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Path Painter - Paths, Ramps, Roads & River Beds for Unity Terrain

Discussion in 'Assets and Asset Store' started by AdamGoodrich, Sep 11, 2018.

  1. AdamGoodrich

    AdamGoodrich

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    Welcome to Path Painter, the Path, Ramp, Road and Riverbed painting system for Unity 3D.

    Whether you are making a road, a ramp, a path or a river, Path Painter makes terrain based path creation and texturing a breeze!

    Path Painter allows you to:
    - Create paths;
    - Create ramps;
    - Create roads;
    - Create plateaus for secret forts;
    - Create lake and river beds;
    - Change terrain elevation along path;
    - Re-texture along path embankments;
    - Clear grass and trees along path;
    - Use various algorithms for natural clearing;

    And Path Painter is completely Unity Terrain compatible - no third party shaders required!

    Note: This asset is provided in DLL form rather than with source code. If you would like to purchase the source code then please contact us directly.



     
    Last edited: Sep 26, 2018
  2. AdamGoodrich

    AdamGoodrich

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    Grab 20180910082212 w1920h1039 x170y92z-327r265.jpg
    Grab 20180917195258 w1920h1039 x-115y86z-160r258.jpg
     
    Last edited: Sep 17, 2018
  3. derkoi

    derkoi

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    Could you please put the Quick Start guide online, so i can take a look at how it works before purchasing please?

    Thanks
     
  4. AdamGoodrich

    AdamGoodrich

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    Yep, this and tutorials coming soon.
     
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  5. Fattie

    Fattie

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    Hey guys - we're having a heck of a time simply adding "a painted line" to Terrain.

    (So - imagine say a ski run, easy enough in Unity Terrain. Just want to paint a blue line (as if someone took paint and painted a "blue line" on the snow) say 0.5, maybe 1m, wide.)

    This (as you probably know) is remarkably difficult. In fact, could we do this with Path Painter?

    (It would just be the simplest possible path .. like, "blue" ! :) Perhaps ideally transparent blue.)

    What do you think?

    screenshot.png not so easy!
     
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  6. frankslater

    frankslater

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    Hey @Fattie,

    It's probably not the best idea to use the Unity Terrain texture for that if you want a fine line, because you are limited by the resolution. Similarly as if you tried to paint a line on an image where the line would be too slim for the resolution:
    upload_2018-9-11_13-57-40.png

    Here I tried to do something similar (in transparent brown) with Path Painter but I don't think this is what you want:
    upload_2018-9-11_14-0-46.png
     

    Attached Files:

  7. tequyla

    tequyla

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    hello,

    is possible to add fence and others things on the edge when i draw a road ?

    regards
     
  8. Fattie

    Fattie

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    Re: "painted line" - got it ! Thanks, masters! :) Am buying the asset anyway as it is clearly by far the best for paths, walkways etc.
     
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  9. frankslater

    frankslater

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    Thank you for your question @tequyla!

    That's something we could consider at some time in the future. It's not in the scope and not on the roadmap at the moment considering that GeNa does a great job at spawning fences and other things:

    [To avoid confusion: WHAT YOU SEE IN THE 2 PICTURES BELOW IS GENA IN ACTION, NOT PATH PAINTER - I wouldn't want someone scrolling through, buying the tool and then looking for the fencing you see below.]





    I hope this helps
     
    Last edited: Sep 11, 2018
  10. Mark_01

    Mark_01

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    So you could set GeNa rules to put the fence etc, along the " Re-texture along path embankments "
    If you had a Path embankment texture ? even if it was a temporary texture just for Gena to find ?

    Maybe an easier method can find its way into GeNa 2 for this idea .. ;)
     
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  11. runningbird

    runningbird

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    of course the second I saw this I had to purchase! Can't wait to try it out.
    I've used other pathing tools and they weren't the quality you get from Procedural Worlds!!!
    Thanks
     
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  12. frankslater

    frankslater

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    Yes, the good thing about both tool being Procedural Worlds tools is that we can make the work nicely together over time.

    Keep in mind guys that Path Painter is still just a hatchling at this stage. We aren't entirely sure ourselves yet what it can grow up to be and what cool things these tools will be doing together.

    If it helps you big time now, awesome!
    If it doesn't, you can keep an eye on it for the future until you are entirely happy that you need it.

    We are happy to get your feedback and ideas.
     
  13. frankslater

    frankslater

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    Above I realised it would be bad if someone just skimmed through and thought that was Path Painter in action (that was GeNa spawning fences).

    This is what Path Painting looks like:

    PathPainting.gif
     
  14. Mark_01

    Mark_01

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    Bought and now I don't have to worry this will be deprecated like the other path tool I got
    less then a year ago.

    Again this is my argument for supporting developers you know and have been around and give great service!!!

    After playing around and doing the quick start, WOW.
     
    Last edited: Sep 11, 2018
  15. txarly

    txarly

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    A question about pathpainter and gaia.Is possible after create paths with PP, retexture the terrain with gaia without update the heighmap so the changes made with PP remain?

    Thanks
     
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  16. RonnyDance

    RonnyDance

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    Nice to see a new Procedural World Asset came out. Concrats to Adam and Frank!
    Two quick question:

    So with Path Painter I suppose you always have to draw the roads / paths by yourself? No point click generation like other Assets? (Which is totally fine by me ;))

    Is it possible to create Cliff Ways something like that?


    So you define the size lets say 8m and Path Painter create hard slopes (not so smooth ones) like in the picture? A tutorial or video for that would be really nice but I am sure Adam is working on it.

    Cheers
    Ronny
     
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  17. rrahim

    rrahim

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    This image helped me understand that this is exactly what I've been looking for.
    I'm going to purchase now, but I hope you add more tutorials / insight into the use of the tools on the forum and asset store page soon.

    Also, I'm curious about the integration with the other tools.
     
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  18. frankslater

    frankslater

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    Sorry I didn't get email notifications but I will answer as quick as I can. :)
     
  19. frankslater

    frankslater

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    @Mark_01,

    We are happy that you are happy! :)
    We are in this to help your dreams come true.That's what moves us. It's not possible to make things that will fit everyone, but we strive to make our things help as many as we can.

    Please do come by on the Discord server and share any thoughts you have on the tool. Or do it here. (but it could take longer for us to reply when we don't get email notifications)
    With that said, we are very busy with a lot of stuff, so please bare with us.

    And as always: Have fun creating! ;)
    F.
     
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  20. frankslater

    frankslater

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    Hey @txarly!

    If I understand you correctly you would want Path Painter created textures to persist when Gaia spawns textures?
    Sorry that's not possible at the moment although one of the things I want to explore would probably make that possible too.
    Note: exploring doesn't guarantee it will happen. We need to find a good balance and hastily taking the tool in one direction could close down other more important directions.

    We released Path Painter with what we thought was the bare minimum (instead of adding all the crazy ideas that kept bumping in our heads), so over time we can tailor it to the users' need. We want you to love it. We could create something that we love, or that we think you would love, but if it doesn't fit how you guys use it, that doesn't benefit the world much.

    Long story short: There are no fancy integrations and features yet (although some people would argue that some of the stuff that's already in there are pretty fancy :) )

    I hope this answers your question.
     
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  21. frankslater

    frankslater

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    Thank you Ronny!

    You can create straight roads with clicks but no spline generation as of yet. Here is one of the images from the quick start guide that shows some of that action.


    It would be nice to see your picture better. By the look of it I would say "yes, totally" but I want to be sure that I understand what you are going for. I wouldn't want to mislead you, so let's make sure I understand what you need exactly. Is it something like this that you are interested in?
    2018-09-12_15-31-19.gif

    That's 8m, but if you want total vertical walls and sharp edges, Unity terrain can't handle that well and you will get jagged edges and walls:
    upload_2018-9-12_15-48-3.png

    I hope this helps.
     
  22. frankslater

    frankslater

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    I'm glad that helped @rrahim!

    I touched on the integration question above
    We have been planning to explore VS integration for a while now and will let you know when we have news.

    As regards the video, we can't wait to have it out either!
    That's one of our priority so people who consider it can make sure that they need it and those who have it can learn a few new tricks.
     
  23. frankslater

    frankslater

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    Thank you all for your awesome questions!
     
  24. txarly

    txarly

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    Sorry, may be i didn´t explain correctly before.If i make changes on the heighmap with PP, can I texture the map again with Gaia without change the heighmap?I mean.in other assets like Terrain composer ,when you texture the map the heighmap changes too, so if you have made manually changes to the heighmap, they are deleted when you texture again.I want to use PP to create paths(this will change the heighmap) and after ,texture with Gaia, without loose the paths done by PathPainter.Hope i have explained better this time.
     
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  25. frankslater

    frankslater

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    Oh it's good news then. I'm pretty sure Gaia will only update the textures when you run texture spawn. I will test now.with a small terrain.

    Okay, I just stamped the terrain, Spawned the textures on it and activated Path Painter:
    Unity_2018-09-12_18-32-49.jpg

    Then I painted this rather big ramp:
    Unity_2018-09-12_18-32-59.jpg

    And ran the Texture Spawner again:
    Unity_2018-09-12_18-33-10.jpg

    Did I get your question right this time? :)
     
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  26. txarly

    txarly

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    No doubt, images better than words.Thank you.
     
  27. RonnyDance

    RonnyDance

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    Thanks so much for your very detailed answer. Love that you are showing everything through pictures and examples.
    Yeah thats what I meant. I suppose erosion and making the ramp / cliff way little bit more "used" has to be done with Gaia or other erosion tools? Right now your ramp goes straight down. How is it possible to define that it should be slightly flat in some parts and steeper on other parts like shown in my pictures below? Or define the Embankment higher on some parts and lower on other parts?
    100% vertical walls are not needed and look really bad like you mentioned before. In the picture I posted above for me the sharp edges were more important. I think this pictures here show you better what I mean with "cliff ways":





    Of course picture 2 will be easier to achieve. But anyway picture one shows the tesselated pathway pretty good.I hope you get the idea of mine creating a cliff way from the ground to a big mountain something like that.

    What does the "Elevation" option does in your gif you posted for me? In the gif you have it set to 0.

    Is it also possible to use more than 1 texture for the surface? So you can have a mud texture with a gras texture also using some perlin effects to make it more natural? In your gif I see that you have seleted one texture of your X textures for the surface.

    I really love how easy the asset seems to be. It fits 100% to the procedural world asset idea of Adam.
    Can't wait to try it out. With VS support and perhaps spline generation through clicks in the future this asset will be massive.

    Cheers
    Ronny
     
    Last edited: Sep 13, 2018
  28. ScourgeGames

    ScourgeGames

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    Hey my dudes, is this compatible at all with Vegetation Studio? I've been using masks with my trails in VS on my Gaia terrains, but it can be tedious.
     
  29. derkoi

    derkoi

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    Why not set VS not to spawn on the path texture? That's what I'm doing.
     
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  30. ScourgeGames

    ScourgeGames

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    Apparently I'm missing some knowledge on how to do that. Any tips?
     
  31. derkoi

    derkoi

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    Sure. This was taken from the VS website:

     
  32. ScourgeGames

    ScourgeGames

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    Awesome, thanks! I'm surprised I didn't see that before. I appreciate your prompt reply.
     
  33. derkoi

    derkoi

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    No problem! Makes things much easier!
     
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  34. silkweed

    silkweed

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    Any chance of some documentation or tutorials before the "sale" is over?
     
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  35. frankslater

    frankslater

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    Hey @RonnyDance,

    I saw your message last night but I was so tired that I was uncontrollably falling asleep and I didn't dare to attempt a reply. :)

    Erosion: we have a few different ideas that we are going to explore in the future.

    Yes, that was a single ramp made with full even settings:
    upload_2018-9-13_15-22-40.png
    You can add a little variation by adjusting that to a more terrain following setting.
    Unity_2018-09-13_14-29-12.jpg

    Unity_2018-09-13_14-29-22.jpg

    Unity_2018-09-13_14-29-31.jpg



    If you want more than that, you can prepare the ground a little and/or make it out of more ramps. The spline feature would understandably make it easier.
    I played a little to achieve something like you want.

    First drew a little guide for myself (smaller width because i want to paint over it)
    Unity_2018-09-13_14-40-03.jpg
     
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  36. frankslater

    frankslater

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    Prepped the ground (not very well - again smaller width)
    Unity_2018-09-13_14-50-56.jpg

    and painted ramps with different terrain follow settings
    Unity_2018-09-13_14-52-11.jpg

    Unity_2018-09-13_14-53-43.jpg

    Unity_2018-09-13_14-56-59.jpg

    Unity_2018-09-13_14-59-50.jpg
     
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  37. BackwoodsGaming

    BackwoodsGaming

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    Hi @silkweed!

    I know @AdamGoodrich and @frankslater are both working hard with putting together content for tutorial videos, but I'm not sure when they will be ready. Frank has been doing an awesome job at sharing screenshots and answering questions. If you have anything you would like to know prior to purchase, I'm sure one of us should be able to help get you answers, screenshots, animated GIF clips. Also, if there are specific things in the documentation you'd like to see let us know.

    Hopefully that will help some while we wait for the tutorial videos to be completed.
     
  38. frankslater

    frankslater

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    Elevation is the general elevation of the paths. You can raise it or lower them.

    This was raised
    upload_2018-9-13_15-49-6.png

    This was made by a few lowered paths
    upload_2018-9-13_15-49-32.png

    We are working on the video and that will help answering a lot of questions. It's a little difficult to figure out what to have in the video, because we keep getting surprised what we can do with the tool. Since it's a tutorial, we want to give good tips to the users. We will have the video ready as soon as we can. I actually made these 2 images yesterday, while I was creating a video plan about what to include in the tutorial.

    Multiple textures for the surface: One thing that came up was dual track surface textures, but this is a cool idea too! I'll add it to the rapidly growing cool ideas list that we will need to explore. ;)

    Thanks for the kind words!
     
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  39. frankslater

    frankslater

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    That's awesome info @derkoi, thanks!
     
  40. frankslater

    frankslater

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    Sorry @silkweed about no video yet!

    We are on it. It's just something that is more complex than we imagined. To quote one of the users "I learned Path Painter in 20 seconds!" The simplicity to get started on the tool gave us the false impression that making the video is going to be just as simple and quick.

    It didn't help that we are having a crazy few weeks, but as always we will aim to make everyone happy.

    Thank you for your comment! It helps us to do better in the future.
     
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  41. Mark_01

    Mark_01

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    I was going to ask about possibly two features, I do not know how useful, it would be.

    1: possible or worthwhile to be able to have like a fractal noise option in the path setting so you do not get
    smooth even surface. How useful this might be is another question ... since you can use CTS to fake the areas you need.

    2: the possibility of using a spline path .. " Pegasus ? " The idea being that it might make drawing more accurate / easy ?
     
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  42. Steve-Tack

    Steve-Tack

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    FYI, if you click on the Path Painter Tutorials link on the asset store page, it goes to Pegasus tutorials.
     
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  43. RonnyDance

    RonnyDance

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    I suppose you are talking about Erosion features like I also mentioned in my post? Right now you have to use Erosion Brush or other tools to make the pathway not so smooth and more "used". Would be a cool feature imho when the asset supports it out of the box where you can define the fractal / erosion grade.

    Pegasus is a camera filming addon. How would this benefit the spline generation or Pathway? Please correct me if I understood it wrong.

    Because there are none I suppose ;)

    Best regards
    Ronny
     
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  44. Mark_01

    Mark_01

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    I do not have erosion brush, I had tried to use the Unity tools, to make the path a little uneven, but
    it seemed to go to far to fast ..

    The idea behind using a spline, is shaky hands/ mouse movements, to get where you want exactly.
    I did go through the tutorial, it is great.

    My idea is to use a spline, so you can take your time to adjust it as you want, then hit a button that
    uses the spline to make the final path. The spline is just a guide for the path.
    Some ideas tho are just not worth the effort, and this could be one of them for sure..

    its like make spline then Path apply to spline.
     
    Last edited: Sep 15, 2018
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  45. Ladnav

    Ladnav

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    I'd like to preface this with the standard Dumb Question Disclaimer, because I'm feeling pretty foolish about now. But I'm having trouble even getting started. The Quick Start guide jumps right into Paint Mode which appears to be found inside a Path Painter window, but I can't find this window anywhere. It's not listed under the windows tab, nor are there any Path Painter components to add to the terrain, so I'm a bit lost. Is it necessary to purchase Gaia for this to work?

    Thanks

    EDIT: After closing and re-opening Unity, Path Painter appeared under windows. Good old reboot, should have tried it sooner. :/
     
    Last edited: Sep 17, 2018
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  46. Ladnav

    Ladnav

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    Also, <3 Mark_01' spline idea.
     
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  47. frankslater

    frankslater

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    Those are some great ideas @Mark_01, thanks!

    We've actually had the intention to explore them (and many others), but we didn't want to delay the release, frankly, because people asked us to just make it available already. They thought it can already save a lot of time.

    I won't promise anything for a couple of reasons
    1. There are so many great ideas and possibilities that at this stage it's not quite clear what growth path the tool will take over the long run. Many of the ideas collide, which means, we can't go with all of them. We will need to carefully choose paths to ensure that the tool will bring the most benefit for the vast majority of users. That's going to be difficult to get right, so please bare with us.
    2. I don't want people to go for it because of what it can be in the future (or what would be promised). That can end badly, because of the above reasons, and our aim is to make people happy, not the other way around.
    For these reasons I cannot promise anything. The only thing I can promise is that our intention is to make it as beneficial to as many users as we can.
     
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  48. frankslater

    frankslater

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    Thanks @Steve-Tack, we are working on that.
     
  49. frankslater

    frankslater

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    Thank you for bringing this to our attention @Ladnav!
    I probably missed the info from the documentation regarding where you can find the menu window. Sorry about that.
    Yes, the tool probably just needed to be imported/reimported.

    I hope you are all set now.
     
  50. AdamGoodrich

    AdamGoodrich

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    Grab 20180917195258 w1920h1039 x-115y86z-160r258.jpg

    Working on tutorials - in this technique we use the texture blending capability of CTS in conjunction with Path Painter and its ability to control the strength at which Path Painter can apply textures, in order to create much more natural looking rocky paths! We will create a tutorial specifically on this. ETA for tutorials now one, maybe two days.
     
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