Hard Light Productions Forums
Modding, Mission Design, and Coding => FS2 Open Coding - The Source Code Project (SCP) => Topic started by: FreeTerran on January 02, 2004, 05:42:09 am
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I would code an new hud display (new position of the hud things) but i need some ideas i hope some of you guys could help me and make an hud layout :)
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how 'bout a bitmap cocpit image? Woudn't it look better? I am not sure if this can be easily implemented into Freespace though.
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I second that. There were talks about that earlier and it doesn't seemed to be that easy, but it would be cool. Easily Customizable HUD positions, so that you can adjust them to the cockpit would be good too.
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Make it table based ala mainhall.tbl. Otherwise there's not point to changing it - you'd just be locking us into a different HUD combination that nobody is used to.
The ability to add simple new guages and displays would be an incredibly useful addition too. Guages would obviously need to have an easily defined variable for display (Eg distance from a particular object, or along an axis, or hitpoints of a target, something like that.) Displays, on the other hand, would just need custom graphics, and be controlled by sexps - told to appear, disappear or flash.
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An MFD would be quite useful, so that multiple gauges use the same space of the screen maybe. I always felt that the screen in FS was quite crammed with gauges of all sort compared to some other games. I'd rather see the gauges for the energy setting only when I manipulate them, for example.
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that sounds reasonable, BUT is this doable?
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It couldn't be that hard I think. Simply place all the gauges at the same place and make them invisible until you hit the key assigned to that gauge. And obviously every gauge will have a different key so you won't have the problem that two of 'em occupy the same place at the same time.
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and who is going to do that? I think it will be the same story as shielded cap ships.
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It would be cool if it were possible to make something like the Iwar reticle in freespace...
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It would be simply editing the code to change some gauge positions, like you could do with the interface. A problem could be to program that some gauges stay invisible until they're activated by a key or something and that they go invisible again when they are inactive.
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Dynamic positions would be even better.
If that was implemented there'd be no problem with 1600 x 1200 and other high resolutions.
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just have it so you can set a cockpit bitmap as well as the location for the different gauges and displays.
A cockpit image really has no use if you cannot change the location of things :)
Then have table called cockpit.tbl containing all the info (cockpit bitmap, cockpit locations, etc and name for that setup) -- you'll simply set the setup name in the ships table and the ship will use that cockpit. If no cockpit is set, it defaults to the original.
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Perhaps there could be multiple named cockpit configurations in cockpit.tbl, you could then refer to a specific cockpit configuration for a ship in ships.tbl? I'd also love to see a 3d cockpit model.
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Originally posted by IPAndrews
I'd also love to see a 3d cockpit model.
So do I, since nobody will never make a good looking 2D cockpit, I keep telling that, I keep being taken for a fool :doubt:.
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It may sound stupid, but for performance issues it could be beneficial to bake the cockpits, or at least do a quite low poly version of the cockpit and used the baked textures - for the biggest downside I heard was the performance drain, and the fact that low-poly 3d cockpits tend to suck.
That's my 2 cents, but in reality it's all up to you Modellers/Artists.
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I suggest you get a look at Xwing Alliance, then the upgrade project for Xwing alliance.
Hell, just take a look at Iwar2.
The only people I know who could make cool looking 2D cockpits, they mod Flight Simulator, not FS2.
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Well, from my point of view it shouldn't be too hard to do a good looking 2D cockpit. at least about 1000 times easier than doing the thing in 3D.
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I've tried both and from my point of view it's not.
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This is on the list to be implemented after 3.6 is out.
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Got an IRC coder yet?
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on the cockpit thing, why don't you make it in 3D and import a render?
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Yeah, that's possible, but then can you tell me what's the darn f'cking point in using a 2D cockpit if you have already a 3D one?
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touche........
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well, lemme think...
an excellent looking 3d cockpit will probably cause more performance hit than an excellent looking 2d one, moslty because the 3d one will probably require thousands of polys.
And as far as I can see the only things that may look better in the 3d cockpit (in a comparison between excellent 2d and 3d cockpits) are inertia (like starlancer) that is as cool as irrealistic, and lighting.
On the other hand a 3D cockpit should be faster to be built than a 2d one, and it could be done by more people and in less time than the 2d one.
But even a 3D cockpit will require a lot of textures work to look halfway decent without using true materials and 10k polys, and they will have to be custom textures, wich can't be done by everyone. Actually if you are able to draw those textures you should be able to create a whole 2d cockpit too.
Personally I think that for example you, nico, should be able to create an excellent 2d cockpit (maybe mixing a render and photoshop work).
I also think that I should be able to create a good 2d cockpit, I already used photoshop to create 2d images of complex 3d objects, with good results, so I should be able to do it ....in 2 or three months, probably more.....:rolleyes: (not to mention that my pc will explode if I try to create an image of the size and complexity we are talking about)
I think that even if it was possible to add em, I won't start making ship specific cockpits, either 2d and 3d, since I consider em surely cool but too timewasting and not so addictive to be worth the work.
It could be interesting the possibility to make something simple as an optional cockpit for SCP, something that could be shared, I mean just the crossbars (maybe 3d) and maybe a glass effect, like if the cockpit is projected on the window, something like WC:prophecy.
I may also be interested in giving my contribute in an eventual team project to create just a couple of good cockpits that could be given to SCP, I just don't want to waste time creating on my own many different cockpits for different ships
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Originally posted by KARMA
the 3d one will probably require thousands of polys.
cool, a huge post to which I can reply with one word that will render all the rest wrong:
no.
But that would suck, so i'll elaborate a bit more:
A good cockpit mesh, I can do one with much less than the 800 polys I use for a ship ( if you want I can make an exemple, will take 30 minutes max ). Then for the maps, don't take me for an idiot, the deal would be the same than for ships: some people ( I, you, Bob, Aldo, name anyone you want ), will make some generic maps, then everybody will do like they do for ships: they'll use those maps, they'll never bother doing new ones.
And that makes it all much simpler, isn't it?
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venom/nico, there seems already to be a coding solutions for a 2D cockpit, and when you have a 3D one, you also have a good 2D one. it's not the performance drain on the comp per se, it is also the perfomence drain on the coders.
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but venom, I have no doubts that you can do a 3d one with very few polys, the point is, will it look good?
I remember for example the low poly cockpits of starlancer, and they just suck.
Ok, they suffered of crap maps, but still they were...crap.
An halfway decent 2d cockpit would have been anytime better.
And if you go with a low poly cockpit, you just have to increase a lot the time spent on the textures, with minimal differences with the time spent for a 2d one (maybe built from a render of an high poly 3d cockpit).
And what you get as counterpart? the inertia effect may be cool the first time you see it, but then it become annoying and irrealistic.
And if you don't have the cockpit moving from the viewpoint (so if it keep still), the only difference that you can notice between a 3d cockpit and a 2d image rendered from the same cockpit, is the light, wich is obviously better with an relatively high poly cockpit rather than with a low poly one.
If this is worth the (even minimal) performance loss, I really don't know.... I'm just a bit perplex about what is the best way to go
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Well, if there's no solutions for rendering a 3D object in FS2, I'm sooooooo sorry, my mistake :rolleyes:.
edit: and Karma: yes, it will look good. Sorry, don't have the time to answer to your whole post, my father's calling me.
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Look Venom, off course there are way's to render the stuff, but another solution is already there, and what is the problem with doing something that might require a bit more work for the modder (one render and one conversion) for fairly little result (lighting and a few effects, as KARMA said)? It might cost you a whole of 30 minutes more, and it might save the coders days.
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2D sucks. Face it, if you're gonna go through the trouble of coding in a cockpit, it might as WELL be a 3D one. I'm agreeing with venom here, and saying that if a cockpit goes in, it should be 3D.
If you think that it will be such a huge performance hit, check out ANY recent flight sim's 3D cockpits. They don't kill your computer at all, and it's not like it could do much worse than with the specular lighting, bump-mapping, etc., at least if it's rendered ONLY for the player flying the ship.
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Oh ****, if you want your 2D cockpits so badly, why would I try and convince you that it's possible to make a nice looking 3D cockpit. You don't want to even understand that it's possible and even quite easy, so I give up. Just to say that whatever you do, just imagine it, a 2D cockpit in FS2, that'll look crap.
And in the meanwhile, check that link, lok at the horrible 3D cockpits :rolleyes::
http://www.darksaber.freeserve.co.uk/craftxwaupreb.htm
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ok, i am not saying that 3D is bad, i am saying the advanatge of 3D over 2D is minimal. look at FS2004, the differnec between the normal cockpit and the virtual one is not all that much if you just look straight ahead, it just uses simpler textures.
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I dont know why everyone is so obsessed with 3D.
A 2D cockpit will actually look better AND it will save performance, not to mention there'll be less problems with it.
-.edit: and yes, those 3D cockpits don't look very pretty. Something you could wham together in ~20 minutes in 2D.
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venom, in xwa you can rotate the point of view and look the cockpit at 360°, so it has more sense to make a 3d cockpit there.
wich doesn't mean that an eventual 3d cockpit in fs2 won't have sense.
Plus (having seen many stuff from DS) I doubt this one is exactly a "low poly" cockpit, and althought being surely nice, I have also to say that this one just doesn't look realistic to me, it's a bit too cartoonist.
Wich doesn't necessarily mean to be caused by the cockpit being 3d.
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Originally posted by Lightspeed
-.edit: and yes, those 3D cockpits don't look very pretty. Something you could wham together in ~20 minutes in 2D.
Go on, then. You've got--I'll tell you what, I'll give you a whole HOUR. Get busy. I want to see a good 2d cockpit that is better than the ones Venom linked by 4:37 EST.
Better get busy.
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so is the IW2 cockpit 3d or 2d? i could have sworn it was 3d since it gets lit
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Nico. Why not just make the cockpit. That way you can shut up everyone who thinks it would look crap.
Even if the SCP never implement the feature we might be able to use it for renders or something :)
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Originally posted by PhReAk
so is the IW2 cockpit 3d or 2d? i could have sworn it was 3d since it gets lit
3d. Its a standard .pso, so you can replace it if you want.
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Originally posted by karajorma
Nico. Why not just make the cockpit. That way you can shut up everyone who thinks it would look crap.
Even if the SCP never implement the feature we might be able to use it for renders or something :)
WHy bothering? They KNOW 2D is better. Showing such skills in being obtuse impresses, to be honest.
Oh, but I admit shwoing an Xwing cockpit isn't the best exemple ( coz even the real one is crappy as hell anyway).
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You can get similar effects to lighting by Hue adjusting the colours on the cockpit on a 2D bitmap, but 3D looks far far better.
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Originally posted by mikhael
Go on, then. You've got--I'll tell you what, I'll give you a whole HOUR. Get busy. I want to see a good 2d cockpit that is better than the ones Venom linked by 4:37 EST.
Better get busy.
Oh, i've got more important stuff to do ... and I was talking bout the same quality, not something better :)
I'll only do something if they're actually implemented.
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And they won't be implimented unless someone does something... guess we see where this is heading.
I'll personally say that I don't like on-screen cockpits, because the entire visable cone of the cockpit has to be displayed on a small, square screen that will at best take up 25% of your field of vision while playing. In a fighter, like in a car, you can easily shift your head without thinking about it to see what is happening around you, or to look down at your gauges every so often. You do not, however, stare at them in the middle of a manuver, but rather look at what is most pertanent at the time, your surroundings. The same applies to a dogfight. That's why fighters have such large, clear cockpits, after all, so that the pilot can see more than just right in front of him as he drives.
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Hey, its 8:18 EST and I'm not seeing even an INFERIOR 2d cockpit, let alot a superior one.
I guess its not that easy.
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ohh wait a sec.
I wasn't saying that a 2d cockpit is better than a 3d one.
Actually a 3d cockpit is always better than the 2d cockpit taken from its render (same quality), at least for the real time light effects.
I'm saying a different thing.
If the cockpit stay still, so if it doesn't move during maneuvres (inertia effect, wich suck in my opinion) nor you can rotate your point of view (like xwa or many flight sims), there are very minimal differences between a true 3d cockpit and a 2d one from its render, with some points both in favour and against it.
The 3d cockpit has light effects (including reflective maps, wich could be cool...), effects that are absent in the 2d one, but you need (in my opinion) a relatively high poly model to have good light effects, plus I suspect that a low poly cockpit could look crap, like in starlancer (but I'm ready to say that I'm wrong), and an high poly cockpit could be performance hit.
btw the pcount may vary a lot depending what area you want to model, if you go from the top of the cockpit to the rudder (like in the image you posted in the other thread) it is obviously different than making just the top gauges/monitors and the crossbars.
Except the lit effects there are no visual differences at all, if I'm not wrong.
It isn't THAT faster nor easyer to create a 3d cockpit than a 2d one: the 3d cockpit still need good textures, maybe taken from an higher poly version. So or you create an high poly model (and it may require knowledge of materials, plus surely a lot of time to make the models), and it is true for both for 3d and 2d cockpits, or you draw the textures, wich isn't much easyer than drawing an entire 2d cockpit.
In both cases it is a job that not everybody can do here, and even for those who have the ability, it will require time (both 2d and 3d), for something that surely will look cool, but that personally I don't feel that important (even in the games where there is a cockpit, 2d or 3d one, I always remove it if possible and play in full screen mode).
Things will change more in favour of the 3d cockpit if SCP guys will add the possibility to rotate the point of view (but IIRC there were some problems about this, it has already been suggested, or am I wrong?). And even in this case the cockpit will be just a secondary (althought pretty cool) graphic effect not affecting gameplay, not to mention that in this case you will have to create a 360° model, with higher pcount, more performance hitting, wich will require much more time.
So, as I said, I still have doubts about what is the best way to go, if implementing the 3d cockpit is worth the coders' job, and if any cockpit is worth the amount of time required to do it.
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Yes, rotating the head was impossible for some reason, I think it was something to do with FOV or Poly culling.
You know, theres no reason why both version couldn't be implemented if possible. I suppose one major advantage of 3D is the possibility of using multiple textures, some of them animated with 'other' stuff etc. Whereas 2D would probs have to be one big ANI file to do that, but 2D is (probably) easier to implement, though I have no proof of that, and would hit performance less, which is good for lower performance machines. If you defined the cockpit in ships.tbl you could arrange matters to suit yourself :)
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Originally posted by Flipside
Yes, rotating the head was impossible for some reason, I think it was something to do with FOV or Poly culling.
Bull****, you can already do, with FS2 vanilla ( some num keypad key ), the HUD itself is disappearing, there's a red dot where the reticle was, and you can rotate the head. It's a 90° turn, but you can see the transition.
As for the time it would take, I'm confident I can pop up a cockpit ( a full cockpit, complete with the seat and all that crap ) in a single day, with all the maps, if lazyness doesn't strike half way ( it always does, granted ).
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It's all about depth perception. Which seems more "real" to you? A static 2D cockpit or a 3D one?
It just SIMPLY LOOKS BETTER.
And you CAN pan your view around in Freespace 2, you see a little red dot where the center of your view is supposed to be. God, can't believe you didn't know that, that's in vanilla FS2.
If we were gonna do everything based on it's usefullness and minimal hits to system performance, we (being the coders, not me specifically :D) would've never implemented anything except bug fixes and new SEXPs.
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UT, if the 3d cockpit will be static too, you will hardly see differences with a static 2d image....
The only difference in this case will be the light if I'm not wrong.
Now, if this will be enough to justify a 3d cockpit is something we can discuss about, and you may be right, but don't tell me it will be THAT different please, nor that a 2d cockpit will not seem real.
It would be obscenely cool for example to have a ship between you and light sources projecting a shadow over the cockpit, but as it is now the polys will be just bright or dark depending by the sun position.
And I'm not sure if it will be that easy to have the system count if the light sources are hidden by your own ship, elseway you could have some irrealistic effects......
About the possibility to rotate the viewpoint, I'm not a coder, I just remeber an old discussion where they was saying that it is impossible. IIRC it was something related to maths formulae necessary for angular movements, but I'm not sure, and I'm too lazy to make a search.
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no matter what type of cockpit is implemented it would be up to the artist (aka me) to make it work. i could and would make eighter one work. i did a new 2d cockpit for descent 2 back in the day. and i personally think it looked really cool, considering i did it in ms paint (the one that comes with windows). ive also tried to make a 3d cockpit for an animation i was working on. i dont have pics of eighter because i forgot to transfer them off of my old computer, and then sold it.
i think that we should be able to do custom huds, but rendering a 2d cockpit seems to me to be the old fashoded way. 2d cockpits were used in ms fligh sim 2000. even though the renders looked totally awesome, they seemed too dead and only served to block my view.
combat flightsim 2 and 3 had really awesome virtual cockpits, as well as the simpler 2d view. i always perfered the 3d cockpits over the panel view. cfs3 actually had moving controls that added serious cool factor. aside from being astheticly pleasing and very well modeled, they also allowed for some cool view modes, such as padlock mode. padlock mode let you always focus on our enemy in relation to your plane. it helped you obtain enough situational awareness to position your fighter for the kill in a dogfight. it also made the image active and more alive and also improved gameplay.
we should have 2 options, one would be a customizable hud. id like a non gtva hud design, such as a shivan hud, or a pirate hud. each should have scripted or animated gauges for general info (energy, ammo, targeting, ect...) and maybe mission specific sensors such as wireframe overlay for nebula missions (ships deep in the fog would be overlayed much like the subspace nodes, as an iluminated wire frame, then as they come within visible range the wireframes fade out).
if virtual 3d cockpits are used, id also like a padlock mode. the models should be a full surrounding mesh. when you switch to side, aft and top views, it should show the cockpits from those perspectaves as well. polycount shouldnt be a problem (speed in freespace has never been a problem for me, even when i used a 500mhz machine) most of the cockpit is glass so would not need to be rendered. contrary to popular belief, aircraft cockpits have very little glare from the inside (i know because i flew one once), so why bother rendering glass. i would really like to be able to use the freespace hud as a texture and then actually render a hud display on a surface in the 3d cockpit, that way youy get the best of both worlds.
i wouldnt expect too much out of 3d cockpits in terms of animation, so they would resemble cfs2 cockpits. rendering the hud withen the 3d evnvironment in the cockpit would add alot to the idea and would also allow for higher screen resolutions sence the hud is no longer a simple overlay.
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Originally posted by KARMA
UT, if the 3d cockpit will be static too, you will hardly see differences with a static 2d image....
The only difference in this case will be the light if I'm not wrong.
Now, if this will be enough to justify a 3d cockpit is something we can discuss about, and you may be right, but don't tell me it will be THAT different please, nor that a 2d cockpit will not seem real.
It would be obscenely cool for example to have a ship between you and light sources projecting a shadow over the cockpit, but as it is now the polys will be just bright or dark depending by the sun position.
And I'm not sure if it will be that easy to have the system count if the light sources are hidden by your own ship, elseway you could have some irrealistic effects......
About the possibility to rotate the viewpoint, I'm not a coder, I just remeber an old discussion where they was saying that it is impossible. IIRC it was something related to maths formulae necessary for angular movements, but I'm not sure, and I'm too lazy to make a search.
KARMA, you ever play Crimson Skies? Mechwarrior 3? Those cockpits were completely static: i.e, they did nothing, no buttons no moving parts. Yet they were all obscenely cool because you had DEPTH, and the fact that a few well-placed blinking lights in Mechwarrior 3, and in Crimson Skies, dynamic lighting in-cockpit (such as shadows cast by canopy spars, or muzzle flash reflecting in-cockpit). It all added to a sense of cockpit immersion not seen in current FS2.
Not to mention the fact that it would really help with telling the differences between ships, visually. The only difference now is some HUD artwork.
EDIT: And if you're really THAT concerned about polycounts, I can make a good-looking, full wrap-around cockpit with about 900 polies. That's lower than most fighteres nowadays, especially with T&L.
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Nico, by easier to implement, I mean by the coders, it's up to the modders how much time they spend on the effects themselves, and, as I said, I have no proof that this would be easier to code.
As for the Head turn thing, fair enough, didn't know about that. All I recall is mentioning once using the POV controller to rotate the head and someone said it was impossible, obviously, I was mistaken :)
Ahhhh.. You thought I meant the Front/Back/Left/Right/Top views as done by the POV hat currently, not rotating the camera smoothly, just flipping it one way or another. I meant being able to look around the cockpit smoothly :)
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Yeah, a 2D cockpit is about 3 or 4 lines of code.
After 3.6 I'm going to try for a 3D one, though, as it would seem that even though I promised to implement this if someone made me a good 2D cockpit, no one did.
That leads me to believe that only Venom has any intention of putting any effort into this feature, and he wants a 3D one. So, there ya go. 3D.
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Hell, I'll model 3d cockpits if someone puts it in.
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I'll also do a cockpit if someone puts it in :D
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Oh, I'd model them, I just wouldn't use 'em ;)
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There you lot go. Three of us who will model cockpits. Add some damn 3d cockpits already. ;)