Adding smoke effects to any ship?

Tex · 12-13-07, 02:32 PM

Hi guys. I was wondering if anyone had an easy way to add smoke effects to any ship? I'd like to add fire and smoke effects to a few ships actually that burn continuously. Any ideas?

Thanks in advance for your help!

PS: They are static ships, the battleships sunk in Pearl Harbor.

tater · 12-13-07, 02:47 PM

Stream of consciousness here, posting so it's out there and I don't forget.

People have posted wanting to have darker smoke. ROW does this to some extent, and ups the distance.

The next thing is that many japanese merchants were coal fired still. There is only one type of stack smoke.

Idea: if a fire/smoke could be stuck onto a ship, couldn't the smoke effect in question be cloned, reduced in diameter, then stuck on top of the stack for certain, cola fired merchants?

tater

Tex · 12-13-07, 03:39 PM

Thanks for the feedback tater, though I'm looking for fire and smoke that you see on a sinking ship. In FSX using the SDK one could create fire smoke effects on a small plane and basically place that plane on the object you want smoking effectivly 'hiding' the plane inside the object so it appears the smoke is coming directly from that object. My only issue is, how to actually create that smoke and fire. Cloning an already made fire/smoke like you mentioned could work too, I'm just not sure where to look and what to look for.

tater · 12-13-07, 04:19 PM

Just did it. BTW, I can now add custom smoke effects to specific ships, I will work on a coal fired ship mod. Woot!

The only thing I cannot do at the moment is hook the smoke to the funnel in such a way that it will go away when the funnel gets blown off. Still, that's not the end of the world. BLACK coal smoke for SOME ships can now be easily possible.

tater

tater · 12-13-07, 04:23 PM

BTW, Anvart has a similar SH3 mod: http://www.subsim.com/radioroom/showthread.php?t=118089

When he first posted about it I lacked the skill to understand what he was talking about. My method is different, actually, but his is still very cool.

Actually, Anvart's method will be far better for adding multiple smoke types (coal vs oil vs diesel). When the next S3D is out I will have a crack at it based upon his excellent work.

My technique involved pointing at it with the eqp file. Works, too.

tater

tater · 12-13-07, 04:41 PM

The wrecks at PH are not in the Sea folder, and don't have EQP files. It should be possible to make a new ship type with no model at all, but a few nodes. Then we place the ship on the wreck, with the desired smoke/fire effects stuck to it in the eqp file.

tater

mrbeast · 12-13-07, 05:33 PM

According to the Sqaudron Signal book Japanese Light Cruisers of world war II In Action, Japanese ships tended to give off quite a lot of black smoke, even the oil fied ones. This made them easy to distinguish from allied vessels. Some of the pictures do show this while they are at high speed.

I don't know how valid this is but I'm guessing that the Japanese where probably forced to use inferior quality fuel due to shortages (they even pumped it out of the sunken BB Nagato) which might have created more and darker smoke.

TheDarkWraith · 12-14-07, 01:45 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by tater

Just did it. BTW, I can now add custom smoke effects to specific ships, I will work on a coal fired ship mod. Woot!

The only thing I cannot do at the moment is hook the smoke to the funnel in such a way that it will go away when the funnel gets blown off. Still, that's not the end of the world. BLACK coal smoke for SOME ships can now be easily possible.

tater

in the particles.dat there is an ID named 'funnel_smoke'. The ship's use this for their smoke stacks. If you clone this and change the 'color' parameters in the fastparticlegenerator to make it a darker color and then add this cloned ID in place of the funnel smoke's ID in the ships you should have different smoke then.
To add a smoke node to any ship is also easy to do. Basically clone the fastparticlegenerator out of funnel smoke and paste it onto a new node. Attach that node to the ship you want to have a continuous smoke effect. The best way to do this would be to make the new node 'public' by placing in particles.dat or make a new .dat file for it, and reference it as a new cfg#xx node in the ship's .eqp file.
The particles.dat and materials.dat files I'm very familiar with as I ported them over to SH3 and made my own FX mod out of it for SH3. I'll be bringing that FX mod over to SH4 here soon...

tater · 12-14-07, 02:22 PM

Yeah, anything in Library can be stuck on a ship via the eqp file. Take the burning_oil node in particles.dat. Link=burning_oil for any node in a ship's eqp file, and there you have it.

mrbeast · 12-14-07, 03:39 PM

This sounds promising. Is there anyway this method of making smoke could be tweaked so that smoke screens could be modded in?

tater · 12-14-07, 03:42 PM

Do any of the smoke types "lay down" along the water? I haven't messed with particles, but if there is a setting to do that, then yeah, should be pretty straightforward. Course getting the AI to use it intelligently is another matter entirely.

12-13-07, 02:32 PM	#1
Tex Director of the Deep Join Date: Dec 2007 Location: Houston, Texas Posts: 83 Downloads: 7 Uploads: 0	Adding smoke effects to any ship? Hi guys. I was wondering if anyone had an easy way to add smoke effects to any ship? I'd like to add fire and smoke effects to a few ships actually that burn continuously. Any ideas? Thanks in advance for your help! PS: They are static ships, the battleships sunk in Pearl Harbor. __________________ Click >>HERE<< to View my Films

12-13-07, 03:39 PM	#3
Tex Director of the Deep Join Date: Dec 2007 Location: Houston, Texas Posts: 83 Downloads: 7 Uploads: 0	Thanks for the feedback tater, though I'm looking for fire and smoke that you see on a sinking ship. In FSX using the SDK one could create fire smoke effects on a small plane and basically place that plane on the object you want smoking effectivly 'hiding' the plane inside the object so it appears the smoke is coming directly from that object. My only issue is, how to actually create that smoke and fire. Cloning an already made fire/smoke like you mentioned could work too, I'm just not sure where to look and what to look for. __________________ Click >>HERE<< to View my Films

12-13-07, 05:33 PM	#7
mrbeast Ace of the Deep Join Date: Aug 2007 Location: Bolton, UK Posts: 1,236 Downloads: 0 Uploads: 0	According to the Sqaudron Signal book Japanese Light Cruisers of world war II In Action, Japanese ships tended to give off quite a lot of black smoke, even the oil fied ones. This made them easy to distinguish from allied vessels. Some of the pictures do show this while they are at high speed. I don't know how valid this is but I'm guessing that the Japanese where probably forced to use inferior quality fuel due to shortages (they even pumped it out of the sunken BB Nagato) which might have created more and darker smoke. __________________

12-14-07, 03:39 PM	#10
mrbeast Ace of the Deep Join Date: Aug 2007 Location: Bolton, UK Posts: 1,236 Downloads: 0 Uploads: 0	This sounds promising. Is there anyway this method of making smoke could be tweaked so that smoke screens could be modded in? __________________

12-13-07, 02:47 PM	#2
tater Navy Seal Join Date: Mar 2007 Location: New Mexico, USA Posts: 9,023 Downloads: 8 Uploads: 2	Stream of consciousness here, posting so it's out there and I don't forget. People have posted wanting to have darker smoke. ROW does this to some extent, and ups the distance. The next thing is that many japanese merchants were coal fired still. There is only one type of stack smoke. Idea: if a fire/smoke could be stuck onto a ship, couldn't the smoke effect in question be cloned, reduced in diameter, then stuck on top of the stack for certain, cola fired merchants? tater

12-13-07, 04:19 PM	#4
tater Navy Seal Join Date: Mar 2007 Location: New Mexico, USA Posts: 9,023 Downloads: 8 Uploads: 2	Just did it. BTW, I can now add custom smoke effects to specific ships, I will work on a coal fired ship mod. Woot! The only thing I cannot do at the moment is hook the smoke to the funnel in such a way that it will go away when the funnel gets blown off. Still, that's not the end of the world. BLACK coal smoke for SOME ships can now be easily possible. tater

12-13-07, 04:23 PM	#5
tater Navy Seal Join Date: Mar 2007 Location: New Mexico, USA Posts: 9,023 Downloads: 8 Uploads: 2	BTW, Anvart has a similar SH3 mod: http://www.subsim.com/radioroom/showthread.php?t=118089 When he first posted about it I lacked the skill to understand what he was talking about. My method is different, actually, but his is still very cool. Actually, Anvart's method will be far better for adding multiple smoke types (coal vs oil vs diesel). When the next S3D is out I will have a crack at it based upon his excellent work. My technique involved pointing at it with the eqp file. Works, too. tater

12-13-07, 04:41 PM	#6
tater Navy Seal Join Date: Mar 2007 Location: New Mexico, USA Posts: 9,023 Downloads: 8 Uploads: 2	The wrecks at PH are not in the Sea folder, and don't have EQP files. It should be possible to make a new ship type with no model at all, but a few nodes. Then we place the ship on the wreck, with the desired smoke/fire effects stuck to it in the eqp file. tater

12-14-07, 02:22 PM	#9
tater Navy Seal Join Date: Mar 2007 Location: New Mexico, USA Posts: 9,023 Downloads: 8 Uploads: 2	Yeah, anything in Library can be stuck on a ship via the eqp file. Take the burning_oil node in particles.dat. Link=burning_oil for any node in a ship's eqp file, and there you have it.

12-14-07, 03:42 PM	#11
tater Navy Seal Join Date: Mar 2007 Location: New Mexico, USA Posts: 9,023 Downloads: 8 Uploads: 2	Do any of the smoke types "lay down" along the water? I haven't messed with particles, but if there is a setting to do that, then yeah, should be pretty straightforward. Course getting the AI to use it intelligently is another matter entirely.