[Dragon]

I was messing with planet models from Startrek mod ,Cardinal's Spear and Ott and noticed really weird thing.
All planets are ridicolusly small.
Just take a look at the sceenshot ,Archangel is indeed huge ,but not that much!
All planets I found are in such scale ,can you make some new planet models ,this time in right scale?
I'm very intested in planet models ,I noticed lot of people say they are substandard ,but I want to use them when player is in low orbit and maybe in cojunction of autopilot cutscenes ,which can render modelled planets really useful (you fly ultrahuge distance and planet lightning isn't changing a bit ,isn't that a bit unrealistic? Because that's what you get with skybox).
Planets from Startrek mod are excelent quality and should be getting more attention.
(also ,you should try to look at Startrek Earth model with mainhall music set to "Abandoned" from High Noon V2.0 ,it gave me unforgetable feeling.)
I will soon upload planet pack to FSMods.

[attachment deleted by ninja]

[General Battuta]

Can't you just use skyboxes?

[The E]

My question as well. The "planets" in BtRL looked more realistic than a 3d model would have in the same place, IMHO. The question is, what does a 3d planet offer that a skybox can't?

[BengalTiger]

The question is, what does a 3d planet offer that a skybox can't?

You can collide with it? 

[shiv]

3d planets are not recommended.

Now skyboxes are standard. just take a look how beatifulthey can be:

[Rodo]

My question as well. The "planets" in BtRL looked more realistic than a 3d model would have in the same place, IMHO. The question is, what does a 3d planet offer that a skybox can't?

aproaching feeling?

well hell damn me... those look nice ^^

[shiv]

aproaching feeling?

In space distances are that big that you wouldn't even notice aproach feeling even after long flight.
There's no point in absoleately ugly 3d planets, while skyboxes look sumply pretty and are easier and more convenient.

[The E]

You can collide with it? 

aproaching feeling?

Two things that, at least for me, would break the all-important immersion.

Take this example:

If this was a texture on a 3d sphere, and I would move closer to it, the Image quality would soon degrade into a pixel-y mess. And without some sort of atmosphere simulation to do some sort of reentry effect, it would just be like running into a particularly big immobile object, meaning I would bounce off it and a small particle spew would be spawned. Granted, you could insta-kill the player if he collides with the planet, but I believe that the skybox solution is still the best available right now.

In space distances are that big that you wouldn't even notice aproach feeling even after long flight.
There's no point in absoleately ugly 3d planets, while skyboxes look sumply pretty and are easier and more convenient.

^^ What he said.

[Dragon]

3d planets still have some adventages over skyboxes. (I'm howewer not negating the role of skyboxes ,they also look great ,but are good ,for example ,for short range flights ,orbital battles and missions where you don't need to use autopilot an fly very large distances. And I cannot wait all those stuff you're going to use in ED)
3d planets may atmosphere rotation (it's on trek models) and possiblity to fly
around them with autopilot cutscenes.
(if there will be a possibility of in-game texture replacement ,then it will improve in-game bombardment ,just cover planet with explosions ,replace the textures ,clear explosions and voila).
Not to mention models are nessesary in any mod that want in-game planet-killers.
Take a look at Sol: A History ,and tell my how to remake

Spoiler:

Mission when you have to destroy JCC Destroyer that wants to attack
EA HQ ,if you fail to do it in time it fires it's forward beam at the Earth ,destroying the HQ.

Using skyboxes.
But I agree with one thing.
There is no point in using ugly planet models and that's why I'm drawing your attention to this matter.
I don't want to use ugly planets ,but planets like this one (disregard F3 lab lightnig method ,in mission it's going to look even better).

[attachment deleted by ninja]

[The E]

My point is, on the scale that FS usually operates on, meaning single fighters or capships, in missions lasting < 30 Minutes playtime on average, the player is not able to move fast or far enough to make a 3d Planet worthwhile. You have a point with autopilot cutscenes, but i seem to remember a request by the WCS team concerning changing skyboxes and in-mission lighting via SEXPs.

[shiv]

Take a look at Sol: A History ,and tell my how to remake
(...Spoiler...)

Use SJD Sathanas with special explosion, placed on a long distance?That way beams will hit that SJD and destroy it. Effect will look like base exploding on planet's surface.

[Dragon]

You have a point with autopilot cutscenes, but i seem to remember a request by the WCS team concerning changing skyboxes and in-mission lighting via SEXPs.

Yes ,but there are some questions.
Will the skybox lighning be handled via changing lightning on one texture ,or perhaps by separate textures?
Will there will be multiple textures for all skyboxes ,positioned in all the ways modders can want them to?
What if I imagine the mission where I want player to be fighting over north pole of Earth?
Will there will be also skybox for that?
Also ,there is one word in all those questions: "Will" .
We already have decent planet models ,and I think retexturing and enlarging existing ,working models is much easier then implementing whole new feature in the code (it doesn't mean I don't want to see it there).
And don't forget you cannot blow skybox up.
(though Shiv have a point with simulated explosion(s) on surface)

[The E]

Well, there is only so much that can be done to cut down on the workload new modders have.

Question: From a standpoint of performance, what would be better: Having a skybox (Which has a pretty simple geometry with a few big textures, IIRC), or having a big planet model, that is detailed enough to not appear blocky?

Ultimately, if 3d planets work for you, do them. I'm just saying that, from my arguably limited perspective, skyboxes are a shorter, less complicated, and less hardware-intensive way to achieve impressive low-orbit vistas.

[Angelus]

We already have decent planet models ,and I think retexturing and enlarging existing ,working models is much easier then implementing whole new feature in the code (it doesn't mean I don't want to see it there).
And don't forget you cannot blow skybox up.
(though Shiv have a point with simulated explosion(s) on surface)

It's easy to re-size the planet models to any size you want.

There are some problems of course:

1. The larger the planet model, the more polys it should have otherwise it looks "edgy"
    To much polys and your performance drops, especially if you have some action going on and i'm not even
     talking about BoE here.
     Load one of the models in PCS2, save it as *cob, go to preferences and change the scale factor so that
     the model has a size of 170kilometers ( deathstar size ), load the model save again as *pof and see how it looks ingame.

2. Textures: Your texture map has to be huge, 4096*2 upwards or you have to use tiling to make it
    look halfway decent.

3. Models above a certain size causes problems


For now, skyboxes are the way to go, at least 'till someone rewrites the code.
You're right, you can't blow them up, but you can fake it with FRED.

[Getter Robo G]

Yes... But Omni's Earth had a separte cloud layer (I forgot if it was animated or not)
Plus you could have the model rotate... Again further development was halted as Omni got into BTRL...

[Droid803]

You can have animated clouds on a skybox texture as well. Case and point? Subspace corridor.
Well, at least I know it's possible.

[Dragon]

Are you sure that subspace corridor isn't handled a different way than skyboxes?
It's composed of two separate models and is enabled via "takes place in subspace" button if FRED rather than skybox field.
And where I can get Omniscrapper's Earth model?
Is it the trek one ,or some other ,even better?
Startrek Earth (as well as Ferenginar ,Kronos ,Romulus and Remus) is animated via four slowly moving subobjects and takes 1411kB (much less than Steve'o's updated Hyperion which takes 11306kB).
I believe BOE above such planet would be a bit less stressing to computer than BOE with pair of Hyperions (they are said to work in pairs).
I will try rescaling ,but I don't like it because it's causing a lot of problems (all the things I rescaled worked strange except GTD Daegon whith have simple structure and is easy to resize).

[Droid803]

Well, the subspace corridor looks like a skybox to me, and behaves like one (you're always at it's center).

Bottom line, planet models look fugly unless you make them really high poly and have hi res textures, in which case it becomes a performance drag. Just don't do it.

[Angelus]

Are you sure that subspace corridor isn't handled a different way than skyboxes?
It's composed of two separate models and is enabled via "takes place in subspace" button if FRED rather than skybox field.
And where I can get Omniscrapper's Earth model?
Is it the trek one ,or some other ,even better?
Startrek Earth (as well as Ferenginar ,Kronos ,Romulus and Remus) is animated via four slowly moving subobjects and takes 1411kB (much less than Steve'o's updated Hyperion which takes 11306kB).
I believe BOE above such planet would be a bit less stressing to computer than BOE with pair of Hyperions (they are said to work in pairs).
I will try rescaling ,but I don't like it because it's causing a lot of problems (all the things I rescaled worked strange except GTD Daegon whith have simple structure and is easy to resize).

The BtrL demo has a astlayer model that has a rotating inner ring to simulate a "active" asteroid field.
While the filesize of that model isn't that big, the impact it has on performance is, on lower end computers - like mine - quite huge.
I have only around 20fps, the same mission without that model runs on 50-60fps.

Ships with a high poly count are split into several subobjects and have LODs, which improves the performance,  the same ship without that stuff is a entirely different matter.
The planet  should be created that way too, but in this case LODs are pretty much useless, 'cause you never get that far from the planet in a mission too make LODs useful.

I think a BoE over such a planet would kill performance, or would cause strange things.

In which size do you need the planet ( diameter in meters )?

[Dragon]

Earth from INF has 12740000m in diameter.
I would like to see planets in that size.
Trek planets are good looking ,but have mere 20080m in diameter.
And for LODs ,Hyperion lacks them and is actually one of most Hi-Poly ships out here (with rotating section).
INF Earth was quite no-stressing and I seen Shadow0000's upgrade here: http://www.hard-light.net/forums/index.php/topic,37185.0.html
There is a beautyful Earth render ,cetrainly in game and most likely with unchanged ,or only slightly change model.
The problem is I cannot find it anywhere (link in post is dead as a doorknob).
Can you reupload this Hi-res Earth to FSMods?
I tried to resize trek Earth but got weird problems (see first attachment).
As for planet usage I also have something that will make you ROTFL.
I made a short mission to demonstrate planet models and included a battleship bombarding the Earth for testing.
The problem is ,I made it without checking planet's HP or balancing the beam cannons ,so battleship blew up the planet (and it wasn't my upgraded Eclipse ,only this Archangel from the first screen).
Last screenshot shows it ,middle one is Earth in-game.

[attachment deleted by ninja]