Hard Light Productions Forums

Modding, Mission Design, and Coding => The Modding Workshop => Topic started by: ShadowWolf_IH on July 01, 2012, 10:47:50 pm

Title: Full Nebs can be so cool
Post by: ShadowWolf_IH on July 01, 2012, 10:47:50 pm
here's a wip, I'm not happy with the opacity on the poofs, so i'll be working on them more tomorrow.

(http://casofwar.hard-light.net/images/screen0209.png)
Title: Re: Full Nebs can be so cool
Post by: T-Man on July 02, 2012, 01:09:05 am
Out of interest is this in a nebula mission or with a nebula background (assuming former)? I notice you can see the Orion a lot better than you would in retail; i like it. :D
Title: Re: Full Nebs can be so cool
Post by: MatthTheGeek on July 02, 2012, 02:26:07 am
I think it's both, nebula mission with a nebula background.
Title: Re: Full Nebs can be so cool
Post by: ShadowWolf_IH on July 02, 2012, 04:41:18 am
A nebula skybox, and full neb poofs.
Title: Re: Full Nebs can be so cool
Post by: X3N0-Life-Form on July 02, 2012, 10:09:29 am
Yo dawg, I heard you like nebulae, so we put nebula inside your nebula, so that you can fly in a nebula while surrounded by a nebula.

Jokes aside, I like that green-ish nebula. People have been making beautiful nebulae lately.
Title: Re: Full Nebs can be so cool
Post by: JGZinv on July 02, 2012, 10:17:29 am
yeah I like it....
Title: Re: Full Nebs can be so cool
Post by: z64555 on July 02, 2012, 12:52:57 pm
Hey, your Orion radar icon is backwards :P

Nebula cloud-lets look smooth, but I can't tell if I like the overall effect or not...  :nervous:
Title: Re: Full Nebs can be so cool
Post by: Droid803 on July 02, 2012, 01:13:19 pm
Uh, what's causing that weird dark artefacting on the upper left area?
Some weird interaction between the poofs and the skybox?
Title: Re: Full Nebs can be so cool
Post by: Cyker on July 02, 2012, 01:54:33 pm
How does it look up close?

Current SCP nebula is broken IMHO as when you're right next to something, the nebula is still obscuring your vision at the same degree and real fog does not work like that!

It's really annoying as I can't even read decals or see turrets clearly even if my fighter's nose is right next to it!


The original retail nebula was a lot better for that, although it had much more obvious fog planes which spoilt the effect somewhat.

This one does look nice tho' :)
Title: Re: Full Nebs can be so cool
Post by: ShadowWolf_IH on July 02, 2012, 04:23:08 pm
Droid, I'm not really sure what you mean.  It is either the dark nebs, which are now gone, or a trick played on the eyes due to this being a still shot taken from something moving.

I still have to play with poof coloring (never should have messed with it).

Cyker, I hope this answers your questions.  I think that your problem isn't with the SCP stuff, but with poof opacity.  In this incarnation I used 50% opacity on the poofs.  If you look down the hull in the second pic, you can see that the forward turrets are much more obscurred than the closer one.  I hope I am right in this.

Far away Orion:
(http://casofwar.hard-light.net/images/screen0212.png)

Close up Orion:
(http://casofwar.hard-light.net/images/screen0211.png)
Title: Re: Full Nebs can be so cool
Post by: Cyker on July 02, 2012, 04:31:13 pm
Oh yes! That looks a bazillion times better! :D
Title: Re: Full Nebs can be so cool
Post by: ShadowWolf_IH on July 02, 2012, 04:36:22 pm
The SCP thing, as near as I figure, simply controls how far out the fogging of the models happens.  In these images we are too close for the fogging to take place, the only thing obscurring the model is the poofs.  Lowering the opacity does the trick, and it lets the skybox come through a bit.

These are easy as eating ice cream to do, just don't do it too fast or you'll end up with a brain freeze.
Title: Re: Full Nebs can be so cool
Post by: Scourge of Ages on July 02, 2012, 04:52:22 pm
This is incredible. That's all.
Title: Re: Full Nebs can be so cool
Post by: Droid803 on July 02, 2012, 05:19:44 pm
I was talking about the dark green bits that look like someone took a grunge brush on pencil mode and clicked on the screen a few times.

Well, the artefacting appears to be gone in the newer 2 screens so whatever.
Title: Re: Full Nebs can be so cool
Post by: ShadowWolf_IH on July 02, 2012, 06:11:12 pm
Droid I'm going to be honest with you, I have no idea what you mean, mostly because I don't know the terms.  Talking to me in the terms of the trade is like taking a 5 year old and telling them that the race car needs a round of wedge put in because it is developing a push in turn 4.  I just don't have the terms, so if I come off as rude, I don't mean to, I just have no idea what people are talking about at times. :)

Before you tel me to look it up....this what I found at freedictionary...artefacting - no dictionary results
Title: Re: Full Nebs can be so cool
Post by: BlasterNT on July 02, 2012, 07:11:29 pm
I think he means the dark nebula as seen in http://www.hard-light.net/forums/index.php?topic=81249.0
Title: Re: Full Nebs can be so cool
Post by: ShadowWolf_IH on July 02, 2012, 07:27:33 pm
Oh ok, well yeah, I decided to forego the darkneb layer this last time around.  I think it was a good decision, the nebula looks a good deal better without it. 

Once I get some time (yeah right), I may just make a slew of these for downloads to any and all who want them.  The main problem is that we can only have 6 poofs.  I am trying to get that changed in Fred via SCP, same as the number of nback.  Which means that currently each one would have to be a package in and of itself.  That should give me the practice I need to put out something that looks good.  This is a whole new process for me.  Take the last incarnation.  I specifically chose colors from the skybox and made the poofs using those colors.  Now they kind of drown out the skybox, with the exception of the stars in the nursery.  So lesson learned, paint the poofs a few shades off of the skybox colors, or desaturate them a bit, or something, not sure what yet.  I'll figure it out and quit being the ameteur of backgrounds.
Title: Re: Full Nebs can be so cool
Post by: jr2 on July 02, 2012, 11:11:54 pm
I see you got it, but:

(http://i48.tinypic.com/2yy61ia.png)

Maybe if you just increased the dark nebula opacity or something, but it looks great without it I think.
Title: Re: Full Nebs can be so cool
Post by: Droid803 on July 03, 2012, 12:19:44 am
I thought it may have been an image compression issue due to the pixellation (be it of the poofs skybox, or the image itself), thus (compression) aretfacts.
Guess it's just that the poofs/fog are playing weird with a layer on the skybox.
Title: Re: Full Nebs can be so cool
Post by: ShadowWolf_IH on July 03, 2012, 03:56:14 am
Yeah that's what it was, the dark layers.  Sorry that you need to dumb down the convo for me :)

Now that I have added a new word to my vocabulary, I think I am done with this one since I redid the poof colors and set them to the same opacity as the previous incarnation.  I think that choosing a base color from the skybox and using it to make the bitmap for the lightning bolts would probably be the way to go for lightning if it is desired. 
 
(http://casofwar.hard-light.net/images/screen0214.png)
Title: Re: Full Nebs can be so cool
Post by: ShadowWolf_IH on July 12, 2012, 04:45:56 pm
Here are two that I will be releasing to the public once I get some more done, these two use the same poofs, so no problems in NOT running them together.  They will be released later, by later I mean probably within a month.

Pink and purple background neb
(http://casofwar.hard-light.net/images/pink.png)

Purple background neb
(http://casofwar.hard-light.net/images/purple.png)
Title: Re: Full Nebs can be so cool
Post by: NGTM-1R on July 12, 2012, 04:54:37 pm
Of course, you all should now probably realize the most important thing that can be done with this.

we can make an Aquanox mod now
Title: Re: Full Nebs can be so cool
Post by: ShadowWolf_IH on July 12, 2012, 05:01:42 pm
Atmospheric missions will also be much easier, as well as some other choice things (that i can't mention even though they were what I was working on when i stumbled onto this). 

I'm not even good at this, this was all found by accident.  I figure that pretty soon someone with some real talent for art will catch this and then the artistic beatdown of Shadowwolf will commence.
Title: Re: Full Nebs can be so cool
Post by: jr2 on July 13, 2012, 07:33:50 am
Hmm..

/me wonders if a modification this could somehow be implemented only when flying through cloud layers.  Like a bunch of small, local nebulae in the atmosphere.

:nervous:

Is that what was being referred to earlier?
Title: Re: Full Nebs can be so cool
Post by: ShadowWolf_IH on July 16, 2012, 08:55:53 am
Blue and DBlue

(http://casofwar.hard-light.net/images/Blue.png)

(http://casofwar.hard-light.net/images/DBlue.png)
Title: Re: Full Nebs can be so cool
Post by: Cobra on July 16, 2012, 02:27:46 pm
Release now god damnit. I want pretty nebula in my FS2. :P