[Valathil]

Been working on this for the past day have a look I think its finally working as it should

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_Tw9nNcgbU0

[Flipside]

That's bloody impressive! Good stuff.

[sigtau]

I like what I see!  How did you manage to overcome the light limit?

[Iss Mneur]

I like what I see!  How did you manage to overcome the light limit?

Valathil can correct me if I am wrong, its done with a tube light (that is the entire beam is a light emitter, rather than the (three?) spot lights that we used previously.

[Jessnec]

look nice! 

[Valathil]

I like what I see!  How did you manage to overcome the light limit?

I work on that in a separate patch beams are much closer for me to release.

(that is the entire beam is a light emitter, rather than the (three?) spot lights that we used previously.

Exactly the beam light is a tube light and I could eliminate one useless light spawn. Beams that hit a ship would always spawn 2 lights, I killed the light that would spawn when a collision is detected and handled that with the tube light. So that makes it a little easier for the 8 light limit.

[Black Wolf]

Nicely done! It looks way more subtle. and much more realistic - no more green-wash capships

[Nuke]

will this also cast light on objects that the beam passes, like a fighter between capships that are duking it out?

[Valathil]

i wanted to do that but the light limit precludes me from removing the filter that only applies beam to the ship the beam was meant for. However if i can fix the problems with my light limit patch this should be possible in the future.

oh and new preview:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TWFkbEJVVhk

[Kolgena]

Nicely done! It looks way more subtle. and much more realistic - no more green-wash capships

A thousand times this.

i wanted to do that but the light limit precludes me from removing the filter that only applies beam to the ship the beam was meant for. However if i can fix the problems with my light limit patch this should be possible in the future.

oh and new preview:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TWFkbEJVVhk

I know the blue AAA beams already cast light on things that are nearby, but aren't colliding with the beam. Or at least I think so. Not sure if that's useful for you to know though...

[Spoon]

Keep up the good work Valathil 
Improving the lighting (and adding shadows ) is one of the major points of potential improvements for the freespace graphics 

[chief1983]

I want to see it against a box-shape ship now, like the Orion.  The Lucifer is very rounded, I have a feeling it will have a different effect on a ship that's mostly flat surfaces and right angles.

[Kolgena]

The Colossus in the second video is decidedly box-like.

[Valathil]

I know the blue AAA beams already cast light on things that are nearby, but aren't colliding with the beam. Or at least I think so. Not sure if that's useful for you to know though...

they dont have the filter set cause they are expected to miss often

[Luis Dias]

I have to say I'm impressed, and I hope the next version of beam lighting will be this one.

Having said this, I also have to say that I'm slightly disappointed that the light hitting the hull of the ships is not exactly aligned with the beam itself, it seems that the light source is too far away from the hull itself, and the end result seems more like a reflection of a somewhat distant light, rather than the beam's light itself.

When I read your explanation, I thought, "Great, someone made a nice review of id's cheat on QuakeGL's missiles light (spheres)", but after seeing the videos, I see that by "tube" you mean something different.

So could someone explain to me what is geometrically happening within "light tubes"?


EDIT: And perhaps make it a little less "subtle"?

[Kolgena]

The "subtlety" could probably be tweaked by light tags.

I do agree that at point of impact, there needs to be a fair bit more relative luminosity though.

[Valathil]

I have to say I'm impressed, and I hope the next version of beam lighting will be this one.

Having said this, I also have to say that I'm slightly disappointed that the light hitting the hull of the ships is not exactly aligned with the beam itself, it seems that the light source is too far away from the hull itself, and the end result seems more like a reflection of a somewhat distant light, rather than the beam's light itself.

When I read your explanation, I thought, "Great, someone made a nice review of id's cheat on QuakeGL's missiles light (spheres)", but after seeing the videos, I see that by "tube" you mean something different.

So could someone explain to me what is geometrically happening within "light tubes"?

EDIT: And perhaps make it a little less "subtle"?

well by tube light i mean i take the nearest point on the beam line relative to the current calculating pixel and use that as a lighting direction. the to far away effect that doesnt look right comes from that kinda "faking it" way of doing the calculation. hardware limitations preclude me from a more accurate solution of integrating the light components along the beam (at least i think they do, i could try though would be crazy but worth it if it works).

will this also cast light on objects that the beam passes, like a fighter between capships that are duking it out?

i want to correct myself on that tube lights currently project light onto every target in range except the firing ship ( to save calculations about being "behind" the beam ). a fighter between two capships is currently being lit beautifully in my last test

EDIT: And perhaps make it a little less "subtle"?

im currently tweaking the lighting parameters thats why it isnt released to the public yet

[Luis Dias]

Ahhh nice, now I get it.

Soooo, is it so hard to code a fixed-distance from the hull? Since the engine already calculates the intersection between the beam and the hull, could one not calculate the point in the beam where it stands, say, 100m from it?

EDIT: alternatively, could it be possible to calculate the half-distance between the closest pixel on screen and the hull? Even if by "half-distance" one is measuring in actual pixels on-screen (thus not in real distance), the effect could be better. Or 2/3, or 4/5, I mean it could be testable.

[Kolgena]

i want to correct myself on that tube lights currently project light onto every target in range except the firing ship ( to save calculations about being "behind" the beam ).

What does this mean? A ship firing its own beams won't be lit by them? I'm thinking specifically of ships like the Hecate, where a tube light might look nice if it gets closer to some of the projections, or the Orion, when firing off a beam at a very acute angle.


I revisited the video, and I think your method of calculating light intensity based on distance looks pretty good. The washed-out effect only really shows up when there are 2-3 beams active, which makes sense; it's be equivalent to having 2-3 fluorescent lights lined up in the same orientation. You'll get soft light that bleeds together to look more uniform. It probably just needs more intensity to look normal.

Preview vid 2, at 0:12, makes me think that you're on the right track. 0:32? not so much.

[DaBrain]

Very impressive work!

Is the attenuation for the lights hard-coded?