WaterWorks Mask Generator Tutorial
The Mask Generator of WaterWorks can be used in Ice Shelf, Lava, Sorta Surf, as well as Whitecaps. An outline of the Mask Generator and the usage of each plug-ins are explained in this tutorial.
- outline
- Ice Shelf
- Lava
- Sorta Surf
- Whitecaps
1. Outline
The mask generated by Mask Generator is 8bit RAW file with no header.
(i) Colors on the Mask
Land area is black in color on the mask. Black here is 99% black color on the gray scale mode. Water area is white in color. White color here is 0% white on the gray scale mode. Area defined by Depth Contour is denoted by gray of 50% on the gray scale mode. When the mask is painted with paint program, black (100% on gray scale mode) must be used.
(ii) Interface
| - Terrain size Choose the size of terrain to be generated by the mask from the Pop-up List. - Pixel per TG Unit This control the resolution of the mask. When set to exceptional high value, you will need to have a really long coffee break. According to the manual written by the developer Jo Meder, 'Best result can be obtained by setting to 10-pixel. Acceptable result with 5-pixel'. - Water Level The water level defined by Terragen is the setting value. - Depth Contour By setting to value less than that of the defined value, shallow water can be expressed as gray on the mask. |  |
2. Ice Shelf
 sample_01 Water Level 2-TU Shelf Depth Limit 2 |  mask_01 Depth Contour 0 |
Sample_01 is rendered by a mask generated by setting the value of Shelf Depth Limit of Ice Shelf to 2 and the value of the Depth Contour of Mask Generator to 0. The water area is all the ice shelves as it is same with in the case that it does not use a mask.
 sample_02 Water Level 2-TU Shelf Depth Limit 2 |  mask_02 Depth Contour 0 |
Sample_02 is rendered by a mask generated by setting the value of Depth Contour to 1.5. Although the area with Depth Contour setting less than 1.5 is gray in color, the rendering is the same as sample_01. Using only a mask with gray area defined by the value of Depth Contour, there is no influence to the effect of the Ice Shelf plug-in.
| Sample_03 is rendered by mask_02 with the value of Shelf Depth Limit of the Ice Shelf set to 1.5. If the value of Shelf Depth Limit of Ice Shelf and the value of Depth Contour of Mask Generator are the same, the area of ice shelf and gray area will be the same. This is very useful to add cracks to the ice shelf by painting the mask with paint program. |  sample_03 Water Level 2-TU Shelf Depth Limit 1.5 |
 sample_04 Water Level 2-TU Shelf Depth Limit 2 |  mask_03 Depth Contour 2 |
Sample_04 is rendered by mask_03 painted by paint program, together with a setting of the value of Shelf Depth Limit to 2, and a setting of the value of Depth Contour to 2.
3. Lava
The effect of Lava plug-in mask is basically the same as the Ice Shelf plug-in.In this plug-in, the Depth Contour setting of Mask Generator has no meaning.
Sample_05 is rendered by mask_04 painted by paint program.
 sample_05 Water Level 2-TU |  mask_04 |
4. Sorta Surf
When mask is used, Sorta Surf can recognize all 256 grades from white to gray, and from gray to black.
 sample_06 Water Level 2-TU Breaking Depth 5 |  mask_05 Depth Contour 0 |
The emphasize the effect of Sorta Surf plug-in, all of the water area of sample_06 is rendered by mask_05 with the value of Breaking Depth set to 5. The effect of the 100% of a plug-in can be seen in the white area (gray scale mode 0%) of mask_05 and in the same area of sample_06.
 sample_07 Water Level 2 Breaking Depth 5 |  mask_06 Depth Contour 0 |
Mask_06 is made by painting the white area of mask_05 to gray (gray scale mode 50%) by paint program.
The result of rendering by the above mask is shown in sample_07.It can be seen that effect of the plug-in is halved.
 sample_08 Water Level 2 Breaking Depth 5 |  mask_07 Depth Contour 0 |
* The color of land area on mask_07 is different from the actual color.
Mask_07 is made by painting the white area of mask_05 to black (gray scale mode 100%) by paint program. Sample_08 is rendered by mask_07, but with the effect of the plug-in all removed. From the above examples, it can be seen that the effect of the plug-in can be controlled in 256 grades by setting the color from white to black in the mask.
From sample_06 forwards, the effect of the plug-in in the water area is activated, by setting the value of Breaking Depth of the Sorta Surf plug-in to 5. If the value is set to 1.5, there is no need to paint the mask for the deepwater area where the effect of the plug-in is not wanted. This is due to the fact that the area where the effect is shown is determined by the Breaking Depth value.
For all the water area, the plug-in effect is controlled by the mask.In that case, all the water area of the mask must be painted.
And don't forget that the value of Breaking Depth must be set much greater than the largest depth.
In the manual written by the developer Jo Meder, he says that 'according to the present plug-in specifications, it is advisable to use a ridiculous value of, say, 20000 in order to reduce the effect of Sorta Surf plug-in in accordance to water depth'.
This plug-in can also be used to set the value of Depth Contour of the Mask Generator. The problem in this case is that as mentioned in the very first item, Sorta Surf plug-in recognizes all 256 grades from white to black and the specified area is shown in gray. The method to work around this problem can be found in the manual written by Jo Meder.
5. Whitecaps
The mask effect of Whitecaps plug-in is basically the same as Sorta Surf plug-in. There is no need to set the value of Depth Contour.
Sample_09 is rendered by mask_08 painted by paint program.
 sample_09 Water Level 2 Density 100 |  mask_08 Depth Contour 0 |
* NO reproduction or republication without written permission.
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