[Grug]

I agree with you there too WMCoolmon. Especially the Halo bumpmaps.

Which reminds me, if shadows and bumpmapping are in. All fighers should get a spot light on their nose. That would be awsome to be flying along a large cap ship in its shadows, with a spotlight shining down below it.

[DaBrain]

Bumpmapping is nice, but keep in mind someone would have to create normal maps for each map used in-game...

Not even the shinemaps are complete by now, now guess how long it will take to get all those bumpmaps working...



I don't think bumpmapping will be very visible with the current lightning model anyway.

Add some glows and everything will look better.
Shaders will fix the intersecting problem I think.

Will all these nebulas and stuff blooming will look great.

[Flipside]

It'd look even better to keep it in darkness and see the bumpmaps lit up whenever weapons fire etc is happening

As for normal maps, theres an NVidia plugin for photoshop which automagically makes normal maps out of Bump maps. Also, if I can get my normal mapping working on Lightwave, and I have the time, theres a strong possibility I can generate normal maps the 'professional' way, by converting bump-maps in Ultra-Hi poly models

[gevatter Lars]

What would shaders do for us practical...I mean I can see the shadows quite clearly but didn't get what shaders would do.

[Roanoke]

I recall DavB poppin' in and siging the shadows praises.

[Flipside]

It was actually DaveB who made a request for them

[WMCoolmon]

Pixel shaders would do bump mapping/motion blur/blooming. It can also be used for weapon effects and semi-transparent effects.

With Cg, I think it'd be possible to add pixel shader stuff to a table, so modders could add their own effects as well. I'm not sure what exactly that would allow/entail, though.

[DaBrain]

That is exactly what I'm looking for.
EFF made some really cool things possible, but togther with pixel shaders, the possibilities are unlimited.

[gevatter Lars]

Mh Bumpmaps...ok like them.
Motion blure...well don't realy need it, never likes it except for movies.
blooming...what is that?
Half transperent things...also good.

Mh I think their is much more to gain from the Pixel shaders then from the shadows....so I would go for the pixel shaders first.

[Bobboau]

and shaders would be usefull when I do make shadows again, one of the reasons why I put it off, if things were a bit more organised shadows would be a lot easier to implement.

[Deepblue]

Huzzah for shaders!

[gevatter Lars]

I allways thought you would organise yourself or do you guys still do each what he wants and then wonder why sometime the code is unstable ^_^
Beside that I have heard rumorse that with each update the program gets slower...never seen that myself since I still use an older exe.

[Bobboau]

there was recently a dramatic slow down, I am endevoring to solve the problem, recenter builds should have better frame rates.

[DaBrain]

Actually it gets faster sometimes.

Well, cool features need more power.


Edit: too slow...

[MoodyB]

Originally posted by Flipside
Also, if I can get my normal mapping working on Lightwave, and I have the time, theres a strong possibility I can generate normal maps the 'professional' way, by converting bump-maps in Ultra-Hi poly models

I might be able to help with any normal mapping issues you're having in LW ( used both the free plugins from Marvin Landis and Microwave at work ) if you could let me know what the issue is ?

[phatosealpha]

I think I'd rather have Bobbau working on pixel shaders as an investment for the future then on shadows again - especially if, as it sounds like, implementing shadows before pixel shaders would require reimplementing them after pixel shaders for highest efficiency.

Though, to be perfectly honest, bobbau could do nothing whatsoever, and I could pump the resolution on the SCP to 2048 by 1536 and Bobbau would still give me the programmer equivalent of penis envy, so anything he feels like doing at the time is absolutely ok by me.

[Bobboau]

I feel like eating a pizza.

[Omniscaper]

Here ya go.

[WMCoolmon]

With pixel shaders, pizza eat you!

[Flipside]

That's why Duke Nukems taking so long