[DaBrain]

Is there any progress on this?

[Carl]

i think this would make it look too cartoony.

[Turambar]

I need to dig up my high quality beamglows again

i reformatted my hd like 3 times since then, I'll probably have to make new ones, but i remember that they looked realistic, instead of just flare-ish, i put lens flares on them etc.

[DaBrain]

Originally posted by Carl
i think this would make it look too cartoony.

Why would that be?

[taylor]

Originally posted by DaBrain
Is there any progress on this?

Nope.  It's still on my list but I've been really busy lately and haven't had much time to get some current code bug-fixed and in CVS.  Primary weapon particles (ani, eff) will be properly animated and beams can use animated textures as soon as I get a chance to commit things to CVS.  That's the best I can offer at the moment since bug fixes are taking priority and both of those were filed in Mantis.

[terren]

it's on the list, that's good enugh for me.  

Just dont loose the list. :Undue worry:

[DaBrain]

Originally posted by taylor

Nope.  It's still on my list but I've been really busy lately and haven't had much time to get some current code bug-fixed and in CVS.  Primary weapon particles (ani, eff) will be properly animated and beams can use animated textures as soon as I get a chance to commit things to CVS.  That's the best I can offer at the moment since bug fixes are taking priority and both of those were filed in Mantis.

Animated beam(glow?)s? That's even better. Looks like I'll have to do some animations soon.

[Trivial Psychic]

Just remember DaBrain, since the current anis use 8-bit, you may have some difficulty getting good looking ani effects.  If you haven't done so already, I highly advise you read through this thread from Sectorgame's SCP Forum section.  It discusses Taylor's eff implimentation.  Its kinda an alternative to ani files that is a little more flexible.

[DaBrain]

Look through this thread. I've already posted there a while ago.

[Lightspeed]

EFF beamglows? You crazy or something?


(imagines 70 MB/glow - shudders)

[DaBrain]

Pehrpahps DDS does the trick for big animations like the shockwave.

I'll give it a try but not anytime soon...

[Lightspeed]

Yeah, DDS will have to be tested properly. It'll be interesting to see how it turns out - the rapid succession of images might weaken the influence of the compression artifacts - or... just the other way round.

[DaBrain]

DDS can be superior to PCX even when it comes to gradients. Even for static effects!

This is an exaggerated example:

Base map:


256c PCX


DDS



Well, but who needs this ammount of colors?
Probably nobody, but some of my effects look better as DDS than as PCX. Not very much though.

I'm not sure about this, but I think DDS has one big advantage over PCX. The way 8-bit images get resized in-game (distance-wise) is just ugly.

I think it's like this:

Base map:


Resized PCX:


Resized DDS:



So for animations DDS is the better solution, because animations often have many different colors and grafients. And i.e. shockwaves will look better when you're close to them.