How many ways to texture a hillside cut?

[Emery]

So far I can only think of three ways to texture a hillside cut in BTB:
1) Use BTB terrain and pick the texture of choice
- a) if photo background of aerial imagery is used, it will not look right
- b) details of hillside cut (e.g. rock pokes out) are lost
2) Use BTB walls
- a) limited number of polygons
- b) tough to shape to a complex contour
- c) can place photo per panel, so detail is good
- d) might induce flickering
3) Make a textured object and put in place
- a) unlimited number of polygons
- b) can precisely place polygons
- c) can place photo per panel, so detail is good
- d) can use too many polygons and affect framerate

Are there other techniques that can be used within BTB?
Are there better ideas?
Which technique to do you use?
Have I listed all the ramifications of each method?

 

[nissan man]

those seem like the 3 obvious solutions, but i'm sure someone who is very creative has come up with others.
on 3 you should have a d) too many polygons could induce slowdown.

 

[zaxxon]

You can include the cut as part of the road, editing the profile, adding vertical zones and changing the material for the new parts. Not easy but allows good integration with the road and textures can be mapped better than if terrain is used.

 

[Emery]

Zaxxon - I quickly realize that I haven't played with editing the road profile enough... aren't you limited to the road surface being only 4 or 5 polygons in width? Otherwise, I can see how that method would work well.

 

[mianiak]

For road surface, in shape, you can ctrl + click on the surface to add another row. There is a video tutorial on Piddy's youtube channel explaining it.

I had a cut i needed to make in my last project Nikko Circuit, at first i stitched together a heap of pics and used a wall to make it but it just didnt look right. In the end I just made a seperate model in Blender and uv mapped a few textures to it. It didn't look as realistic, but it looked much better. I honestly tried many different ways including all the ones you mentioned, but the only way to get it right was to make a seperate model. The cut is a major feature in the track and had some destinctive markings that needed to be included to make it look the part. I dont know if this will work for you though.


The stitched photos, on a wall.
http://www.3rdgearmotorsports.com/modding/GRAB_091.JPG
http://www.3rdgearmotorsports.com/modding/nikko/GRAB_002.JPG

The model.
http://www.3rdgearmotorsports.com/modding/nikko/GRAB_102.JPG
http://www.3rdgearmotorsports.com/modding/nikko/GRAB_098.JPG
http://www.3rdgearmotorsports.com/modding/nikko/GRAB_097.JPG

In Real Life,
http://www.nikko-circuit.jp/images/50410/393390/619918/0730021400xq0image2.JPG
http://www.nikko-circuit.jp/images/50410/393384/619912/0830021400tk2image1.JPG
http://www.nikko-circuit.jp/images/50410/393390/619918/332326719100ghaimage1.JPG

 

[Emery]

Tinkering with track profiles, I find that adding a polygon to a section of track ends up adding it to the whole length. Neither could I apply a texture to one polygon because only the whole segment would be selected. Am I doing something wrong or has my BTB Pro gone whacky?

Overall, I think I'll use walls in my current project for the roadside cuts.

 

[R Soul]

Neither could I apply a texture to one polygon because only the whole segment would be selected. Am I doing something wrong or has my BTB Pro gone whacky?

Add two surfaces at the start and finish of where the new material is to be.

Go to the surfaces editor and for both the first and second, select Material (where it says 'Edit' Shape or Material) and then 'Set Material'. Select the first surface, and with Material selected, click and drag from one of the green outer points towards the blue inner points. You'll now have a gap in the track.

Right click and select Add material. Use the X scale value to make the materials wider or narrower.

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That said, I think walls would be better too. Objects come second because accurate positioning can be quite tricky.

 

[Eric Tozer]

I use a road surface to make my hillside cuts.
This way I can still link the terrain to it.

 

[gstaraz]

Using a road like Eric Tozer suggested is the easiest way, althrough, You can use the blending feature of BTBpro to achieve interesting results, if the "cut" is banked.
-For a nice, detailed near track hill, I would use a road, and for distant hills, I`d use the BTB blending feature (pity it aint included in BTBevo)

 

[RT1971]

(pity it aint included in BTBevo)

This has nothing to do with BTBEvo it is because these games don't support blending.

 

[gstaraz]

This has nothing to do with BTBEvo it is because these games don't support blending.

-incorrect:
I have made this track for GTL and, as You Can see, gtl supports blending (idem for gtr2).