thats a great idea
Maybe this will help (from latest betareadme)

effect_load(material,string name) (Commercial & Pro)
Loads an effect file in Microsoft .fx format from the work folder
into the given material, and applies to effect to all models and
terrain that have this material sssigned. This instruction can be
used to edit effects and shaders in real time and observe the result
immediately in the game.

That seems pretty good, so you can see how your changes effect the....effect....without having to relaunch it all the time. I would guess that you could link this to a image reader that maps the picture (above) from top left to bottom right and uses the alpha to calculate where to place the grass models....

i.e the models that the waving grass is attached too, is deployed according to the image...... The main problem I can see is the z position, i.e do the grass models have a -z until hit something, to place them on the terrain, of can you compare x,y position from the image with the z position of the terrain...and use them to deploy the grass/shrubb models?

I am sure I could get this to work, and may do so yet, but with my current work load it is likely to take some time....

This sounds like a job for the V man....

Sorry to post a new quesiton..
I have added the grass to my terrain, and I can see it moving..
however it is all black..
how do I, and where is the targa image that is to be used defined?

Regards,
Sean

Hmm, I had this problem as well, I believe I removed these lines:

mul_x2 r0.rgb,r0,v0 // modulate with lighting

and

Texture[0]=<texSkin1>;

Just comment them out, it should work

Hi,
umm, because you were just talking about lighting problems there... what can I do to control the brightness of the model with the effect assigned? The effect works great (nice work ventilator ) but the models that use it don't seem to be influenced by any level lighting, ambient parameters oder dynamic lights. So what can I do if I simply want it to be a little darker?

Hey come on, noone!?
This is really important to me, doesn't anyone know how to control the brightness with this effect assigned?
To go a little off-topic, I guess the board's sloooow speed is most likely to be the reason for this massive "posting-break" but... come on let's keep the community alive!
Post it!
Back to bussiness:
ventilator, the matrix has you. In fact it's searching you, where are you? need help!

either do the wanted lighting calculations with <veclight> and everything taken into account in the vertex shader and pass it to the pixelshader as oD0 or (the easier solution) remove the pixelshader and use the directx settings from the second post of this thread instead:

http://www.conitecserver.com/ubbthreads/showflat.php?Cat=&Number=297998&page=1&view=collapsed&sb=5&o=&fpart=1

should work but i haven't tested this!

Hi,
now the matrix has you
Nice quick answer, thanks a lot! Could you maybe explain this <veclight> thing? actually I'm quite new to shaders...
And, btw, I need the pixelshader for the waving effect.

the vertex shader does the waving effect!

...i would have to experiment with the lighting calculation and don't have the time at the moment...

Oh does it???
Well what then do you need the pixelshader for?