I've decided the region will be inspired by Herjedalen in the middle of Sweden. It is mountainous and was once believed to be home to trolls, giants, and all kinds of supernatural things.
There is also a legend about the origin of the name.
In the 9th century a Norseman called Haerjulf had to flee from Norway after killing one of the king's closest men with the king's ornate silver horn, breaking the horn against the man's skull. Thereafter he was known as Haerjulf the Hornbreaker. He came into service of the Swedish king Anund, but eloped with the king's sister and disappeared in the depths of Herjedalen.
I like that story and it will give me something to relate to when I work so I'll stick with Herjedalen as my location. This narrows down my list of assets needed. I made a scots pine and a silver birch, both natives to the region selected for the scene. I'm hoping to make more trees soon, but the scene will have to look a bit repeated for a while.
The forest should be old and mostly untouched. I want trees of all ages and a forest floor that is a bed of dead trees, lichen, and old moss. CryEngine can do all this and more, I have to try to get the most from it.
There is also a legend about the origin of the name.
In the 9th century a Norseman called Haerjulf had to flee from Norway after killing one of the king's closest men with the king's ornate silver horn, breaking the horn against the man's skull. Thereafter he was known as Haerjulf the Hornbreaker. He came into service of the Swedish king Anund, but eloped with the king's sister and disappeared in the depths of Herjedalen.
I like that story and it will give me something to relate to when I work so I'll stick with Herjedalen as my location. This narrows down my list of assets needed. I made a scots pine and a silver birch, both natives to the region selected for the scene. I'm hoping to make more trees soon, but the scene will have to look a bit repeated for a while.
The forest should be old and mostly untouched. I want trees of all ages and a forest floor that is a bed of dead trees, lichen, and old moss. CryEngine can do all this and more, I have to try to get the most from it.
After I had covered the scene with vegetation my draw calls were hitting higher numbers than I wanted. I decided to make some tree clusters that I can use to fill larger areas and save draw calls for all those unique trees I'm hoping to make. This means I have to make those parts of the terrain leveled or I'll either have floating roots or bury the detail at the roots.
I ran grooves for the water streams in the terrain editor and then I covered those using the river tool in tiered sections connected by the road tool with a foamy water texture. I also laid out the network of trails that will connect important landmarks. I've also made some more changes to the terrain like dug out a small alpine lake and raised some occlusion areas in the middle of where I am planning a deep forest. I also raised the glacier based on my colormap which made it look like a nice thick mass of ice.
I'm not putting too much work into each asset right now, mainly just roughing out the sculpt and baking on a retopoed mesh. I like getting things into the game early on and then going back and tweaking the final asset.
I've prepared a rock texture-overlay group in Photoshop which is easy to slide over to new PSDs so I save time when making new rock formations. I'm thinking I have triangle budget for a lot of rock variations since they average about 2-3k tris and I can usually get them down to 400tris on last LOD.
For these rocks I use a blend layer so that I can tile a detail map of moss controlled by an opacity map.
I've prepared a rock texture-overlay group in Photoshop which is easy to slide over to new PSDs so I save time when making new rock formations. I'm thinking I have triangle budget for a lot of rock variations since they average about 2-3k tris and I can usually get them down to 400tris on last LOD.
For these rocks I use a blend layer so that I can tile a detail map of moss controlled by an opacity map.
The Scandinavian mountains are full of huge erratic rocks dropped by the ice after the last ice age so I have to have a few of those.
There are legends of those too - that the rocks were carried there by giants or maybe they were trolls caught in the sunlight.. So there should really be a handful of them with unique character.
There are legends of those too - that the rocks were carried there by giants or maybe they were trolls caught in the sunlight.. So there should really be a handful of them with unique character.
My vegetation right now has a lot of plants native to the region like cranberry, fireweed, buttercup, and the europeean blueberry. I have a long ways to go with the vegetation but it helps the overall feel to have something on the ground quickly.
Sun has set over my forest, I'm done for today.
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