what is ground and how to align objects above ground

daveso

as you can see from these screenshots, it appears the wagon and props are actually below the ground level
when I render, it appears they are rasied above the ground a bit. I tried lowering each one using Y Tanslate, but that did not seem to work
Then I tried setting the field ground to move down ... when I did that, it buried the wagon and props. I raised them and found I had the same problem again. 

Not really sure why this is happening or how to fix it.
any ideas?

Fishtales

Try setting Ground Position to Manual.

AllenArt

Have you tried moving the objects "to floor"? (Crtl+D)

Laurie

L'Adair

AllenArt said:

Have you tried moving the objects "to floor"? (Crtl+D)

Laurie

Unless he positions the Apple Orchard set so the ground of the set is at 0, moving the object to floor will lift them even higher.

@daveso, Try this:

• Hide the environment, so only the "floating" props are visible.
• Create a plane primitve, maybe 2 meters, 1 polygon, Y-Positive.
• Open the Align Pane/Tab.
• Select the apple crate.
• Select the plane primitive, (in that order.)
• In the Align Pane, set the Y option to Stack Below; leave X and Z options at No Change.
• Click on Accept. plane should now be below the crate.
• Align the baskets and the wagon in the same manor:
  • Select the Plane.
  • Select one prop.
  • set Y option to Stack Above.
  • Click on Accept.
  • Repeat for each prop.
• Parent the props to the plane.
• Hide the props. The only thing visible now should be the plane.
• Unhide the environment.
• Move the plane down until it's sitting on, perhaps intersecting slightly, with the ground of the set.
• Unhide the props.
• Hide the plane.

Do a test or spot render. If the props still aren't touching the ground, you can move the plane down incrementally until they do.

daveso

AllenArt said:

Have you tried moving the objects "to floor"? (Crtl+D)

Laurie

yes..that reulted in the underground deal ... after the cart i did the crate, etc ... stuck in the mud. 

daveso

L'Adair said:

AllenArt said:

Have you tried moving the objects "to floor"? (Crtl+D)

Laurie

Unless he positions the Apple Orchard set so the ground of the set is at 0, moving the object to floor will lift them even higher.

@daveso, Try this:

• Hide the environment, so only the "floating" props are visible.
• Create a plane primitve, maybe 2 meters, 1 polygon, Y-Positive.
• Open the Align Pane/Tab.
• Select the apple crate.
• Select the plane primitive, (in that order.)
• In the Align Pane, set the Y option to Stack Below; leave X and Z options at No Change.
• Click on Accept. plane should now be below the crate.
• Align the baskets and the wagon in the same manor:
  • Select the Plane.
  • Select one prop.
  • set Y option to Stack Above.
  • Click on Accept.
  • Repeat for each prop.
• Parent the props to the plane.
• Hide the props. The only thing visible now should be the plane.
• Unhide the environment.
• Move the plane down until it's sitting on, perhaps intersecting slightly, with the ground of the set.
• Unhide the props.
• Hide the plane.

Do a test or spot render. If the props still aren't touching the ground, you can move the plane down incrementally until they do.

thanks..will give it a try. I ended up also to note the ground line by using the front camera ... moved everything around to meet it ..seemed to work ok ..got a little low but looks pretty much like the wheels are stuck in the dirt. 

L'Adair

@daveso, Another problem you're running into is the area you're using has very uneven ground. This is a viewport draw in Shaded Wireframe mode:

You may be able to flatten the area out using a dForm, Influence: Weight Map. Let me know if I can help with that.

BeeMKay

Alternately, you could change the angles of the crate and waggon so that they fit to the uneven ground. That one's pretty time consuming, but looks realistic.

Quasar

In this situation, you have your own ground plane so you don't need/want IRay to draw the ground at all. Click the button in the render settings under "draw ground" to turn it off. Then you just have to make sure all your objects are touching the ground of your set in the proper way, and the shadows will cast as expected.