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Why is my speedtree grass like something out of a bad cartoon

Discussion in 'Getting Started' started by Hawk0077, Nov 20, 2017.

  1. Hawk0077

    Hawk0077

    Joined:
    Nov 6, 2017
    Posts:
    788
    Hi, I am completely new to unity and am just finding my feet. I purchased speedtree grass pack believing it would be better than the default grass but basically wasted over $100 on it as its a complete joke. RATHER, I dont know how to do it so it looks like something out of a really bad cartoon.

    I am using TerrainComposer and the grass looks reasonable until I add a height mask which shouldnt change the quality of the grass but it does.

    Take a look and you will see it is a joke, I am almost ambarassed to put it up, but surely grass should look like grass out of the box.

    I read that speedtree grass has to be added as a tree but cant find my way around the "space between trees" in TerrainComposer.

    The image below was taken at 512 resolution and increasing that just makes the grass look like "Lots of Joke Grass".

    Heres the gra... image:



    Seriously? $100+???

    As you can see noone has ever created grass this bad in the history of creating grass.
    I have lowered the height to try and blend the grass with the splat but it just aint having it.

    Any help/pointers appreciated, thanks.

    By the way, I dont know anything about billbards and meshes so can only use the 2d bad grass above.
     
  2. Tset_Tsyung

    Tset_Tsyung

    Joined:
    Jan 12, 2016
    Posts:
    411
    Hi there Hawk0077,

    Don't Despair! I'm sure that we can resolve this and get it looking how it should. If not me, then certainly someone else.

    Just a few questions to help:
    1. Annoying stupid question, I know, but have you done much in the way of terrain tutorial videos? Perhaps watched youtube vids with themes of "How to make amazing scene landscapes" and stuff? Like I said, it's a bit of a daft question, just want to cover all bases.
    2. Where are you adding the heightmask, and to what? Are you adding it to a terrain that already has grass on it?
    3. Following on from Q2, does the grass look fine and how you want it BEFORE you start adding the heightmask?
    Like I said, I'm sure we can help you get your money's worth out of this pack.

    (I've been looking into 2D forrest packs for a friends project and a lot of the comments on them include statements like "This is a terribly un-optimised pack". Meaning that you (the developer) will need to adjust them to a certain extent to suit your individual needs. I haven't used the asset store much, but get the impression that between building the packages in different versions of Unity and the final uses being so completely varied a fair amount of adjusting is down to us developers... just a thought I could be TOTALLY wrong here)
     
  3. Hawk0077

    Hawk0077

    Joined:
    Nov 6, 2017
    Posts:
    788
    Thanks for the response. In regard to your questions...

    I have purchase Terain Composer2 and watched those videos loads of times, also World Composer videos, I have just started a beginners course on Udemy, I have done the introduction to scripting, and have done the Roll A Ball tutorial.

    Because I am using TerrainComposer2 it is difficult to watch tutorials because a lot of them are working manually by painting splats and trees as well as grass. I cant do that in TerrainComposer.

    I have also created several Gaia terrains but not really worked on those other than spawning them.

    Like I said, I have watched quite a few creating grass videos but they are doing it all manually and so they arent much help.

    I havent found any tutorials that tell me what billboard is and how to use the ones I got with speedtree and the same for meshes. I just know of them but nothing about them.

    Oh this is the course I have just started; https://www.udemy.com/intro-to-game-development-using-unity-part-i

    Its basic but good for me I think.

    Second Question:
    The heightmap was stamped using Terrain Composer 2, I have added splats (grass) and now adding grass materials to those splats. I have got it a little better as you can see in the first image below;



    But I copied the test settings from the default unity editor version that I did sinse making this first post. Here is that version which you can see is much better. Having said that in the TerrainComposer version I did have to shorten the grass because of scaling it to the ethan character.

    Heres the original.



    Problem is if you shorten the grass it leaves gaps and doesnt bunch up.

    The grass does look fine before I add the height mask (it was actually a terrain mask - specific splat/grass).
    As you can see from the image above but it wasnt as good as that second image even before the heightmask.

    Thanks again for the response. I really appreciate it. That should answer your questions.

    regarding your last statement, I agree All of the tutorials by all of the developers have been speaking to me as if I knew what I was doing. ie a developer. I am far from it. I just like getting my hands dirty and creating stuff with these great tools the real developers have provided us mere mortals. Thay are speaking a different language.

    I opted for terrain composer because the demo video made it look reasonably easy and really good results but then I discovered my lack of knowledge hindered me greatly. So I started the beginners course.

    I am just the type of chap that will dive in the water not knowing how to swim and then learning as I slowly drown. lol

    Again much appreciated for your response.
     
  4. Hawk0077

    Hawk0077

    Joined:
    Nov 6, 2017
    Posts:
    788
    I must add that it looked quite good before I had to reduce the size to scale it with the trees and Ethan. even at 512 resolution, but it was too jerky at 1024 or even 720.