hi there! i would like to change the terrain type "path" into real beach sand. i usually look thru all available terrain and choose one terrain i like and change it into a new folder until i have a perfect environment. but in all terrain files i have is no beach sand (correct me if i'm wrong). in the store i also didn't find beach sand. i can find a lot of files but i don't know how to import this into a terrain folder. i know how to change terrains but i don't know how to create the three dds files in gimp. can you help me how to do this? i was looking in the forum and the only thread with a usable title was "oops error 404".
can you tell me a place to find nice textures for my purpose? i have some but i'm sure there is better tsuff out there.

The beach sand texture I use (see attachments) comes from cgtextures.com. If you go to this free texture web site and select" Soil" then select "Beach" You will see many sand textures that you can select from. The one I am using in the attachments is "soil beach0087" Size "700x700" or texture#32630.

thank you, this is great! i have found a few very nice terrain files but HOW do i get it into my terrain tool now? i am familiar with gimp and i have bumpmap and dds filter but i have no idea how this works now...

Before you spend a lot of time getting a grasp on the "DDS" files issue you must first select an image that is suitable to act as a "tile". See the attachment.

A suitable image is one that when placed adjacent to a duplicate of it's self, in all possible combinations will show NO edge between the tiles.
When this type of image is found it then needs to be sized the same as the "Path image" we want to replace. If the current image to be replaced in the terrain bank file is 1024x1024 then the new tile image should be the same 1024x1024.

The rest of the procedure is simple if the software being used is capable of saving a "jpeg" file out as a "DDS" file
I can't help you much with the procedure because I don't use "Gimp". I use a free copy of "Paint.net" (a very handy program for creating most dds files for Game Guru.

Be aware you only need a "Path_D.dds" file and a "Path_N.dds" file.
If you choose to try Pain.net I might be able to show you how change the "Path files" required.

thanks a lot for your help! i will try this when i'm home. i think finding a tile that is "infinite" will be challenging but not impossible. then i will try to save the 2 dds files via gimp. if this doesn't work i will take a look at paint.net ad get back to you thanks, this is already a big help!

@ Nuncio - you can create tileable textures in GIMP. Just do a Google search for' GIMP tileable textures', and you'll find several tutorials.

ah, ok! i think this will help a lot thanks!
but can anyone tell me how to make correct dds file(s) for the terrain tool from this image?

my problem: when i open path_d.dds f.e. i expect a yellow sandish structure but i have an inverted purple pattern and i better don't play around with this outherwise i'm about to ruin it all (again) due to lack of knowledge.

You can also go above this resolution, 2K textures make a world of difference to this engine.

It is true that the "DDS" files in this discussion can be 2k, or even higher, but for a tool just to paint areas of sand on a beach, higher resolution might be considered overkill. (See the previous posted attachment).

In this post I have included a partial screen shot of some of the sand "tile sets" available at www.cgtextures.com. These tile sets have been created by cgtextures.com for the exact purpose you have in mind.

Using Gimp (Which I am no expert in) I was able to make "_D.dds" "_N.dds" files (1024x1024) that work just fine. It appears that one needs to use the "export" command not the "Save as". I hope other members with a better understanding of "Gimp" than I, can help you.
Also see attachment showing the files that exist in tgc supplied"terrainbank/jungle folder" and the new terrainbank/jungle2 folder which would now appear in terrain selection box (tab/tab).

thank you! after all your really useful help i have four great beach sand tiles that are wonderfully seamless. i found a video tutorial and after 2 minutes i had the files ready. really great.

now how do i get these dds files? i will try to export the four files into dds files and see what happens... i have totally no idea how that works ;D

hey, it's working. kinda. i overwrot the path D and path N dds in a new folder and tired it. the three screenshots below show what happened.
actually it works!
take a look at the sliders: when i have TERRAIN SHADER on HIGHEST the beach sand has an awful colour. when i put the slider to MEDIUM the sand looks good. i made four different sand types, i tired them all and all of them had the same effect. high terrain, evil colour.
why does this happen and how could i fix this?
i took sand 87_10 for my "main sand". i also use VA's asphalt way in this terrain set and this asphalt looks better when the terrain is on MEDIUM. but when i choose HIGH the colour of the asphalt, the green and the rest is not going crazy. only my beach sand causesa pain in the eyes

thank you for helping me come this far, i'm really happy with the results.

I think the "path_N.dds" had the wrong settings when you created it. To confirm this, remove the path_N.dds to keep it from being called when terrain is set to "highest". If the Path_N.dds file is removed the sand should look the same as medium or lowest setting when set to "Highest".

Game guru only uses this file (Path_N.dds) when the terrain is set to highest. but it always uses the "path_D.dds file.

When you redo the path_N.dds file using Gimp by going to Filters>Map>normalmap select sobel 3x3 then ok then export the new normal map.
Or when you redo the file select "none" rather then sobel 3x3.

I'm ALMOST certain the problem is in the "N" file.

i did what you told me, i opened the path_N.dds in gimp, did filters/normalmap/sobel 3x3 and now i got this when i put the slider on highest.
the sand is great but now it's reflecting th sun. how does this come? is this realistic? not really or what do you think?
thank ou more the help! it's working

If the slider settings are the same as your previous post attachments then the problem is the Global Specular slider setting is set greater than zero. Play with this slider and the sun glow showing on the sand will diminish or glow brighter based on Global Specular slider settings. Zero will shut this feature off!

I think you have your new sand paint tool under control, now you have to play with any and all sliders to get the effect you desire. Using the highest terrain setting kicks in hidden features that are not part of the lowest and medium settings.

Good job!!

May have been mentioned already but you put the specular into the alpha channel of the diffuse _D for terrain textures otherwise you will get a high shine all over your material.

@rolfy

I always wondered why the diffuse files in terrainbank looked different. Could you maybe give us a hint as to how this is done. I just assumed the specular files were always separate files. Learn something new everyday...

Create a new alpha channel for the _D diffuse texture , you can get away with simply copy/paste the diffuse texture into the alpha channel (because its an alpha it will change to greyscale so need to desaturate it). Mostly for GG specular is a fair bit darker to work best, I don't use gimp so cant say how to create an alpha channel in it but pretty sure it isn't difficult . If unsure how to create alpha you could always open one of the existing terrain textures and paste your own into both the channels then save it out

@m2Design-is there a plugin I need for Gimp as I don't see Filters>Map>normalmap in my version 2.8 of Gimp.
[edit] - is ok I found it.

A lot of really good information in this thread! Thanks to all!

Also remember that if you create an awesome terrain texture set, you are most welcome to publish it on the GameGuru Asset Store and earn 70% of the sales while you're working on your masterpieces. I think we could use more terrain texture sets to give end users more choice in the visual styles of the games being made.

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