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General FreeSpace => FreeSpace & FreeSpace Open Support => Topic started by: Iain Baker on July 05, 2018, 04:55:17 pm

Title: Knossos Blue Planet lighting pre-sets
Post by: Iain Baker on July 05, 2018, 04:55:17 pm
Hey guys!
I have a quick question regarding Blue Planet on Knossos. Is there a way to apply lighting pre-sets to it?
I am able to with other mods, but for some reason it is not working with this one. Is this due to BP using 3.8.0, which does not show up in the list of FSO builds? (I’m seeing 3.8.0-2, 3.8.0-03 and 3.8.1-lotsofnumbers.)
The pre-sets appear to work with Blue Planet when I use WxLauncher however.
Any ideas?
Cheers 😊
Title: Re: Knossos Blue Planet lighting pre-sets
Post by: FrikgFeek on July 05, 2018, 05:27:23 pm
All the lighting presets are very outdated as they were made for the old lighting engine(pre-HDR) which was chnaged three years ago. The lighting works very differently on 3.8.0 and was changed again in recent nightlies.

If you're using the latest nightlies you should either write your own settings or copy some more recent ones.
Title: Re: Knossos Blue Planet lighting pre-sets
Post by: Iain Baker on July 05, 2018, 07:23:42 pm
Hi there, thank you for the info. Are there updated presets available now then? If so, where can I get hold of them please? Or a guide as to how to create my own with the new lighting engine? Cheers :-)
Title: Re: Knossos Blue Planet lighting pre-sets
Post by: FrikgFeek on July 06, 2018, 12:11:30 am
-ambient_factor (0-128) This controls ambient lighting which is applied to all parts of the ship from "all" directions. The way this works is a bit weird. (ambient factor * 2) - 255 is "added" to mission ambient, but since this will almost always be a negative value it's actually removed from mission ambient.
Because of how light values are clamped it cannot go below 5.1, ambient_factor 70 will result in -115 to mission ambient which is 120 by default.

70 is essentially the lowest ambient for missions with default ambient settings which are all retail missions and the vast majority of mod missions. Some BP missions have increased ambient so values below 70 actually do something.

So 70 is basically no ambient, 80 is a bit of ambient, and 90 is quite a bit of ambient(ships will look bright from all sides). Anything above that will make ships look incredibly "flat".


Spec_tube and Spec_point are multipliers applied to beam and laser lighting respectively. If you want beams or lasers to light up more set these to around 2. If you want less lighting set them to around 0.5.

Spec_static is a multiplier applied to direct specular lighting from suns. For non-PBR models it will make their sun-lit side very shiny and reflective, for PBR models it will make the sun-lit side a lot brighter. There's no flag to control diffuse static lighting so non-PBR models will always have the same amount of light come from suns.



So for a more dynamic "dark" look you should go with ambient_factor 65, spec_static 2.5, spec_tube 2 and spec_point 1.5. Also disable emissive lighting in the launcher settings because it makes the ships look pretty flat.

This will make lighting "dark" by default but ships will be pretty bright when facing the sun or when firing beams and lasers, resulting in a rather pretty contrasting look.

If you want a flatter, grayer look where lighting is more even use ambient_factor 85, spec_static 0.8, spec_tube 1.5 and spec_point 0.5. Beams should still be pretty bright honestly. Also disable emissive lighting in the launcher.
Title: Re: Knossos Blue Planet lighting pre-sets
Post by: AV8R on July 21, 2018, 08:59:33 pm
FrikgFeek, thanks for posting this. A lot of people (myself included) have been looking for a bit of help with the lighting settings post 3.8.0 since they seem a bit harder to tweak with the move to the new lighting algorithm. Getting that really dark, moody, realistic look with the new engine is a little harder to do now - but your clear explanations of what each setting does makes it a little easier to try new combinations to get a possibly desired effect.

Thanks for the info/clarification.  :yes: