32k BlueMarble Virtual Earth Texture is now available

[t00fri]

Jack...I thought this was a 32k texture, no?

See my previous post about adding spec map and night side lights.

Regards...bh.

Besides Walton's 32k main earth 0.5k tile set, I use a 32k NormalMap tile set of 2k (or 0.25k), a 16k set of Nightlight tiles of size 2k and a fixed 4k spec map.

Please keep in mind that the spec map is most uncritical and really does not need to be bigger then 4k! It just designates the portions that are supposed to reflect the sun light (white) as opposed to the totally non-reflecting land (black).

Unfortunately, KDE-Celestia crashes when I use my small 0.25k NormalMap tiles instead of my original 2k ones. I have checked a lot of things, including the code , but could not locate the reason for the crash yet...

It would be most useful to know whether another NormalMap 'tiler' among you -- using small tiles-- can reproduce that crash perhaps also in Windows?...

I hope Chris will find out the reason.

Bye Fridger

[JackHiggins]

Well, the top level (level 5) is 32k, but I only downloaded levels 0 to 4 so far...

See my previous post about adding spec map and night side lights

Whoops... Well it's still a good idea!

[JackHiggins]

Besides Walton's 32k main earth 0.5k tile set, I use a 32k NormalMap tile set of 2k (or 0.25k), a 16k set of Nightlight tiles of size 2k and a fixed 4k spec map.

Please keep in mind that the spec map is most uncritical and really does not need to be bigger then 4k! It just designates the portions that are supposed to reflect the sun light (white) as opposed to the totally non-reflecting land (black).

A normalmap going from 0.5k, 1k, 2k, 4k, 8k, 16k, 32k would be so cool.... Any chance this might become available in the future...!?

Ah yeah I know the specmap doesn't need to be really high res... On the other hand though, since most of it will be either white or black, a 32k would still be relatively small, since all you need is the coastlines...! Just leave gaps where it's plain black or white! (Or am I wrong here..?)

[DJ_Night]

[quote="JackHiggins"]
A normalmap going from 0.5k, 1k, 2k, 4k, 8k, 16k, 32k would be so cool.... Any chance this might become available in the future...!?/quote]

=) a Virtual Normal map 0.5k-32k for earth would really be amazing. I?ve tried to make my own but ended up with very bad results, over and over.. black boxes etc., despite many atteps. some day in the future I guess... I?m not giving up yet.

Mr. Fridger>> please share your 8/16k singletexture normalmap for the beutiful planet of Earth if possible =).. that would make many of us very happy =)

sry my bad ENG. its not my mother language =)

[bh]

Interesting stuff guys... I plugged in my existing 4k spec map...and in a lot of places it's way off...I've got shiny islands, delta areas and other stuff. Also at this res some rivers need specularity also.

I would like to see the 'tiled' normal map in action. Fridger...any chance you could post a pic of with and without. I've steered clear of bump maps for Earth as I think they degrade the original texture.

I would also like to rework my existing Night Lights texture...I would like to maybe make the lights in Europe and North America more yellow and white for the rest.

I'm quite keen to implement the 'waves' spec map. Of course it should only apply at very low altitude views...and you would have to zoom in some to see them...deep water areas only, I guess.

I'm really pleased to be able to view all this on my old GForce2 MX 400...it really is amazing...many thanks.

Regards...bh.

[t00fri]

Interesting stuff guys... I plugged in my existing 4k spec map...and in a lot of places it's way off...I've got shiny islands, delta areas and other stuff. Also at this res some rivers need specularity also.

I would like to see the 'tiled' normal map in action. Fridger...any chance you could post a pic of with and without. I've steered clear of bump maps for Earth as I think they degrade the original texture.

I would also like to rework my existing Night Lights texture...I would like to maybe make the lights in Europe and North America more yellow and white for the rest.

I'm quite keen to implement the 'waves' spec map. Of course it should only apply at very low altitude views...and you would have to zoom in some to see them...deep water areas only, I guess.

I'm really pleased to be able to view all this on my old GForce2 MX 400...it really is amazing...many thanks.

Regards...bh.

With my new very efficient 'virtualtex' 1.03 script, the generation of a 16k normal map tile set is really fast now. I just completed another 16k set with 512x512 tiles. It's a matter of less than an hour with my slow machine...
Actually this strange crash with the 256x256 tiles is gone now!

Unfortunately, I am extremely busy over the daytime during the coming weeks, and thus cannot find the time until about Oct 10 to upload these big files from the office. At home I have only a slow modem that just gives 3.5 KB/sec!!

Here is an appetizer shot with my new 512x512 NormalMap tiles that here display (just) 16k resolution. Note also my good old 2k clounds. I just like them;-)...

Don't be afraid, the image is 'natural size', i.e. 1600x1111 as seen on my 21 inch monitor. Sorry I would have suffered to cut it down...

Bye Fridger

[DJ_Night]

Mr. Fridger>>> Wow, that 16k virtual normal map looks amazing, great work, keep up the good work,

For now I use a singletexture 8k Earth NormalMap, but I?m sure that a Virtual 16k NormalMap will run faster than a single 8k if Im not wrong.

October where are you?

cheers

[JackHiggins]

Fridger

And to think I was impressed with my 8k NormalMap...

I'm looking forward to Oct 10 or so...!!

This is truly the ONLY way to view Bluemarble textures!!

If I wasn't so busy myself I might have a go at making some virtual textures of my own...

I plugged in my existing 4k spec map...and in a lot of places it's way off...I've got shiny islands, delta areas and other stuff. Also at this res some rivers need specularity also

That's why i'd like a BM 32k specmap too...! Imagine all of canada's & finland's lakes in a specmap...

*leans back in awe*

[ogg]

Hi... just seeing if there's any chance of a JPG version reappearing? I'd be interested to see if it would help my non-DDS-compatible laptop out with large textures. Even if it were just down to level 4... that would still be a fantastic improvment over what I've got at the moment.

Now at least I know that new computer's going to be worth it if I ever get the dosh together... sigh

[herman]

I'm using this marvellous earth texture and I like it very much. But the image on the screen looks rather dark, even setting ambient light value high. The water looks very dark! I'm using a nVidia graphics card and Windows XP.
What can be the reason, or is it normal?

[t00fri]

Interesting stuff guys... I plugged in my existing 4k spec map...and in a lot of places it's way off...I've got shiny islands, delta areas and other stuff. Also at this res some rivers need specularity also.

I would like to see the 'tiled' normal map in action. Fridger...any chance you could post a pic of with and without. I've steered clear of bump maps for Earth as I think they degrade the original texture.

I would also like to rework my existing Night Lights texture...I would like to maybe make the lights in Europe and North America more yellow and white for the rest.

I'm quite keen to implement the 'waves' spec map. Of course it should only apply at very low altitude views...and you would have to zoom in some to see them...deep water areas only, I guess.

I'm really pleased to be able to view all this on my old GForce2 MX 400...it really is amazing...many thanks.

Regards...bh.

bh,

OK, here is a comparison: on the left, you see Walton's 32k tiled main texture + my 16k tiled normal map, both rendered together. On the right, normal map rendering is switched off...

Quite a dramatic difference, right?

I should also mention that displaying several tiled textures at once is quite a strain to the system, notably the harddisk! One really needs a fast one, otherwise there will be breaks while zooming and lots of search & load activity to be heard...

Bye Fridger

[selden]

Fridger,

What are the Longitude and Latitude of this region?

It'd be interesting to compare other renderings of the same location.

Thanks.

[t00fri]

Fridger,

What are the Longitude and Latitude of this region?

It'd be interesting to compare other renderings of the same location.

Thanks.

72.979 W
49.7 S

Bye Fridger

[bh]

Fridger...that looks very impressive...at least on ice and snow. Is there a virtual texture normal map available? If so, how do we implement it?

I would certainly like to give it a go.

Regards...bh.

[fsgregs]

Hi guys:

I'm sorry to pose what may have already been answered as a question ... but ...

I am running Don Edwards' 16K Realistic Earth texture at the moment. It works fine and shows a beautiful crisp image from thousands of km out. It only blurs when you get real close to Earth. When I loaded the 32k virtual textures, they were of course spectacular close in, but as you zoomed out to the level 0, the Earth got a bit too blurred. I'm used to seeing the 16k from even far out in space.

Is there any way to load just the 32k level 5 textures so that Don's 16K Earth is visible until one gets close in, whereby the level 5 virtual texture displays?

If not, is there any way to not use levels 0 through 3, and use the level 4 (16k) and level 5(32k) virtual textures only, so that level 4 is visible from out in space and nothing changes until you get close, whereby the level 5 textures kick in? I tried dropping levels 0, 1, 2 and 3 from the Extras folder, and all I got was a black Earth until I got close enough for levels 4 and 5 to display.

Thanks in advance.

Frank

[selden]

For comparison with Fridger's images, here's a view of Walton's tiled BlueMarble using Don Edwards' NewEarth4KBump.png on the left and of Celestia's default surface on the right.


(as usual, this links to a much larger image)

Celestia (plus everything else) was using 480M at this point, so my poor 256M system took a while to get to this viewpoint.

[wcomer]

fsgregs,

This was addressed earlier in the topic, but the thread has gotten long so I'm not surprised you didn't find it.

You can fix the blurriness by editing your .ctx file. Change the TileSize from 512 to 256 or even 128. This will cause Celestia to pick up higher resolution layers at higher altitudes.

You cannot use the 16k texture and level5 of the 32k texture simultaneously. Well.... technically you could split the 16k texture into two 8kx8k textures labeled tx_0_0.dds amd tx_1_0.dds and dump the level[1-4] tiles but keep the virtual texture .ssc and .ctx. This would load the level0 8kx8k tiles from any high altitude and then load the level5 512x512 tiles at the same altitude as before. Hope that helps.

Walton

[DBrady]

I use some 32k normal map tiles uncompressed(u888). Heres some comparison pics.

The first using basic render...


The second with all bells and whistles enabled...

Theres a 32k nightlight map visible in the second picture too.

I made the normal maps using pixels version of nm16(after recompiling it with t00fri's correction) and the Globe DEM data. I could send the recompiled version of nm16 to anyone who wants to try and make a normal map themselves. Theres no mystery to making them - it's really quite trivial(i'll even offer my help if people are stuck)).

[t00fri]

For comparison with Fridger's images, here's a view of Walton's tiled BlueMarble using Don Edwards' NewEarth4KBump.png on the left and of Celestia's default surface on the right.


(as usual, this links to a much larger image)

Celestia (plus everything else) was using 480M at this point, so my poor 256M system took a while to get to this viewpoint.

The 4k 'NewEarth4KBump' texture is basically very smooth since (unlike DXT) it is *.png format and thus despite its "small" size gives a pleasing and notably smooth result. However, a closer comparison with my image based on a 16k normal map shows clearly much more "fine struture" in the altitude profiles.

Bye Fridger

[bh]

Well....whistles and bells aren't working for me I'm afraid. Any sort of bump map. 4kpng , 2kjpg or normalmap.dds just crashes!

I ctrl-V and Celestia disappears!

Also I get horrible artifacts in the desert regions...anyone else have these problems?

I will stick to raw textures for the time being.

Grumpy bh.