16 Km Visibility Mod and FOG - Page 2

Gammel · 01-23-06, 06:29 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Redwine

I have the same problem, exact the same.
It happens too underwatwer when you increase too much the visibility underwater, you start up to see the boundaries of the surface texture, and a square appears, may be when you put the camera on a plane the same effect happen due to the increased visibility.

Interesting info, perhaps someone is able to fix it.
For me itÂ´s a great immersion killer, the game looks so great in all other terms...

What has happened to Manuel Ortega?
He was the creator of the original visibility mod.

What videocard are you using, Redwine?
ati X800XL here...
But i guess itÂ´s not a video card related problem.

Marhkimov · 01-23-06, 06:33 PM

It's probably not a driver or card problem.

I think the SH3 engine only renders a certain amount of distance from the U-boat while underwater. Hence, you can only make underwater visibility from 1 to 20... Any higher, and you will see this box effect for sure.

Redwine · 01-23-06, 07:23 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Hartmann

.

Unfortunately the game engine tied the heavy fog with the rain storms. in reality the fog could appears in calm waters.

Hola Hartmann, como anda eso ?

Yes agree, normally in hevy rain visibility is reduced but by the rain not by fog.

Normally fog is in very calm winds and even under not clouds at all weather.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Gammel

What videocard are you using, Redwine?
ati X800XL here...
But i guess itÂ´s not a video card related problem.

ATI X800 XT PE here, but i think so it is not related to the graphic cards because, according the misssion i dont have this issue.

In some third party missions i cant see this square from the plane.
I think so it is relating to mod settings.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Marhkimov

It's probably not a driver or card problem.

I think the SH3 engine only renders a certain amount of distance from the U-boat while underwater. Hence, you can only make underwater visibility from 1 to 20... Any higher, and you will see this box effect for sure.

Yes 20 or 21 is the limit, but we have some similar problem when we put the camera on a plane, it is posible to see the texture square boundary in some missions, very wreid.

The game model the sea surface only in a determined size square, you can see its limits.

Panama_Red · 01-23-06, 08:12 PM

I was fooling around with the scene.dat file a couple of months ago and I found out that you can "shrink" or "enlarge" the SH3 world (move the edge of the world inward or outward), but it comes at a cost.

The larger the world, the lower the FPS. If you ever really dig into the scene.dat file with TT's Tweaker, you will find that the reason the 8km visibility is so FPS friendly is because the edge of the original SH3 world is not much further than 8km (the fog covers the boundry so it does not look so weird). When you use the 16km visibility mod, you must enlarge the SH3 world and as a result, your FPS drop as it has to render 4 times the amount of space in the game.

What you see when you raise your camera up in the air beyond 70 meters (original game limit), is this edge, so if you do not like the edge, do not go so high.

Gammel · 01-24-06, 02:48 AM

Hello Panama,

does that mean it is fixable?
can you tell what entry in the scene.dat file has to be raised to
increase the world limit to get rid off that ugly square with the 16 km mod installed?
No problem if the fps would go down!

Panama_Red · 01-24-06, 07:02 AM

Gammel:
When I get home tonight, I can post the locations that you have to play with in the scene.dat file to enlarge your world. There is also a location that you use to "flatten" or "curve" the world too.

When I was playing with the scene.dat file, I found that I had to "flatten" the world so you could actually see the correct amount of the ships on the horizion (I used some sight distance formulas to get the correct data). Currently, the 16km mods out there only show about half of the amount of ship on the horizion that you should really see from the bridge of a U-Boat. As a result, when you flattern the world, i.e. raise the level of the ship on the horizion, you can see them even more as in real life.

Gammel · 01-24-06, 05:01 PM

Great and interesting info, Panama Red!

Sounds like youÂ´ve really digged deep into tweaking the scene.dat file.
I doubt iÂ´ll be ever able to do most things you discribed, maybe a little of them, but for sure not so good like you would do.
Also i have not very much time to play and test atm, so would you like to post your best results settings for other users and me?
For sure iÂ´ll remember this tread when i hav e time to play SH3 again!
Or how about releasing a ready to use scene.dat file where the square problem is eliminated or reduced? :P
But iÂ´d be even very happy for a little hint what values have to be altered.

Panama_Red · 01-24-06, 06:50 PM

Here is the information you requested on "tweaking" the 16km visibility mod SH3 world using TT's Tweaker program.

File: Scene_dat.txt
Category: General Environmental Data
Names & Values:
DynamicOceanGridSize = 10
DynamicOceanGridSize = 0.33
DynamicOceanGridSize = 10
DynamicOceanGridSize = 2.6
DynamicOceanGridSize = 55 <--- The larger the number, the larger the SH3 world
DynamicOceanGridSize = 22
EarthRadius = 3000000 <--- The larger the number, the "flatter" the SH3 world
LightColor = 5E5039
...
...
...
...
WindDirection = 0.7

Most 16km visibility mods use DynamicOceanGridSize = 60, but reducing to 55 gave me an average of 3 more FPS at the low end of the my tests and at 16km distance, you could not really tell the difference.

Raising the EarthRadius = 3000000 did not affect FPS, but it did allow you to see the proper height of ships/trees/buildings in the distance above the waterline. Most 16km mod have that number around 80000 which makes the ships/trees/buildings to low over the horizion.

Use your TT Tweaker to install these numbers and you will see the results. If you think your video card is real powerfull, raise the DynamicOceanGridSize above 60 and your world will enlarge, but your FPS will drop too.

Marhkimov · 01-24-06, 09:24 PM

Someone with some 3D graphic skills could even edit the environmental sphere, and make it so that you can lower the "DynamicOceanGridSize" value.

At DynamicOceanGridSize=55, it does eat up a lot of computing power. So you might have thought: why not make it smaller? Maybe 20 or something? Well, I've tried that, but then there becomes a giant gap where the water surface is supposed to be. A little 3D editing, and you could cover that up with a low res surface.

It's too bad I don't know my Wings3D.... Anyone want to give it a try?

Gammel · 01-25-06, 01:39 AM

Thanks very much for posting your settings, Panama.

and also a big salute to other posters here!!

looking forward to do some testing!!
Unfortunately iÂ´ve not the time do do right now...

Redwine · 01-25-06, 09:06 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Gammel

Hello Panama,

does that mean it is fixable?
can you tell what entry in the scene.dat file has to be raised to
increase the world limit to get rid off that ugly square with the 16 km mod installed?
No problem if the fps would go down!

I think so some changes in fog values can make the texture boundaries appears in sight.

May be rstircting the range of view from Object camera from scene.dat using minitweaker.

This may be not affect other range of sight, only the sight on object camera ?

May be ?

01-23-06, 06:33 PM	#17
Marhkimov Admiral Join Date: May 2005 Location: Bay Area, California, USA Posts: 2,377 Downloads: 0 Uploads: 0	It's probably not a driver or card problem. I think the SH3 engine only renders a certain amount of distance from the U-boat while underwater. Hence, you can only make underwater visibility from 1 to 20... Any higher, and you will see this box effect for sure. __________________ It takes two to tango

01-24-06, 09:24 PM	#24
Marhkimov Admiral Join Date: May 2005 Location: Bay Area, California, USA Posts: 2,377 Downloads: 0 Uploads: 0	Someone with some 3D graphic skills could even edit the environmental sphere, and make it so that you can lower the "DynamicOceanGridSize" value. At DynamicOceanGridSize=55, it does eat up a lot of computing power. So you might have thought: why not make it smaller? Maybe 20 or something? Well, I've tried that, but then there becomes a giant gap where the water surface is supposed to be. A little 3D editing, and you could cover that up with a low res surface. It's too bad I don't know my Wings3D.... Anyone want to give it a try? __________________ It takes two to tango

01-23-06, 08:12 PM	#19
Panama_Red Ensign Join Date: Sep 2005 Posts: 229 Downloads: 89 Uploads: 0	I was fooling around with the scene.dat file a couple of months ago and I found out that you can "shrink" or "enlarge" the SH3 world (move the edge of the world inward or outward), but it comes at a cost. The larger the world, the lower the FPS. If you ever really dig into the scene.dat file with TT's Tweaker, you will find that the reason the 8km visibility is so FPS friendly is because the edge of the original SH3 world is not much further than 8km (the fog covers the boundry so it does not look so weird). When you use the 16km visibility mod, you must enlarge the SH3 world and as a result, your FPS drop as it has to render 4 times the amount of space in the game. What you see when you raise your camera up in the air beyond 70 meters (original game limit), is this edge, so if you do not like the edge, do not go so high.

01-24-06, 02:48 AM	#20
Gammel Commodore Join Date: Apr 2005 Posts: 641 Downloads: 276 Uploads: 0	Hello Panama, does that mean it is fixable? can you tell what entry in the scene.dat file has to be raised to increase the world limit to get rid off that ugly square with the 16 km mod installed? No problem if the fps would go down!

01-24-06, 07:02 AM	#21
Panama_Red Ensign Join Date: Sep 2005 Posts: 229 Downloads: 89 Uploads: 0	Gammel: When I get home tonight, I can post the locations that you have to play with in the scene.dat file to enlarge your world. There is also a location that you use to "flatten" or "curve" the world too. When I was playing with the scene.dat file, I found that I had to "flatten" the world so you could actually see the correct amount of the ships on the horizion (I used some sight distance formulas to get the correct data). Currently, the 16km mods out there only show about half of the amount of ship on the horizion that you should really see from the bridge of a U-Boat. As a result, when you flattern the world, i.e. raise the level of the ship on the horizion, you can see them even more as in real life.

01-24-06, 05:01 PM	#22
Gammel Commodore Join Date: Apr 2005 Posts: 641 Downloads: 276 Uploads: 0	Great and interesting info, Panama Red! Sounds like youÂ´ve really digged deep into tweaking the scene.dat file. I doubt iÂ´ll be ever able to do most things you discribed, maybe a little of them, but for sure not so good like you would do. Also i have not very much time to play and test atm, so would you like to post your best results settings for other users and me? For sure iÂ´ll remember this tread when i hav e time to play SH3 again! Or how about releasing a ready to use scene.dat file where the square problem is eliminated or reduced? :P But iÂ´d be even very happy for a little hint what values have to be altered.

01-24-06, 06:50 PM	#23
Panama_Red Ensign Join Date: Sep 2005 Posts: 229 Downloads: 89 Uploads: 0	Here is the information you requested on "tweaking" the 16km visibility mod SH3 world using TT's Tweaker program. File: Scene_dat.txt Category: General Environmental Data Names & Values: DynamicOceanGridSize = 10 DynamicOceanGridSize = 0.33 DynamicOceanGridSize = 10 DynamicOceanGridSize = 2.6 DynamicOceanGridSize = 55 <--- The larger the number, the larger the SH3 world DynamicOceanGridSize = 22 EarthRadius = 3000000 <--- The larger the number, the "flatter" the SH3 world LightColor = 5E5039 ... ... ... ... WindDirection = 0.7 Most 16km visibility mods use DynamicOceanGridSize = 60, but reducing to 55 gave me an average of 3 more FPS at the low end of the my tests and at 16km distance, you could not really tell the difference. Raising the EarthRadius = 3000000 did not affect FPS, but it did allow you to see the proper height of ships/trees/buildings in the distance above the waterline. Most 16km mod have that number around 80000 which makes the ships/trees/buildings to low over the horizion. Use your TT Tweaker to install these numbers and you will see the results. If you think your video card is real powerfull, raise the DynamicOceanGridSize above 60 and your world will enlarge, but your FPS will drop too.

01-25-06, 01:39 AM	#25
Gammel Commodore Join Date: Apr 2005 Posts: 641 Downloads: 276 Uploads: 0	Thanks very much for posting your settings, Panama. and also a big salute to other posters here!! looking forward to do some testing!! Unfortunately iÂ´ve not the time do do right now...