Rhino in the workflow of making an airfield and buildings?

Rhino Rhino for Windows
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Hi,
Just what of this task can Rhino v8 assist with ?

I need to recreate a genuine airfield, show it as it was over 80 years ago in 1940, its a small one , not Heathrow or JFK !

What software to create realistic vegetation, grasses weeds, nettles, bushes trees, tarmac, concrete etc. as well as brick and wood hangars, dispersal huts. Also need to place in vehicles such as refuellers, oil carts, humans that are realistic, Spitfires and Hurricanes.

I recall Bryce but that was 20 years or so ago.

I do mean realistic. Something that a VR headset would have you think OMG I am in a real landscape.

Also wanted the ability to do a walk around. as well as fly over.

To be able to add in structures where the brickwork uses real brick colouring created in photoshop from photos of the actual brickwork.

Can Rhino generate the real looking structures with the photoshop bricks placed into it ? Then I take that into the chosen landscape making software.

I would need to alter the computer perfect placement and do a bit of real bricky variation.

Even the mortar would get a varied weathered effect.

Can the result be then taken into the other software.

Where is it best to use the height data for the terrain ? I seem to remember a greyscale image that generates the 3D shape, am I right ? Is there a size/area limit ?

Does this come ready formed from the Ordnance Survey (it’s a UK area) or is it a set of numbers that needs some kind of conversion.

Would the 3D shape be done in Rhino then grassed and tracked up in the other software ?

I am drawing the structures in Rhino. Rhino seems too accurate to go brick laying in though. If I get the basic shapes done, then take those into bricklaying software is that the way ?

Steve

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Rhino + D5 Render

D5 Render | Real-Time 3D Rendering Software

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I think you should consider the reality of what you want first.

For environments with vegetation, realistic buildings and other items; you really need to consider what level of realism is acceptable.

This can go anywhere between 2000s level game style with 2D-plane based trees and immersive. Alternatively, you are asking for “realistic”.

That could be a whole other level of demand on your hardware. If I remember correctly, you have an RTX 3070 (8 GB). Again, you need to think about the demands on your hardware and its limits.

Given your other topics, it seems best to stay within Rhino Cycles rather than keep jumping around different renderers (material translation…). Ultimately Cycles would likely be really good to get going, sans grass. Everything else for outdoor it can make at least some decent (and often great) job of.

Regards VR, again, is this a formal requirement? If so, you may need to make some mock setup in Cycles, but you may eventually need to move to a game engine like Unreal Engine or an incredibly fast GPU renderer like Chaos Vantage. Are you making something that is deployed and public facing?

But first thing is to at least have some refined idea of what you want before splashing out cash or learning random rendering engines/software.

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That’s good advice! Also consider the reality of what you yourself are able to do. Creating large scale realistic landscapes with photo realistic, detailed buildings, vehicles and full vegetation is not something you just “do” for VR/on-screen walk-abouts. What software will you be using? The only one I know of that allows for close-to-photorealistic walk-abouts in real-time is Unreal Engine 5 (and maybe Unity, to a lesser extend), and it has a fairly steep learning curve, especially since you, at the same time, would have to learn how to optimize every single asset in terms of polycount and texture load, if it really needs to be real-time. There’s a reason why game studios employ 3D artist to do nothing but asset optimization. Also, what is your timeframe? And budget?
If you are really looking for realistic real-time (something like this or this) I think you might be better off finding someone who already knows more than just a bit about UE5. If you can settle for less, I’d go with either D5 or Twinmotion, but beware: it’s still not a task done in 2 weeks.
My 2 cents,
Jakob

1 Like
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Hi, Thanks for the links to the videos,
Wow !! things have moved on since Bryce 20 years ago !

I think D5 or Twinmotion might be enough. The walker will not be getting up close to the vegetation as such. Both seem most capable of the realism I need. I need to see which one does a realistic walk as opposed to floating around. (I hope the walker in UE5 was wearing wellies ! )

Both seem very able to make a grass airfield with trees round the edge ! ….and vary the grass types, add in daisies etc., and longer grass away from the mown areas.

Not sure how I add in a real terrain, but no doubt there is a way. Using height data from the Ordnance Survey. Cannot find a video on that yet. I reckon its best done there rather than in Rhino, correct me if I am wrong.

I wonder which is the easier intuitive to learn one of the two, and is there a difference in realism between them. An initial view of youtube shows no immediate difference.

Unreal Engine 5 is awesome, but overkill for an airfield walkaround !

I couldn’t see anything about how to bring in a 3D model from Rhino and one where I have applied actual bricks. I am not wanting fictional bricks but I need to use actual ones, and they vary in colours, one brick can be reddish with a cream patch, another all cream, another all red.

The structures will be created in Rhino. Else it means learning their own CAD drawing system to make models.

Just how do I apply actual bricks created in photoshop to a model made in Rhino ?

I need to find out how one makes ACTUAL buildings with their actual exterior materials in Rhino, unless these progs allow actual photos to be applied. Maybe if I create a skin of the bricks then that can be applied. That is my plan, create a raster of the bricks with mortar, then with it skin the wall either in Rhino or in D5 or Twinmotion,.

Then I need to create vehicles and ladders, boxes etc, and add camouflage paint, also add in humans in RAF clothing, not something found in their library of humans, vehicles etc. so all done in Rhino first.

Its to be a prerecorded video that the public can view via a website.

I need to contact D5 and Twinmotion, run past them the actual project and see what is capable with my Nvidia3070 and 64Mb DDR4 and system I have.

Steve