[jaw wide open, in awe]

Wow!

I'm looking forward to a release :up:

New stuff looks and sounds good LV :up:


RDP

Hey Dave..

I thought you would take a weekend without SH-IV :rotfl: :rotfl:
Fantastic shots, can't wait for this mod.. :arrgh!:

It would be very cool to see the sea and wind change some more.
Also a better view of the seafoam textures from higher camera angles is highly appreciated !

Thanks

Dennis
I will send you the program and login tomorrow !

<- I like my new title and avatar :D ;)

Thanks to FooFighters / reallydedpoet / Soviet_Warlord / chopped50ford
 

for the comments.

Ya Dennis the Avatar looks cool and thanks for setting me up with a private place to post downloads for testers looking forward to it.

As soon as I have sea's where the sea foam is present they will be adjusted for optimum look that I promise.

I have enlisted some extra testers to help with getting everything looking it's best. They are guys that have been around for a very long time some from before SHIV came out and their input will be very valuable in making this work and look as good as LBO and a nice compliment for it all. They are testing both my work and Kriller2's work combined and how it all looks for problem fix's and over all impact and things needed.

No names it is up to them if they want to be known or not, just wanted to update you on how much I and Kriller are trying to make this Mod the best possable eye candy for everyone on external view's.

A little tid bit that might be helpfull to testers and others downloading mod's especialy visual enhancment's. Redwine and I found out that sometimes the person doing the mod's settings in the Graffic's adjustments in the menu for the game can be carried over into the mod work and actualy change your own settings. It is sugested to uncheck all of the enhancment's and apply them then go back and check off what you want and apply them again to reset exactly what visual effect you want for your own game. Yes this sounds strange that it should happen but we have confirmed this 2 times now from downloads he has gotten from me for testing. The checked off box's don't change but the settings from one guy's game to anothers actualy do show up in the game.

Files like the scene.dat / camera.dat and so forth can cause this problem from mod's.

I think what is happening is there is almost like an ingame save effect that get's carried over into those types of files and the game makes changes to them in some way or another that get's imprinted to the files so when you download them you get the same effect's.

You will see smoke and and fire lighting effects and reflections
 

like you have never seen before in the game! Here is an example on how the sun will now amplify the lighting effects and how much the reflection mirriors the visuals.

http://static1.filefront.com/images/...u.thumb250.jpg

I want to make an appology to Seeadler
 

Let me explain something I didn't understand until now getting into the work seriously with the reflections and lighting effect's. Look at the picture first!

http://static1.filefront.com/images/...q.thumb250.jpg

In the distance see those light reflection effect's? That is actualy the games way of showing how light is reflected off the tops of the waves vs camera angle and sun's angle. And as the sun get's lower in the sky they turn a darker color for the shadow effect the game try's to recreate.

Seeadler there is very little that can be done to make that all go away you can only just dull the effect a little. You were on the right track with your work though, it just needed some refinement. I don't know if you are still around but a comment I made about it in your thread when you first released the mod was off base and I am sorry about that!

Nice LV, keep it going on this stuff :up::up:


RDP

Thanks to JakeToox new find
 

All subs reflections on the ocean's surface will now be a lot clearer and even more enhanced. There a total of 8 subs that this can be done to even the new Uboat Dusiums added to Trigger Maru so that will be applied to this mod when it is released. Sending all the new stuff to testers now so look for it guys.

Will post new pics in a few but here is one from JakeToox for the late war Balao

http://i215.photobucket.com/albums/c...413.21_968.jpg

very nice - thats what i meant :)

just out of curiosity, is something similar possible for the refraction effect from beneath the surface? of is that taken are of, too?

thanks JakeTooks for pointing this out :up:

edit:
just thought of something crazy: i know it's a lot of manual labor, but whatever you guys did with the subs should be possible for *all* ships. looking through the dats inside the Sea folder i can see every object has the same reflection properties which could be modified. if you gave be specific instructions, i'll be more than happy to take care of that part, too :)

l3th4l
 

almost every object that has a dat file can get this enhancment yes. But it is one thing to do it to something you see all the time but if you do it to every object in the game once they are visable and in play then you will see a FPS drop you will never forget. Like putting the game in capture mode it will only do 1 frame per second.

I had already done this to the sun and moon a long time back to help create those sunset's and sunrise screen shot's I posted just didn't know about doing it to the subs till Jaketoox pointed it out.

But there are adjustments for the conning towers as well and that will go good with the sub enhancments and I will do that today and get it out to the testers. I also enhanced the scopes reflection effects for calm sea's to match the sub's and conning towers.

Keep in mind testers that the calmer the water the less distorted and clearer the reflections appear on the water. I have purposly set up the reflections so far that they slowly get more distorted as the wind and waves increase is which a lot more true to life effects. Same with the under water view's. For instance you may see a torpedo at a 10 ft or less setting in calm water but once the waves are at 5mps winds you might not see it at all only the wake behind it. I want to try and keep the effect's as real as possable.

Let me explain something for all testers
 

I am using files from T.M. 1.6 and just adding on top of them the propeller fix for subs and all other enhancments are included in the file's guys so this can be applied on top of the other files using JSGME.

I figured it was the easiest way to accomidate all the needs out there. I am working on one thing to try and make a vs that will work with MAV87 sextant navigation mod once that is set I will send that file change to those using that mod.

For you guys who are waiting for this mod just for the fix on the sea foam effect's from Seeadler's work you can play with these 2 adjustments until you find a combination that works for yourself.

use the mini tweeker and the scene tweek file go to the tab Sea Foam

then work with these 2 sets of numbers only:

TextureScale
MaskTextureScale

I am not releasing numbers yet because I havn't even gotten fine tuned right in my own eyes.
Just thought I would give you a heads up on what you can do while waiting for me to finish
this mod!

Start with a TextureScale of 120 and then work from there if it helps.

Okay just to keep you up to date
 

I only have a few more minor tweek's to do just need to be in each individual wave state to finish the reflections work. So it is up to the game's Mother Nature God now to let me do the final finishing touches. Then this will be ready for everyone.

I had to enhance these pictures to show the effect
 

But with changing the angles of reflections and narrowing the effect's you will now see realistic shadowing in the game on the sub's and ships. I hope you can see what I mean with these photo's of a moon rise. I have also extended the reflection's on the water so now they travel much further away from the object's than before in camera view's. I am also enhancing the star flairs the DD's use so that they will light up the clouds a little bit and have a brighter circle of light on the ocean surface around them. Inother words the flairs the DD's use at night to find you will be much more effective.

http://static1.filefront.com/images/...s.thumb250.jpghttp://static1.filefront.com/images/...r.thumb250.jpghttp://static1.filefront.com/images/...u.thumb250.jpghttp://static1.filefront.com/images/...a.thumb250.jpg

Man, I am soooo confused now as to how all this stuff relates to all this other stuff (LBO, reflections, lightning, smoke, sea foam, Kriller, Seeadler, etc. etc.) :o

But who cares - i.e., don't spend any time trying to explain it to me/us - just keep plugging away as long as you can stand it, and be sure to take some breaks now and then so you don't get burned out and leave us all hanging - these screen shots just keep looking better and better and we'll just have to keep cleaning the drool off our keyboards and waiting as patiently as possible for the eventual release(s). Really looking forward to seeing this stuff in my game and not just in these threads :yep: