Interesting Shadows - Page 14

Graf Paper · 03-03-09, 07:06 PM

I managed to do a little testing last night. I only altered the intensity settings for Sunlight and Ambient to 1.0 and 1.7, respectively, and using version 2 of the Shadows test mod.

There were no noticeable changes in appearance from your screenshots, Racerboy. Shadows do look very good but there are still no shadows cast underwater.

I'll try playing with the Translation and Rotation settings next.

The deckgun shadowing looks especially nice, in my opinion.

Keep up the good work, RB!

CapZap1970 · 03-03-09, 08:40 PM

IMHO, Nbr 1, but it's very hard to say. Anyway, I thing it's a great job you are doing!!

CapZap

TheDarkWraith · 03-04-09, 09:41 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Graf Paper

I managed to do a little testing last night. I only altered the intensity settings for Sunlight and Ambient to 1.0 and 1.7, respectively, and using version 2 of the Shadows test mod.

There were no noticeable changes in appearance from your screenshots, Racerboy. Shadows do look very good but there are still no shadows cast underwater.

I'll try playing with the Translation and Rotation settings next.

well then the question to ask is where is this 'Sunlight' used actually in game? If we can find a place where it is used then playing with the settings would give us better feedback to try and understand what a particular change does. Catch my drift?
I think you'll see some kind of change playing with the position/rotation settings though. I'll see if I can't find where this 'sunlight' is actually used in game.

Graf Paper · 03-04-09, 03:21 PM

I also noticed a setting in the Env node called SunlightUnderwaterAngle (or something close to that). The current value is set to 15.

I'm wondering if by altering this value it would allow shadows to be cast underwater?

My thinking is this value may only allow direct light to "filter" through the water at a certain maximum angle and this has the effect of killing shadows. 15 degrees is certainly shallow when you consider that directly overhead is 0 degrees and the horizon is 90 degrees, according to the orientation of the world coordinates.

I'll give it a shot while you dig around in the guts of the code, RB. Sure wish I knew more about hex and assembly to help you out better.

tonschk · 03-04-09, 05:17 PM

The 15 degrees you are talking about are this ?

Graf Paper · 03-04-09, 07:28 PM

That's correct, tonschk.

I'm also looking at a sub-node called "Uplight" that controls light properties in shallow depths ( "Downlight" controls lighting at deep depths and the ocean bottom ).

I think a combination of these settings in Env and in Sunlight are the answer. It will just take a while to find the right balance in the values to get the desired effect.

I just hope someone can figure out why the crew looks like they've been painted with radioactive waste after replacing the 1.4b SH3Controllers.act file with the 1.0 version.

TheDarkWraith · 03-04-09, 07:59 PM

Graf Paper you might be onto something. I didn't get a chance to look at anything yet and won't be able to until early next week. Got called out of town for work.

IFRT-WHUFC · 03-04-09, 08:55 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Graf Paper

I also noticed a setting in the Env node called SunlightUnderwaterAngle (or something close to that). The current value is set to 15.

I'm wondering if by altering this value it would allow shadows to be cast underwater?

My thinking is this value may only allow direct light to "filter" through the water at a certain maximum angle and this has the effect of killing shadows. 15 degrees is certainly shallow when you consider that directly overhead is 0 degrees and the horizon is 90 degrees, according to the orientation of the world coordinates.

I'll give it a shot while you dig around in the guts of the code, RB. Sure wish I knew more about hex and assembly to help you out better.

In SH4 the MaxUnderwaterSunLightAngle is set to 90 and I'm pretty sure i've seen the sub cast shadows onto the seabed!

hope this is of some interest.
Rick

Graf Paper · 03-04-09, 11:23 PM

I sincerely hope I am on to something, Racerboy. We'll try and hold down the fort while you're away. Maybe the rest of us will have good news for you when you return.

Rick, that is very good information indeed! I was thinking that the very shallow angle of that parameter was why there were no discernible shadows being cast when submerged. It's like the way no shadows are apparent at high noon in the real world.

Keep it up! Any information could be the key that unlocks the door, even if it seems completely unrelated (such as this info about the parameter settings used in SH4).

I'm beginning to go beyond suspicion into the realm of certainty that many effects are there in SH3, just unimplemented or disabled when the game was being developed to try and ensure decent framerates on computer hardware that was current back in those days.

tonschk · 03-05-09, 05:27 AM

[quote=IFRT-WHUFC
In SH4 the MaxUnderwaterSunLightAngle is set to 90 and I'm pretty sure i've seen the sub cast shadows onto the seabed!

hope this is of some interest.
Rick[/quote]

Dynamic Shadows in SH4 ? , this is Impossible , the developer of SH4 " Dan " told us very clear that SH4 dont have any Dynamic Shadows , this are his own words .......

Hi guys, We did have dynamic shadows for SH3, but they were disabled in code I think. There's almost no programmers left from that team to ask them about it... and I don't think there's any tangible way to get them back

Sorry can't be of much help. They were unfinished and created lots of visual problems, .

Dan

IFRT-WHUFC · 03-05-09, 07:07 AM

I think the problem with the crew is that they have a light source attached to them which is self illuminating (selfillumi) if this can be changed or removed, i'm sure would solve this problem! (Which I'm not sure how to do without it causing a CTD).

ok
Rick

Hitman · 03-05-09, 07:40 AM

Quote:

I just hope someone can figure out why the crew looks like they've been painted with radioactive waste after replacing the 1.4b SH3Controllers.act file with the 1.0 version

IIRC those parts painted in lime green were actually the parts which would be shadowed. Hence you could solve already the worst part if you find the code line that sets the green to high in the three colours mix (Red/blue/green). Probably reducing the balance of all colours a lot would simply give a darker look to the shaded area that currently appears as green.

TheDarkWraith · 03-05-09, 10:21 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Hitman

IIRC those parts painted in lime green were actually the parts which would be shadowed. Hence you could solve already the worst part if you find the code line that sets the green to high in the three colours mix (Red/blue/green). Probably reducing the balance of all colours a lot would simply give a darker look to the shaded area that currently appears as green.

I only have my company laptop so I'm going from memory here until I get back home. In \data\Crew\Body01 and \data\Crew\Body02 I remember extracting out the TGAs used in those and they looked more like lightmaps or bumpmaps than anything else. When I viewed them with Photoshop 5 the green channel was the only channel enabled. Remember some posts back when I put up those screenshots of green crew and said aliens had taken over my uboat? That happened when I removed the bumpmap controllers and the 'selfillu' controllers.
In the Type 2/0 nodes dealing with crew there are Type 13/0 nodes that are 'selfillu' attached to them. I believe these are the self-illumination that IFRT-WHUFC is speaking of. That's about all I can help with for now until I get back to my real computer and tools.
I think it's great that SH3 has one up on SH4 - Dynamic shadows

skwasjer · 03-05-09, 12:10 PM

Uhm... 4-5 pages back... Have you tried?

PS: I'm fairly sure the 'selfillu' does not refer to self illumination in this particular case. I'd assume it should be 'bump' (as it is in other files) but apparently it isn't. Either it's a mix up or I don't know what, but the game files have more errors, this may well just be one. The game probably does not care about it (like many other cases where faults are tolerated) as it always expects a normal map for crew anyway. One thing that is sure is the textures linked to them which are most definately 'normal maps'.

Again, I would try disabling the normal map per how I suggested below...

Quote:

Originally Posted by skwasjer

Quote:

Originally Posted by Racerboy

Quote:

Originally Posted by skwasjer

RB, have you tried disabling the normal map for crew?

explain what you're talking about. I think I know what you're asking me but just want to be sure. I saw that there was a selfillumni controller attached to the 2/0 nodes in the crew's body and I tried removing those but didn't have any effect.

Either you have to remove the uv-data (uv map 2), not sure if the game stops rendering bump map then, or otherwise you can try substitute the normal map texture with a flat map (probably RGB=128,255,128). In the latter case, the result should be no 'height' alteration so light is not bend depending on light source, which seems to be the problem.

Graf Paper · 03-05-09, 08:27 PM

In perusing some of these files, I just wonder if that fix might be as simple as using the v1.0 crew textures for the uv mapping?

I also took a peek at EnvSim.act and noticed numerous references to lighting, in addition to the references in the SH3Controllers.act file upon which RB has been concentrating.

This may require more than simply altering settings in scene.dat with S3D but I'll keep plugging away at it until someone has a look at those .act files.

Makes me wish you had built in support for this file type with S3D, skwas. I'm just not enough of a mad genius programmer to read hex.

03-03-09, 07:06 PM	#196
Graf Paper Ace of the Deep Join Date: Jan 2008 Location: Pacific Northwest United States Posts: 1,146 Downloads: 41 Uploads: 2	I managed to do a little testing last night. I only altered the intensity settings for Sunlight and Ambient to 1.0 and 1.7, respectively, and using version 2 of the Shadows test mod. There were no noticeable changes in appearance from your screenshots, Racerboy. Shadows do look very good but there are still no shadows cast underwater. I'll try playing with the Translation and Rotation settings next. The deckgun shadowing looks especially nice, in my opinion. Keep up the good work, RB! __________________ Still sailing the high seas, hunting convoys with those who join me.

03-03-09, 08:40 PM	#197
CapZap1970 Sea Lord Join Date: Mar 2007 Location: La Paz, Bolivia Posts: 1,956 Downloads: 259 Uploads: 51	IMHO, Nbr 1, but it's very hard to say. Anyway, I thing it's a great job you are doing!! CapZap __________________

03-04-09, 03:21 PM	#199
Graf Paper Ace of the Deep Join Date: Jan 2008 Location: Pacific Northwest United States Posts: 1,146 Downloads: 41 Uploads: 2	I also noticed a setting in the Env node called SunlightUnderwaterAngle (or something close to that). The current value is set to 15. I'm wondering if by altering this value it would allow shadows to be cast underwater? My thinking is this value may only allow direct light to "filter" through the water at a certain maximum angle and this has the effect of killing shadows. 15 degrees is certainly shallow when you consider that directly overhead is 0 degrees and the horizon is 90 degrees, according to the orientation of the world coordinates. I'll give it a shot while you dig around in the guts of the code, RB. Sure wish I knew more about hex and assembly to help you out better. __________________ Still sailing the high seas, hunting convoys with those who join me.

03-04-09, 05:17 PM	#200
tonschk Admiral Join Date: Mar 2007 Posts: 2,200 Downloads: 172 Uploads: 0	The 15 degrees you are talking about are this ? __________________ What we do in life echoes in Eternity

03-04-09, 07:28 PM	#201
Graf Paper Ace of the Deep Join Date: Jan 2008 Location: Pacific Northwest United States Posts: 1,146 Downloads: 41 Uploads: 2	That's correct, tonschk. I'm also looking at a sub-node called "Uplight" that controls light properties in shallow depths ( "Downlight" controls lighting at deep depths and the ocean bottom ). I think a combination of these settings in Env and in Sunlight are the answer. It will just take a while to find the right balance in the values to get the desired effect. I just hope someone can figure out why the crew looks like they've been painted with radioactive waste after replacing the 1.4b SH3Controllers.act file with the 1.0 version. __________________ Still sailing the high seas, hunting convoys with those who join me.

03-04-09, 07:59 PM	#202
TheDarkWraith Black Magic Join Date: Jun 2007 Posts: 11,962 Downloads: 147 Uploads: 5	Graf Paper you might be onto something. I didn't get a chance to look at anything yet and won't be able to until early next week. Got called out of town for work.

03-04-09, 11:23 PM	#204
Graf Paper Ace of the Deep Join Date: Jan 2008 Location: Pacific Northwest United States Posts: 1,146 Downloads: 41 Uploads: 2	I sincerely hope I am on to something, Racerboy. We'll try and hold down the fort while you're away. Maybe the rest of us will have good news for you when you return. Rick, that is very good information indeed! I was thinking that the very shallow angle of that parameter was why there were no discernible shadows being cast when submerged. It's like the way no shadows are apparent at high noon in the real world. Keep it up! Any information could be the key that unlocks the door, even if it seems completely unrelated (such as this info about the parameter settings used in SH4). I'm beginning to go beyond suspicion into the realm of certainty that many effects are there in SH3, just unimplemented or disabled when the game was being developed to try and ensure decent framerates on computer hardware that was current back in those days. __________________ Still sailing the high seas, hunting convoys with those who join me.

03-05-09, 05:27 AM	#205
tonschk Admiral Join Date: Mar 2007 Posts: 2,200 Downloads: 172 Uploads: 0	[quote=IFRT-WHUFC In SH4 the MaxUnderwaterSunLightAngle is set to 90 and I'm pretty sure i've seen the sub cast shadows onto the seabed! hope this is of some interest. Rick[/quote] Dynamic Shadows in SH4 ? , this is Impossible , the developer of SH4 " Dan " told us very clear that SH4 dont have any Dynamic Shadows , this are his own words ....... Hi guys, We did have dynamic shadows for SH3, but they were disabled in code I think. There's almost no programmers left from that team to ask them about it... and I don't think there's any tangible way to get them back Sorry can't be of much help. They were unfinished and created lots of visual problems, . Dan __________________ What we do in life echoes in Eternity

03-05-09, 07:07 AM	#206
IFRT-WHUFC Engineer Join Date: Jul 2006 Location: By the Nordsee Posts: 200 Downloads: 374 Uploads: 0	I think the problem with the crew is that they have a light source attached to them which is self illuminating (selfillumi) if this can be changed or removed, i'm sure would solve this problem! (Which I'm not sure how to do without it causing a CTD). ok Rick

03-05-09, 08:27 PM	#210
Graf Paper Ace of the Deep Join Date: Jan 2008 Location: Pacific Northwest United States Posts: 1,146 Downloads: 41 Uploads: 2	In perusing some of these files, I just wonder if that fix might be as simple as using the v1.0 crew textures for the uv mapping? I also took a peek at EnvSim.act and noticed numerous references to lighting, in addition to the references in the SH3Controllers.act file upon which RB has been concentrating. This may require more than simply altering settings in scene.dat with S3D but I'll keep plugging away at it until someone has a look at those .act files. Makes me wish you had built in support for this file type with S3D, skwas. I'm just not enough of a mad genius programmer to read hex. __________________ Still sailing the high seas, hunting convoys with those who join me.