MODELING TREESUsing TreeCage v 1.5By Danny MurrayWhat You’ll LearnIn this tutorial you’ll learn the basics of TreeCage to model whatever kind of tree you want (although you won’t learn how to make leafy trees here)Why Use TreeCage?• It’s fast! It saves you a LOT of time. It creates the trees in seconds in Modeler.• It can create quality trees in many variations.• Since it’s done in modeler you can manipulate the trees anyway you want after they’re made.Tree Cage MenuThere are 5 different tabs: Main, Filter, Trunk, Foliage, and Hazard/File.You’re going to be mainly concerned with the Main tab, of course, and so we’ll start with the growth section.Download TreeCage v 1.5: http://perso.orange.fr/dpont/plugins/TreeCage_Lscript.htmThe segment count changes how many segments you have between each branch division. Length determines how long each of those braches are.Bend does just what you’d think: it bends the tree. The same goes for twist. Both can have either a positive or negative value. Having either on too high can creative some odd results.Heliotrope causes the tree to bend towards the sun (an imaginary one) while gravity causes the tree to bend towards the Earth. You can have both on and get some bends up and down.GROWTHStart Radius: The radius of the base of the treeScale %: Determines the size of the next segment in relation to the previous oneTrunk Scale %: An additional scaling for the trunk onlyMin Radius: If a branch’s radius falls below the minimum radius it is not created. A good way to limit unwanted branching.Waving: If gravity and/or heliotrope are activated then waving can bend the branches to make them wavier.Randomness (+/-) : Many of the effects mentioned have randomness value attributed to them to make the trees more spontaneous. The higher the value the more randomness that is allowedBRANCHING90 causes each branch to be a quarter turn away from the last one.Step Angle120 makes each branch 120 degrees from the last. This makes triangular polygons.180 makes the branches either go left or right. This makes planar trees.180+ does 180 degree turns except for one 90 degree turn for the last branches.Angle: changes the angle between branches.Radius %: determines how large a branch is compared to what it branched from.Note that both of these can be randomized.Tree TypesSide: branches grow off the side of the previous section without an effect.Fork: cause the branches to be forked into different directions than original branch.Symmetrical: same as side, but for each branch there is a duplicate on the other side.Full: every division make a branch from each side and continues the original.Trunk Multiply: creates more branches from the trunk giving a fuller look. Only available for side and symmetrical.Break Middle: only for full. Breaks the middle division branch to create a different look.TREE ITERATIONTrunk Section: Determines the length of the tree before the first branch. Multiply this number by what length you have and you’ll get the length of your trunk section.UVMap & WeightMap: Check these to apply a map to the tree.Octave: Determines the amount of branching that takes place. This is very important to your tree. Higher octave levels increases creation time and polygons. The polygons are roughly doubled with each increase. To the left is a display of octave levels from 1-10. Creation takes much longer depending on the tree type you’ve chosen. Full and symmetrical types take longer than side and fork, especially full. At 5 octave a full tree takes close to 100000 polygons while fork at 10 octave takes about half that. Make sure you save before experimenting with high octave levels.FILTERThe filter tab gives you the power to increase or decrease the effects on the trunk, first branches, and last branches. This makes is possible to create very unique trees. Note that the sliders will only let you change the values from 0-100, but you can enter in any number you want.TRUNKBole: Increases the number of polygons per segment (double for x2 and tripled for x3)Bulge: Causes the tree to bulge outward (only works if Bole is on)Reduce From/Step: Reduces the number of trunk sections that have the Bole effect. Higher number = less reducing.Shift Branching: Shifts branches to different angles. Only works with Bole on.RootsHeight %: How tall the roots are in comparison to each segment.Length%: How long the roots are in comparison to the start radius.Pruning OffQuantity: The amount of breaking on the tree.Break Area: What section of the tree is broken.Max Group: The max number of breaks that can happen in a row.Max Interval: The longest a branch can go without breaking.Break Division: causes there to be no division in certain areas.Break Length: this makes the divisions, but destroys the length, leaving a stub.Break Trunk: this causes the trunk to break after the octave you choose with Max OctaveFoliagehttp://balo.com/tutortree02.shtmlIn version 1.5 I could not get the foliage to work so I can’t really help you here. It worked in version 1.1, but that version is a lot slower. If you can get it to work it should be pretty easy to work with. If not, then you can use the same tutorial I used to create the trees shown at the beginning of this tutorial:HazardTrue Random: generates a new random sequence for every tree. Repeat Sequence: uses a single random sequence for all trees until you click New Sequence. This can help you create similar trees if you want.FileAllows you to save your TreeCage data and load it later for reuse.Things to Note•All the attributes of the trees can be set to any value you want such as scale% being able to go above 100% (who knows why you would want that though).•The best way to get the tree you want is through experimentation and learning how everything I’ve shown you affects the tree and seeing how they all work together.References: