Making realistic forests

[Terring7]

I always surround my cities with dense forests, making them islands of culture and technology in a huge green ocean of wilderness. When I make the forests, I also leave some open spaces. Then I fill them with different type of trees for variety, as well as flowers, bushes, rocks, lakes and animals. If the open spaces are close to the city, I fill them with parking lots and picnic tables. So my forests are something like this...



But I feel that something is missing. I want my forests to be realistic, so I need some advises to do it. Any idea will be welcomed for making better looking forests

[Swordmaster]

I would start with phasing out CP's old controllers. As great as his trees were back in the day, we've now gotten quite a few better models, not least CP's own from prop pack vol 2.

Of course there are not as many controllers (yet) who use these, but then if you want really realistic forests even the best controller can't do that for you. You'll need to start with MMPs. It depends on what you want from these forests. If they're just "filler" around cities a controller should do. But if they're the main theme maybe you should also devote some more time to them and use MMPs more often. If you haven't, get everything made by Girafe off the LEX.

Off the top of my head, the best forest scenes are regularly seen in these MDs:
- Antigone
- Siilijoki
- Alba Ceann mu Dheas


Cheers
Willy

[sunv123]

If you don't feel like using MMPs, this controller is actually okay when it comes to detail. (link at the bottom.) Still, i would go with Swordmaster's suggestion by using MMPs. I use them and they work mighty fine. It just takes blood, sweat and tears to master it. Okay, not that much. But it takes time and patience.

If you want to see amazing MMPing, check out Port St. Claire by Swordmaster.

Tree controller link: http://community.simtropolis.com/files/file/28296-pacific-northwest-tree-controller/

Good luck!

P.S. Girafe's MMPs are a really good choice when it comes to detail.

[Girafe]

Off the top of my head, the best forest scenes are regularly seen in these MDs:
- Antigone
- Siilijoki
- Alba Ceann mu Dheas

& yours Willy

[IL...]

You should try to make some terrain variations, like some pits and some more elevated lands, forests are not very flat afterall, also try to add some ground flora, or grass, depending on the climate you are making, in this case, small bushes, maybe some flowering bushes, and some grass patches around big rocks or something would be great, also don't forget the rocks, try to make them arranged, as a natural event happened there, idk maybe heavy rains, fire, or earthquakes, fallen trees and dead ones would be a good idea from time to time.

I hope that helps

[epicblunder]

Here's my checklist for Order of Operations when using MMPs to make a complete forest:

1: Have a plan- the type of forest you want to make depends entirely on climate.  If you're unsure of which MMPs you want to use do some recon on teh interwebz.  Once you've decided what climate you want it to look like select which tools you're going to use from your toolbox (and like willy said, use the newer stuff):

2: Use multiple 'large' tree brushes- Forests are seldom homogenous with respects to their largest denizens.  Although some brushes are diverse enough to pull off being the only 'large' tree in your forest (like Girafe's Ashes), the majority aren't.  For instance in your first pic terring, if you add c.p.'s douglas fir and a bit of larch to that western redcedar forest the diversity makes an improvement.

3: Start with the MMPs having the largest footprints-  Largest trees first.  Have a level of randomness in your placement.  The human eye is very good at picking out repetitive detail and spacing things evenly will look wrong.

4: Fill out the forest with 'detail' trees- These are neither of your 2 (or more) primary trees that make up most of your forest, but add flavor to the whole such as dead trees or young growing trees.  Aside from nature reserves/national parks you seldom see forests that haven't been tampered with by man or have had something else (mudslides/windstorms/floods/etc.) happen to them that allows new trees to start growing.

5:  Place all the smaller stuff/underbrush last-  Yes there are some dry climates where forests don't have underbrush, but many do.  For instance those redcedar that you used always have underbrush unless they are on some kind of mowed grass space like at a park day-use area.  For this stage Girafe's bushes are your best friend.

I did a rough example tutorial a year or so ago on this.  It uses some old flora models but it's still serviceable, other than i violated the evenly spaced rule.  Part 1,  part 2.

[Terring7]

This new tree controller looks awesome, I'll have it a look . Thanks for the advises folks, they can be useful for my parks too

[Terring7]

I made an attempt to make a small forest with only M.M.P.s. Tell me what you think

[TheAttendee]

Now I feel like there's too much open space. A few more areas with denser tree-lines and I think you'll be on the right path. Also, bushes tend to grow in large tight groups, not so often do you find single bushes spaces out from each other.

[vortext]

The varierty is good but I agree trees could be pulled closer together. Or in other words, more contrast between open space and dense forest.