130. Ecosystems placed with a global Environment are only limited by the Rules-of-Nature. Ecosystems can also be attached to vectors, which define their extent and give them priority over Environments. Change back to realtime mode in the upper right view and switch to the Plan Camera.

131. Use the Zoom Box in the Plan view to zoom in on the widening of the canyon east of the Main Camera.

132. Undock and drag the view out to create a larger view to draw on.

133. Render a preview.

134. The render illustrates the challenge of Ecotype Dissolve Textures. What looks good from one camera view doesn't necessarily look good from another. We need another version of the Grassland Ecosystem for planimetric renders.

135. Go back to the Land Cover Task Mode. Clone the Grassland Ecosystem and rename it Grassland Plan.

136. Expand the Scene-At-A-Glance. Expand the Grassland Plan Ecosystem, Ground Overlay, and Grassland Material.

137. Select the Understory and disable it. The Grassland Plan Ecosystem will render its Ground Overlay only.

138. Collapse the Ecosystem and Scene-At-A-Glance.

139. Bring the YNP Environment Editor forward and Grab All again. Select the Grassland Plan Ecosystem and Raise its render priority. Save the project and render a preview.

140. Diagnostic Data tells us that the Grassland Plan Ecosystem rendered on the valley floor and the Pine Burn Ecosystem covers the steeper slopes. The Grassland Ecosystem did not render because the Grassland Plan Ecosystem took all the qualifying polygons.

141. Select the Pine Burn Ecosystem in the Scene-At-A-Glance and Create. Confirm that you're creating a vector for the existing Ecosystem, Pine Burn.

142. Left-click a couple of vertices around this raised area.

143. You won't see the vector on the render. If you want to check your progress, key F8 to switch to a realtime view and select Yes to Retain diagnostic data. This will save the RGB render (and other channels) in memory. Continue digitizing here, if you'd like, or F8 back to the render. Digitizing on a render gives you more scene detail and more precise vertex placement.

144. When you're done, Right-click, or Esc on a Mac, and name the vector Forest.

145. Confirm that you want to add the vector to the Pine Burn Ecosystem.

146. Save the project and render a preview.

147. The Pine Burn Ecosystem has rendered, but not quite within the vector we digitized. The outline is blocky. Select Measure Distance from the toolbar and click once and twice along a block edge. The length of the block is about 90 meters.

148. Bring the Pine Burn Ecosystem Editor forward and go to the General page. The vector bounded Ecosystem is rendering in 90 meter blocks because that's its Resolution.

149. Reset the Resolution to match the underlying DEM by unchecking and checking the Floating box.

150. Save the project and render a preview. Dock the Plan view when you're done.

151. A Foliage Effect is used to place individual Foliage Objects. Select the Foliage Effect in the Scene-At-A-Glance and Create.

152. The Create window will confirm that we're creating a new Foliage Effect with an attached vector.

153. Turn to the Mouse page, select Connect, and change the Point Space to 10 meters. This will automatically generate vertices every 10 meters.

154. You can't see it now, but there used to be an old cabin here that's been long since broken up for firewood. All that's left are the snags of trees planted along one side of the cabin as a windbreak.

155. Switch to a realtime Plan view and Zoom Box in on the area directly in front of the Main Camera.

156. Open the Plan View Preferences to the Overlay/Gradient page and select Ecosystem Map.

157. Left-click a starting point near the north canyon wall and left-click an end point on the canyon floor. Right-click to finish, or Esc on a Mac.

158. Name the vector and Foliage Effect Tree Break.

159. Add the vector to the Foliage Effect and close out the Component Gallery when it opens.

160. Change the Absolute Height to Foliage Group.

161. Go to the Groups page, Add Foliage Group, and name it anything. The name will be overwritten when we load the Component. Select Load Foliage Group .

162. Load the Pine Snags Component we created earlier.

163. We don't want the special Grassland Plan Ecosystem to render, it's just for planimetric views. Go to the Scene-At-A-Glance and disable it.

164. Save the project and render a preview.

165. Switch the Main view back to realtime mode and retain diagnostic data; we'll use it in a moment.

166. By default, Realtime Foliage Preview is enabled for Foliage Effects.

167. Because of the possible resource load involved, it's not recommended that you enable Ecosystem Realtime Foliage without first changing the Preferences. Open the popup menu and select Realtime Options > Land Cover > Realtime Foliage File Preferences.

168. Move the Diagnostic Data and View Realtime Preferences windows so you can see the Main view. Find the distance to the right ridge, about here.

169. The Distance is about 600 meters. Change the Distance Criteria Far value to 600 meters and the Height Criteria Minimum to 5 meters. Close the window.

170. Open the Main popup menu, and select Realtime Options > Create Realtime Foliage File.

171. VNS will render a preview to generate the foliage file.

172. When it's finished, open the popup menu and deselect Show Preview.

173. Open the popup menu again and select Realtime Options > Load Realtime Foliage File.

174. Open the popup menu and Edit View's Camera to open the Main Camera Editor. This will set an undo point.

175. Use the spacebar to Manipulate Camera and activate Move Mode. Slowly move the camera forward. The view response to mouse movement will be very sluggish.

176. Realtime Foliage is very handy for knowing where foliage is going to render. Use it judiciously, though, the resource load is high.

177. Undo all changes in the Camera Editor to undo your camera moves since the Editor was opened.

178. Open the Main view popup menu and select Realtime Options > Load Realtime Foliage File to unload the foliage file.

179. Save the project and render a preview.

180. The next to last category in the Land Cover Task Mode is Snow. Double-click it to create a new Component, called Snow.

181. Snow has a Rules page, just like Ecosystems. The difference is that the Elevation Line is the lower limit of its coverage, not the upper. Change the Elevation Line to 2065 meters.

182. Render a preview.

183. Snow covers Ecosystems and Ground Effects, just like it does in the real would, but not Foliage Objects. If you want snow on your trees, you'll need Foliage Objects that already have snow on them.

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