@Mongoose - I remember that thread -- it may have been in FreeSpace Upgrade Project. They had it working and all were congratulating, but when I saw it, I wondered if [V] locked off our jump drives in FS1's final mission for a universe-rules reason (see below).
I always imagined it as reaching the light at the end of the subspace tunnel. Then it'd envelop your ship in some kind of misty cloud and then you emerge from the warp hole.
@Snail - I think evidence exists to support that: You have to jump into the node right after the Lucifer,
can't jump out once inside, and emerge alongside the Lucifer out of one big jump hole. I don't think it was due to [V] not bothering/needing a warpout effect. I think they were trying to tell us something about Subspace -- that once you have engaged your jump drive and are enroute to your destination, you have to ride it out (subspace tracking just lets you hijack someone else's pre-existing wormhole). Well, that's my interpretation. So here's my idea to aid the "reaching the end" model of subspace exit.
=> At its simplest: Plant a Sun at the 'exit' end of the subspace tunnel, and triggering a Supernova? ~ EDIT: oh wait, we want transitions ~=> At its most complex: Speculating here, perhaps we would need a custom Supernova which simply enlarges the first Sun placed in a mission, fades the screen to white after a countdown, and sets off a SEXP of your choice once the screen is totally white. Complete with a HUD display saying something like "Subspace exit warning."
So once the screen hits white, it sets off a skybox change SEXP, then somehow delete the sun from the mission, spawn an already-open subspace vortex directly behind the player ship which closes after a delay of our choice, and populate the new background with the nebulae and stars the mission designer wants. Whew. >_<; Yeah. Maybe that idea is doable with LUA, I don't know.