export from FT3 as an icosahedral flat world.
Profantsy shop shows bundles.
I've made several large 25000 by 14000 mile flat planets with CC3.
posts
So, I know now that i can make a world large as mine, thank you. But do you know if I can import in CC layers from photoshop, one by one, in order to define areas and layouts of this card ? (instead of draw them one by one !!)
As well, could you confirm that i can't import the result on FT ? It seems strange to be possible to export from FT and not the opposite, don't you think ?
FT is intended as a source of data for CC3. It cannot import CC3 files directly. There are some suggestions out there for getting CC3 data into FT3, but it's not a primary use of the program.
For the export in KML, I'm sorry but I can only see six options (icosahedral images, sphere map images, cosmographer templates, multiple files, spin view image sequences and VRML) but none of them seem to export something else than simple image (jpg or bmp).
Use Help --> About to check your version (or see the splash screen or title bar). if you have FT Pro, go download the new version of the demo.
Well, I now have a world on google map but I have two problems and one question :
- Very bad resolution (14 ko !!) . I tried to find where i could increase the resolution ... I thought i found ... but it didn't change nothing
- When i pass the mouse on the map, GE tells me properties (latitude longitude, but most of all altitude) of earth and not the world from FT
So is it possible to see climats, rain fall and so on, as well on Google earth ?
As for the real altitude issue: Google Earth will treat this as an overlay on earth, it isn't equipped to handle different planets. So unfortunately, the information shown is really for the underlying earth, and not your world. Latitude and longitude will be correct, because this is how it is measured on all spheres, but everything else is from the Earth.
To show rainfall and so on, you need to do a separate export from FT. It exports the current view, so if you are currently viewing the rainfall in FT, that is will get exported.
Well , I've been looking a little bit better to the Mike Summers' tuto about export from cc to FT ... and I need at least Wilbur to try it . Is it possible to get it for demo ? And what about cc ?
There is no demo version of CC3, but ProFantasy have a 14-day satisfaction guarantee, so you can buy it, test it, and return it within 14 days if you didn't like i.
I have a small problem with it. In the tuto, one step in wilbur is : "Texture | Grayscale Bump Shader" but i don't find this option. Is it because i have a demo version ?
So, after trying FT and taking informations about it and CC, I can see that they are really as great as i heard about. Of course, i didn't used all fonctions and I almost browsed it with my specific wish of remake an already made world. Unfortunately, to do so, they (CC as well) have no import possibilities. I'm so sorry of this . i dream photoshop and FT (or/and CC) open together and just make copy/paste ... perhaps one day the team realise this dream or at least introduce some import fonctions ?
Anyway i'll surely get CC soon cause i need cities and areas. Even if i didn't try it, i know it's the best. That's what all role playing community say.
I thank all of you for your help. Congratulations to the team that really made fantastic job.
it's three days i dont succeed in getting these two pages. It's a pity cause one of them was very useful. Do tou have the same problem ? If you don't know a nex adress of these, would you have the adress of an other page for tutorial of FT ?
jslayton is active in these forums though, so I am sure he will either fix it, or we will hear from him soon.