Question

I checked for a LibGDX heightmap loader and found one, but I am not quite sure how the buildIndices() code works. I am also not sure why it only generates a heightmap chunk that is 128*x*128, anything bigger than 128 (eg. 1024) makes the loader mess up like this:

1024 chunk

As you can see, the mountains have holes and the chunk shape renders as a 128*1024 mesh

128 chunk

Perfectly ok with the 128*128 chunk

Here is my code:

package com.amzoft.game.utils;

import java.util.Arrays;

import com.badlogic.gdx.Gdx;
import com.badlogic.gdx.files.FileHandle;
import com.badlogic.gdx.graphics.Color;
import com.badlogic.gdx.graphics.Pixmap;

public class HeightmapConverter {

    public int mapWidth, mapHeight;
    private float[] heightMap;
    public float[] vertices;
    public short[] indices;
    private int strength;
    private String heightmapFile;
    private float textureWidth;

    public HeightmapConverter(int mapWidth, int mapHeight, int strength, String heightmapFile)
    {
        this.heightMap = new float[(mapWidth+1) * (mapHeight+1)];
        this.mapWidth = mapWidth;
        this.mapHeight = mapHeight;
        this.vertices = new float[heightMap.length*5];
        this.indices = new short[mapWidth * mapHeight * 6];
        this.strength = strength;
        this.heightmapFile = heightmapFile;

        loadHeightmap();
        createIndices();
        createVertices();
    }

    public void loadHeightmap()
    {
        try{
            FileHandle handle = Gdx.files.internal(heightmapFile);
            Pixmap heightmapImage = new Pixmap(handle);
            textureWidth = (float)heightmapImage.getWidth();
            Color color = new Color();
            int indexToIterate = 0;
            for(int y = 0;  y < mapHeight + 1; y++)
            {
                for(int x = 0; x < mapWidth + 1; x++)
                {
                    Color.rgba8888ToColor(color, heightmapImage.getPixel(x, y));
                    heightMap[indexToIterate++] = color.r;
                }
            }
            handle = null;
            heightmapImage.dispose();
            heightmapImage = null;
            color = null;
            indexToIterate = 0;
        }catch(Exception e){
            e.printStackTrace();
        }
    }

    public void createVertices() 
    {
        int heightPitch = mapHeight + 1;
        int widthPitch = mapWidth + 1;

        int idx = 0;
        int hIdx = 0;

        for(int z = 0; z < heightPitch; z++)
        {
            for(int x = 0; x < widthPitch; x++) 
            {
                vertices[idx+0] = x;
                vertices[idx+1] = heightMap[hIdx++] * strength;
                vertices[idx+2] = z;
                vertices[idx+3] = x/textureWidth;
                vertices[idx+4] = z/textureWidth;
                idx += 5;
            }
        }
    }

    public void createIndices() 
    {
        int idx = 0;
        short pitch = (short)(mapWidth + 1);
        short i1 = 0;
        short i2 = 1;
        short i3 = (short)(1 + pitch);
        short i4 = pitch;

        short row = 0;

        for(int z = 0; z < mapHeight; z++) 
        {
            for(int x = 0; x < mapWidth; x++) 
            {
                indices[idx++] = (short)(i1);
                indices[idx++] = (short)(i2);
                indices[idx++] = (short)(i3);

                indices[idx++] = (short)(i3);
                indices[idx++] = (short)(i4);
                indices[idx++] = (short)(i1);

                i1++;
                i2++;
                i3++;
                i4++;
            }

            row += pitch;
            i1 = row;
            i2 = (short)(row + 1);
            i3 = (short)(i2 + pitch);
            i4 = (short)(row + pitch);
        }
    }

    public String getHeightmapFile()
    {
        return heightmapFile;
    }

}

Why don’t larger chunks work? How does createIndices() (called buildIndices() in the LibGDX code) work?

Answer 1

Solution is here: http://badlogicgames.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=11&t=4918#p23683

Java short can only hold values [-32768 .. 32767] That terrain mesh
use more indices than that. 256*256 is too much(around 65k) so you are
only seeing small portion of height map.

Thanks to kalle_h for the solution.