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VirtScape is a 3DS MAX scene generator. The purpose of this utility is to aid you in creating backgrounds for your scene. Let's say you have created one of your splendid characters and want to put him in some environment. VirtScape comes in handy here because it does the whole job of background object modelling for you.
And there is one more important advantage of this utility - it's freeware.
As a scene generator it does not work like other 3DS MAX plugins. Only some basic features can be interactively modified through its interface. The rest of the settings (and there are a lot) is to be set up before the scene is actualy created. The scene creation itself requires a havy computation. It is therefore very easy to exaggerate the input information and make the task impossible for the computer.
The size and complexity of the scene is limited only by the power output of your computer (and of course time consumed by the computation).
The subject of the scene is a simple virtual landscape (hence the clever name!) It consists of several groups of objects. First there is a plane representing ground. Then you have grass, flowers, foliage, stones, bushes and trees. Default camera and direct light are provided for your convenience.
The plane shape is limited to square strictly. However the side of the plane can be modified. Generally, after the scene is created you can delete any parts of it and do further modifications.
This utility is originaly created to render still images. You can of course animate the camera and merge the scene with other objects like moving characters.
After zip file is downloaded it has to be unpacked to default C:/VirtScape directory. If you place the files to any other location the utility will not load correctly.This utility is not installed to 3DS MAX enviroment like normal plugins. It has to be loaded from the utilities panel. Go to UTILITIES PANEL- MAX SCRIPT - RUN SCRIPT - navigate to c:/VirtScape directory and select VirtScape.ms Select VirtScape from the dropdown menu to open the VirtScape rollout. |
Basic scene composition is edited here. At startup viewport is maximized and set to camera. In viewport You can directly observe any changes done in rollout. The camera view in viewport is sugested to be used for final rendering. Of course you can use any other views for rendering.
SIDE LENGTH- Sets size of the ground. The ground is square shaped so the size would be 10x10, 20x20, 100x100 and so on. This setting affects scene complexity the most. Be careful using it. If set too high you may run out of memory. One unit represents 1 meter. All units used throughout VirtScape folow this rule. The length of a grid is equal to 1 unit and to 1 meter. This gives you easy interpretation of numbers put in. Exapmle: if you want trees four meters high set TREE HEIGHT to 4.0.
DENSITY- Affects the maximum number of objects (grass,flowers,leaves and stones) created per one square meter. Rises or lowers the number of all above named objects equaly. To subdue or increase the amount of only one group of objects use its MULTIPLIER setting. The DENSITY value should be set to low first. Then make all other settings and test the scene layout with low DENSITY. If approved you can rise DENSITY and create the whole scene. Use low DENSITY for large scenes (SIDE LENGTH set to high) and vice versa.
HILLS- Size of hills. Low value creates flat ground. High values create mountains.
CAMERA CONTROLS GROUPHEIGHT- Z position of camera. FOV- Field of view. ANGLE- Look up/down. DISTANCE- Ditance from the corner. It is the lower left corner of the ground plane seen in top view. It is placed at grid space 0,0 and scene creation originates from here. It is also a place of the highest density (see EDIT DENSITY GRAPH). Not all objects may be seen in cameras scope. If NUMBER OF RANDOM BUSHES is set to 1 and scene is created the single bush could be randomly placed out of camera's view. Set DISTANCE to lower values to get the lost bush in view.
DISPLACEMENT MAP GROUPThe shape of the ground plane is customized here. VirtScape uses two basic mapping systems: composition mapping and sample mapping. Ground displacement map uses composition mapping. It means that the dispacement map is influenced by two factors: noise and custom map. The idea is that you can roughly shape the ground with custom map created in other programmes like Photoshop and add subtle bumpiness using noise map. MIX AMOUNT- Represents the ratio between noise and custom map influence. If set to 0 only custom map is used. 100 means noise only. When 50 both are represented equaly. NOISE SIZE- Size of noise spots. Composition maps can be directly seen as a texture on ground plane viewed in schaded viewport. However there is a bug in 3DS MAX. Procedural textures are displayed in viewports differently from rendered pictures. This applies to noise maps as well. So you can see noise texture in the viewport but it is not displayed correctly (spots appear to be smaller). Custom map is displayed fine. THRESHOLD- Blurs edges of noise spots. 0 value makes the transition between black and white very soft. Value of 49 makes it very sharp. CUSTOM MAP- You can select your own map here. Any bitmap picture format supported by 3DS MAX is valid. Using grayscale pictures is strongly advised. The pictures should be square shaped also. Rectangle pictures can be used, but it gives twisted results. The size of the picture in pixels is variable. Only it should be greater than SIDE LENGTH. White areas represent value of 1.0, black 0.0, gray shades reflect values in between. Example: if HILLS is set to 5.0 then white parts of the picture will form peaks of the hills with altitude of five meters (like contour lines). Another example: if DENSITY is 10.0, grass MULTIPLIER is 20.0 - parts marked with white color will generate 1.0 x 10.0 x 20.0 = 200 grass stalks. There will be no grass in black areas.
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Density graph was made for creating large landscapes. It gives you possibility to control the level of detail according to distance from camera. The farmost places do not need as much as detail as places right under the camera. The distribution is given by equation: y=a/x^b+c. Lowering "a" value draws the curve to the zero point, rising it makes the curve more flat. "b" value shifts the beginning of the curve left or right. And "c" value moves the curve up and down. The vertical blue line is controled with the LOD spinner. It divides the scene in two parts: level of detail zone 1 and 2. Objects created in LOD zone 1 are more complex than those in LOD zone 2. This reduces polygon count in distant parts of the scene. You can imagine that the left edge of the graph is situated at the camera point and the right edge is placed in the corner at the other side.
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| a=0.6 b=1.2 c=2 LOD=11 | a=10 b=0.7 c=0 LOD=23 | a=10 b=24 c=46 LOD=80 |
CLOUDS COLOR-
SKY COLOR-
CLOUDS SIZE-
MULTIPLIER-
LENGTH-
LENGTH DIFF.(%)- If set to 0 all grass stalks have exactly the same height. 100 makes the the stalks height variable in range from 0.0 to value of LENGTH.
USE DISTRIBUTIOM MAP- If checked grass height adapts to local grass density. This creates the efect of clusters of grass with length of stalks gradualy descenting from center to borders.
BEND- Angle of maximal bend effect aplied to grass stalks. Direction of bending (Z axis rotation) is picked randomly.
GRASS COLOR-
GRASS MAP SETTINGS- See desciption of using composition maps in Displacement Map Group section.
MULTIPLIER-
GRASS DISTRIBUTION- Flower grow only where grass grows.
EVEN DISTRIBUTION- Flowers scatered everywhere.
LENGTH-
LENGTH DIFF.(%)-
FLOWER COLORS- Six available colors for flower blooms.
MULTIPLIER-
MAX. SIZE-
MIN. SIZE(%)- Stones smaller than size of percentage of MAX. SIZE will not be created.
ADAPTIVE COUNT- If checked number of stones rises with decreasing size. This makes big stones less scattered. And areas with small stones more crowded. If left unchecked number of stones is restricted to MULTIPLIER and DENSITY.
BOULDER PROBABILITY- One big stone (ten times bigger than the others) is created out of the number of stones chosen here.
STONE SIZE MAP SETTINGS- This map does not represent the number of stones created in one square meter, but the size of them. Places with white color will have stones of MAX. SIZE and black parts will be empty (stones with size between 0.0 and MIN. SIZE(%) are not created).
MULTIPLIER-
MAX. SIZE-
SIZE DIFF.(%)-
LEAVE TYPE A/B- This slider represents ratio between linden type leaves and maple type leaves. The more to the left the more maple leaves you get and the more to the right the more linden leaves.
LEAVES COLOR SETTINGS- Leaves use vertex color mapping. The range of colors used can be chosen here and directly observed on the picture situated between hue settings.
HUE MIN.-
HUE MAX.-
VALUE SHIFT- The greater this number the darker the colors can be.
LEAVES MAP SETTINGS- See desciption of using composition maps in Displacement Map Group section.
NUMBER OF RANDOM BUSHES- Number of bushes randomly scattered around the scene. They are independently created on those determined by CUSTOM BUSH PLACEMENT MAP.
HEIGHT-
HEIGHT DIFF.(%)-
WIDTH- With small numbers bushes get more narrow an branches are more straight. Big numbers make bushes wide and branches are hanging down.
WIDTH DIFF.(%)-
MAX. NUM. OF BRANCHES- Number of branches when density graph output is 1.0
MAX. NUM. OF LEAVES PER BRANCH-
MAX. LEAVE SIZE-
SIZE DIFF.(%)-
LEAVES COLOR SETTINGS- See LEAVES GROUP.
SAME LEAVE COLOR PER BUSH- When checked every bush has uniform leave color within the range of LEAVES COLOR SETTINGS. Otherwise leaves on one bush are of a different color.
BRANCHES COLOR-
SAMPLE RANGE- Sample mapping is a method of placing bushes in the scene and defining their height at the same time. The program takes the CUSTOM BUSH PLACEMENT MAP provided by you and divides it into a grid with square blocks of side size set by SAMPLE RANGE. It evaluates the average density value from CUSTOM BUSH PLACEMENT MAP in these blocks. This average value is set as the reference to bush height. It ranges between 0.0 and 1.0. Then the bush position is determined somewhere within the block borders. The smaller SAMPLE RANGE value is the more bushes you get and vice versa. This way you can easily design layout of your scene by your CUSTOM BUSH PLACEMENT MAP and then chose bush density by assigning SAMPLE RANGE value.
CUSTOM BUSH PLACEMENT MAP-
PREVIEW- Press this button to see the preview of your scene. The position of bushes is only probable. Note that every time you press this button the picture looks slightly different. The final scene will only folow the general layout and will differ in details.
NUMBER OF RANDOM TREES-
HEIGHT-
HEIGHT DIFF.(%)-
TRUNK WIDTH- Diameter of tree trunk at its bottom.
WIDTH DIFF.(%)-
TRUNK HEIGHT- This setting determines where the lowest branch will be. If the value is 0.0 the first branch grows directly at the ground level. This way you can actually make a bush out of a tree. The value of 0.9 makes a long tree trung with very few branches and leaves at its top.
NO. OF 1. CLASS BRANCHES- 1. class branches are branches that grow directy from tree trunk.
NO. OF 1. CLASS LEAVES- Leaves growing on 1. class branches.
NO. OF 2. CLASS BRANCHES- 2. class branches grow from 1. class branches.
NO. OF 2. CLASS LEAVES-
MAX. LEAVE SIZE-
LEAVE SIZE DIFF.(%)-
LEAVE TYPE A/B- See LEAVES GROUP. Only one type of leaves can grow on one tree.
LEAVES COLOR SETTINGS- See LEAVES GROUP.
SAME LEAVE COLOR PER TREE- See BUSHES GROUP.
TRUNK COLOR-
SAMPLE RANGE- See BUSHES GROUP.
CUSTOM BUSH PLACEMENT MAP-
PREVIEW-
GRASS-
FLOWERS-
STONES-
LEAVES-
BUSHES-
TREES-