This was an experiment using the Blender Sapling add-on for the first time. The Sapling presets looked like slight variations of an Aspen to me so I wanted see if I could create a specific tree with realistic leaves and trunk.
I picked the Sugar Maple because it has a very round shape that is not included as one of the presets, and because I’ve always liked its neon-like fall colors of the Sugar Maple.
I wasn’t able to get Sapling to shape the Maple as round and as symmetrical as it is in nature, but I think I came close. I would like the Pruning option to be a bit more precise as it didn’t seem to have much affect on my Maple except to push the top down or the sides in a little. But I couldn’t get a nice arc from the crown to the base limbs.
The leaves created in Sapling are a separate object, so to get three different types of leaves I had to start with 100% of the leaves, select random at 33.3% and press P to separate the selection to its own object. I then hid that selection. I selected 50% of the remaining leaves and did the same thing. That gave me 3 sets of leaf objects that I could then map a different leaf texture to each of the three objects.
I then mapped a different color and size Maple leaf to each section of leaves to give the combined three sections a nice balance of color and size variation.
The trunk is as close as I could find to accurately representing the color and texture of the Sugar Maple–at a distance. It’s UV textured with normals, but the branches are procedurally generated (no UV mapping) using the same texture. Sapling makes the trunk and branches as a single object, so I needed to separate the trunk from the branches and then UV unwrap it. I also added 4 loop cuts and a displacement modifier to give the trunk a slightly irregular shape.
Also, Sapling doesn’t have a way to shape the base of the trunk, so I extruded a simple base that flares out a bit to make it more realistic. But to do it right in the future, I’d modify the base to show the transition to the roots.
The other experiment was to represent dead leaves on the ground around the tree. I’m new at 3D modeling (this is my third model with any software), but I thought it would be straight forward using the Particle system and distribute two types of leaves around the tree using weight painting to restrict the distribution. I was wrong. Perhaps because I’m such a novice, I had a heck of a time getting the dead leaves to display properly.
Also, for some reason I couldn’t get the dead leaves to remain on top of the ground when I used a displacement modifier to deform the ground plane. I know it can be done, I just haven’t figured it out yet.
Once I finally got the leaves to lie on the ground properly, I decided to leave (no pun intended) well enough alone and so I didn’t bother make them more realistic (notice they are all facing the same direction). I’ll give that a try another day.
The sky and ground are just to show off the tree.
You can easily use this tree to change the seasons. Just replace the fall leaves with three different shapes and colors of summer leaves, or hide all of the leaves for the winter look. You might be able to do spring as well by mapping buds and young leaves, but I haven’t tried that yet.
Finally, the blend file is much too large for just a tree. At the time, I didn’t think to reduce the resolution of the texture files before using them, which are probably adding significantlly to the size of the model. I’ll reduce the resolution of the textures and see if that helps. Beyond that, the rest of the blend file is just the basic Sapling tree with a plane for the ground and sky.
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