Hard Light Productions Forums

Modding, Mission Design, and Coding => The Modding Workshop => Topic started by: J.P. on December 25, 2005, 12:31:14 am

Title: New Revision of Subspace Effect...
Post by: J.P. on December 25, 2005, 12:31:14 am
Here you go folks. Ok, I haven't made it an .EFF. In fact, I dont' even have freespace 2 installed anymore and I won't be able to for a while. I can render each frame as .JPG's if you guys want, but DaBrain or somebody would have to convert them to .DDS' and make the .EFF.

But anyways, here you go: http://www.badongo.com/vid.php?file=Freespace+Subspace+Effect+Revised__2005-12-24_Subspace.mov

-J.P.
Title: Re: New Revision of Subspace Effect...
Post by: DaBrain on December 25, 2005, 03:20:57 am
Awesome  :eek: !


I love the effect. I'd be glad to convert it for you.

100% quality JPGs should be fine. I'd prefer TGAs or BMPs though. Doesn't really matter. ;)
Title: Re: New Revision of Subspace Effect...
Post by: Fineus on December 25, 2005, 04:06:03 am
Very very smooth indeed, I like it!

(On the subject of subspace effects, it'd be really nice to see some variations on the effect.. particles flying out of the hole, or even into it for a vaguely black-hole like feel (matter on the event horizon of a subspace portal is sucked towards it...). Also unstable portals and so on (with lightning skittering around the edge) etc.

This is of course not exactly canon and just for fun... but what the heck.
Title: Re: New Revision of Subspace Effect...
Post by: starfox on December 25, 2005, 05:13:21 am
What I'd like to see is, that the ship becomes gradually invisible as it enters the portal. ( take a look at some briefing animations, when ship enters the subspace) Same as it comes out of the vortex, it starts out invisible, gradually (very quickly) becoming visible.

I think, the effect requires some shader effects, but it would would certainly look much cooler than the current entering/exit method.
Title: Re: New Revision of Subspace Effect...
Post by: J.P. on December 25, 2005, 10:55:17 pm
Alrighty, here it is. http://www.badongo.com/file.php?file=WarpMap01__2005-12-25_WarpMap01.zip

Can't wait to see screenshots.  :D

-J.P.
Title: Re: New Revision of Subspace Effect...
Post by: Trivial Psychic on December 25, 2005, 11:02:15 pm
One interesting method I just thought up, would require a new model.  Basically, there would be multiple layers to the vortex, ahead of the vanishing point.  The animated warp map effect allplied over these layers would have a degree of alpha-map transparency, so that the ship becomes more and more obscured as it enters the vortex.
Title: Re: New Revision of Subspace Effect...
Post by: WMCoolmon on December 25, 2005, 11:16:55 pm
JP, for some reason that link doesn't work for me. :(
Title: Re: New Revision of Subspace Effect...
Post by: J.P. on December 25, 2005, 11:59:26 pm
Hm, wierd. It works for me. *shrugs*

-J.P.
Title: Re: New Revision of Subspace Effect...
Post by: WMCoolmon on December 26, 2005, 12:24:37 am
Ahh, figured it out. It wanted a cookie.

I wuv 'Allow for Session' :drevil:
Title: Re: New Revision of Subspace Effect...
Post by: WMCoolmon on December 26, 2005, 12:53:53 am
Hmm, I tried to do the EFF myself...

I copied the original EFF to Media_VPs/data/effects (I'm using kara's mod setup here) and left the filename as WarpMap01.eff. Then I modified the contents to:
Code: [Select]
$Type: JPG
$Frames: 30
$FPS: 24

However, whenever I see a warp then it looks like a big white box. I did a quick debug and it looked like it was trying to page the EFF in as an image. :wtf:
Title: Re: New Revision of Subspace Effect...
Post by: taylor on December 26, 2005, 01:36:25 am
Wasn't sure that I would but I really like the new effect.  I liked your last one too though, more so than the original, but this one still looks good and it's closer to the original style.  Nice.


However, whenever I see a warp then it looks like a big white box. I did a quick debug and it looked like it was trying to page the EFF in as an image. :wtf:
Yeah it's supposed to look like an EFF.  You have to look at bm_bitmaps[].info.ani.eff.filename for the real filename (probably won't have the extension though) and bm_bitmaps[].info.ani.eff.type for the real image type.  It was done this way since it's seamless with the old ani code.  It's a little more work to determine how to properly deal with an EFF, but it was less hacky than what I had originally coded for it and only required changed internal to bmpman that way.

As far as the white box thing goes, it's a code bug.  I forgot to make sure that the image size (the memory it will need) is properly updated in bm_load_animation().  This isn't a problem for DDS images which is why I didn't catch it before.  It does effectively kill JPG, PCX and TGA usage for EFFs though.  I had previously cleaned up how memory allocation works in order to simplify things and it broke those image formats at that time.  The fix is going in shortly, when I commit my last OGL mipmap related fixes (and hopefully the single-color-with-popup-on-ATI problem too :)).
Title: Re: New Revision of Subspace Effect...
Post by: WMCoolmon on December 26, 2005, 02:09:11 am
Nifty, thanks taylor. :nod:
Title: Re: New Revision of Subspace Effect...
Post by: DaBrain on December 26, 2005, 03:09:49 am
One interesting method I just thought up, would require a new model.  Basically, there would be multiple layers to the vortex, ahead of the vanishing point.  The animated warp map effect allplied over these layers would have a degree of alpha-map transparency, so that the ship becomes more and more obscured as it enters the vortex.

Interesting idea. Are you going to try it?



BTW I've converted and uploaded the warp map. And I've... well recolored and added is as WarpMap02. ;)

www.game-warden.com/starfox/Non_SF_related_stuff/JPwarpMap(s).rar (3 MB)
Title: Re: New Revision of Subspace Effect...
Post by: MetalDestroyer on December 26, 2005, 09:36:39 am
Wouaw ! Good job JP.
Title: Re: New Revision of Subspace Effect...
Post by: Trivial Psychic on December 26, 2005, 11:39:18 am
One interesting method I just thought up, would require a new model.  Basically, there would be multiple layers to the vortex, ahead of the vanishing point.  The animated warp map effect allplied over these layers would have a degree of alpha-map transparency, so that the ship becomes more and more obscured as it enters the vortex.
Interesting idea. Are you going to try it?

Hell no!  :p I can't model at all.  I'm just an idea guy.  Of course, I never said that my ideas had to be good ones, I just come up with them and let other people decide whether to persue them or not.
Title: Re: New Revision of Subspace Effect...
Post by: c914 on December 26, 2005, 12:36:53 pm
That new effect is fantastic :nod: :yes:
Title: Re: New Revision of Subspace Effect...
Post by: BlackDove on December 26, 2005, 01:46:35 pm
Screenshots please :)
Title: Re: New Revision of Subspace Effect...
Post by: WMCoolmon on December 26, 2005, 04:15:47 pm
Tada!

[attachment deleted by admin]
Title: Re: New Revision of Subspace Effect...
Post by: Taristin on December 26, 2005, 06:38:49 pm
I would really like it better if the edges faded to black, rather than looking like  plasma blob, personally.
Title: Re: New Revision of Subspace Effect...
Post by: BlackDove on December 26, 2005, 10:08:27 pm
Definatly better than the existing one though.

Pretty good.

More screenies if you please (diff angles/lengths to and fro).
Title: Re: New Revision of Subspace Effect...
Post by: FireCrack on December 27, 2005, 12:08:22 am
Okay, first thing first, there needs to be a knossos variant.

Second thing, at one point, due to a code bug in 3.6.5 or somthing, i had env-mapping applied to subspace vortexes, it would be cool if we could still apply an envmap to the portal, but it wouldnt use the mission enviroment map, but rather a funky subspace blue swirls prerendered env-map (except mabye in a subspace mission it would use a stars env-map). anyways, you'd use a rather low-res shinemap to apply this towards only the center of the texture, to avoid funkiness around the edges of the subspace 3d model.


Oh, and i like it.
Title: Re: New Revision of Subspace Effect...
Post by: taylor on December 27, 2005, 12:13:45 am
Okay, first thing first, there needs to be a knossos variant.
Grab the link DaBrain posted, it has both.
Title: Re: New Revision of Subspace Effect...
Post by: J.P. on December 27, 2005, 09:55:34 pm
I would like to see some more screenshots myself. Until I am able to reinstall freespace 2 and freespace open I won't be able to see it in game. I would also like to see the knossos varient.

-J.P.
Title: Re: New Revision of Subspace Effect...
Post by: AqueousShadow on December 28, 2005, 02:40:57 am
You did it without even testing it?

And it turned out this well? :eek:
Title: Re: New Revision of Subspace Effect...
Post by: Grug on December 28, 2005, 11:25:50 pm
Nice. Looks good in the screeny. :D

Reckon you could do a square one...? :)
Title: Re: New Revision of Subspace Effect...
Post by: J.P. on January 03, 2006, 08:17:21 pm
You did it without even testing it?

And it turned out this well? :eek:

... I guess. :-P

Reckon you could do a square one...? :)

Why? So we can go plaid? :-P

I guess I could... no... wait... possibly. It would take a lot of work though.