[WIP] Turm Flags for OM

[etheberge]

Turm Flags for OM

http://www.subsim.com/radioroom/picture.php?albumid=103&pictureid=3788

Estimated Date of Release: When it's done.

Done so far: Type IX, IXB, IXC, IXC/40, IXD2.
Edited 03/19/11: Type IIB, IIC and IID done.
Edited 03/21/11: Type VIIB done.
Edited 04/04/11: Type VIIC, VIIC41, VIID done.

Two versions will be available: 1 Flag on Turm only or 1 pennant on Turm + 1 flag at stern.

Includes flagstaff and ropes. Flag and ropes are not visible when submerged. Model provided by Privateer.

Will include a selection of flags. Pennants will be sporting flotilla emblems.

Open to suggestion regarding the flag/pennant selection but keep in mind one side of the flag will always be mirrored so any writing like tonnage, etc, is not really practical.

[Slyguy3129]

Hey since your working on flags I was wondering if you were also planning on moving the flags on ships.

What I mean is that 90% if the ships I have encountered in OM have the flag on the stern of the ship.

Nothing is more frustrating than to spend hours hunting down a ship, maneuvering into a final solution position and even have torpedo tubes open to finally see the flag and its Panama (The last one I saw) or some damn place like that :haha:.

Is this something you had in mind, or just strictly for subs? Either way it looks cool. BTW are those flags historical correct or in lines with Germany's law of forgetting WW2 ever happened?

EDIT: Never mind I guess I didn't see the Swastika first time around.

[Madox58]

Nice work Mate!
:up:

Did you edit the dds for the triangular Flag?
I could do a new Animation if needed.

[ReallyDedPoet]

Nice :up:

[etheberge]

Hey since your working on flags I was wondering if you were also planning on moving the flags on ships.

What I mean is that 90% if the ships I have encountered in OM have the flag on the stern of the ship.

Nothing is more frustrating than to spend hours hunting down a ship, maneuvering into a final solution position and even have torpedo tubes open to finally see the flag and its Panama (The last one I saw) or some damn place like that :haha:.

Is this something you had in mind, or just strictly for subs?

Just for U-boats. I'd like to move the flags on all those ships too but from what I'm seeing working on this mod it would be a royal pain in the ass.

Nice work Mate!
:up:

Did you edit the dds for the triangular Flag?
I could do a new Animation if needed.

Thanks. Yeah all I did was duplicate the model and edit the alpha channel of the second DDS. The triangular flag animation looks fine at first glance but I haven't paid close attention to it. Still just placing the two models on all the U-boats and turms...sigh...

[etheberge]

I'm having a little issue. It's not a big problem but it's bothersome. When the boat is submerged and the camera is slightly above the surface looking down, you can still see a white outline of the flag through the water at certain angles. But if you move the camera under the surface that white outline is gone and things look as expected. I'm wondering if I might not have screwed something up. Does anyone know what can cause this?

http://www.subsim.com/radioroom/picture.php?albumid=103&pictureid=3782

http://www.subsim.com/radioroom/picture.php?albumid=103&pictureid=3783

[Madox58]

Can you send me a link to your Flag dat?
I deleted the original I had.
(I never keep anything around long)

Also, when a Ship sinks, do you see the same effect of the flag?
It is after all just a shrunken version of the Ships flags.

[Ducimus]

http://www.subsim.com/radioroom/picture.php?albumid=103&pictureid=3782


I noticed that too. I blew it off, although i sat there wondering how many people would notice. :O:

Maybe its a texture resource issue. Have to set the proper settings perhaps? id compare it to the flags used by ships, and see what differences there are if any.

[etheberge]

Can you send me a link to your Flag dat?
I deleted the original I had.
(I never keep anything around long)

Here you go: http://www.box.net/shared/65iceriiqz

It's not your original though, it's a tweaked version with different IDs and stuff. Feel free to let me know if I messed something up. I don't have the original anymore either :-)


Also, when a Ship sinks, do you see the same effect of the flag?
It is after all just a shrunken version of the Ships flags.

Never noticed but I'll check.

I noticed that too. I blew it off, although i sat there wondering how many people would notice. :O:

Maybe its a texture resource issue. Have to set the proper settings perhaps? id compare it to the flags used by ships, and see what differences there are if any.

Thanks for the tip Ducimus and Privateer.
It's not a show-stopper but after you notice it once it does get annoying.

Also you were quite right in the other thread, placing those objects is pretty painful.

[Sailor Steve]

Is anyone planning to duplicate Anvart's work for SH3? Flags and antennae going up and down on command?

[etheberge]

Well the solution for the white flag outline is to remove the checkmark from "Disable z-buffer write+enable alpha blend" for the material chunk of the texture.

HOWEVER, when you do that the flag is still visible when looking at the submerged sub with the external cam above the water. When the cam is below the surface, the flag is gone.

It looks like the solution for that is to somehow replace the "VisibleUnderWater" controller with the "WaterInteraction" controller as discussed in these two threads --> http://www.subsim.com/radioroom/showthread.php?t=147954&highlight=visibleunderwater and http://www.subsim.com/radioroom/showthread.php?t=125598&highlight=visibleunderwater

Unfortunately my S3D skills are too lame to figure out where to place that controller and how to implement it to have the flag object disappear and reappear based on the sub's depth. Tried a few different ways but didn't get anywhere.

Will try again some other time.

Is anyone planning to duplicate Anvart's work for SH3? Flags and antennae going up and down on command?

Maybe after a year of playing with S3D I could figure it out but for now I wouldn't hold my breath on that one Sailor Steve. :rotfl2:

[Madox58]

Anvart had a MotherBoard death about a month back.
:nope:
But I'm sure he would grant permission to adapt it to SH4.
He'd probably do it himself if not for the MB problem.
:yep:

[Anvart]

Well the solution for the white flag outline is to remove the checkmark from "Disable z-buffer write+enable alpha blend" for the material chunk of the texture.

...
IIRC, in SH3, if you use alpha blending and water reflection for submerged flags... you will have artefacts...
try to disable water reflection for flag (with alpha blending)...
How in SH4 i don't remember already...
IIRC, in SH4, if you use VisibleUnderWater = false for some object and if you (camera) are not submerged (over water), you will see this object in any case (if water is transparented)...
Anvart had a MotherBoard death about a month back.
:nope:

... already two months... :wah:

But I'm sure he would grant permission to adapt it to SH4.
...
Of course. :woot:

Good luck,
Alexander.

[Jan Kyster]

Anvart had a MotherBoard death about a month back. :nope:

... already two months... :wah:No need for crying! :D

What cpu do you use? I have a couple of motherboards doing nothing but waiting for some action...

[Anvart]

No need for crying! :D

What cpu do you use? I have a couple of motherboards doing nothing but waiting for some action...
:DL
Thanks, Jan Kyster.
I have had MoBo Asus P4P800 Deluxe with mPGA 478 socket and Pentium 4 Processor 2.8E GHz and hardware RAID 0 with two HDDs... but it's very old system (more then 7 years worked for me)...
Therefore, may be, more rationally to buy (and assemble) new machine...
may be... MoBo Asus P8P67 Pro - 1155 socket, P67 (B3) chipset... Processor i7 2600K and so on.
But in Russia to buy needed computer's set not easy task...

[etheberge]

IIRC, in SH3, if you use alpha blending and water reflection for submerged flags... you will have artefacts...
try to disable water reflection for flag (with alpha blending)...
How in SH4 i don't remember already...
IIRC, in SH4, if you use VisibleUnderWater = false for some object and if you (camera) are not submerged (over water), you will see this object in any case (if water is transparented)...

Thanks for the tip Anvart. I don't have any WaterReflection controllers enabled for the flag so no problem there.

And yes, what you're saying about the VisibleUnderWater controller in SH4 is exactly what I'm seeing. I haven't found a way around it. I tried playing a bit with the WaterInteraction controller, thinking I might be able to replace the flag texture with a transparent texture when submerged and then replace it with the real texture when surfaced. Unfortunately I didn't get very far trying it this way. Not even sure it's possible.

Oh well, I guess people will just have to deal with it. It shouldn't get in the way too much. I spent too much time on this mod anyway, I'm already scaling it down.

[Anvart]

I have experimented with the WaterInteraction controller for DF antenna in 2006 ...
This controller was made to manipulate objects of particles.
And I noticed that if you remove the original object (ex. DF antenna) and generate a second object, and then remove the second object and generate the third object (same as original object) and a submarine will move (not fixed) you get the offset of the third object relative of the original object (relative of the original position of object)... and for more speed of submarine you will get bigger offset of the third object.

P.S. The second object would be offset too...

[etheberge]

I have experimented with the WaterInteraction controller for DF antenna in 2006 ...
This controller was made to manipulate objects of particles.
And I noticed that if you remove the original object (ex. DF antenna) and generate a second object, and then remove the second object and generate the third object (same as original object) and a submarine will move (not fixed) you get the offset of the third object relative of the original object (relative of the original position of object)... and for more speed of submarine you will get bigger offset of the third object.

P.S. The second object would be offset too...

haha, yes I noticed that too at one point in my tests but I thought it was just because I didn't know what I was doing.

[Sepp von Ch.]

Hello etheberge, can you give me please an download link for this great mod for OM/OMEGU? PLEASE!!!

[etheberge]

Sorry Josef, I never finished this mod and even worse I lost all the files for the parts of it I had already done :wah:

[Sepp von Ch.]

:wah:

Even though thanks for reply.