@Liam303

Devlog 5

What was added?:

• User tkinter file page to create a way to export all of the data cleanly
• Seperated the diffrent features like height map, water level and used zipfile to combine all of the exported data into one clean file manager.

-Issues:

• A weird issue where the file manager would pop up so you could choose to save the file but it would be transparent and whenever you click on it you click through it, it remained even after closing the program and the only way to fix it was to restart the computer. It turns out the line root = tk.Tk(); root.withdraw() was forcing it to be the prioratized window but the background process also assumed it was the prioritzed window and so it just hang out waiting for the code to update it.
• When importing the textures into other software all of the textures would be made for a diffrent sized mesh, fixed this by setting them a constant scale defined by the resoulation of the image, this will also come in handy later.

Next time on Open PLG

• Advanced simlation ooh, being able to simulate stuff like river errosion and snow maps as accuratly as possible, defintly not just doing this as an excuse to practice my simulation rendering skills.
• Adding a resolution control and the ability to control the resolution of the exported data, probably also a rendering setup so it doesn’t crash when run

Devlog 4

What was added?:

• Main thing that was added is exporting, the ply file can be exported and you can import it into your software of choice, the reason for .ply is the way in which is stores its data based on vertex positions which matches the height map generation my code runs off.
• Semi-functional biome masking, so it textures based on catogrized zones such as costal shorlines, flatlands highlands ect.
• Expanded the internal dictionary for faster switching between elevation values and biome classifications

Errors:

• Trying to apply the biome mask to the mesh caused the geometry to form stair looking blocks, turns out the warp_by_scalar function replaces elevation data with specic indices like -1.0, -0.2, 0.5, 1.5. Fixed this by adding a geometry_elevation array to expand possible vertex indeces, overly simpliefied explanation but I don’t know how to explain it any better
• All of the checkboxes and export buttons all fused in the left hand bottom of the screen and refused to move, turns out in my hastely coppiying from the PyVista website examples I defined a variable as l_stat which held the location data inside it but I assumed it was a PyVista function with other uses, fixed it just by removing that variable and adding my own location data for each.

Next time on Open PLG:

• Height map exportation so you can choose to displace a plane rather then importing a 3d model, started on this today but didn’t get far before deciding to post this devlog and to take a break.
• Mask exportation so the final user could use weathering mask for better texturing, this is a feature that a surprisingly low number of similar software have easilibly usable so I knew this was a must have for my project
• Height based blending for external shaders.

Devlog 3

What was added?:

• Make like a sky blue gradient background to make it look better
• Added a very basic Thermal Erosion Simulation, more for looks than anything
• Weathering slider to control the weathering and color
• Modified the earth color to make it look better
• Setup the official git hub page

Issues:

• Significant frame drops when I turn the weathering to its heighest setting, fixed it by vectorizing the smoothing operation therefore eliminating the need for the loops I had before.
• Water shader wasn’t reflected properly, fixed this by creating a specific material for the water and manually adjusted them

Next time on Open PLG:

• Being able to export the height maps and 3d models
• Biome texturing based on larger array of values

Devlog 2
Note - Due to the complexity of this project all future devlogs on this project will be equally complex, if you have any questions about what anything means feel free to ask and I will try to answer asap

What was added?:

• Infinite world panning: You can now infinitely scroll to either side of the world instead of focusing on a single chunk, acts as both a random see generator and access for larger terrain.
• Second Noise pass: I added a second higher frequency Perlin noise layer to brake up flat looking areas and add additional micro details
• Added a transparent water layer that’s controllable by the user
• Added PBR: Physically Based Rendering and smooth shading adds shadows and overall makes it look a bit better.

Issues:

• Had a problem where moving the sliders at all would result in: “TypeError: The Input DataSet type StructuredGrid must be compatible with PolyData.” The error was a result of PyVista trying to convert the mesh to a PolyData object. I bypassed this by updating coordinate and scalar arrays through actor_3d.mapper.dataset.points instead of .copy_from().
• The labels of different sliders would hide off screen due to the very tight pixel positioning and therefore wouldn’t account for screen size. I fixed this by significantly increasing their position onscreen so that no matter the screen size they would fit on screen, I originally tried screen based scaling but it didn’t work.

Next time on Open PLG

• Advanced biome coloring so that cliifs sides and steep slopes have a diffent color then flat planes.
• Erision filters to simulate damage to the landscape
• Custom shaders to make everything look better, no idea how I’ll add that but I guess we’ll find out.

Sorry for the lack of any project updates for the past couple of days, the school term here in New Zealand has just started, I’ve also had to replace my laptop so I’ve been very busy switching over. The Open Aero project has been postponed to the forceable future to make time for this project, Open PLG, or Procedural Landscape Generator. This is a project I actually need for a separate non-Star Dance project I’m working on so it’s got a high priority. This project is built to generate 3d landscapes for modeling for cgi project and game creation, I’m surprised how much I got done in the opening five hours of the project and a huge amount of this is based on sigh math. For the specic details: its based on the Perlin Noise library to generate the noise for environment displacement, I’m also using pyvista because I’ve used it before so I know it quite well, due to school, coding time will decrease significantly.

It’s works. I am so unbelievably surprised that it works, yes it might be like 5 frames a second but it works. There’s not much to say in this dev logs other than the fact that I am literally jumping with joy. Not even kidding just I was about to sit down and write this develop about how nothing was working, I tried one fix and it works. To many of you python fanatics this might not seem like a big achievement but to me this is one of my biggest coding accomplishments ever. I am more energetic then ever to finish this project.

I’m improving, soon I will be able to calculate and visualize the aerodynamics of a… sphere. Yeah its not the most interesting dev log ever, I’m working on turn the calculations into visual representations, this involves particle collisions and making the engine more efficient. The main issues are around the collisions, there’s a surprising lack of errors rather its just the ‘air’ particles fazing through the mech. No interesting photos this time, more updates to come soon.

I’m not narcissistic I just think I’m the best coder to have ever existed on earth, I’ve been able to make my own 3d engine and all I’ve had to do is use somebody else’s library with somebody else’s example code with a lot of tutorials and a huge amount of errors most of which were a result of misspellings. So far the 3d viewers works, it doesn’t do anything yet but the basics are there, I’ve rewritten all of my code from the ground up so I haven’t started on the complex math’s stuff (not exited for that), progress is coming along slowly but shortly

I hit an absolute gold mine. So my code so far has been based on a ui library for python, which is fine for two and graph plotting but lingering in the back of my mind has been this fear of how I’m going to actually set up the 3d simulation part of my software, kind of important for a 3d aerodynamics simulator. That’s when I came across pyvista, which is a library made for my exact purpose, it means I have to remake most of my code, which I already knew I would need to do, but I’m so exited to see stuff start working, I’m still far of actually finishing the 3d ‘engine’ but I feel more motivated then ever

Can’t say I’m surprised, if you want to make a complex aerodynamics software your bound to crash it a couple of times. Fixing errors is boring so I’ve moved onto making the 3d part of the software, I’m sure there’s a simple reason behind the crash but I don’t know what it is yet so time to go back to code cut to intense coding montage

I’m not a big UI connoisseur and not very original so I used the same UI library as from Open Wall because I know how to use it, don’t worry I’ll change it in the future. And for all those waiting I’ve revolutionized aerodynamic simulation, I can calculate and simulate the aerodynamics of a… circle. Yeah, not the most exiting, but I’m pretty sure that part of it is working. I couldn’t get the drag force telemetry graph working properly, but that’s not a huge deal right now, but also found some distortion on the simulation. Its a problem with my graph ability more then my simulation ability, as much as it may surprised you all I’m not the best coder of all time, but for now I’m happy with how its working and I’m going to try start making it 3d next time.

New Beginnings: After the completion and submission of my last project (and alot of sleep) I have begun my new project. This time I wanted to test my abilities so I’m making an easy to use aero sim. My plan for uni is engineering aerodynamics so I’m taking this chance to learn as much about it as possible by designing my own, I have seen plenty of cool cad designs on Stardance that could be tested in one. I’m going to try take this project a lot slower and just get it right. Today I finally applied physics equations outside of school, I used the equation for drag, (F_d = 1/2pv^2 * C_d *A). My plan is to at first just create a simple 2d simulator, nothing complex just so I can test the basic functions.

Its officially done, Open Wall is finished. 120 hours have gone into the project and I’ve gone from a complete beginner in python to somewhat competent. I’ve lost a huge amount of sleep trying to get this working but now that’s it’s finished I feel so proud of the final design. A massive thanks to Star Dance for hosting this and giving me a reason to finally learn python, I’ve never given myself a good enough reason until now. My dream is to become a aero engineering and this project is a stepping stone in that journey, my next project will be alot more relaxed. Thanks to everyone that supported me along the way, and with that I need sleep so in case I don’t see ya, good afternoon, good evening, and good night!

Sorry if it sounds like I’m in a rush but I was in the process of testing my code for bugs and I discovered a gasp bug. Basically for driver swaps in the middle of the year like Lawson and Red bull the code would download separate data for the team for two different instances, and since previously I would have it assume they were the same it would crash. This fix shouldn’t take long, just like 30 minutes of testing values, but I’ve confirmed everything else works, fixed some bugs surrounding the time library I use, and so I’m confident my next post will be one announcing the conclusion of this project. For dramatic effect my project will officially be released in Bum bum baa 2 Hours. (Sorry for the lack of a project image, you’ll just have to check it out for yourself ;)

I’ve officially passed 100 hours on my project. Today is the final stretch, the final sprint to the finish line, I was able to get it all running normally on windows, my plan is to lock in the for the remaining time, hopefully my next post will be to tell you all of the projects completion, I found the problem from yesterday and was able to get the data to cache properly and now I’m literally just running the app over and over to find as many bugs and errors as possible, I’d rather get the errors myself then make the final user have them. Sorry if none of this makes sense or if it lacks any of my previous humor, I’m pretty tired and I know the second this project is over I will be sleeping as long as possible, but for now I’m just desperately trying to get the final project finished.

I jinxed myself. So earlier I might have got a bit cocky about my own error fixing ability, it all worked perfectly well on my Cachy os laptop, but on my windows pc it all breaks for absolutely no reason. What I’ve spent the past 9 hours doing is converting it to use a different library, while this is easier than it sounds it’s by no means a walk in the park, so far I’ve got the functions to run, but efficiency, ironically the thing I was bragging about before, it still a problem so it crashes after like 5 minutes due to the previously displayed data not being properly cached. My plan is to finish the entire project by the end of tomorrow, I’m so close and super exited to show the final product.

Mānawatia a Matariki! 🌟, I am in a very good mood. For the past 9 hours I’ve worked on this project everything has just worked, within an hour the error that plagued me yesterday just dissapeared, do I know why? No. Do I care? Not at all. If it works it works. Today was more of a continuation of yesterday, making everything feel faster, better, fixing everything that didn’t work yesterday, I made the graphs scroll properly, I made the ui look even better, my plan is to lock in today and tomorrow and finish it by the end of tomorrow, might pull an all nighter

Error time: For the past 9 Hours I’ve spent trying to make everything more efficient and I’ve been plagued with error after error, and as of this moment the errors are still erroring. The first error I got was the “texture not found”, which is unusual when I directly gave it the image texture, now obviously the fix to this error was that a completely unrelated button was labeled wrong so… Also some random thing about the way it downloaded the values from online meant specific races would spit out values that led to random websites, so basically it would try to download the f1 values from a bands website that had f1 in its name. Also the error below which I’m in the process of fixing.

Day number, you know what I’ve lost track of the time. Hours go by so quickly yet it refuses to work, I refuse to give in the ai and let it fix it for me, what could I have done, did I displease the coding gods, how can I undo my, oh wait it works now. Seems I mistook a full stop for a comma. That definitely didn’t take me over 5 hours to fix, and of course the error messages point to a random line that has nothing to do with the problem. Today was mainly just cleaning up the ui, just unifying everything into a good looking color scheme, next I think will be a few new features.