[WIP] OLC Environment for GWX 2.0 (BETA)

[onelifecrisis]

The beta test is now closed to applications. Thanks to all who have offered to help!

This is a complete environment (graphic) upgrade for GWX 2.0. It changes lighting (and, by extension, lighting effects) and reflections, and all the environment colours, among other things. As well as making the game look nicer, the mod includes a lot fixes. As most of these simply make things look better I won't list them all, but some notable fixes are:

The sun and the moon are now the correct size.
The sky no longer flickers when water washes over the scope at night.
The horizon in the 16km Atmosphere has been fixed (the sea goes all the way to the horizon and the sky has haze).This mod will not affect any sensors. However, tiny adjustments have been made to the visual range of the player to bring it closer to the visual range of the crew. For example, in 8km mode your crew can see ~8.1km, but you can (normally) see about ~9.4km, making your crew seem blind in comparison. In OLC Environment you will be able to see ~9.0km (and your crew, being unaffected by the mod, will still see ~8.1km).

The beta is currently underway. The screenshots below were taken using the beta. They're unaltered in-game screenshots (no photoshopping ;)). Click on an image to enlarge it.

Cheers
OLC

http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3187/2333274507_7f9c85dedd.jpg (http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3187/2333274507_6ca4190498_o.jpg)

http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2297/2333274687_2221a88b08.jpg (http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2297/2333274687_560c02fdb1_o.jpg)

http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2156/2333274853_1af8a6175e.jpg (http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2156/2333274853_003a41226e_o.jpg)

http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2167/2334101800_45cfc640c7.jpg (http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2167/2334101800_a060199eda_o.jpg)

http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3110/2333275149_b02b2286b9.jpg (http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3110/2333275149_8a088400b7_o.jpg)

http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3246/2334101228_e4fa95a2f4.jpg (http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3246/2334101228_333a6427ff_o.jpg)

[Mikhayl]

Now that sounds interesting ! The only reason why I didn't install your night fix is precisely because I like watching the stars, but that blinking thing is still damn annoying.
Oh well now you make me wondering about how and what, can't wait for some shots :D

[Wilcke]

Looking forward to it! :sunny:

[Alex]

Quite interesting, Sir ! :hmm:

Let's see what you can come up with ! :up: :D

[Graf Paper]

OLC, you are indeed a genius! :know:

With all the brilliant mods being done around here lately, I'm going to need to have a scorecard just to keep up with it all!

I'd have to say that you're easily in the top ten modders list, at least in my book. :rock:

Could you do a more naturally dark night sky version as well? I'm not sure if it's simply due to the North Atlantic latitudes or GWX having a "light night" mod built in but it sure seems awfully bright during the night for me, like the sun has just set.

I would take a shot at darkening the sky, but I have absolutely no idea where to begin. :-?

Perhaps you could document your knowledge for the benefit of the community.

I just draw u-boat emblems. No matter how much I study it, all this "hex" and other esoteric matters of modding remain pure witchcraft to my calcifying neurons.

[Adriatico]

100% supported OLC... :yep:

After years of Env. tweaking, sharpening the clouds(?),...etc, we could barely say that latest Environment achievements look better than "original" ones...

With a full respect to technical achivements of GWX, we could hardly say the same for "meteorology" side :huh:

Looking forward to your effort... if you make 30% visual success compared to your sea textures - I'll be happy...

Go for it mate :up: :ping: :up: :ping:

[Adriatico]

Like your night sea :yep: :|\\ :yep:

Are these "compared screens" in the same weather condition, or you have sacrified clouds density ?

:roll:

[Venatore]

Good luck with this matey, I hope it works to your intent :up:

[onelifecrisis]

Like your night sea :yep: :|\\ :yep:

Are these "compared screens" in the same weather condition, or you have sacrified clouds density ?

:roll:

The screenies are taken in the *exact* same time/place/conditions as each other. As I said the cloud texture is stock which, yes, is less dense than the GWX texture. However, dense clouds suffer a problem in SH3 which is the all-too-visible line between the normal coloured clouds at the top and the fog-coloured clouds near the horizon. This is very visible in the screenies on the left, especially the one in the middle and the one at the bottom.

However I'm working on an alternative solution to this which may allow the best of both worlds... will keep you posted.

Edit: Thanks Ven!

[Mikhayl]

That looks most promising, the clouds in daylight look pretty real :hmm:
The night may be too blue as you said, but still way better looking than the original. I don't know if it's the screenshot or what but I like the "hazy" feel.
Very different bit of work than the GUI stuff but looks like it's also gonna turn into an "indispensable" :up:

[Alex]

Your night sky looks very cool, would look even better if you decide to darken it a bit later, but you still deserve congratulations, Sir ! :yep:

:up: :rock:

[Adriatico]

*However I'm working on an alternative solution to this which may allow the best of both worlds... will keep you posted.*

:up: :yep: :up: :yep: ...

[Alex]

Please do so, Sir ! :up:

[onelifecrisis]

Your night sky looks very cool, would look better if you decide to darken it a bit, but you still deserve congratulations, Sir ! :yep:

:up: :rock:

Thanks. The night sky itself is actually the exact same colour as the GWX one. :hmm: If you look at the screenies above and imagine the clouds aren't there in the GWX shot, you'll see what I mean. What I've done is made the night-time clouds almost the same colour as the night sky - which after all, they are (IRL) - and I've removed the black colour from the haze on the horizon. On a clear night the sky itself looks exactly the same as GWX except for the lack of black haze.

[Letum]

No more pitch black horizon!
We will be able to see ships at night without daft gamma adjustments!

OLC! I love you! ....errr....*cough*.....I mean I love your work! :D

[Pablo]

Hi!

This looks very promising. Were those screenshots taken with the 16km visibility mod in place?

Thanks!

Pablo

[onelifecrisis]

Hi!

This looks very promising. Were those screenshots taken with the 16km visibility mod in place?

Thanks!

Pablo

No the videos and screens are all 8km. :yep:

[johnno74]

Looking good.... I like the night (last) one.

IMHO its much more realistic than GWX. On a clear moonless night the sky is actually pretty bright once your eyes adjust - and extremely spectacular if you are well away from any light pollution. It should definitely be possible to spot silhouettes against the horizon, looks like your mod fixes this.

With a full moon and a clear sky visibility isn't really that much less than daylight...

[Letum]

Ahh, will there be a 16k version?
8k is unplayable!

[Steel_Tomb]

I agree, can we have a 16km version too? Its so hard playing with 8km!

[Uber Gruber]

Loved the dark nights, thanks for that alone!

Your clouds tend to fade into the distance better and give that "hazzy" look which looks real so thumbs up all round. Overall, its a big atmospherical improvement, well done mate:up:

Oh and another vote from here up in the peanut galley on having a GWX 2.1 16km version :know:

[onelifecrisis]

Yes 16km will be released as well. :yep:

[jmr]

It should definitely be possible to spot silhouettes against the horizon, looks like your mod fixes this.

I recently finished reading Iron Coffins and the author mentioned many times of spotting silhouettes against the horizon at night.

[Letum]

It should definitely be possible to spot silhouettes against the horizon, looks like your mod fixes this.
I recently finished reading Iron Coffins and the author mentioned many times of spotting silhouettes against the horizon at night.

I recently looked out of my window at night and I definitely silhouettes against the horizon. ;)

[onelifecrisis]

It should definitely be possible to spot silhouettes against the horizon, looks like your mod fixes this.
I recently finished reading Iron Coffins and the author mentioned many times of spotting silhouettes against the horizon at night.

I recently looked out of my window at night and I definitely silhouettes against the horizon. ;)

You looked at the outside world? :o

Maybe I should try that. You know, in the name of mod research... :hmm:

[Adriatico]

Hhm,...
This afternoon, I was looking trough my office window, into semi-cloudy February sky... haven't seen any high resolution clouds...

What's wrong with original SH3 clouds,...? Could they be increased, just a little bit... just the way they are ?

:roll: :|\\ :roll:

[Turm]

Very much looking forward to this one, OLC :up: I guess you couldn't manage to play the game very much before feeling the urge to get back to tweaking things ;)

I have never used your night sky fix as I didn't want to lose the stars. I don't think I've ever exploited or benefitted from the glitch so I've lived with it, but it is annoying.

I've always hated the blue-ish light from the below-the-horizon sun at night time, though, so if you can alter that I'll be most pleased. If that light came from the moon then all would be well, but it seems the sun is the only point light source which seems to generate a kind of 'moonlight', usually from a totally different direction than the moon is in :roll:

Your screenies look excellent! Best of luck with getting everything to balance out nicely.

[onelifecrisis]

I've always hated the blue-ish light from the below-the-horizon sun at night time, though, so if you can alter that I'll be most pleased. If that light came from the moon then all would be well, but it seems the sun is the only point light source which seems to generate a kind of 'moonlight', usually from a totally different direction than the moon is in :roll:

I hate it too! I think I mentioned it in post #1 but anyway, yes, that's fixed. :yep:

I agree that moonlight would be nice but SH3 doesn't do it so we'll have to live without it. :(

[Graf Paper]

Perhaps a moonlight effect could be "cheated" by cloning and attaching the sunlight to the moon and fiddling with the brightness/gamma/color so it's a pale, blue-white glow. :hmm:

Just a wild idea that popped into my skull.

[onelifecrisis]

Perhaps a moonlight effect could be "cheated" by cloning and attaching the sunlight to the moon and fiddling with the brightness/gamma/color so it's a pale, blue-white glow. :hmm:

Just a wild idea that popped into my skull.

Been tried before with no joy IIRC.

[onelifecrisis]

OK the mod is starting to take shape. After messing around with just about everything to see what can be improved and what can't, I reverted right back to stock settings and started over with a clear direction. That direction is as follows.

There are effectively 6 times of day in SH3. They are:

High Noon
Morning/Afternoon
After Sunrise/Before Sunset
Before Sunrise/After Sunset
Early Evening/Early Morning
Night

The Night time is being completely reworked from scratch with the aforementioned fixes (which are also being applied to the Early Evening/Early Morning time where appropriate). Since we don't have light-sourced moonlight in SH3, and since even bodged moonlight would only look nearly-correct once in a blue moon (haha) I've decided to set the colours appropriate for a moonless or partial-moon night (note: a half moon is only 10% of the brightness of a full moon, meaning that the average brightness of the moon over a full month is negligible even if you assume that every night is a clear night - see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Moon#Observation).

The other five times of day will get the following enhancements:
- Fixed horizon haze colours for the 'Partialy Cloudy' weather type (this is the only weather type where they need fixing IMO).
- Fixed sun size.
- Reworked sky/sun reflections using alpha channel.
- Better cloud textures and reflections.

Screenies to follow.

[Adriatico]

*Screenies to follow*
:o :roll: :huh: :o :roll:

:ping:

[Uber Gruber]

"The Screenies!".....at a cinema near you..now!

[onelifecrisis]

Sorry that there aren't any screenies yet - as soon as I have something to show that actually looks the way its meant to, I'll show it (off). :cool:

[Venatore]

What on earth would possess a developer to code seperate ambient light settings for different surfaces in the first place is beyond the understanding of this modder.

They do this to make us work just that little bit harder :doh:

[onelifecrisis]

What on earth would possess a developer to code seperate ambient light settings for different surfaces in the first place is beyond the understanding of this modder.

They do this to make us work just that little bit harder :doh:

:lol:

Ven, you've modded crew uniforms... any idea where this setting might be? I thought maybe it was the ambient colour of the bump map which was causing the problem but its not. Now I'm trying to find the ambient light settings for the base (normal) textures of the uniforms - do you know where it is?

[Venatore]

Sorry matey this is a new mod threat too me, I'll start looking my end, we will meet in the middle :arrgh!:

[onelifecrisis]

Sorry matey this is a new mod threat too me, I'll start looking my end, we will meet in the middle :arrgh!:

:up: :up:

[onelifecrisis]

Done so far:

Changed the size of the sun and moon to RL values. *1
Made the reflectivity of the water as realistic as possible and fixed the ugly square-shaped reflections which sometimes occur. *2
Made new cloud textures with both cumulus and stratus clouds by simply combining the stock and GWX textures.
Used stock sky textures for the daytime and early evening, and GWX sky texture for the new night environment (all oceans).
Used stock sky/sun reflection textures for the daytime and made new textures for the night time (all oceans).
Used OLC Improved Wave Textures for the wave textures.
Made new environment colours using stock colours as a starting point. About 150 of the 800+ environment colours have been changed from the stock settings but most of the changes are very subtle. The most noticable changes are at night.
Fixed the bug causing a flickering sky when water washes over the scope.
Removed sunshine/fake moonlight at night time (ships are now visible only as silhouttes). *3*Footnotes:

The sun and moon in SH3 are huge! The SH3 moon is 8 times bigger than it should be! The SH3 sun actually changes size (artistic license I suppose) so that its 8 times bigger than it should be at sunrise/sunset, and only 4 times bigger than it should be at high noon. In OLC Environment I've set the sun and moon to be their proper size (which is just half a degree wide - that's one sixth of the width of Orion's belt) at all times. At first the sun and moon (especially the moon as it has no halo) will look very tiny indeed compared to what you're used to, but this isn't just realism for realisms sake. You now get an accurate sense of perspective - the horizon really feels like its 8km away, and the clouds feel like they're high and big, not close and tiny. The sun halo (glow) now looks much better in comparison to the sun itself, especially when partial clouds come along because the sun size affects the behaviour of its halo when it is shining through clouds, and the new, realistic ratio of sun-to-cloud size now allows the sun shine at varying brightness levels when it is partially visible, instead of the stock behaviour which is to spend much of its time being a strangely flat, not particularly bright disc whenever it is behind a wisp of cloud - an example of this comparison can be seen in the screenshots below.
"As realistic as possible" is definitely subjective in this case because SH3's quirky light modelling, combined with its very low polygon count on the ocean surface, means that truly realistic reflections are probably not possible. I've therefore worked with specific camera views - the on-deck camera and periscope/binocular/UZO views - and tried to get those as good as possible. It's all about angles, you see. From those cameras you'll never have a particularly high viewpoint and things will look great. However if you switch to external view and put the camera up high then the reflections in OLC Environment won't be ideal (though still not terrible).
There is still an issue with the "base ambience" of the crew uniforms. I'll keep trying to fix it.Still to do:

Environment colours for overcast/stormy weather conditions.Screenshots:
[out of date - removed]


Remember it's still WIP.
OLC

[Mikhayl]

:o !! Wow !

(kinda make me speechless)

[onelifecrisis]

Thanks :ping:

[Boris]

Good stuff!

This won't be compatible with Reece's atlantic water though, will it?

[onelifecrisis]

Good stuff!

This won't be compatible with Reece's atlantic water though, will it?

Sadly not. :(

You'll be able to use the OLC Environment colours with Reece's SH4 Scene for SH3 and you'll get my bug fixes (and my colours of course) combined with all the cool looking effects from Reece's scene mod (though I don't recommend this to GWX players because his scene file seems to have adverse effects on GWX sensors, which is a real shame because it looks stunning).

You'll also be able to do the reverse i.e. combine my scene file (which does the reflections, but not the night colours and fixes) with Reece's green colours.

What you can't do is combine all his colours and effects with all my fixes and effects. Sorry.

[thesarunat]

Very nice, thanks a lot :sunny:

[Philipp_Thomsen]

well olc, your water really looks like water. Thanks a lot for the effort, Im sure this mod will be a must have, and no other scene mod will be necessary. Looks fanta stic. :D

So can u tell us when this baby will be under our grasp?

[onelifecrisis]

In a few days I hope but it depends. There are some quirks to fix...

[joegrundman]

OLC, mate, this is looking awesome :drool :up:

[Philipp_Thomsen]

Yes 16km will be released as well. :yep:

1) OLC, can you tell us what are all the diferences between 8km and 16km atmospheres? I've heard that the rendering goes to 30km, so this 8/16 changes what? Visuals only? Sensors?

2) The screenshots on the page 2 are awesome, however I've noticed that there's no screenshot in storm conditions. Can you post some stormy screenshots? The water must be fantastic.

[onelifecrisis]

Thanks Joe :D

1) OLC, can you tell us what are all the diferences between 8km and 16km atmospheres? I've heard that the rendering goes to 30km, so this 8/16 changes what? Visuals only? Sensors?

I'm not sure why you're asking me this. I'm not modifying the atmospheres, I'm just making my mod compatible with the existing GWX atmospheres, namely 8km and 16km.

To try to answer you anyway, from what I know the 16km atmosphere doubles the visibility range (allowing you to see ship masts/smoke over the horizon) and doubles some of the AI sensor ranges for both your crew and those of other ships. When I say "some of the sensors" ... well visual detection ranges are doubled for sure, but I don't know about radar. Sonar seems to be unaffected but that's just based on experience.

2) The screenshots on the page 2 are awesome, however I've noticed that there's no screenshot in storm conditions. Can you post some stormy screenshots? The water must be fantastic.

Thanks, but...


Still to do:

Environment colours for overcast/stormy weather conditions.

...taken from the same post as the screenies. :damn:

The screenshots just before and just after sunset show the sea in a moderate wind - I can't remember the m/s but it was just strong enough for some wave textures to show (you can see them if you look closely). However in really strong winds there is hardly any reflection on the waves anyway, so the stormy water in OLC Environment looks quite similar to the stormy water in any other mod (or even stock) apart from the wave textures of course.

[Philipp_Thomsen]

Ops... sorry there, OLC... I thought you were modelling the atmospheres too... But thanks for your answer anyway! :up:

Don't be so modest, Im sure the overcast/storm part of your mod will kickass as well! :up:

(the wave textures are the most important part, IMO)

[Uber Gruber]

I like it OLC, the screenies look good. My worry is that you might be walking into a minefield here what with GWX 8K and 16K and the existing SH4 effects for SH3. I think your stance of making your mod compatible with both GWX 8K and 16K is a good one and should help to avoid some noise.

Right, now my oppinions on the screenies...I definately want a darker night but the night shot in your screenies looks, well, very very dark. I'm just wondering if all nights will look as dark as this ? If so then I would suggest having a bit of "false" light coming from somewhere just so the sea has some subtle hue to it. Its my experience that the sea always has a sheen to it except for the most pitch black of nights (overcast thus no stars and no moon and in the middle of the night). Normally there is always some incidential light from either sun over the horizon reflected of clouds (if any) and moon (even if behind clouds) or stars (on less cloudy nights).

Right, thats my tuppence worth.....i'm off to the pub to get drunk!

Cheers...:up:

[onelifecrisis]

More screenies will come soon UG, and you'll see that the sea does have quite a shine on a clear or partially overcast night. :yep: However on a fully overcast (stormy) night you really won't be able to see much at all.

I don't see any "minefield". :hmm:

[onelifecrisis]

I should address this:

I'm just wondering if all nights will look as dark as this?

NO. :)

The sun has to get 15 degrees (or more) over the horizon for it to get that dark. 15 degrees may not sound like much but in fact it doesn't happen all that often. In the north atlantic, for example, you'll never see a night that dark during summer, though all nights will be that dark in middle of the winter in the middle of the night.

When the sun is out of sight but less than 15 degrees over the horizon the environment is like what you see in the screenies 5th from the top.

Most of the time, there's some sunlight coming from somewhere (even if the sun is out of sight). My changes affect the very darkest times of the very darkest nights - not all nights everywhere.

Hope that's clear now :up:

[Uber Gruber]

Thanks for explaining that....thumbs up all the way mate.:up:

[Phoenix3000]

Looking Good OLC!! :up:

I'll definitely be installing this!

Px3000

[onelifecrisis]

This mod is starting to look pretty stunning if I say so myself! :sunny:

I'm going to post an alpha download - tonight hopefully, otherwise tomorrow. Anyone who wants to can download it, test it, and provide feedback. :up:

[Ivan Putski]

Sounds good OLC, looking forward to it, thanks. Puts:up:

[Mikhayl]

No doubt I'll be waiting too :)

[Philipp_Thomsen]

MEEEEE MEEEE!!! OVER HERE!!! GIMME GIMME!!! :rotfl:

I'LL PLAY ALL NIGHT AND GIVE YOU ALL THE FEEDBACK YOU WANT!!!

IM DYING TO TEST THIS!!! :up:

[onelifecrisis]

lol :D

[onelifecrisis]

Alpha uploaded. Please see post #1 for details. Feeback (ideally with screenies showing any problems) is very welcome please!

OLC :ping:

[Philipp_Thomsen]

And the first download is mine!!! Can hardly belive it...

Do I have to be in base to activate this mod? (Im pretty almost quite sure I dont...) :rotfl:

[onelifecrisis]

And the first download is mine!!! Can hardly belive it...

Do I have to be in base to activate this mod? (Im pretty almost quite sure I dont...) :rotfl:

No, but you have to save and exit. :up:

[Philipp_Thomsen]

First day review:

I had a save game, quadrant BE63, overcast. Here's a pic around 3 P.M.

http://img180.imageshack.us/img180/3995/resizeofsh3img292200823gi2.jpg

Wolfpacking with GWX 2.0 + OLC Environment, quadrant BE63, carrer mode, 1940, around 3 P.M.


Must say, OLC, this new environment is amazing, the sky really looks like a sky, but the ocean, oh my god. On the bridge looking to all that ocean, you almost feel the wet salty water in your face. Just amazing. This one is past midnight.

http://img180.imageshack.us/img180/145/resizeofsh3img292200805tf9.jpg

The new environment took a pretty good hit on the FPS. Before that I could easily get 25-30 FPS on the outside, but now I couldn't go past 20, with the avarage being around 15. But I wouldn't bother on that, since my computer is damn old (athlon xp 3000 barton, 1gb ram dual channel, geforce fx 5700LE 256mb). My new computer arrives in two weeks and I'll be able to test this better, with AA, and AF (yes, my graphic card is set all to minimum/low/off and still looks freaking amazing). This one is around 7 P.M.

http://img254.imageshack.us/img254/3672/resizeofsh3img292200808lb6.jpg

The horizon now looks like a horizon. It's all just the way it was suposed to be, OLC. I wish I had something to complain about so you can fix, but unfortunally I think you hitted perfection on the first attempt this time. :up:

[onelifecrisis]

Thanks! Please keep testing when you can :) I already found some things that don't look right.

Have you seen a pitch dark night yet? It can get a lot darker than that screeny you posted! [Edit: sorry I just saw the second screeny - looks good but see my note about the moon below ;)] I really could use feedback on how the dark nights look, I think they still need work. Try the scapa flow mission (as soon as it starts just fast forward to around midnight) for a partially cloudy night, or try the XXI mission (evade the task force and then fast forward to night time again) for a clear night. Bismarck mission will fast forward to a stormy night.

I think the dark night colours still need some polish... the ship wake / sea foam colour probably needs brightening a bit, and maybe the reflection on the water too :hmm: I'll keep at it. Any constructive criticism you have is very welcome.

Oh and yes, the framerate will decrease but that's due to one simple setting so it'll be easy enough to release "low spec" versions which don't affect FPS and which look almost the same.

One other thing, to anyone reading: I accidentally put the wrong size moon in the 16km version. :oops: It should be half that size. The 8km version is correct. That'll be fixed in the beta.

[Philipp_Thomsen]

Thanks! Please keep testing when you can :) I already found some things that don't look right.

Have you seen a pitch dark night yet? It can get a lot darker than that screeny you posted! [Edit: sorry I just saw the second screeny - looks good but see my note about the moon below ;)] I really could use feedback on how the dark nights look, I think they still need work. Try the scapa flow mission (as soon as it starts just fast forward to around midnight) for a partially cloudy night, or try the XXI mission (evade the task force and then fast forward to night time again) for a clear night. Bismarck mission will fast forward to a stormy night.

I think the dark night colours still need some polish... the ship wake / sea foam colour probably needs brightening a bit, and maybe the reflection on the water too :hmm: I'll keep at it. Any constructive criticism you have is very welcome.

Oh and yes, the framerate will decrease but that's due to one simple setting so it'll be easy enough to release "low spec" versions which don't affect FPS and which look almost the same.

One other thing, to anyone reading: I accidentally put the wrong size moon in the 16km version. :oops: It should be half that size. The 8km version is correct. That'll be fixed in the beta.

Well, the dark night reeeeeally looks dark in here.. I had to pitch a little bit my gamma to see my crewman 3 foot away from me in the bridge. But my monitor is old, 10 years, so he have a brightness issue, so you cant really rely on me for finetunning your night specs. My gamma is soooo messy that I cant even figure out which is the standard position anymore. Screw it, my new computer with a 19" wide screen lcd monitor arrives soon and soon I'll be able to tell you something more concrete!

[Adriatico]

On my office LCD seems to be very, very dark... night invisible :dead:

Have to try at home PC:o

:ping: :ping: :ping:

[Philipp_Thomsen]

Even without a moon, thats not suposed to look that dark in a clear sky. In a overcast, thats ok. With a full moon and clear weather, thats suposed to look very bright (in the middle of the atlantic).

But I dont know if the moon changes anything in the brightness of the night in sh3. OLC told me it dont. I wonder...

I've edited the post with the pictures indicating the approximated time of the day that originated the screenshot, for clarification.

[mikaelanderlund]

The dark overcast night is very very dark. I can't see my crewmen:88) . Using samsung SyncMaster 940BF LCD.

Mikael

[Adriatico]

I have the same LCD...
I'm afraid that we have a problem, again...:hmm: :cry:

I know well - a difference between clear and overcast night... in a darkest night you should sea your crew and edges of your deck.

( When fishing with a boat in a pitch dark, I could se near by islands, let alone my friend in a boat )

There should be some "alternative way" to light it up... :hmm:

:ping: :ping: :ping:

[Uber Gruber]

Night time on LCD screens will appear a lot darker than on CRT screens. OLC, do you have access to a resonable LCD screen ? If so then it might be an idea to release an LCD version of the mod.

Just an idea.

[Mikhayl]

@UG : on my CRT an overcast night is as dark as you say, I can barely make out the two guys on my side and I can't see the UZO. It's not a CRT/LCD glitch, OLC made that type of night that dark on purpose.
Now I'm not saying "don't change it", just pointing this out. For the actual darkness level I'll let the guys with that kind of real experience help adjust it if needed :up:

[Uber Gruber]

I'm going to test this on my LCD at home this eve and hopefully will be able to provide more feedback.

@OLC: Just curious but will this mod be compatible with Reece's "SH4 Scene for SH3" mod ? Aparently, Reece's mod is compatible with GWX 8K but not 16K. I ask because although i've not used Reece's mod yet I have heard some positive comments.

Thanks...

[Philipp_Thomsen]

I'm going to test this on my LCD at home this eve and hopefully will be able to provide more feedback.

@OLC: Just curious but will this mod be compatible with Reece's "SH4 Scene for SH3" mod ? Aparently, Reece's mod is compatible with GWX 8K but not 16K. I ask because although i've not used Reece's mod yet I have heard some positive comments.

Thanks...

It's not compatible, once it replaces the same files. Yes, Reece's Scene is very very nice, but a little unrealistic. The ocean looks like a big lake with no waves and there's too much reflections, the sea looks like a big mirror. Its DAMN beautiful, tho, much more then OLC's, but unrealistic.

OLC, this dark is damn dark. How about pitch it up a bit?

[Letum]

T
Oh and yes, the framerate will decrease but that's due to one simple setting so it'll be easy enough to release "low spec" versions which don't affect FPS and which look almost the same.




Please do this. :)
*kisses*

[onelifecrisis]

Letum, gerroff!

UG, I will say this once more and then won't discuss the issue again. SH4 scene for SH3 is "compatible" with GWX in that it won't CTD. It is by far the best visual enchancement available for SH3 in my opinion, and I should know - I've spent a lot of time looking at it. In terms of eye candy it is 10 times better than this mod will ever be or is ever intended to be. This mod is ultimately a bunch of "fixes" or "tweaks" to the existing environment, that's all. My primary focus is to get rid of things that look wrong to me, and my secondary goal is to make GWX look a bit nicer without breaking any sensors (or anything else for that matter).

I love eye candy. If SH4 scene for SH3 were, in my opinion, compatible with GWX, then I certainly wouldn't be doing half of the work I'm doing on this mod. Now if you want to know more about Reece's SH4 Scene for SH3, there's a thread right next door for it. I've said my opinion, it's just my opinion and I didn't like saying it - and by the way my opinion is based on play-testing and some basic knowledge about SH3 sensors (I am not a "hardcore" modder) and so I could be wrong. I've wished and wished I was wrong. If I am wrong i.e. my previous tests turn out to have been jinxed or something, then the reflections part of this mod will be dropped like a hot potato and I'll be asking Reece for permissions before you know it.

[Adriatico]

Please OLC,

Get focused on your night light and visibility...

:yep: :o :yep: :o

SH4 scene for SH3 is, more or less, determined mod... some sailors like it - some prefer default GWX, there are no miracles to be done...

In my, modest opinion, without some kind of Sea transparency - it will never reach full compatibility with SH3...

(I've tried it all, ...seriously :o )

:ping:

Don't leave us in a blind dark, with a "bat crew" shouting - ship
spotteeeed :nope: :dead: :nope: :dead::nope: !?!

[onelifecrisis]

Yes, the night needs brightening, especially the storm night where the crew can see a ship you can't - that's just daft.

I'll do some more work on it over the weekend if I get a chance. :yep:

[java`s revenge]

Great mod!

Fps is about 46. No problems with it.

[KeldorKatarn]

Tested this a bit and although it looks quite good it kinda makes the waves very aliased. The triangle edges are a lot rougher somehow..

[onelifecrisis]

Tested this a bit and although it looks quite good it kinda makes the waves very aliased. The triangle edges are a lot rougher somehow..

Yes it will if you've got AA turned off. Try turning it on?

[onelifecrisis]

I've brightened the night in clear weather conditions to this:
http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3129/2301203478_9ff3f5cdae_o.jpg

How does it look?

Partially overcast, which I'm tweaking now, I'm thinking will be either the same light level or possibly a bit darker but either way brighter than it is in the alpha. Stormy night I'm still: :hmm:

[Philipp_Thomsen]

This looks pretty good. Looks like a real night, you can see the horizon.

But OLC, this dark is a very complicated thing... on CRT it may look ok, but on LCD will be too dark, so it will never be perfect to all players, since some people have CRT monitors and others have LCD monitors... its a very complicated deal. I think that the best you can do is to set the darkness of the night in between ideal for CRT and LCD, and each individual will turn the brightness of their own monitor up or down, according to necessity.

Great work, keep it up! :up:

[Alex]

possibly a bit darker

Agreed. :hmm:

:rock:

[onelifecrisis]

@Philip

A lot of people make the mistake of thinking that modders are trying to please everyone. I'm certainly not - and even if I was, I'd fail - but constructive criticism is useful nonetheless and sometimes great ideas come out of it. So, don't mistake me asking people what they think for a statement of intent to please everyone - I'm just trying to get some brainstorming going. :yep:

Right now all I'm getting is "too bright" or "too dark" but hopefully complaints will get more specific as the mod progresses e.g. "too blue" or "the wake is too dark" or "the horizon looks wrong" and tweaks can start to happen.

[onelifecrisis]

I would send you a PM OLC but you need to delete some old messages!:yep:

Done!

[KeldorKatarn]

Tested this a bit and although it looks quite good it kinda makes the waves very aliased. The triangle edges are a lot rougher somehow..
Yes it will if you've got AA turned off. Try turning it on?

Wasn't meant as a complaint. Just wanted to point out that aliasing is very visible and more pronounced than without the MOD. AA does easily fix this of course, but AA is probably a must when using the MOD.

Otherwise I like this very much. Btw...is the sun in 16k the right size?

[onelifecrisis]

AA is probably a must when using the MOD.

Yes, for the "high machine spec" version (which will have distance waves rather like those in the alpha) I agree.

Btw...is the sun in 16k the right size?

Yes I do believe so, but I could check it if you think its wrong. It should be half a degree in diameter. You can check this by looking at it through a scope and counting marks, but how many marks will depend on whether any of your other mods affect the scope zoom level.

The moon is the wrong size in the 16k version - it's supposed to be smaller.

[onelifecrisis]

New daytime overcast look:
http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3268/2301381934_b7eacdec02_o.jpg

New dark night overcast look:
http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2192/2301373384_057f144abb_o.jpg

And one with lightning ;)
http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3093/2300580133_7121216e8c_o.jpg

[Philipp_Thomsen]

Now everyone is probably wondering "HOW THE HELL DID OLC MANAGE TO SCREENSHOT A LIGHTNING???"

The guy is as fast as a bullet... :rotfl:

You are right, OLC. Sometimes I forget that you are not doing this for the comunity, but for you. Maybe I'm too nice, always trying to please everyone when I mod. But since you are looking for a brainstorm, I think the water is a little bit too blue. How about getting a little more black into the mix? Try just to see how the water will look like, I think you might be surprised (in a good way).

:up:

[onelifecrisis]

Now everyone is probably wondering "HOW THE HELL DID OLC MANAGE TO SCREENSHOT A LIGHTNING???"

The guy is as fast as a bullet... :rotfl:

I cheated. ;)

I think the water is a little bit too blue. How about getting a little more black into the mix?

On the clear night or the storm? Or both?

[NAZ2222]

First of all, great work OLC!! I love your mod, I just wish it had that green colour... but from my testing I have enabled OLC env>Reece scene>green colour, and it works, your night sky, green colour and great reflections seems to work! Am I missing some detail? no ctd no nothing, I'm glad it functions, but I fear that something could be in conflict and I'm losing some effects. Used JSGME by the way
could you test? or someone else
thankx

Keep up the good work

[onelifecrisis]

First of all, great work OLC!! I love your mod, I just wish it had that green colour... but from my testing I have enabled OLC env>Reece scene>green colour, and it works, your night sky, green colour and great reflections seems to work! Am I missing some detail? no ctd no nothing, I'm glad it functions, but I fear that something could be in conflict and I'm losing some effects. Used JSGME by the way
could you test? or someone else
thankx

Keep up the good work

If you enabled them in that order you're basically getting Reece's mod and that's all. I'm glad you like Reece's night sky and reflections, but this thread is for the OLC Env :p ;) :lol:

[Adriatico]

It is a great piece of mod, OLC :up:

The more complex it is, the more opinions and discussion it rises...

Overcast night is too dark, but it is a touch of reality... Don't think that without moon, stars or city lights you could have a lot of activity in 1940...:ping:

On the other side, it's question - where is a "common ground" between real life and simulation fun ? :know:

Afterall, you could offer two light options within download,... just to avoid pages -discussing screen settings...

[NAZ2222]

Due to my complete ignorance in the files that compose the mod, I must admit that you are probably right! but the the night sky is clearly yours, with was the thing that I most hated in reece's mod! It would be awsome if you could team up with with reece and do a more realistic and beautifull .dat ! I know that you are doing this mod for youself, and for that thankx again for letting us use it!

cheers ;)

[onelifecrisis]

It is a great piece of mod, OLC :up:

The more complex it is, the more opinions and discussion it rises...

Overcast night is too dark, but it is a touch of reality... Don't think that without moon, stars or city lights you could have a lot of activity in 1940...:ping:

On the other side, it's question - where is a "common ground" between real life and simulation fun ? :know:

For me, fun decreases if I have to put a lot of conscious effort into suspending my disbelief. Doing a surface approach on a convoy that can't see me in spite of the night being almost as bright as the day is one example of when suspending my disbelief becomes hard.

Afterall, you could offer two light options within download,... just to avoid pages -discussing screen settings...

I'd rather have pages than go down the blasted "two version" route. True, I said there'd be 8/16 and high/low spec versions but that's because once I've made, for example, 8/high, it takes all of 5 minutes to convert that to 16/high, 8/low, and 16/low. But creating two different night environments is not a 5 minute job - heck, just creating one night environment that looks right to me is taking me longer than I'd anticipated. :roll:

[MONOLITH]

Done!


OLC, Did you get my PM from a few minutes ago, or did it get caught in the mass delete?

[Erich Topp]

The mod is great, many other bugs disappeared (blue color on waves when the sky is grey, for example, and false moon mirroring in the water in cloudy night). But nights are too dark on both of my monitors - LCD and CRT. The human eye has an ability to adopt. This cannot be done in current game engine, but the only wish to this excellent mod is making night a little bit brighter. Or concept of "night surface attacks" becomes useless. Actually any night attack becomes. Also I noticed, that crew heads in the night are dark, but the hands are bright and seeable. Looks like we have africans in crew)) Thanks anyway, OLC. The best enviroment mod ever i guess..

[onelifecrisis]

I got it MONOLITH :up:

The mod is great, many other bugs disappeared (blue color on waves when the sky is grey, for example, and false moon mirroring in the water in cloudy night). But nights are too dark on both of my monitors - LCD and CRT. The human eye has an ability to adopt. This cannot be done in current game engine, but the only wish to this excellent mod is making night a little bit brighter. Or concept of "night surface attacks" becomes useless. Actually any night attack becomes. Also I noticed, that crew heads in the night are dark, but the hands are bright and seeable. Looks like we have africans in crew)) Thanks anyway, OLC. The best enviroment mod ever i guess..

Well spotted on the hands - its on my fix list already (they are also too dark in the daytime, I'll fix that too).

(believable) night surface attacks are one of my main objectives, and in the current, brighter version they are very doable (unless you play in a sunlit room, perhaps - but I don't). I've experienced many nights far away from artificial light (including some at sea in the Atlantic, actually) and I'm trying to simulate that. Yes, the eye adjusts - but we're not cats :lol: and on a dark but clear night, most things are only visible as silhuettes when you see them against the sky/horizon (which is how we see ships in SH3).

So far I've posted screenies of grey subs. I'll post one of a white destroyer in a sec...

[Philipp_Thomsen]

Looks like we have africans in crew


:rotfl: :rotfl: :rotfl: :rotfl: :rotfl:

Long time since I've laughed this much...

About the ocean, OLC, too blue during the most bright part of the day. Specially the morning. I think that if you put more black and green instead of blue and grey, it will get better.

[onelifecrisis]

About the ocean, OLC, too blue during the most bright part of the day. Specially the morning. I think that if you put more black and green instead of blue and grey, it will get better.

Post a screeny please?

[Philipp_Thomsen]

About the ocean, OLC, too blue during the most bright part of the day. Specially the morning. I think that if you put more black and green instead of blue and grey, it will get better.

Post a screeny please?

Oh jesus... I was going to watch a movie and crash... just to think on that looooading tiiiiiiiiiiiiimes.... :shifty:

you'll pay for this!

[Philipp_Thomsen]

Here you go... this is 8 o'clock in the morning. The only time of the day that the water dont look like water. (IMHO)

http://img301.imageshack.us/img301/6862/sh3img292200801450218nn2.jpg

I think that if you put a little bit more of green/black, it will be superb!

[Gezur(Arbeit)]

lol it looks good.... (the water)

[Adriatico]

Water looks good...

More green ? No way, mate, as long as you have a reddish tone of morning sky - it could be only less green...

Red lite or reflection can not result in more green apperience... no way.

[Erich Topp]

Well.. Thanks for answering, just waiting for v.2... And one question - what exactly you've done with body01.dat and body2.dat? Some model lighting features I guess? I just found out, that included bump-map in the body01.dat do not fits GWX (and Fubar's) crew skins well - some misplaced button "shadows" etc. Changing it on original GWX map is just a couple of minutes, but maybe you didn't noticed. Waiting for update...sir)

Philipp_Thomsen: I am crying, looking on your screenshots... What system is it? Mate, throw this old coffee grinder into garbage. 12 fps... It's slide show))) You can buy PC, which will be pretty good for SH3, for a 400 E... Not a big sum)

[KeldorKatarn]

Agreed. I've seen the ocean in morning light and evening. Colors range from reddish to even something like golden, but never green :P

edit: Oh yes.. what Erich said.. how does this affect MODs like Fubars crew skins?

[Erich Topp]

I didn't found anything critical, excluding misplacing of bump-mapping on models, which can be easily fixed with repacking .dat with old GWX .tga.
One thing I forgot to say: what do you think about "white nights" in high altitudes? Iceland "gap" is placed not far away from polar circle, and I am living in St. Petersburg myself - there is enough light to read in June nights, for example.

PS: What an excellent mod. Continuing to wonder me more and more, in playing process new features open in sight. Btw, mod fits well with WeatherFix 2.0 - no installation problems))

[Philipp_Thomsen]

OK, that was the final proof i needed... the water on the picutre looks like garbage to me, but to you all looks good. That means exactly what I was fearing: my system is destroying the game. I'll buy a new computer.

Problem is, in Brazil everything is much more expensive. I mounted a computer (Quad Core Q6600, asus striker, 2X2gb corsair ddr2 800, asus geforce 8800gt 1gb, 500gb sata 2 seagate 7200.11, 19" lcd widescreen samsung) and it will cost me R$ 3,800, which is equal to (in american dollars) $2.200, quite expensive. If I buy the parts on, lets say, buy.com, I'll pay $1,200 dollars, but then I'll have to pay more 60% taxes when it enters Brazil. This country sux!

So does my current computer.

[Adriatico]

Take it easy, mate...

The fact that reddish morning lightning could not generate a green reflection (except on Maracana or Wembley grass...) is not the reason to "fire out" $2.200 for a new PC...

Anyway, OLC painting has nothing to do with CoreQuad6600 CPU or 4G of RAM...

Maybe you simple have a different visual experience with a deep green sea - due to sandy floor and many rivers at Brasil coast ?

As far as SH3 is concerned, there is no mod that requires such a monster of PC, SHIV is different thing...
The only real "bottleneck" is HDD speed of reading (loading) - but, for the time being, there is nothing we could do about it...

[Gezur(Arbeit)]

LOL I payed 550€ for my PC (AMD X2 Dualcore 6000+, 2 GB ram, 8600 GB nvidia 512 mb) and SH§ runs good only near land or big convois you can not go furthan than 256x TC without "lags"

And...keep in mind...this game is not for Dualcore.

[Adriatico]

Finally, OLC, had my Saturday afternoon to try your 8km version...

Simply, it is gorgeous, visual feeling between natural sky and live sea surface is the best so far...:up: :up: :up:

Time 16.02

http://img88.imageshack.us/img88/7551/11602fw9.jpg

As I said, feeling of water under sky, with reflections and surface is great :o

Time 16.09

http://img180.imageshack.us/img180/9440/21609gw1.jpg

As the night falls, above features are still realistic, better than anything before.... :o , but lack some orange color, sunset should not be grey...

Time 17.50

http://img179.imageshack.us/img179/3518/31750xl0.jpg


Night, as said before, is very realistic, but still too dark... even for a screenshot...

Early morning, again, gorgeous realistic visuals, but lacks a color of dawn (6-7 P.M. must have some red tone of east sky... )

7.02

http://img222.imageshack.us/img222/4982/4702lv1.jpg

After 7.25, everything is perfect again, movie screens, color again... :up:

7.25

http://img526.imageshack.us/img526/9476/5725xe0.jpg

Congratulations OLC, if you polish some details, you'll make SH5 by yourself...

I grew up at sea and served in Navy... and simply, your visuals balance is a "real thing".

Hope you'll find enough time in a weeks to come...

:ping:

[Philipp_Thomsen]

I agree, the visuals are amazing! (the screenshots of other people are amazing, so my computer is the problem).

Just to close the subject on my computer and not hijack this, for me makes no sense to buy a computer a "little" better, just to run sh3. If I'll spend some bucks on a computer, then lets do it right, buy the best cost/performance parts, makes no sense to spend money on a little better machine.

Adriatico is right, a little more orange on sunsets and the rest is perfect! :up:

I was going to say something about sky reflections, (I'm used to reece's scene) but with so many little waves, theres no how to have any reflections. And thats the way its suposed to be, the ocean is not suposed to look like a lake. Its perfect!

[Adriatico]

Just a small, short, friendly advise...

WinVista is not yet a mature product, DirectX10 is still to be polished, there are new graphic cards with a "price drop" in a next few months,.... etc.

Do not upgrade yet...
You will spend a money and find out that... DirectX10 drops your FPS 20%, you can't play Flight SimulatorX in a full settings, cant't play Cryses in a full settings, Oleg's Battle of Britain is not even on a horizon,...etc.

I know very, very experiecend "gurus" in gaming hardware/software and beleive me... it wil take a few more months till WinWista and DirectX10 gets in mature phase :down:

My apologise to OLC for "off topic" post :oops: :cry: :oops:

[Philipp_Thomsen]

Just a small, short, friendly advise...

WinVista is not yet a mature product, DirectX10 is still to be polished, there are new graphic cards with a "price drop" in a next few months,.... etc.

Do not upgrade yet...
You will spend a money and find out that... DirectX10 drops your FPS 20%, you can't play Flight SimulatorX in a full settings, cant't play Cryses in a full settings, Oleg's Battle of Britain is not even on a horizon,...etc.

I know very, very experiecend "gurus" in gaming hardware/software and beleive me... it wil take a few more months till WinWista and DirectX10 gets in mature phase :down:

My apologise to OLC for "off topic" post :oops: :cry: :oops:

I agree with you completly. I'm delaying this new pc for months now, waiting for everything to get in its right place. Even if I do buy this computer soon, I'll stick with windows XP pro and directx 9 until the absolute breaking point. Its just too soon, you are losing more then earning if you change to directx 10 now. DONT DO IT, PEOPLE!

Again, OLC, sorry for the hijack attempt! :oops:

[Erich Topp]

Also noticed, that ship wakes and "tails" on the water are too bright in the winter dawn, when it's already dark (18.00), but wake is bright. Much brighter than "foam" from moving ship. Most noticeable on torpedo boats... I mean, texture part of wake, not drop one.

[onelifecrisis]

Thanks for the feedback!

Away from home right now but to answer some questions:

OLC Environment uses the same crew bumpmaps as GWX.

You will be able to use OLC Environment with custom crew skins (by ignoring the JSGME error) but they will be much too bright at night - your crew will seem to glow. Therefore, I'd recommend players do not use any custom skins with the mod. After the mod is done I could write instructions on how to merge crew uniform mods with OLC Env, time permitting.

I agree that the green ocean colour looks wrong at sunrise/sunset and I'll see what I can do with it.

@Adriacto
Immediately before sunrise / after sunset the clouds are redish. They fade to that greyish colour (seen in your screenshots) as the sun lowers to about -9 degrees, by which time you can hardly call it "sunset" anymore - it's early evening, and then the clouds are supposed to be grey.

[onelifecrisis]

Also noticed, that ship wakes and "tails" on the water are too bright in the winter dawn, when it's already dark (18.00), but wake is bright. Much brighter than "foam" from moving ship. Most noticeable on torpedo boats... I mean, texture part of wake, not drop one.

Screeny please :)

[Adriatico]

Maestro, any plans on cloudy night ?

[Gezur(Arbeit)]

Stars shining on the sea....looks unreal ^^

http://www.abload.de/img/screenshot_35299a.jpg


Isnt this is a bit too dark?

http://www.abload.de/img/screenshot_353wj8.jpg

[moscowexile]

On 16 kms - total sea blackout at night and at daytime total sea whiteout; pointers also missing on dials in control room.

First class in 8 kms mode.

Probably this damned ATI Radeon HD 2600 pro AGP card that I bought several weeks ago is to blame: I have had endless graphics problems since installing that card and trying to find a driver for it.

Wonderful mod. Pity I cannot get it to operate on 16kms visibility.

[Adriatico]

I have ATI1950XTX, god old "horsepwer" and I fell in love with 8km mod in a first minute...
Make sure if your previous card was nVidia that you have compleatly cleared all driver files... sometimes it even takes Windows reinstalation...

[onelifecrisis]

Stars shining on the sea....looks unreal ^^

That's not supposed to be stars reflecting. In fact those white spots aren't supposed to be there at all :hmm: looks like there's a graphical glitch there Gezur. What are you AA and AF settings?

Isnt this is a bit too dark?

Yes. I've brightened it a bit. The beta will be released in a few days.

[Gezur(Arbeit)]

Stars shining on the sea....looks unreal ^^
That's not supposed to be stars reflecting. In fact those white spots aren't supposed to be there at all :hmm: looks like there's a graphical glitch there Gezur. What are you AA and AF settings?

Isnt this is a bit too dark?
Yes. I've brightened it a bit. The beta will be released in a few days.
Antialiasing is when the pixels are not that sharp right? its full...

dunno what AF is, and i have a Nvidia 8600gt 512mb....but didnt have it before and its much more than you can see on the screen becasue the reflections are showing with the moves of the waves, but only at night. Well these points look very much like stars ^^ (maybe because of the better waves that are included)


Its like these waves on the horizon, but you cant see it (the stars) on daylight ^^.... :hmm:

http://www.abload.de/img/screenshot_3205hc.jpg

[Philipp_Thomsen]

The wake is not suposed to look that bright and that long... are you sure you're not using any mod that changes the wake? (or did it yourself)

[Gezur(Arbeit)]

The wake is not suposed to look that bright and that long... are you sure you're not using any mod that changes the wake? (or did it yourself)

nope it was that way everytime since i play sh3

[onelifecrisis]

Maestro, any plans on cloudy night ?

:cool:

You mean partially cloudy, right? This is how its shaping up atm:

http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2014/2307150246_24e37d409d_o.jpg

http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2384/2306349539_2812efacff_o.jpg

[Adriatico]

:o :up: :o :up:
:ping: :ping: :ping: :ping:

[onelifecrisis]

dunno what AF is

Anisotropic Filtering. It should be in your graphics card settings somewhere, and in SH3 it will improve/fix the look of both textures and reflections on distant waves.

[Adriatico]

- OLC, your effort to lighten up the night skay is great :up: :up: :up:

- According to my "fishing memory", first light at 5-6 a.m. (-X angle under horizon) is simply never grey...

It could be: blue tone (realistic) , violet (great) or finally, burning horizon...

http://img179.imageshack.us/img179/7638/ocpdbignx0.jpg

http://img244.imageshack.us/img244/8373/dawn751547ge1.jpg

http://img408.imageshack.us/img408/6213/57427967ch3.jpg

If there are game-engine limits... We can't expect miracles...

But, if you can reach perfection, it would be great :up:

:o :yep: :o :yep:

[onelifecrisis]

Adriacto, I'm confused. :-?

I thought it was the colour of the clouds you said you'd like changed, but there are no clouds in any of those photos...

Anyway, location make a big difference. First light where you live may look like that, but where I live (Britain) it looks exactly the same pale blue colour as you see in SH3.

[moscowexile]

If you could see the eastern horizon (the Pennine Hills) where I used to live in England, it was going to rain: if you couldn't see the hills, it was raining. As far as I am aware, the proximity of the North Atlantic was responsible for his seemingly endless rain and gloom.

[Adriatico]

OLC, that is correct... :yep:

I was testing within Giblartar single mission, so it was artificialy grey "end of night"...

We can't make entrance to Mediterranian - out of North sea, NewFoundand...etc.

Anyway, I am deeply convinced that "one drop of blue" would make it look much better... just one drop.

Simply, maritime environment in game - seeks slightly blue tone.

[3Jane]

The moon in the 16km version is twice as big as it should be.

Does this make the moon larger or smaller than the one in 2.0, or more or less the same size.

[onelifecrisis]

Adriacto, I've changed some of the twilight colours quite a bit. I'm not sure if its what you wanted as I'm still not sure what it is you wanted :roll: but they look better to me. I'll post screenshots at some point.



The moon in the 16km version is twice as big as it should be.

Does this make the moon larger or smaller than the one in 2.0, or more or less the same size.

The OLC 16km Env moon is smaller than the GWX 16km moon yet still larger than my intended moon size. Double-checking this is on my to-do list.

[onelifecrisis]

I'm working on the horizon and thought I'd put up a preview. You can see the beginnings of this work (some changes to the horizon cloud color) in the alpha but a lot more has been done since then. I'll let the pics do the talking.

Left/Right = GWX 8km / OLC 8km

All four pictures are taken in the same place at the same time (just after sunset) in the same conditions (partial cloud, no fog) and looking in the same direction etc. etc. That's the same convoy you can see on the horizon (exactly 8km away).

Click on the picture to enlarge it.
http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3170/2309450153_073fed494e.jpg (http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3170/2309450153_5733d8b9eb_o.jpg)



Now for a bit of a technical ramble.

The 16km horizon is something I've wanted to fix for a while, but... SH3 has an horrendous fudge for trying to simulate ships being over the horizon i.e. partially obscured at long range, so that you can see only the masts and smoke. This is how it does it:

The ships are always rendered on a perfectly flat plane. The sea itself is on an inverted sphere, so that it is rasied up near the horizon. Shrink the sphere enough, and you get this:

http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2366/2309501339_c705e94a04_o.jpg

By setting the sphere to the same size as the earth (something which I've yet to see in stock or in any mod, btw) you will get exactly the right amount of ship occlusion for a camera at sea level i.e. for a scope, but you will also get the sea itself rendered part way up into the sky, so that the ship doesn't look at all like its vanishing over the horizon, it just looks like its sinking into the sea.

There are some things that can be done to mitigate this problem but not enough. The sea itself can be both fogged (to merge with the sky) and clipped (at a certain height) but these things just make ships look like they're floating in fog instead of sinking into the sea. This is how its been implemented in the 16km mod and that's part of the reason why the horizon looks so unconvincing there.

Speaking of floating ships, you can invert the sphere but like I said the ships are rendered on a flat plane regardless, so you end up with floating ships again (and a gap between the sky and the horizon to boot).

So anyway...
When your eye level is 5m above sea level (as it is when you're surfaced and standing on the bridge) the horizon is almost exactly 8km away. So in the 8km version, I've just made the sea flat. Problem solved. But in the 16km mod I'm :hmm: :damn: :hmm: :damn: :hmm: over what to do. The only nice solution I can think of is to again make the sea flat. This would look alright (certainly better than what we have now, especially when combined with my other horizon fixes) but it would also be rather unrealistic.

Cheers
OLC

[onelifecrisis]

Meh, I'm being too picky. Even at 16km a ship would only have 5m of its hull obscured, so a flat ocean wouldn't be that unrealistic.

Cool. Sometimes it's good to just write stuff out - clears the mind and all that. :)

[Adriatico]

Great work OLC :up: :up: :up:

* * *

Be carefull when adding red colour...

It always turns out to be "more red than intended", on a big surface, when you add "a little bit"... :know:

Very agressive colour...

[onelifecrisis]

I didn't add any red colour to anything, what you're seeing there is the cloud reflection (which I made less transparent). I'm still tinkering with that. :up:

Edit: BTW Adriacto, those are the colours of the clouds immediately after sunset. They're the same as in the alpha. Didn't you say those should be more red? ;) :p

[Mikhayl]

That's looking really good, it's a pity I didn't have (or take) a minute to test the Alpha yet. I always play with 16km mods so that's cool you can sort this version too (well even if you don't I guess I'll leave 16km for your 8km mod :hmm:)

[onelifecrisis]

That's looking really good, it's a pity I didn't have (or take) a minute to test the Alpha yet. I always play with 16km mods so that's cool you can sort this version too (well even if you don't I guess I'll leave 16km for your 8km mod :hmm:)

Sorry I guess I didn't make it clear but I will be proceeding with 16km, but it will have a completely flat ocean (i.e. no ship occlusion on the horizon) as that's the only solution I can think of which doesn't have major drawbacks.

[Phoenix3000]

Hi OLC,

Good work with the mod, but I 'think' I understand what you mean about having to use a flat ocean for the 16km mod, but can you possibly post a couple of screenshots for comparison between the 8km and 16km versions? It's probably easier to understand if we saw the difference.

I have been using your alpha version since you released it, and I'm very impressed with the distance views I'm getting. Only last night the watch crew called out a contact at long range and when checking through the binoculars I could just make out a smoke plume literally touching the horizon. For me it did look like ir was 'over the horizon' - much better than before.

Cheers OLC! :up:

Px3000

[onelifecrisis]

...can you possibly post a couple of screenshots for comparison between the 8km and 16km versions?

Will do when its ready.

[Adriatico]

Almost right, Maestro :|\\:up:

I asked this, just slightly colored : Time 17.50

http://img179.imageshack.us/img179/3518/31750xl0.jpg

...just a 3-4 % increased coloring.

(to have one drop of blue with a half-drop of violet in sky/clouds...in 1 litar of grey color )

Just forget it...

***
Only thing you should remember is... that every "burning " cloud is in a sharp contrast with greenish surface reflection.

Just do it your way:up: ... 100 people > 100 visual tastes...

[onelifecrisis]

Only thing you should remember is... that every "burning " cloud is in a sharp contrast with greenish surface reflection.

If you mean the cloud reflections (?) yes you're right, they're too strong, like I said they're still being tweaked. Part of the problem is, you can't make the cloud reflections a different colour to the clouds. As for the 17:50 screeny, can you say when (date) and where (grid) that was taken?

Edit: nm, I can tell from the screeny its definitely twilight. Like I said those colours are being reworked quite a bit (wave textures looked very wrong in conjunction with clouds). Here's a screeny of the current state of it (sun is about 10 degrees over horizon here):

http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2219/2309998689_63d4878739_o.jpg

[thesarunat]

Great work...
BTW I was really impressed about that inverted sphere...:doh:
What a weird approach to geography, those folks... :dead:

[onelifecrisis]

What a weird approach to geography, those folks... :dead:

Weird indeed. :yep: :doh:

[Philipp_Thomsen]

Remember that old discussion about my computer being crap?

Well, I've noticed something, OLC. On external camera, pressing ".", if I aim the camera to show the uboat and the ocean, my frames are near 50 fps. If I show just a little bit of sky, then It drops down to 10, even below 10. Any idea why? This sky is 5 times harder to render?

[Wilcke]

Remember that old discussion about my computer being crap?

Well, I've noticed something, OLC. On external camera, pressing ".", if I aim the camera to show the uboat and the ocean, my frames are near 50 fps. If I show just a little bit of sky, then It drops down to 10, even below 10. Any idea why? This sky is 5 times harder to render?

That does not make any sense to me...I was playing last night and did not see any change in FPS.

SH3, GWX 2.0 and OLC great stuff! 16km

[Adriatico]

- The reflection was not too strong, it was beautifull... :up: Please do not decrease it !
It was the most beautifull submarine reflection so far...


- Just want to say that if you like to increase violet color of clouds or sea, you'll have to decrease green color of surface

- Screenshot was made in "Giblartar" single mission (stock s.m.) between Spain and Maroco

:ping:

[Adriatico]

Ooops... "violet color of clouds or sky" (...wanted to say :oops: )

[Rubini]

Hi OLC,

Some questions:


Fixed the flickering sky when water washes over the scope (see http://www.youtube.com/v/25HdLJ_Mwvg&rel=1 for an example of this bug).

Some months ago when you tried this you also found an annoying side effect: no stars in the night sky. You have found a good solution for this issue?:hmm:


I also noticed that you said in another thread that you adjusted the scene fogs parameters to match the "default" sensors...that is ok...but IMHO the best is to have the major word possible to play (speaking on 8km environment)...so isn't a good thing to have 9.2km (and the proportional improvements on all fog states) instead of 8.1 to play?

And if you really achieve to have haze on the horizon (clear no fog day/night) for 16km atmosphere...WOW this will be very good - I then will be finally converted to 16km environment!:yep: :up:

[onelifecrisis]

Hi OLC,

Some questions:


Fixed the flickering sky when water washes over the scope (see http://www.youtube.com/v/25HdLJ_Mwvg&rel=1 for an example of this bug).

Some months ago when you tried this you also found an annoying side effect: no stars in the night sky. You have found a good solution for this issue?:hmm:

Yep. Much better. :up:

I also noticed that you said in another thread that you adjusted the scene fogs parameters to match the "default" sensors

I think you must have read that I'd adjusted visual ranges and incorrectly assumed I meant fog parameters. Fog parms affect sensors and so I will not adjust those. I've only tweaked a little how far the player can see in zero fog.

...that is ok...but IMHO the best is to have the major word possible to play (speaking on 8km environment)...so isn't a good thing to have 9.2km (and the proportional improvements on all fog states) instead of 8.1 to play?

As it happens I settled on about 9km (18km in the 16km mod) as a good balance. :yep:

And if you really achieve to have haze on the horizon (clear no fog day/night) for 16km atmosphere...WOW this will be very good - I then will be finally converted to 16km environment!:yep: :up:

How's this?

http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3007/2313495988_632bd37004_o.jpg

That small convoy (training mission convoy) is about 15-16km away. :rock:

[onelifecrisis]

The circled ship is right on the edge of my crew's visual range at 16km. The player can see it for another 2km after that before it completely merges with the haze.

http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3218/2313520850_0e69a39ef3_o.jpg

[Mikhayl]

that means no more "gap" between sea and sky with 16km ? Wow you rock :D ! Besides the above screen with the inky water looks great, now I need time to see it all :lol:

[onelifecrisis]

that means no more "gap" between sea and sky with 16km ?

:yep:

now I need time to see it all :lol:

Don't bother with the alpha mate, all the good stuff hasn't been released yet.

When it's ready...

:D

[Mikhayl]

Actually despite the already know glitches I really find that alpha (16km for me) much better than the previous scenes.dat I used. I wanted to compare with two others 8km and 16km mods, the difference was so obvious that I didn't bother taking screens :lol: It's gonna be another must have for sure :up:

[Rubini]

Hi OLC,

Some questions:


Fixed the flickering sky when water washes over the scope (see http://www.youtube.com/v/25HdLJ_Mwvg&rel=1 for an example of this bug).

Some months ago when you tried this you also found an annoying side effect: no stars in the night sky. You have found a good solution for this issue?:hmm:

Yep. Much better. :up:

I also noticed that you said in another thread that you adjusted the scene fogs parameters to match the "default" sensors

I think you must have read that I'd adjusted visual ranges and incorrectly assumed I meant fog parameters. Fog parms affect sensors and so I will not adjust those. I've only tweaked a little how far the player can see in zero fog.

...that is ok...but IMHO the best is to have the major word possible to play (speaking on 8km environment)...so isn't a good thing to have 9.2km (and the proportional improvements on all fog states) instead of 8.1 to play?

As it happens I settled on about 9km (18km in the 16km mod) as a good balance. :yep:

And if you really achieve to have haze on the horizon (clear no fog day/night) for 16km atmosphere...WOW this will be very good - I then will be finally converted to 16km environment!:yep: :up:

How's this?

http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3007/2313495988_632bd37004_o.jpg

That small convoy (training mission convoy) is about 15-16km away. :rock:


WOW:huh:

Awesome mate!
In the final version if the player could see things almost the same time that the crew then will be even better! Also as a suggestion, could be possible to have all these news without change colors on the environment files? Perhaps a complete version with all yours news changes (new "colors" and visual fixes) and another only with the "visual" changes like the fixed flicking sky, haze for 16km nofog and the adjusted visual coordenation between player and crew? Only these 3 things already will make this a must have mod and deserves a separated release!:up: :up:

[Adriatico]

When I think better, i have that feeling for 8 km...

I would be happy with Alpha, with just a bit lighter night..

Have a fear that some of beauty could disappear in complex tweakings :roll:

[Venatore]

http://img179.imageshack.us/img179/3518/31750xl0.jpg

I thought this was a bloody actual photo for a second or two, awesome angle shot, everything seem just right for this screen capture. This is the best I've seen, I'll use this for a upcoming mod if you don't mind. Sorry for the small hijack :oops: please continue with this excellent development thread :up:

[Adriatico]

:up: ??? Mate, there are very few "my rights" in this screen...

Environment is gorgeous Alpha by OLC, and skin is... as far as I remember, some mix of Yamato9 skins, the last VIIc left in my JGSME... (not even finished)


It is simple "in game" screen, not even polished in Photoshop... as far as my ownership is concerned...

( This is amazing thing with this Alpha, light & reflection form "key stroke" looks like cosmetics from Photoshop... )

[Barbac]

OLC, you are definitely a top modder :up:
Guys, you have amazing graphic skills and environment understanding !!! :rock:

Thanks to GWX Team and some modders, this game has become a masterpiece

Carry on guys cause you have our whole support

:yep:

[onelifecrisis]

:D it does look good eh?

@Rubini
I would love to be able to release the mod as several seperate mods but unfortunately there's an important relationship between the scene.dat file and the skycolor.dat files - they must be used together or not at all. The environment colours can be enabled seperately without any bugs but if a player enables my sky colours with some other environment colours then things will look very odd e.g. red haze with blue sky or something like that. So really, I have to release them all as a single mod. There is too much interaction between the files to separate them.

@Adriatico
Have some faith mate. You may be looking at screenies and thinking "yuk!" but remember its still WIP! If I were completely happy with the colours I'd have released the mod already. It all still needs a lot of work. Obviously I can't guarantee you'll be happy with the end result but at least rest assured that I too am looking at some of these colours and thinking "yuk!" :lol: and they will be changed before release.

[Adriatico]

...just promise that you won't sacrifice original sub reflections structure, whatever painting would be!

:roll: :ping: :roll:

[onelifecrisis]

...just promise that you won't sacrifice original sub reflections structure, whatever painting would be!

:roll: :ping: :roll:

Sub/sky/sun/moon reflections aren't changing from alpha :up: I did try changing them but couldn't improve on the alpha so I went back to those settings.

Cloud reflections are having minor tweaks done

[Rubini]

:D it does look good eh?

@Rubini
I would love to be able to release the mod as several seperate mods but unfortunately there's an important relationship between the scene.dat file and the skycolor.dat files - they must be used together or not at all. The environment colours can be enabled seperately without any bugs but if a player enables my sky colours with some other environment colours then things will look very odd e.g. red haze with blue sky or something like that. So really, I have to release them all as a single mod. There is too much interaction between the files to separate them.

That is ok! Anyway please don't forget that only those 3 new adjusts already deserve a mod release. I'm saying this because some of us (to not say a lot of ppl) already have some personal adjusts on env colors by personal taste or even to solve some LCD problems (lack of contrast, etc). I guess that the env colors/reflections is the matter where we have more mods on the shelf just because this is so much for the personal taste side matter. My fear is that all the personal adjusts (mainly for LCDs) need to be redone again. And obviously is always possible that you have a very good or even the best colors in the end when you release it...it's always good to have one more option on the matter, but...please look carefully over this issue, mainly the LCD monitors dark screens problems, ok?:up:

[onelifecrisis]

Well like I said folks can use the scene.dat + skycolours and leave out the envcolours, but I don't want them blaming me if they do that and things look odd... hence, one combined release. Folks who don't like dark nights... don't have to use the mod.

Speaking of dark nights... here's another screeny, which I'm showing just because I really like it :D

http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2265/2314003311_020673d54b_o.jpg

[Philipp_Thomsen]

Well like I said folks can use the scene.dat + skycolours and leave out the envcolours, but I don't want them blaming me if they do that and things look odd... hence, one combined release. Folks who don't like dark nights... don't have to use the mod.

Speaking of dark nights... here's another screeny, which I'm showing just because I really like it :D

http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2265/2314003311_020673d54b_o.jpg


JESUS CRIST OLC, HOW DID YOU DO THIS??? ITS A... HOW'S THE NAME, OPTICAL ILUSION OR SOMETHING LIKE THAT.

GUYS, THIS IS NOT A JOKE. KEEP LOOKING AT THE WATER, ON THE LIGHT REFLECTION. IF YOU STARE AT IT WILL RELAXED EYES, YOULL SEE THE WATER MOVING, WAVES FORMING JUST AFTER THE LIGHT REFLECTION, LIKE ITS A VIDEO, NOT A PHOTO.

AWESOME, OLC. IT CHILLED MY SPINE! :up:

[Adriatico]

...support comment of Rubini 100%

I have the same "screenshot" in two different color visuals at my office screen and my home screen :doh: :huh:

Even coloring of image seems far better on my office screen, although its some 150EUR cheaper than my home "monster" ?!?

[onelifecrisis]

...support comment of Rubini 100%

I have the same "screenshot" in two different color visuals at my office screen and my home screen :doh: :huh:

Even coloring of image seems far better on my office screen, although its some 150EUR cheaper than my home "monster" ?!?

I guess you didn't read my reply. Here it is again.

Well like I said folks can use the scene.dat + skycolours and leave out the envcolours, but I don't want them blaming me if they do that and things look odd... hence, one combined release.

And as a minor additional point, which I've already stated once, the water-over-scope fix is in the envcolor.dat and skycolor.dat files.

[Rubini]

Ok kaleum! Go to work now! :D

I guess that some points are already posted and you are the mod maker, so all the decision are up to you and we will be happy with them anyway!
We are awaiting for the next release and if some guys have some requestion we can make (ask for) them (the requestions, interchanges of ideas) for you later! ;)

Edited: sorry for my bad english and come back to work mate! We all want this!

[onelifecrisis]

Ok kaleum! Go to work now! :D

I guess that some points are already posted and you are the mod maker, so all the decision are up to you and we will be happy with them anyway!
We are awaiting for the next release and if some guys have some requestion we can make them for you later! ;)

I'm not just being obnoxious. This isn't just a case of "I want to do it this way, so bugger off" it's a case of "this is the only way there is".

Scene.dat -> Contains, among many changes, parts of the horizon fixes
SkyColor.dat -> Contains, among many changes, the other parts of the horizon fixes and part of the scope fix
EnvColor.dat -> Contains, among many changes, the other part of the scope fix

If it was all in scene.dat I'd just release my scene.dat right now and leave the env colours unreleased, since they are attracting more objection right now than support, but that's just not the case. I'm open to suggestions but this one can't be met, and it's not just because "I don't want to" so I'd appreciate it if you two would stop suggesting that that's the case. :stare:

[Mikhayl]

Just to put in my two cents (of euros) : knowing that the mod will include env. colours, it'd be better to share feelings about OLC's colours (too dark, too green, not enough pink in that world etc) than wishing for what would actually be a different mod. Then when it'll be released everybody will be free to release tweaks for each existing screen on the market :up:

[Rubini]

Ok kaleum! Go to work now! :D

I guess that some points are already posted and you are the mod maker, so all the decision are up to you and we will be happy with them anyway!
We are awaiting for the next release and if some guys have some requestion we can make them for you later! ;)

I'm not just being obnoxious. This isn't just a case of "I want to do it this way, so bugger off" it's a case of "this is the only way there is".

Scene.dat -> Contains, among many changes, parts of the horizon fixes
SkyColor.dat -> Contains, among many changes, the other parts of the horizon fixes and part of the scope fix
EnvColor.dat -> Contains, among many changes, the other part of the scope fix

If it was all in scene.dat I'd just release my scene.dat right now and leave the env colours unreleased, since they are attracting more objection right now than support, but that's just not the case. I'm open to suggestions but this one can't be met, and it's not just because "I don't want to" so I'd appreciate it if you two would stop suggesting that that's the case. :stare:

No, i'm not saying nothing about how you are working with the mod, it's your mod and we know that. It's exactly on the other side. I am (perhaps also Adriatico) just making constructive comments and sharing ideas and requestions to help you to make the mod yet better and is obviously understandable what you are saying about it and why you will make it in this or that way. So, don't worry and excuse me if I wrote something not so good. Perhaps a language barrier (my english is very limited...:D )

I edited the post above do avoid confusion!

[Graf Paper]

OLC, judging by your screen shots, your environment mod is shaping up to be a true masterpiece of the SH3 modders' craft. :|\\

Words cannot express how much I'm looking forward to the completion of this! :yep:

My favorite feature would have to be the more realistically dark nights. Sure, others may complain how it makes spotting targets difficult or impossible but the fact remains that nighttime at sea, well away from any city lights, is very dark indeed.

This is why merchants and Allied warships ran "dark", after all. Night is once again an effective cover with your mod, making us Kaleuns work for that midnight tonnage.:up:

To give an example of just how dark it can be at sea, the lookout in the crow's nest of the RMS Titanic only spotted the iceberg when he did by the glimmer of starlight reflected from the ice!

Honestly, that dawn-bright night sky just rubs me raw. It's a grating reminder that shatters the immersion for me.

Keep up the good work, OLC! It all looks fantastic to me! :rock:

[onelifecrisis]

If anyone reading this knows where the depth charge splash is located (the one when the DC drops into the water, not the explosion splash) please let me know! :up:

P.S. Rubini and Adriatico, I wanted to apologise for my rudeness yesterday... but sorry is hard to say. :nope: So anyway, sorry gents.

P.P.S. Thanks Graf Paper - words of support help a lot sometimes. :)

[Hitman]

OLC, this mod is a great work, but I can't resist putting my 2 cents in the discussion :) :

In SH3 there is a given limitation: Sensors (AI Crew) and environment have "separate" lives, i.e., they will not always match to what the player can see/detect. Worser even, that will also depend on the players monitor and even monitor settings :damn:

Thus, this limitation implies that it is either possible to mod the environment to match the sensors, or the sensors to match the environment, so that player and Ai crews see the same at the same time. The last option is in my opinion impossible, because of the sensor peculiarities in SH3 (Rig for red triggering night vision, etc.), so the first one is the most interesting.

Since I asume that you have tweaked the environment exactly to match your own monitor settings, and it is essential for the mod to work as intended that any player gets the same result in his own monitor, I would suggest that you include in your mod a screenshot taken at night exactly at the point where you -as player- first see a ship, so that everyone can open it and adjust his gamma settings until the ship also becomes visible in the screen. That way they will get exactly what you intended to do with the mod, and not a different result caused by a different monitor/settings. And give that any decent graphics card has storable profiles for each game, this would be set automatically each time the game is loaded.

Cheers :up:

[onelifecrisis]

OLC, this mod is a great work, but I can't resist putting my 2 cents in the discussion :) :

In SH3 there is a given limitation: Sensors (AI Crew) and environment have "separate" lives, i.e., they will not always match to what the player can see/detect.

I know. I've been doing a lot of digging and testing and now consider myself actually quite an expert on both visual (AI) sensors and visual (player) ranges.

All I've done is trim down the visual range of the what the player sees, and only by a tiny bit. It now more closely matches the visual (AI) sensors of your crew, though you can still see a little bit further than they can.

In GWX 8km for example, your crew can see ~8.1km and you can see ~9.4km. In OLC 8km your crew can still see ~8.1km (similarly, enemy sensors also remain unaffected) but you can now see ~9.0km.

Since I asume that you have tweaked the environment exactly to match your own monitor settings, and it is essential for the mod to work as intended that any player gets the same result in his own monitor, I would suggest that you include in your mod a screenshot taken at night exactly at the point where you -as player- first see a ship, so that everyone can open it and adjust his gamma settings until the ship also becomes visible in the screen. That way they will get exactly what you intended to do with the mod, and not a different result caused by a different monitor/settings. And give that any decent graphics card has storable profiles for each game, this would be set automatically each time the game is loaded.

Even on the darkest (clear) night I can see ships ~9km away in OLC Env (well, maybe ~8km actually :hmm:) and my crew can see them ~8.1km away, as is normal (GWX makes the enemy blind at night, but not your crew, which is sweet :rock:). Anyway my point is, I'm not sure what you mean. I can see why including a dark night screenshot is a good idea (so people can adjust their monitors) but I don't see what difference the range makes. :-?

Edit: aha, the penny dropped. Yes, a good idea indeed! I'll include said screeny and instructions in the readme. :)

[Rubini]

OLC, this mod is a great work, but I can't resist putting my 2 cents in the discussion :) :

In SH3 there is a given limitation: Sensors (AI Crew) and environment have "separate" lives, i.e., they will not always match to what the player can see/detect. Worser even, that will also depend on the players monitor and even monitor settings :damn:

Thus, this limitation implies that it is either possible to mod the environment to match the sensors, or the sensors to match the environment, so that player and Ai crews see the same at the same time. The last option is in my opinion impossible, because of the sensor peculiarities in SH3 (Rig for red triggering night vision, etc.), so the first one is the most interesting.

Since I asume that you have tweaked the environment exactly to match your own monitor settings, and it is essential for the mod to work as intended that any player gets the same result in his own monitor, I would suggest that you include in your mod a screenshot taken at night exactly at the point where you -as player- first see a ship, so that everyone can open it and adjust his gamma settings until the ship also becomes visible in the screen. That way they will get exactly what you intended to do with the mod, and not a different result caused by a different monitor/settings. And give that any decent graphics card has storable profiles for each game, this would be set automatically each time the game is loaded.

Cheers :up:

This was the most clear explanation about the problem until now Hitman. I guess that with this idea in mind a last tweak could be done on this matter (perhaps using this new mod by OLC or even by any big mod). Just top and clear solution!!:rock:

@OLC: all is ok mate. We are waiting by your mod!:up:

[Wolfehunter]

:hmm: Amazing but has anyone made the sun reflect off the water. It can be blinding you know.:yep:

What a tactic that would be if the AI used that to its advantage.:smug:

[Uber Gruber]

include in your mod a screenshot taken at night exactly at the point where you -as player- first see a ship, so that everyone can open it and adjust his gamma settings until the ship also becomes visible in the screen. That way they will get exactly what you intended to do with the mod, and not a different result caused by a different monitor/settings. And give that any decent graphics card has storable profiles for each game, this would be set automatically each time the game is loaded.

Excellent Idea:up:

[Philipp_Thomsen]

Hey there mate, how's things going on your scene mod? Hope everything is ok.
Im just waiting my new computer arrive so I can test this beauty, your mod! :rock:


That sound pack you were waiting for is out already. I didn't see any comment from you there, so I dont know if you saw it at all.

Anyway, here's the link. Hope you enjoy it!
http://www.subsim.com/radioroom/showthread.php?t=132583

By the way, I've made each of my mods compatible with the latest version of your GUI mod, hope you dont mind.

Thanks bro! :up:

[Adriatico]

:ping: :ping: :ping:
http://img122.imageshack.us/img122/9528/modtk6.jpg
:ping: :ping: :ping:

[onelifecrisis]

Thanks for the link PT! I posted a question in your thread there. :up: I haven't seen much of the forums of late because I've been very hard at work on my mod! :yep: The scope has broadened a bit, you might say, but I'm very pleased with it. I now have a spreadsheet for calculating all the environment colours using formulas/functions that I came up with after (quite a bit of) research into SH3's rendering. Once I'd worked out how SH3 calculates the colour of each surface/particle, the formulas became easy. :D Now I just put in a few parameters for a given ocean and all 294 environment colours for that ocean are calculated in a flash. And they look great! :rock:

I'm putting the final touches on the beta now. It'll be basically a "finished" version for the atlantic.

The sky/moon/sub/ship reflections have all been changed again (sorry Adriatico!) and now for the first time ever they all match. You might not have noticed but until now the sub/ship reflections were calculated differently to the sky reflection and looked a bit like they were added on to the existing sky/cloud reflections, instead of being a part of them. The overall effect of this fix is really good when looking at another ship or at your own sub.

I've also been through all of the bitmap particle generators and, where appropriate, I've told them to be coloured according to the environment. Now torpedo explosions will look correct in any lighting conditions, bubbles will not look super-bright when the water is dark, and so on. Kinda hard to describe this one but it looks good. There's one particle generator I've been unable to locate and that's the one that makes the splash when a depth charge drops into the water, so until I find and fix that it will look a bit wrong at night time.

The beta is not quite ready yet but a DL link and screenies will be posted probably within a couple of days. I hope folks will like it. :ping:

[Rasher]

Thanks so much OLC

This sounds that its going to be brilliant. Im sure like me, the rest of us appreciate you sharing your hard work with the rest of us. Well done mate:up:

Rasher

[Mikhayl]

Sounds good & interesting, come on spit some screenies to tease us a bit :D

[Uber Gruber]

A couple of days?!!! C'mon man, we embark on WaW patrol this eve.....:yep:

[Adriatico]

Well, it's your mod afterall, OLC ... :cry:

Just hope that you'll find, one day, some spare time to help me... to brirghten up 5% the Alpha cloudy night,... whatever your new "Atlantic stew" would be...

:roll: :hmm: :roll:

[Philipp_Thomsen]

Thank you, OLC!

I've voted here, 5 stars for you!

I've answered your question over there, too! :up:

[onelifecrisis]

Well, it's your mod afterall, OLC ... :cry:

Just hope that you'll find, one day, some spare time to help me... to brirghten up 5% the Alpha cloudy night,... whatever your new "Atlantic stew" would be...

:roll: :hmm: :roll:

If you don't like the end result then yes I'll help you tweak it. The environment settings are a walk in the park compared to the menu file (at least, they are once you've spent an age testing them to work out wtf they do :roll:) so it really won't take long to explain them. But who knows, maybe you'll actually like the end result and not want to tweak!!! :o ;)

@PT
LOL, thanks for the vote. :lol: :up:

[Philipp_Thomsen]

Moderators will kill me when they read the post #68!

By the way, before pressing ctrl+S, be sure that your weapon officer is on his station! Otherwise nothing will happen! :up:

[onelifecrisis]

Sounds good & interesting, come on spit some screenies to tease us a bit :D

Oh go on then :lol:

These are all taken in times/places/conditions which are 100% finished i.e. what you see below is exactly what you will see in the beta (and hopefully in final release). I thought about capturing a video because those reflections really look good in motion :D but screenies are highres and, well, easier.

http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3060/2325448926_2a6ae926fa_o.jpg

[NAZ2222]

Well done, I would like a little more green, but I agree your way is more realistic!
Cant wait to see how the finished version of a storm condition will look like!

Amazing work, and this will be definetly on my SH3 jsgme folder the day it's out!!:)
Just beautifull

[onelifecrisis]

Well done, I would like a little more green, but I agree your way is more realistic!

:yep: cos the atlantic isn't green, except in some places very close to land.

Just beautifull

Thanks! :D

[Letum]

Thats very sexy OLC.

[NAZ2222]

:yep: cos the atlantic isn't green, except in some places very close to land.

I know, but looks(although in a fake way) more "marine"!

Thanks! :D

Very deserved ;)

[Alex]

Thats very sexy OLC.

:yep: :up:

Good job, mate !

[Philipp_Thomsen]

Alpha was beyond great.

Beta looks astonishing!

When Omega version comes out we wont need to leave the room anymore.

And we will get the water coming from the monitor into our faces in bad weather on the tower.

OLC, are you intending on releasing a mechanism that squirts salty water on players faces together with your mod?

[onelifecrisis]

:lol:

[Mikhayl]

OLC, are you intending on releasing a mechanism that squirts salty water on players faces together with your mod?

No dirty talking on that forum please, there are kids out there.

[onelifecrisis]

Cant wait to see how the finished version of a storm condition will look like!

Overcast sky, light fog, no rain, wind speed 12m/s. Normal GWX2 wave textures in this shot.
http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3202/2326759118_b837d99d6f_o.jpg

[Philipp_Thomsen]

How will look your overcast wave textures?

The sky look pretty real! :up:

[onelifecrisis]

How will look your overcast wave textures?

The sky look pretty real! :up:

My wave textures look good, but enabling OLC Improved Wave Textures + OLC Environment + AF will hurt the framerate quite a bit on a low spec machine. I'm thinking of including a special version of the OLC IWT mod which is designed to work with OLC Env without hurting the framerate, but doing so would effectively make the mod incompatible with the GWX2 wave textures, so right now I'm going for flexibility. Players with even moderately powerful machines will be able to take their pick of which wave textures they want.

Just a quick note: that's light fog in the screeny above, which you get in the Bismarck mission, but in a campaign you usually (if not always) get medium or heavy fog with an overcast sky. They have both been graphically tweaked in OLC Env to show an appropriate amount of sky, but neither of them show the sky stretching off into the distance like you see in that screeny. For example, the screeny below is heavy fog (with wind speed 15m/s and rain). Medium fog is, naturally, somewhere between this and the light fog in terms of how far the clouds are visible into the distance.

http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3184/2326972592_d9db06d106_o.jpg

[Philipp_Thomsen]

Great picture... Looks like the ocean is moving, olc. Very very good. Now the only thing missing is the water squirt!


Look what I've found in my image bank. What do you make of this?

http://img72.imageshack.us/img72/1058/moontq4.jpg

[Adriatico]

Just a general opinion...

This is March 2008 so PC beauty takes some hardware bases...

Improving visual beauty of game to new standards - with a restriction "not to hurt" FPS on low end PC rig... it's a :damn:

Keep in mind - what is hardwer price for SH4 visual improvement...

[Philipp_Thomsen]

Just a general opinion...

This is March 2008 so PC beauty takes some hardware bases...

Improving visual beauty of game to new standards - with a restriction "not to hurt" FPS on low end PC rig... it's a :damn:

Keep in mind - what is hardwer price for SH4 visual improvement...

Agreed. You must take for basis the general computer performance of the subsim crew here. Some guys have low end machines (like me) but the most part of them have high end machines. Your mod should target the high end users.

[onelifecrisis]

What do you make of this?

Huh? :doh:

[onelifecrisis]

I have a low spec machine. I'll be damned if I'm going to make a mod that I can't even use! :lol:

AMD Athlon FX-55
ATI Radeon X800XT (using Omega drivers but no overclocking)
2Gb DDR400
Windows XP Professional SP2

And I keep it pretty steamlined (no unnecessary background processes, regularly defragmented HDD, etc).

That should give you an idea of what level of machine the mod is aimed at. :up:

[Philipp_Thomsen]

What do you make of this?

Huh? :doh:

Just an idea of what water reflections shoud look like! :lol:

I have a low spec machine. I'll be damned if I'm going to make a mod that I can't even use! :lol:

AMD Athlon FX-55
ATI Radeon X800XT (using Omega drivers but no overclocking)
2Gb DDR400
Windows XP Professional SP2

And I keep it pretty steamlined (no unnecessary background processes, regularly defragmented HDD, etc).

That should give you an idea of what level of machine the mod is aimed at. :up:

Godahell, OLC... :rotfl:

I've a Athlon XP 3000+, 1gb ram ddr, geforce FX5700LE, XP SP2., with my mother and my sister eventually surfing the net and caching viroses. :damn:

I must trade this computer imediatly, sir.

[onelifecrisis]

:o

You need a new comp mate.

Med colours are done. Here's a taste:
http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2317/2327071718_71d88e9109_o.jpg

http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3228/2327071508_09582df77a_o.jpg

[Philipp_Thomsen]

:o

You need a new comp mate.

Med colours are done. Here's a taste:


http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3228/2327071508_09582df77a_o.jpg


When I first looked at this picture, I thought to myself: "Get ready torpedos 1 to 4. Depth 3 meters, impact pistol, open tube doors..."

[NAZ2222]

I have a low spec machine. I'll be damned if I'm going to make a mod that I can't even use! :lol:

AMD Athlon FX-55
ATI Radeon X800XT (using Omega drivers but no overclocking)
2Gb DDR400
Windows XP Professional SP2

And I keep it pretty steamlined (no unnecessary background processes, regularly defragmented HDD, etc).

That should give you an idea of what level of machine the mod is aimed at. :up:

First of all, let me say thankx for the stormy screen, it truly shows the best in your work!
In second I realise that it's a damm shame that you dont have a better comp, I feel that your work is being limited by your rig. What you've done so far is quite dazzling giving the power of your card. I had a similar X850Pro as well, and although they are great cards, their age stars to show.
I hope you can pump all of that card, to make the most realistic SH3 Env ever!

I'm even more amazed by your skills now! ;)

[onelifecrisis]

Hey, don't knock my machine. Nobody but me knocks my machine. :stare: ;)

After being a gamer for years, I dreamed of owning an Alienware. Then one day (just over 3 years ago :oops:) I bought one. It was the biggest, best, strongest Alienware that money could buy, at that time. I don't think the X800 was that much to shout and scream about, but the FX-55 processor was way ahead of its time IMO.

Anyway, Alienware lived up to their rep. The machine is very well balanced and ends up being a little bit more than the sum of its parts (in terms of performance) especially when well maintained.

Now I'm not sure what the point of that ramble was. Oh yeah, I remember... don't knock my machine. :stare:

[Philipp_Thomsen]

Hey, don't knock my machine. Nobody but me knocks my machine. :stare: ;)

After being a gamer for years, I dreamed of owning an Alienware. Then one day (just over 3 years ago :oops:) I bought one. It was the biggest, best, strongest Alienware that money could buy, at that time. I don't think the X800 was that much to shout and scream about, but the FX-55 processor was way ahead of its time IMO.

Anyway, Alienware lived up to their rep. The machine is very well balanced and ends up being a little bit more than the sum of its parts (in terms of performance) especially when well maintained.

Now I'm not sure what the point of that ramble was. Oh yeah, I remember... don't knock my machine. :stare:

Alienware is hooooooooooooooottttt...

OLC, if I buy a computer from alienware and made it deliver at your home, then you send me here in Brazil as a gift, with no price on it, I wont have to pay 60% tax + 18% ICMS... this country sux in this department...

I've bough a Peradon Joe Davis snooker cue, two pieces, first quality ash and ebony, payed 96% taxes, doubled the price of the cue... and fedex delivery... It cost me twice as I expected.

Im sorry, this thread had something to do with... ahn... Environment? Oh yeah... Great work, OLC!

[NAZ2222]

By the contrary, your machine is very good, your CPU still kicks a lot of ass!! you have as mutch ram as I do, just your card, I fear it is the weak link! I have a 3800+ X2, 2 gig ddr400, and a HD3850, not very far from your rig, only the card is "new", and in this days they are dead cheap!

and "It's not the machine that makes the engineer" :up:

[onelifecrisis]

By the contrary, your machine is very good, your CPU still kicks a lot of ass!! you have as mutch ram as I do, just your card, I fear it is the weak link! I have a 3800+ X2, 2 gig ddr400, and a HD3850, not very far from your rig, only the card is "new", and in this days they are dead cheap!

and "It's not the machine that makes the engineer" :up:

You know I was just messing with you, right? :)

PT, mail it over here. I'll definitely, certainly post it to you right away without any delay at all. Definitely.

[Philipp_Thomsen]

PT, mail it over here. I'll definitely, certainly post it to you right away without any delay at all. Definitely.

Really? The way you spoke, you got me wondering... :rotfl:

OLC suddenly desappears from subsim just after I've mailed him my new rig.

[Hitman]

The mod looks fantastic, but I would prefer a more turquoise colour for the Mediterranean sea :)

Take a look at this pictures, taken by me (Yeah, camera is bad, not to mention the photographer....:damn: but you get the idea):

Valencia harbour:

http://aycu29.webshots.com/image/45348/2005378665840205146_rs.jpg

Aiguablava (Gerona, catalonian coast):

http://aycu17.webshots.com/image/44856/2005373068639256432_rs.jpg


http://aycu31.webshots.com/image/47390/2005363038721054838_rs.jpg

[onelifecrisis]

Turquise/green ocean colours only happen at land, Hitman, and even then only near certain kinds of land. Out at sea, in deep water, the ocean colour is more blue than green.

Think about it this way: water is colourless. The only colour it gets is from the sky and what's underneath it. Out at sea, all that's underneath it is more water, so the colour becomes derived entirely from the sky. :up:

[NAZ2222]

And I guess that the sh3 engine, does not allow for changing the colour of the water, based on land proximity?

[onelifecrisis]

And I guess that the sh3 engine, does not allow for changing the colour of the water, based on land proximity?

No it doesn't, unfortunately.

[NAZ2222]

Too bad!!

I had a question, do you have any plans to improve the OLC improved wave textures? they are already great, but maybe all this work with the OLV Env teached you something new.

Cant barely wait to test the new BETA by the way:p

[Adriatico]

Wave textures have already pushed visuals forward... and I am afraid that, withinn game engine, improved distribution of sea textures and movement - could be further possibility to make a "live sea".

Unfortunately, there is not much that SH3 engine would let us tweak for better visuals of waves.

Correct me if I'm wrong Maestro...

[Philipp_Thomsen]

Wave textures have already pushed visuals forward... and I am afraid that, withinn game engine, improved distribution of sea textures and movement - could be further possibility to make a "live sea".

Unfortunately, there is not much that SH3 engine would let us tweak for better visuals of waves.

Correct me if I'm wrong Maestro...

The waves are pretty good already, but Im sure OLC can push it a little more to perfection, the guy is a genius!

The one part I dont like is the particle generator of the screws, above the water.

http://img245.imageshack.us/img245/197/john20butler1rk9.jpg

That on the picture, the water foam that comes out of the surface when the screws are turning fast. (yes I know thats a stock sh3 pic, its just for the example)

That is one of the things I wish it was remodelled. It dont look like water, look like picked styrofoam or something like that. The size of the particles need to be smaller, and maybe a change in the collor, I dont know.

[Adriatico]

I am ashamed that afterall - could not join your beta testing... but I'll have extreamly stresfull 7-10 working days...

I could really not join long hours of "bug hunt" this fortnight... :oops:

My simple opinion would just be a pure surplus, in a truckload of opinions and comments...

Pitty...

[onelifecrisis]

I am ashamed that afterall - could not join your beta testing... but I'll have extreamly stresfull 7-10 working days...

I could really not join long hours of "bug hunt" this fortnight... :oops:

My simple opinion would just be a pure surplus, in a truckload of opinions and comments...

Pitty...

Sorry to hear it mate. :( It's not a truckload (I think 7 people so far) so if you get a chance let me know.

[Steel_Tomb]

Nope, it doesn't. Shame really, would be pretty amazing if it did.

[onelifecrisis]

Wave textures have already pushed visuals forward... and I am afraid that, withinn game engine, improved distribution of sea textures and movement - could be further possibility to make a "live sea".

Unfortunately, there is not much that SH3 engine would let us tweak for better visuals of waves.

Correct me if I'm wrong Maestro...

The waves are pretty good already, but Im sure OLC can push it a little more to perfection, the guy is a genius!

:smug:

;)

OK, actually there are some wave texture settings in scene.dat and these have been tweaked in the beta, but they just control things like how fast the textures move and how quickly they appear and disappear. There's unfortunately not much scope for improving wave textures. If I could, I'd get them properly shaded (right now they are all one colour which is :damn: cos they should, at sunset, be bright on the side of a wave facing the sun and dark on the opposite side, but they aren't so they look wrong at sunset no matter what colour you give them). Anyway...

The one part I dont like is the particle generator of the screws, above the water.

http://img245.imageshack.us/img245/197/john20butler1rk9.jpg

That on the picture, the water foam that comes out of the surface when the screws are turning fast. (yes I know thats a stock sh3 pic, its just for the example)

That is one of the things I wish it was remodelled. It dont look like water, look like picked styrofoam or something like that. The size of the particles need to be smaller, and maybe a change in the collor, I dont know.

That's a stock pic? Well...

A change in the colour I can do, but changing the particles themselves is out of the scope of this mod... I don't want to open up that can of worms, or it'll never end.

That said, I don't see much wrong with the above-water particle colours. Have you got a screeny (with my mod enabled :roll:) where the colour needs a tweak?

[Hitman]

Turquise/green ocean colours only happen at land, Hitman, and even then only near certain kinds of land. Out at sea, in deep water, the ocean colour is more blue than green.

Think about it this way: water is colourless. The only colour it gets is from the sky and what's underneath it. Out at sea, all that's underneath it is more water, so the colour becomes derived entirely from the sky. :up:


Yes I know :) but since the Mediterranean is not overall very deep as average, it retains the slight turquoise/greenish tint on sunny days almost overall, even if not as much as near land (Check the water colour near the horizon in my pics). I have seen this at high sea, but did not take pictures back then. In turn, the Atlantic -which I have seen both in Norway and in the Canary Islands- is definately much more blue-grey. The difference is quite noticeable, trust me. :yep:

Cheers

[onelifecrisis]

Turquise/green ocean colours only happen at land, Hitman, and even then only near certain kinds of land. Out at sea, in deep water, the ocean colour is more blue than green.

Think about it this way: water is colourless. The only colour it gets is from the sky and what's underneath it. Out at sea, all that's underneath it is more water, so the colour becomes derived entirely from the sky. :up:


Yes I know :) but since the Mediterranean is not overall very deep as average, it retains the slight turquoise/greenish tint on sunny days almost overall, even if not as much as near land (Check the water colour near the horizon in my pics). I have seen this at high sea, but did not take pictures back then. In turn, the Atlantic -which I have seen both in Norway and in the Canary Islands- is definately much more blue-grey. The difference is quite noticeable, trust me. :yep:

Cheers

I've seen the med too ;) and it's true, it's a bit more green... so maybe I should tweak it. I'm just saying that they shouldn't be as green as the very shallow water photos you showed.

Also, take note: my colours grey slightly on a partially overcast day. Check the difference in water colours in these two med shots from earlier in the thread.

http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2317/2327071718_71d88e9109_o.jpg

http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3228/2327071508_09582df77a_o.jpg

I guess it all comes down to personal taste ultimately.

One final note: photos aren't always a good guide to colour. When they're developed, some colours are "enhanced". This photo of the med is definitely showing blue water, and its even taken near land!

http://www.hickerphoto.com/data/media/185/mediterranean-coastline_11069.jpg

[onelifecrisis]

A cold, clear, windless day in (I think) the Arctic (Narvik II mission)
16km beta
http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2011/2328445039_289b90b8aa_o.jpg

[onelifecrisis]

Hitman, this is interesting...

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mediterranean_Sea

(in particlar the bit which says "The Mediterranean is characterized and immediately recognized by its deep blue color.")

:hmm:

[The Bad Wolf]

Hi OLC
Your a busy man - another really top mod :up:

I thought that GWX sun and moon was perhaps ok for the Equator (optical illusion), but out of place in the North. Personnel preference, have always played with Krillerssun and Carotios Moonmod, more realistic and both same size. Still waiting for an eclipse!

Looking forward to trying the mod 16m.

[onelifecrisis]

Hi OLC
Your a busy man - another really top mod :up:

I thought that GWX sun and moon was perhaps ok for the Equator (optical illusion), but out of place in the North. Personnel preference, have always played with Krillerssun and Carotios Moonmod, more realistic and both same size. Still waiting for an eclipse!

Looking forward to trying the mod 16m.

Thanks.

I prefer the sun/moon realistic - the sky looks like a sky now.

The GWX 16km sun (half size of 8km) wasn't too bad at high noon (only twice as big as it should be) but at sunset it was plain ridiculous (4 times the correct size in 16km, and 8 (!!!) times the correct size in 8km).

Anyway, I've not (yet) changed the size of the halo, so during the day the sun looks the same as before, really... i.e. big and blindingly bright. I'm considering increasing the size of the halo quite a lot, so as to simulate sun glare during the day... I need to play around with it and see how it looks.

My main problem with the sun was when it was setting, or behind a cloud. At those times the halo is low or even gone altogether, and the sun is visible as a simple circle... which is very much the wrong size. :nope:

[The Bad Wolf]

I'm sure it will be better than my temporary fix.

I can see another sticky here!

[Hitman]

Hitman, this is interesting...

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mediterranean_Sea

(in particlar the bit which says "The Mediterranean is characterized and immediately recognized by its deep blue color.")

:hmm:


He he...check the satellite view of the Mediterranean in the picture at the side of that paragraph and compare with the picture of the Gibraltar Strait down in "Subdivisions" ;) Deep blue in the first one, green in the second....why? One is a satellite/aerial view, the second is a surface view. The time of the day and wether a coast is near or not (The yellow sand from the bottom is what causes that greenish tint when combined with the blue of the sea Blue+Yellow=green) has of course a big influence, but anyway giving it a second thought and seeing your pictures, I believe you have achieved a nice compromise :up: Leave it as it is, it certainly looks terrific :yep:

[onelifecrisis]

why? One is a satellite/aerial view, the second is a surface view.

If that's the reason, then why is the picture below that blue? It is taken at surface level (from a boat, in fact). IMO it's blue because it's out at sea (between Barcelona and Minorca according to the text) whereas the Gibraltar straight is near land / shallow waters.

Like I said, I believe that on a clear day deep water = blue water (i.e. sky colour) no matter what ocean you're in. The Med may be shallow compared to other oceans, but with an average depth of 1.5 kilometers (!) and a maximum depth of over 5km, I'd say it's still pretty deep.

but anyway giving it a second thought and seeing your pictures, I believe you have achieved a nice compromise :up: Leave it as it is, it certainly looks terrific :yep:

Well, I'd love to think that I'd conviced someone that the ocean is in fact blue! :roll: :lol:

[Progrocker]

Im looking forward on 16km version of this great mod. Will Beta version support 16km GWX mod?

[onelifecrisis]

Im looking forward on 16km version of this great mod. Will Beta version support 16km GWX mod?

Beta is already out and yes it supports GWX 16km :up:
I made a seperate thread to announce the beta. I suppose I should update post #1 of this thread! Will do that now...

Edit: due to a spate of people offering to beta test in the last few minutes, I've now closed the beta to applications so I can concentrate on testing and tweaking. Thanks very much to all who have offered to help. :up: :up:

[onelifecrisis]

For anyone who is interested in night time attacks using the OLC Env mod...

Today I started a new career in which to test my 16km beta. Sept 1939, 97% realism (event camera on), Type VIIB sailing from Willy.

Call it fate, but the first unlit ship I chanced upon was spotted by my crew at 6km on a very dark, overcast, lightly fogged evening. Winds were high but there was no rain. I took two WO readings to get a rough course then went to PD. Then I had an idea... and started recoding this video (http://files.filefront.com/OLC+Env+Night+Attack+Video/;9806832;/fileinfo.html). It shows the attack in full. ;)

If you watch it you'll see that I couldn't make out the ship's flag but I took the risk and proceeded with the attack (I wouldn't have normally, but I really wanted to get the vid done). The ship turned out to be a German ship :roll: but for me, this is the very pinnacle of realism. :rock:

Please note that the video is taken on an overcast night in the north atlantic in autumn, and is the darkest night there is in the OLC Env. It's much darker than any clear night. It's also brighter than an overcast night in the alpha (which could actually go totally black). On a clear night in the beta, flags can be recognised without too much difficulty even at the darkest time.

OLC

[Reece]

Your mod is coming along very nicely, I might switch, mine sort of looks SH4ish!:lol:
You and others may agree here but although the SH4 sea is transparent it looks fake like a painting even with post processing off it still looks like it has a skin on the surface or something, I much prefer the SHIII sea!:up: If I keep editing & tweaking the SH4 Scene it might eventually turn into SHIII Scene!:rotfl:

[Graf Paper]

You're doing fantastic work, OLC! :rock:

I still don't understand all this debate over ocean colors. This could be settled real quick by having a few of the ex-navy guys in the forum chime in about their own direct experience. The expression "deep blue sea" is such for a reason.

Having seen with my own eyes the Atlantic, Caribbean, and Gulf of Mexico I can support your assertion that deeper waters are indeed a deep blue while shallow waters tend to be tinted by the sea bottom, hence the more or less greenish to brownish tint but even shalllow waters look blue when viewed from a distance.

The Gulf of Mexico is so shallow that its waters tend to be very silty and colored brown to brownish green. Ugh.

Southern Atlantic and Caribbean waters tend to be very clear and pure even right up to the shore and the more or less white sandy bottom tends to color the waters less green.

I really can't stand the "green milk" color that many people seem to prefer for the Atlantic. It certainly isn't for realism's sake.

[Marko_Ramius]

I really can't wait for this mod :up: Fantastic skills and inspiration on those forums !


Even if i'm not a "dark night" guy, i will certainly appreciate your work, OLC. Big thanks.




it looks fake like a painting

I agree with you, Recce. A bit too much "cartoon" ..

[Philipp_Thomsen]

The ship turned out to be a German ship :roll:





:rotfl: :rotfl: :rotfl: :rotfl: :rotfl:

Dont you just hate when that happens?
A whole patrol without spotting a ship, and on the way back home, sink a german ship... :damn:
I'll download the video now... OLC, have you considering uploading it on youtube?

[onelifecrisis]

The ship turned out to be a German ship :roll:





:rotfl: :rotfl: :rotfl: :rotfl: :rotfl:

Dont you just hate when that happens?
I'll download the video now... OLC, have you considering uploading it on youtube?

YouTube's resolution is way too low. You won't be able to see anything. I've already halved the video to 512x384, and compressed it, to keep the file size low... and you can barely make it out at that level of detail. On youtube, you'd not be able to see anything at all. :-?

[Philipp_Thomsen]

The ship turned out to be a German ship :roll:





:rotfl: :rotfl: :rotfl: :rotfl: :rotfl:

Dont you just hate when that happens?
I'll download the video now... OLC, have you considering uploading it on youtube?

YouTube's resolution is way too low. You won't be able to see anything. I've already halved the video to 512x384, and compressed it, to keep the file size low... and you can barely make it out at that level of detail. On youtube, you'd not be able to see anything at all. :-?

Such a shame. So much faster to upload and download. I hate filefront, I pay a lot of cash for a 2mbps conection and here I am, downloading at 30kbps from filefront. 45 Minute download.:damn:

[onelifecrisis]

Even if i'm not a "dark night" guy, i will certainly appreciate your work, OLC.

I hope so, cos there's now a lot more to this mod than dark nights... its, er, grown. :lol:

Dynamic lighting, specular highlights - and of course the sea reflections - have all been improved here (if only marginally in the case of the first two). It's surprising how much of an impact on things the colour files have! As I discovered, they do more than just colour things ;)

[Sailor Steve]

I really can't stand the "green milk" color that many people seem to prefer for the Atlantic. It certainly isn't for realism's sake.
It's the Das Boot connection, and I've always thought the underwater color in the movie was awful. I agree, deep water is blue.

I disagree, however, about SH4. I can't actually look at it for real, but some of the ROW screenshots are frighteningly realistic and beautiful. At least to me.

[Adriatico]

Good one, Reece :up:
:rotfl:

[onelifecrisis]

Your mod is coming along very nicely, I might switch, mine sort of looks SH4ish!:lol:
You and others may agree here but although the SH4 sea is transparent it looks fake like a painting even with post processing off it still looks like it has a skin on the surface or something, I much prefer the SHIII sea!:up: If I keep editing & tweaking the SH4 Scene it might eventually turn into SHIII Scene!:rotfl:

Thanks mate and lol :lol: