Any suggestions on how to make trees and other plant based props?

[BNG Da BZ Fool]

I've begun to make to some symetrical looking plants, but wondered if anyone had any thoughts on how to make non-symetrical plants like trees and such. As most of you know by now I mostly use Ttruespace, so please keep any sugestions somewhat general so that I can adapt them for use with my 3d modeller. I also have GMAX with a tree generator plugin, so if I need to I can partially use that to build the base plants trunk objects and import those into TS for further editing and texturing tasks. How were the plants done in Forgotten Enemies as I recall some very nice plant based props?

I made quite a few plant props with Gamespace. Most were drawn using the freehand nurbs object tool in GS then converted to solid polyhedron objects and then manipulated into arch shaped leafy looking objects copied several times to form the base plant and then grouped together in the infamous H. tree.

Plant props don't need to own terrain right?

Also, if I group several together as copies and resized them to give them all a variety of sizes will that work okay with the map editor?    

[mrtwosheds]

I've been making plants too  
Currently we still seem to have a bug in 5.1 with transparent .png textures that causes the wrong surface to be draw first/last, so I have not been using them. So I have been making them from very low poly bits, making leaves out of just one 2-sided triangle for example, or extruding a simple half sphere at scale 0, flatten its base, delete 2/3 of its polys and then taper to shape it into a nice spiky thing.

Try to be clever with your uv mapping and textures, you can make allot of very different looking plants that all use just the one texture.

Large trees work well as 176buildings or flare mines but they need a simple box collision mesh for the trunk, they can also then have ambient sound fx defined in odf.

Even with the increased poly count of 5.1, try to keep them as low as you can, so that they don't impact game performance too much when placed on a map in large numbers.

We should have a bz2 gene bank where people can deposit their plants and props for others to use, its the only way to evolve some biodiversity.

[BNG Da BZ Fool]

Can they be made like sprites and always display towards players so that flat 3d cutouts of plants can be textured with a plant picture; like a silouette? I have quite a different thoughts, but don't really know what's possible with the game limitations.

[mrtwosheds]

Not using any technique that I am aware of. The stock grass is done with just 2 flat square planes and a transparent texture, quite simple to make.
I have got my best results using simple polygon shapes and non transparent textures in 5.1. Quite pleased with my spiky grass and palm trees so far.

[TheJamsh]

If you want to make a plant face the player like a sprite, then USE a sprite. All you need is an image of the tree. But either way it wont look as good as other trees, it'll just look like a cheap old PS1 game.

MrTwoSheds' trees are the best i've ever seen actually... but unfortunately that transparency bug exists with all texture formats, not just .png However you can split the components of a tree up into separate objects, and it stops it happening.

Now all you need to do is animate them to look as if the wind is blowing M2S

[mrtwosheds]

Now all you need to do is animate them to look as if the wind is blowing M2S

That might sound like a good idea, but I don't think it is  .  I cannot actually recall having seen animated trees in any game at all.

However you can split the components of a tree up into separate objects, and it stops it happening.

It does? had not noticed that.

[TheJamsh]

Yeh, GH is currently doing it with the stock plants, like mobush, as its three 'bushes' can be seen through each other. According to some, splitting it into three separate objects should fix it... which is wierd.

FS2 has animated grass

[mrtwosheds]

I quite like giving some plants atmospheric sound fx, wind insects etc

[Avatar]

I cannot actually recall having seen animated trees in any game at all.

Ghost Recon.  Absolutely screwed up my ususal 'if it moves, and it's not us, shoot it' methodology of playing...   

Animated trees can be done simply by making them "powerplant" class...  which I find very ironic.  (get it, power plant?)   Now, if you make them 'wave in the wind' that means you can't spin them randomly to make them look more natural.  You can't have wind blowing one tree one direction and the tree next to it another, right?

You also end up with them all moving in snyc, which is cool for some types of plants but a whole forest?  Ack...  they end up looking like an old cartoon...

To avoid all of this you end up making a bunch of variations, to have different orientations but all moving and blowing the same way, but at different times.  A hundred of these will drag pretty much any system down, especially if you do it with vertex animations...

Still, computers get faster every year... 

-Av-

[Nielk1]

I am working on collapsing planets from mods into single planet packs that can be used to manufacture a large number of maps. It is difficult though with how some mods organize their assets.

[BNG Da BZ Fool]

Some of the plants in the XSI model pack look very simple in design; some looking like there super low in poly count as well. I made simple tree trunk and branches, but the foliage looks like quite a challenge to make without driving the poly count through the roof. I've also revisited the concept of using some X models in the game again; only drawback so far is textures still don't materialize on the model in the map editor just the base material colors which don't look half bad as I can produce literally tons of different color shades. Takes a bit of doing though.

[Zero Angel]

I believe Lizard likes to create plant props in groups (like a plant prop model which incorporates multiple bushes, trees and grass clusters) because its easier for the bz2 engine to keep track of and causes less strain on the CPU.

[TheJamsh]

Would make perfect sense. I tend to go easy on trees for maps (apart from recently, because i couldnt care less ), it just gives the engine something else to keep track of.

[BNG Da BZ Fool]

Plants in groups sounds very easy to do just by copying one and placing them nearby, grouping all together and varying the scale a bit to make them look less sysmterical instead of placing them one by one. I've always felt that props should be used in moderation rather then making a forest just a few placed in key areas adds little areas of interest for the player.

[TheJamsh]

For forests, i always find that using the terrain is the best way to make most of the trees, break the land up.