How is Texture Splatting in OpenGL implemented?

Question

I have been reading for a while the different techniques used to texture terrains and came across texture splatting. I have found a lot of articles that discuss how to do this in OpenGL, but most only discuss it theoretically and provide little to no code that I can study. Does anyone know/have some code that illustrates this in OpenGL?

Just to clarify, I want to be able to load four different textures, and based on the height of the quad/vertices, change the texture from one gradually to the next.

Edit: Below is a quick bit of code to help show what I want to know

#include <windows.h>
#include <SFML/Graphics.hpp>
#include <gl/gl.h>
#include <gl/glu.h>

#define GL_CLAMP_TO_EDGE 0x812F

class Scene {
public:
    void resize( int w, int h ) {
        // OpenGL Reshape
        glViewport( 0, 0, w, h );
        glMatrixMode( GL_PROJECTION );
        glLoadIdentity();
        gluPerspective( 120.0, (GLdouble)w/(GLdouble)h, 0.5, 500.0 );
        glMatrixMode( GL_MODELVIEW );
    }
};

int main() {

    sf::RenderWindow window(sf::VideoMode(800, 600, 32), "Test");

    ///Setup the scene, materials, lighting
    Scene scene;
    scene.resize(800,600);
    glEnable(GL_DEPTH_TEST);
    glEnable(GL_LIGHTING);
    glColorMaterial(GL_FRONT_AND_BACK, GL_EMISSION);
    glEnable(GL_COLOR_MATERIAL);
    glShadeModel(GL_SMOOTH);
    glEnable(GL_BLEND);
    glBlendFunc(GL_SRC_ALPHA, GL_ONE_MINUS_SRC_ALPHA);
    glEnable(GL_LIGHT0);
    float XL = .5, YL = .1, ZL = 1;
    GLfloat ambientLight[] = { 0.2f, 0.2f, 0.2f, 1.0f };
    GLfloat diffuseLight[] = { 0.8f, 0.8f, 0.8, 1.0f };
    GLfloat specularLight[] = { 0.5f, 0.5f, 0.5f, 1.0f };
    GLfloat lightpos[] = {XL, YL, ZL, 0.};
    glLightfv(GL_LIGHT0, GL_AMBIENT, ambientLight);
    glLightfv(GL_LIGHT0, GL_DIFFUSE, diffuseLight);
    glLightfv(GL_LIGHT0, GL_SPECULAR, specularLight);
    glLightfv(GL_LIGHT0, GL_POSITION, lightpos);

    ///Test terrain texture splatting

    ///Load the textures
    sf::Image tex1;
    tex1.loadFromFile("texture1.png");
    sf::Image tex2;
    tex2.loadFromFile("texture2.png");

    ///Set the first texture
    GLuint grass;
    glGenTextures(1, &grass);
    glBindTexture(GL_TEXTURE_2D, grass);
    glTexEnvf(GL_TEXTURE_ENV, GL_TEXTURE_ENV_MODE, GL_REPLACE);
    glTexParameterf( GL_TEXTURE_2D, GL_TEXTURE_MIN_FILTER, GL_LINEAR );
    glTexParameterf( GL_TEXTURE_2D, GL_TEXTURE_MAG_FILTER, GL_LINEAR );
    glTexImage2D( GL_TEXTURE_2D, 0, GL_RGBA, tex1.getSize().x, tex1.getSize().y, 0, GL_RGBA, GL_UNSIGNED_BYTE, (const GLvoid*)tex1.getPixelsPtr() );

    ///Set the second texture
    GLuint dirt;
    glGenTextures(1, &dirt);
    glBindTexture(GL_TEXTURE_2D, dirt);
    glTexEnvf(GL_TEXTURE_ENV, GL_TEXTURE_ENV_MODE, GL_REPLACE);
    glTexParameterf( GL_TEXTURE_2D, GL_TEXTURE_MIN_FILTER, GL_LINEAR );
    glTexParameterf( GL_TEXTURE_2D, GL_TEXTURE_MAG_FILTER, GL_LINEAR );
    glTexImage2D( GL_TEXTURE_2D, 0, GL_RGBA, tex2.getSize().x, tex2.getSize().y, 0, GL_RGBA, GL_UNSIGNED_BYTE, (const GLvoid*)tex2.getPixelsPtr() );

    ///Start loop
    while( window.isOpen() ) {
        sf::Event event;
        while( window.pollEvent( event ) ) {
            if( event.type == sf::Event::Closed )
                window.close();
        }

        ///Clear buffer and set camera
        glClear( GL_COLOR_BUFFER_BIT | GL_DEPTH_BUFFER_BIT );
        glMatrixMode(GL_PROJECTION);
        glLoadIdentity();
        gluPerspective(50.0, 1.0, 1.0, 50);
        glMatrixMode(GL_MODELVIEW);
        glLoadIdentity();
        gluLookAt(1, 0, 1, 0, 0, 0, 0, 1, 0);

        ///Begin rendering quad             
        glEnable(GL_TEXTURE_2D);
        glBindTexture(GL_TEXTURE_2D, grass);
        ///I know that around here I should enable blending in order to get my two textures to mix, but I am not certain
        glBegin(GL_QUADS);

            glTexCoord2f(0, 0);
            glVertex3f(-0.5, -0.5, 0.0);

            glTexCoord2f(1, 0);
            glVertex3f(-0.5, 0.5, 0.0);

            glTexCoord2f(1, 1);
            glVertex3f(0.5, 0.5, 0.0);

            glTexCoord2f(0, 1);
            glVertex3f(0.5, -0.5, 0.0);
        glEnd();

        ///Reset env settings for SFML
        glTexEnvf(GL_TEXTURE_ENV, GL_TEXTURE_ENV_MODE, GL_MODULATE);

        window.display();
    }
    return 1;
}

Answer 1

As people mentioned above, use programmable pipeline, use shaders. In the fragment shader you can pass all the textures and interpolate between them based on vertex data you receive from the vertex shader.

Quick search gave me this result. I am sure that is what you need. Also take a look at this post. And this paper explains the technique very well.