Hello, I trying to learn map editing. One thing no one covered in any tutorial is how to create a map backdrop? Like the distant terrain that is not part of the playable map anymore.. Is there maybe a tutorial on this that I missed? Thanks!
I just imported a 20 x 20 km terrain fitting the type of my map with the blosm blender plugin to blender, cut a square hole in the middle fitting the size of my beam terrain. Then subdivide the terrain to a reasonable face count and then imported it to beamng .
Thanks for the reply! So if I understand that correctly you imported the backdrop as a 3D object to Beamng? Ok I have to work around this somehow, I have no knowledge of blender and this will be the only thing I need for my map from an external source. All the rest will be done with ingame assets so I don´t think I will need blender for anything else..
Thanks for the reply, sorry I have a few questions more... I am new to blender and beamng editor... Is the "Beamngexporttemplate" for Blender necessary for this backdrop? Does it need lod? What would you consider a "reasonable face count"? I had my landscape imported in blender and I ended up with over 200k faces for it too look somewhat ok, but I guess thats way over top haha
You can use the decimate modifier and reduce the faces to 20.000 faces. With an overlay texture it looks okay then. https://www.beamng.com/threads/deve...contributing-post.1575/page-1673#post-1648720
Hi! Are you referring to this? https://wiki.beamng.com/File_Blender_export_template.html If so, it may help, but it isn't necessary. I think you have to learn some Blender to do beam map making. If you have gotten this far with the Beamng World Editor, then Blender should be no problem. Here are some resources for exporting models from blender to beam: 1. https://documentation.beamng.com/modding/levels/export_dae/ 2. The main thing is to put your object nested inside the "base00 > start01 > ..." structure, etc, as described in resource #1. I'm guessing export template blend file is just to set up the right structure. And you might have trouble getting it working in a current version of blender, since that file is from 2013. To get a sense of reasonable face count, load a dev map that comes with that game (that you haven't modified), and look at the top left corner of the world editor. It should show the number of polygons currently visible. That gives you a sense of the order of magnitude. A reasonable number really depends on your computer. For LOD, I'm not sure. In general, a useful technique is to reverse engineer by looking at dev maps. What are the LODs for the Johnson Valley backdrops? You can figure it out by looking at the backdrop model in the Shape Editor, and using the information in resource #1.
Thanks for all the replies! Sorry to continue bothering you... I strictly followed all available tutorials but something is still wrong. When I want to put my asset on the map in BeamNG, it is invisible. There is only a grid showing up that I can move or change size of, but it is empty. I both tried to add the map background (which I could build in blender, no problem there) and then just a simple 1 colour cube, happened in both cases. What did I miss?
No worries happy to help! The grid you’re seeing might be the Gizmo Plane, but I’m not 100% sure. If enabled, it shows up for any selected static object. Can you open your model in the shape editor? If so it should show information about the dae file, like number of polys, etc. That will narrow down the issue.
Yes I can open it but it is still invisible/empty, so only the grid shows up. Is there anything specific I can should look into there? This is how it looks like. In blender it is a simple box with a colour.
Did you apply a material to the asset in blender? Do you see a material on the material tab in the shape editor?
This is how it looks like in blender, not sure if that is correctly applied? there is no material to be seen in the shape editor however...
If it's not in shape editor, then maybe it didn't get included with the DAE export. I know there are different ways to create textures and materials from blender, but I use the SimpleBake plugin ($18) and it has been great. Gives you PBR textures exactly how you want, and they look very similar to dev assets. You can also test out whether blender exporting works by using vertex painting/coloring, then you don't have to deal with the texture pngs quite yet. With image textures, you need to make a UV map (this is in blender) to tell the texture how to "wrap" the object. If the DAE doesnt have a UV map, maybe that could be an issue. These are the pieces you need: - DAE file. It's an xml file under the hood, and if you open it in VScode, you should be able to search for your material. For this reason, name your material in blender something unique that you can search for to verify. - beamng materials.json file. You can find many examples of if it in JV. the material name and mapTo field should all be the same, and be the same as the material name in blender. - if not using vertex coloring, the materials.json file needs to have file paths to png texture files. For terrain materials, both color and ambient occlusion are the minimum required, otherwise it wont show up. This could be true for object materials too. Let us know if anything works!
I tried again, here is the result The Material of the original backdrop is now there, though named like my custom material wtf, object still invisible... This is how it looks like in blender: I don´t know if that is correct setup but at least it looks right... When I open the .dae file in VScode I see many examples of my material named "Banana". This is my setup for the folder and materials.json file: the file paths should be correct I suppose and since the material is showing in the editor (only the name, visually it is the original vanilla) it can´t be too wrong. Why does all of this have to be such complicated and frustrating jeez Thank you for your patience this really is a pain in the a++ haha
First you should change the material name into something unique to be safe that this material name is not already used in the map. Then after import to beam find this material name in the material editor in beam editor. If it is not there beamng failed to create the materials.json. You can then manually add a material with the name above. In the material editor add at least a texture to the base color or change the color of the base color. Then you should see your cube.
Next try: make the material double sided in material editor somewhere down in the list. If it’s not working then there is a problem with your mesh. I’m back from holiday on 30.12. if there is still a problem you can pm me and send the mesh to me and I have a look.
Nope didn´t do anything either. Must be something with the mesh. Its probably something simple I just don´t know much about blender and simply followed the availabe tutorials for the setup. Maybe I got something wrong there... Thanks a lot, if the problem still persists then I will send it to you
I know!!! In your materials file screenshot, the Name and mapTo should both be "Banana". Also there is a difference between "banana" and "Banana".
