COMPANY: Planetside Software | URL: www.planetside.co.uk | TYPE: Standalone | PLATFORM: Mac, Windows | PRICE: Free/$199
			Terragen 2 Technology Preview is the public pre-release of Planetside Software's new, cutting edge landscape visualization software. The Technology Preview is now available for both Windows and Mac OS X 10.4.x. See the Planetside website for details on obtaining your free copy. TG2 Technology Preview features an advanced hybrid micropolygon renderer with powerful multi-angle displacement capabilities. It has a versatile procedural engine that can be utilised to apply subpixel-level detail to almost any aspect of a scene. Terragen 2 is capable of rendering billions of polygons in a single scene. Terragen 2 Technology Preview is available both as a free download and as a pre-purchase option for Terragen 2. The free version may only be used for non-commercial purposes and is limited in the following ways: Render Size Maximum: 800x600 Render Detail Maximum: 1.0 Antialiasing Maximum: 3 Number of Rendered Populations: 3 You may purchase a commercial license for the Technology Preview which will remove these feature restrictions and allow you access to more frequent development releases of Terragen 2. You will also be entitled to a free upgrade to a final release of Terragen 2 when development is completed. Please note that the Technology Preview release is aimed mainly at high end users. It has a powerful and flexible graphical node/graph editor which is used for creating networks of shaders and scene elements. The Technology Preview features a number of high level shaders which create more complex scene elements, such as clouds or rocks, as well as a low level function node system which allows you to create shaders from "first principles", using functions and methods that will be familiar to shader writers. The node editor can be used to unlock the full power of the TG2 rendering engine. The Technology Preview is not beta software. Although it will exhibit some of the basic capabilities of TG2, it does not contain the full set of features that will exist in the final Terragen 2 release. Considerable development is underway that will not be reflected in the Technology Preview release. Most importantly the Technology Preview has not yet been optimized for speed and consequently rendering times will not be optimal. As development progresses Planetside will be putting considerable effort into optimizing the renderer, including making it threaded to best take advantage of multicore/multiprocessor machines. Introduction Terragen 2 (TG2) is now the primary development focus of Planetside Software. TG2 is a complete rewrite of Terragen from scratch, and is a significant advance beyond the capabilities of Terragen v0.9. Apart from being a much more powerful renderer, TG2 has a much more flexible architecture which will allow development to proceed at a considerably greater pace. Terragen 2 features an advanced hybrid micropolygon renderer with powerful multi-angle displacement capabilities. It has a versatile procedural engine that can be utilised to apply subpixel-level detail to almost any aspect of a scene. Terragen 2 is capable of rendering billions of polygons in a single scene. Core Features Terragen 2 features the following as part of its core architecture: Cutting-edge adaptive subdivision renderer. Modular, plugin-based architecture. Render entire planets, sweeping vistas, tiny rock gardens, or anything in between. Import 3D objects for rendering. Export high resolution objects. Render millions of boulders or trees using "instancing". Add multiple heightfields to your scene. Use procedural terrains that can span an entire planet. Apply almost "infinite" fractal detail to terrain and other objects. Overhanging terrain using procedural displacements, image-based displacements, or imported geometry. Volumetric clouds or fast "2.5D" clouds. Production quality anti-aliasing and motion blur. Node graph editor for ultimate control over shaders and textures. At the heart of TG2 is a cutting-edge 3D renderer. It is capable of rendering surfaces with extreme procedural displacement and produces images and animations with production quality anti-aliasing and motion blur. Procedural, image-based or object-based shaders can build complex surfaces from simple objects, relying on the renderer's adaptive subdivision algorithms to dynamically adjust to extreme stretching and creasing. TG2 blurs the distinction between geometry and displacement that is common in most high end production renderers, making it an ideal solution for highly complex natural objects such as terrain. While the emphasis is on rendering procedural surfaces with extremely high detail, image-based textures and imported geometry are also supported, and the resulting surfaces can be exported at various resolutions in popular 3D object formats. With Terragen 2 you utilize procedural terrains of unlimited size and detail, heightfield based terrains or a combination of the two. Multiple heightfields and procedurals may be used and mixed freely in a single scene. Heightfield based terrains also greatly benefit from added procedural detail, which can be automatically generated by TG2. Terrain files from Terragen v0.9 are directly supported along with native MOLA data import and other DEM and terrain formats. Procedural Terrain Heightfield (DEM) Terrain TG2 has a global atmosphere system which expands on the unsurpassed realism of the TG v0.9 atmosphere system. TG2 features multiple cloud layers, which can utilise 3D volumetric clouds or 2D clouds for faster rendering. Entire planets can be rendered with realistic global atmospheres and procedural terrain detail from continents down to pebbles on a beach. Multiple planets and celestial bodies such as moons can be added to scenes, and multiple suns can also be used. TG2 features a realtime 3D preview which refines the detail displayed over time. The preview can be used to position the camera and scene elements. It provides an accurate preview of the landscape, texturing, atmosphere and other objects. Realtime 3D Preview Terragen 2 supports vegetation, using 3D models from a variety of sources, including XfrogPlants models from greenworks/xfrog, inc. A Populator system allows you to easily place millions of instances of plant models in a scene, with variations such as rotation and scale to vary their appearance. The Populator can also be used with other arbitrary 3D objects imported from supported file formats. Achieve never-before-seen levels of realism by covering your hills with grass and trees, filling your stream beds with rocks, and much more. The possibilities are now truly limitless. Vegetation TG2 features a powerful and flexible graphical node/graph editor which is used for creating networks of shaders and scene elements. Terragen features a number of high level shaders which create more complex scene elements, such as clouds or rocks, as well as a low level function node system which allows you to create shaders from "first principles", using functions and methods that will be familiar to shader writers. The node editor can be used to unlock the full power of the TG2 rendering engine. Function Node Network Planetside's long term development is now concentrated on Terragen 2, using the TG2 renderer and plugin architecture. The bulk of the work is done, and our next step is to combine the accessibility of Terragen's current user interface and fast, integrated atmosphere system with the underlying power and flexibility of TG2. Planetside are very aware that many users may find the node based interface unfamiliar. They strongly emphasise that the Technology Preview release is aimed at high end users. They are continuing to develop the user interface to reduce the learning curve and make it easier to leverage the power of the TG2 render engine to create scenes of outstanding realism and complexity. Terragen 2 Release Schedule In 2006 the first Terragen 2 Technology Preview was released, giving users hands-on access to the software. Development will continue towards a final release of Terragen 2 for Windows and Mac. Planetside intends to provide multiple version of Terragen 2 to cater to the needs of different users, from hobbyists to professional artists, animators and visualisation experts. They also hope to continue the tradition of releasing a free non-commercial edition that is more than just a demo. Terragen v0.9 Planetside will continue to support TG v0.9 until TG2 is available. Their main development focus now is definitely TG2 however, and they do not plan to add any significant new functionality to TG v0.9. Planetside will certainly still address crashing issues and the like, and they have not ruled out future releases of TG v0.9. Upgrade path Registered users of v0.7 through to v0.9 who purchased before December 15th, 2006 will receive a discount of $99 (USD) towards Terragen 2 when it is available. Current purchasers of TG 0.9 will receive an $80 discount on a purchase of Terragen 2.