Porting Foliage, What makes a good scenebuild prop?

Garry's Mod general
#1

So I’m porting a shitton of foliage over to garrysmod for scenebuilding and poses, and I was wondering what I could do to make the props more friendly to work with.

Do you guys prefer a collision model, or an effect? If an effect, is the handle better in the middle or on the bottom?

Do they need specific resizes or is there a tool that allows for easy resizing of props?

Would people actually use bones in foliage? (for posing leaves of brushing them aside)

Would cluster models be useful, or is spawning a bunch easy enough?.

Here’s some screenshots of what I’ve been porting so far.

https://i.imgur.com/UJfteMa.jpg[/t]
[t]https://i.imgur.com/6Yq69A5.jpg

#2

I personally prefer effects. For those who make big scenebuilds may be a little problem though, since they might don’t want to have the scene full of green rings until the end. Clusters are very helpful for me too, saves some time and makes it a little easier to set the scene. There’s also a prop and an effect resizer tool in the workshop

#3

my main argument against effects: you can’t resize them with the joint tool.

#4

  1. An effect of course, having a collision model would limit it’s use, the handle should be on the bottom preferably.

  2. There’s a tool made for resizing effects so one size is enough.

  3. It would be a good addition but not a necessary one.

  4. Absolutely, actually making forests is a pain in the ass if posing one tree at a time for example, personnally I’m having a hard time giving a illusion of depth without having to put heavy fog.

There’s a tool for resizing effects.

#5

Firstly, you’re a godsend! There is never enough foliage models out there, and these ones look great.

As others have said, an effect is preferred. You can resize them with the effect resize tool available on the workshop, or this fixed version which is compatible with saves.

The handle can be anywhere sensible, but it’s most useful if it’s at the exact ‘root’ of the model (it’s also the most universally agreed upon origin), so the center/bottom of a tree’s trunk, for example. As to other foliage models that don’t have a ‘root’, anywhere in the middle works.

As to clusters vs. separate units, the simple answer is* we need both**. *Clusters allow for dense foliage without spamming the game with entities, and the single units for more careful placements. Any good foliage setup would usually be a mix of clusters and singular models.

I don’t think we need movable bones, I at least personally don’t, but perhaps I’m wrong.

#6

Bones for props such as vines would be really handy.

#7

all the bones that you can bother to rig, preferably

#8

Another question, Is alphatesting okay? since you can just poster and anti alias that way?

#9

asking out of ignorance because i don’t really know how well it works, but why not $allowalphatocoverage?

#10

It kind of has the same problems as alphatesting, and you can’t control the clip value for it.

#11

then alphatesting it is.