Extensions:2.6/Py/Scripts/Render/picogen

Picogen render

Picogen
Use picogen 0.3 as external render engine

UI location	Renderer rolldown menu
Usage	Install picogen with addon, activate Addon, generate terrain / water, make render settings and render
Version	0.0.1	Author(s)	Daniel Brandes
Blender	2.6.1	License	GPL
Category	Render	Distribution	Extern
Note(s)	Actl. beta, needs more testing and more operating system support

Executable information

File name	?

Known Issues	Linux only atm.

What can be done

• Generate terrain easier with nodes instead of programming code, and see results after one klick.
• Generate water code from nodes.
• Rotate and resize the sun, with blender internals.
• Set other parameters could set in the gui in simplified mode.
• Import existing picogen files

Infos

The integration consists of three parts:

• An addon for picogen to get Terrain Data in blender.
• An addon for Blender-pynodes-Branch from Lukas Toenne, i used a custom nodetree to generate Terrain und Water Code.
• An addon for Blender 2.61, the render-integration.

Additional:

• I am not the author of picogen, nor the node branch, so credits go to Sebastian March and Lukas Toenne
• The addons are heavily based on POV-Ray Render addon, so special thanks for this.

TODOs

• At the moment only linux/unix, sorry for this, but getting it on windows to work should't be too complex (Makefile in picogen addon, execution of picogen-quatsch-pure and picogen in blender)
• Gui should be better
• No exceptions
• Use only one, stable, blender version

Getting things work

For getting things to work and create an easy example do the following steps:

Picogen binary

• Download picogen-0.3-source from http://gitorious.org/picogen/picogen/trees/e05949c36d9011b422104ee8bde578652598bbd4
• Extract

 cd picoge-picogen/src
 cd upstream
 chmod 755 wget-everything.sh
 ./wget-everything.sh

• Overwrite yes (2x)
• Run "make" in picogen-picogen/src/

picogen addon

• Download picogen-quatsch-pure from http://gitorious.org/picogen-quatsch-pure/picogen-quatsch-pure/commits/master
• Extract in picogen-picogen/src/

 cd picogen-quatsch-pure-picogen-quatsch-pure
 make

• As root:

 cp picogen-quatsch-pure /usr/local/bin
 cd ..
 cd BUILD
 cp * /usr/local/bin

Modified blender pynodes branch

• Download blender-pynodes-picogen from http://gitorious.org/~danielbrandes/blenderprojects/blender-pynodes-picogen/commits/master
• Extract

 cd blenderprojects-blender-pynodes-picogen
 mkdir build
 cd build
 cmake ../blender
 make
 make install
 cd bin
 ./blender

In blender pynodes branch

Enable addon and Change Scene to Compositing

• Choose Nodetree-Type
• Add new Nodetree
• add->load Examples->Default Terrain
• add->load Examples->Default Water

• Calculate Water
• Calculate Terrain
• node->save picogen nodes as ...
• Save nodes file

install blender stable

• Download Blender 2.61
• Extract

 cd blender-2.61-*
 cd 2.61/scripts/addons/

• Download blender-picogen-addon from http://gitorious.org/blender-picogen-addon/blender-picogen-addon/commits/master
• Extract in addons

 cd blender-picogen-addon-blender-picogen-addon/
 mv render_picogen ..
 cd ../../../..
 ./blender

in blender stable

• Enable addon
• Switch render to picogen-0.3

Load terrain and water from node:

• Select default cube
• Go to object data tab

• import pgnodes
• Choose file
• Generate terrain, generate water
• Go to render tab

• Add Picogen render preset
• Choose camera
• Go to object data tab

• Enable set camera position
• Set camera
• Press num-0
• Go to world buttons

• Generate Sun
• Choose ObjpicogenSun
• Scale a bit to 3.0
• Go to render tab
• Set Samples per Pixel to 1
• Set Surface Integrator to whitted
• Render!

Result:

To see other options, load examples included with picogen with "import picogen file"