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gap · 12-12-19, 04:21 PM

I hope I didn't forget anything, I horrible at packing stuff before release:

https://www.mediafire.com/file/6mjpm..._TWoS.rar/file

@ Vecko please check in game my addon before merging it to TWoS.

The Catalina was missing its light node, so no matter the date it never had any Leigh light. That little blunder is fixed now.

Adjusting beam's parameters and testing their effect in game took to me quite a lot of time:

The HaloSize in Skybaron's mod seemed to me a bit excessive. I reduced it by a considerable amount. When the light is pointing straight to the camera it still blinds the observer, hiding the aircraft behind it, but now the glare is better proportionate relative to the small reflector producing it. A welcome side effect of this resizing is that now the halo is not as 'pixelish' as before, though I will admit that the effect could be further improved if only I could located the texture it uses...
The Angle parameter is only affecting the size of the light projected on the sea surface, not the width of the visual beam, so I edited both this setting and the beam model to be compatible with a 10-deg spread angle.
For Color I used a set of RGB values corresponding to a color temperature of 5200K, typical of carbon arc lamps (but their spectrum is so similar to the one of direct sunlight that I could have used as well plain white 255, 255, 255).
Range and Atenuation parameters seem to only affect the luminosity of the area enlightened by the reflector. This is a feature that is neglected in stock game (you can barely see the projection of searchlight's beam on the sea surface), I hope I made a good use of it, without overdoing the effect.

I hoped I could make the light beam more faint and to have a better transition from full light to darkness, but neither the above parameters, nor material's opacity settings, nor texture's alpha channel seemed to affect beam's length and look, so that is possibly an hardcoded feature.

Finally I wanted planes to switch on their lights at a range of 914 m from their target as historically correct, but no matter how high or low I set the range parameter, during my tests the Catalina has always fired its light at a range of ca. 800 m (not too dissimilar from the desired range), obtaining a bonus in visual range of ca. 6.5 km. At the end I decided to set this parameter to ca. 3200 m, i.e. the declared effective range of Leigh Lights, (though, measured on the TAI map, the in-game range is twice as long).

My traverse/elevation settings are based on historical specifications and require no further comment.

Before you check my work directly in game, I have just a couple of general remarks:

For testing purposes, I commented out leight ligt's start/end date settings in Catalina's eqp file (with those parameters the light didn't show up in game); you should remove the comment marks before merging the mod in TWoS.
The main texture I have added to the package is 256x256 pixels. Considered Leigh Light's small size, this should be enough, but should you think that the texture resolution is too poor, the original texture is 2048x2048 pixels.

And finally a few screenshots I took this evening (beware: large image size):

Well, that should be all for now

P.S: I didn't perform any ballistic test (getting a round to hit that light would be a matter of luck even for a seasoned gunner), but in theory with a well aimed burst of the 2cm Flak, or with a single round of the 3,7cm SK C/30, one might disable the reflector turning its light off, or rip the whole nacelle away from the attacking aircraft

12-12-19, 04:21 PM	#12758
gap Navy Seal Join Date: Jan 2011 Location: CJ8937 Posts: 8,214 Downloads: 793 Uploads: 10	New Leigh light I hope I didn't forget anything, I horrible at packing stuff before release: https://www.mediafire.com/file/6mjpm..._TWoS.rar/file @ Vecko please check in game my addon before merging it to TWoS. The Catalina was missing its light node, so no matter the date it never had any Leigh light. That little blunder is fixed now. Adjusting beam's parameters and testing their effect in game took to me quite a lot of time: The HaloSize in Skybaron's mod seemed to me a bit excessive. I reduced it by a considerable amount. When the light is pointing straight to the camera it still blinds the observer, hiding the aircraft behind it, but now the glare is better proportionate relative to the small reflector producing it. A welcome side effect of this resizing is that now the halo is not as 'pixelish' as before, though I will admit that the effect could be further improved if only I could located the texture it uses... The Angle parameter is only affecting the size of the light projected on the sea surface, not the width of the visual beam, so I edited both this setting and the beam model to be compatible with a 10-deg spread angle. For Color I used a set of RGB values corresponding to a color temperature of 5200K, typical of carbon arc lamps (but their spectrum is so similar to the one of direct sunlight that I could have used as well plain white 255, 255, 255). Range and Atenuation parameters seem to only affect the luminosity of the area enlightened by the reflector. This is a feature that is neglected in stock game (you can barely see the projection of searchlight's beam on the sea surface), I hope I made a good use of it, without overdoing the effect. I hoped I could make the light beam more faint and to have a better transition from full light to darkness, but neither the above parameters, nor material's opacity settings, nor texture's alpha channel seemed to affect beam's length and look, so that is possibly an hardcoded feature. Finally I wanted planes to switch on their lights at a range of 914 m from their target as historically correct, but no matter how high or low I set the range parameter, during my tests the Catalina has always fired its light at a range of ca. 800 m (not too dissimilar from the desired range), obtaining a bonus in visual range of ca. 6.5 km. At the end I decided to set this parameter to ca. 3200 m, i.e. the declared effective range of Leigh Lights, (though, measured on the TAI map, the in-game range is twice as long). My traverse/elevation settings are based on historical specifications and require no further comment. Before you check my work directly in game, I have just a couple of general remarks: For testing purposes, I commented out leight ligt's start/end date settings in Catalina's eqp file (with those parameters the light didn't show up in game); you should remove the comment marks before merging the mod in TWoS. The main texture I have added to the package is 256x256 pixels. Considered Leigh Light's small size, this should be enough, but should you think that the texture resolution is too poor, the original texture is 2048x2048 pixels. And finally a few screenshots I took this evening (beware: large image size): Well, that should be all for now P.S: I didn't perform any ballistic test (getting a round to hit that light would be a matter of luck even for a seasoned gunner), but in theory with a well aimed burst of the 2cm Flak, or with a single round of the 3,7cm SK C/30, one might disable the reflector turning its light off, or rip the whole nacelle away from the attacking aircraft __________________ _____________________ \|May the Force be with you!\| ...\/ Last edited by gap; 12-13-19 at 08:56 AM.