[James Ross]

Thanks to Rob, I've got a new experimental feature to announce: signal light glow.

This feature takes the ideas explored by people with custom mipmaps one step further and adds a "glowing" effect around almost any signal light. The effect is controlled by some relatively simple heuristics for now, but the plan is to allow direct control of this by authors later.

The current heuristics for the "glow factor" is:

• Typical electric light during the day: 3.0
  
• Typical electric light during the night: 5.0
  
• Semaphore signal light during the day: 0.0
  
• Semaphore signal light during the night: 5.0
  
• Theatre box and other info/shunting lights: 0.0

The effect is certainly up for any suggested improvements on the following factors:

• Initial cut-off - the distance before which no glow appears
  
• Glow scaling factor - how fast the glow increases in size (it's logarithmic)
  
• Glow factors - the numbers listed above
  
• The heuristics on types of light - listed above

This feature is in X2322.

[markus_GE]

Having just graduated with "excellent success", I might not be wholly clear in my head, but anyway - How do you use this feature?

Great progress, looking forward to trying it out SOON :sign_rockon:

Cheers, Markus

[James Ross]

markus_GE, on 27 June 2014 - 07:50 AM, said:

Having just graduated with "excellent success", I might not be wholly clear in my head, but anyway - How do you use this feature?

Great progress, looking forward to trying it out SOON :sign_rockon:

You tick the experimental option "signal light glow" and see how much easier the lights on signals are to see in the distance, both during the day and at night.

P.S. Congratulations on the graduation. :oldstry:

[markus_GE]

So, I won´t have to change anything in SIGSCRs or SIG-DATs?

:sign_rockon: :oldstry:

Cheers, Markus

[roeter]

Quote

Freshly graduated with excellent success - If it´s adrenaline, endorphins, or whatever, I might not be totally clear in my head ;)

:bravo: :sign_rockon: :oldstry: :party: :pardon: :burp:

[disc]

something bad happened :\

[James Ross]

markus_GE, on 27 June 2014 - 07:56 AM, said:

So, I won´t have to change anything in SIGSCRs or SIG-DATs?

Correct.

disc, on 27 June 2014 - 09:22 AM, said:

something bad happened :\
Open Rails 2014-06-27 11-40-23.png
Open Rails 2014-06-27 11-40-08.png

If the route already uses the mipmap "trick" then the glow will likely be massively oversized. I don't think we can easily identify this situation though - that will be what the future sigcfg options are for.

[markus_GE]

roeter, on 27 June 2014 - 08:47 AM, said:

:burp: :sign_rockon: :bravo: ;) :party: :burp:

Rob, you´re back?! :pardon:

:oldstry:, Rob. But the last one will only fit to morrow ;)

Cheers, Markus

[copperpen]

James Ross, on 27 June 2014 - 09:53 AM, said:

If the route already uses the mipmap "trick" then the glow will likely be massively oversized. I don't think we can easily identify this situation though - that will be what the future sigcfg options are for.

Comparison of an MLT route with the Mid East Plus reveals that the MLT route uses a signal light radius of 0.6 compared with a default of 0.3. I believe that some later pay routes use a radius of 1.04 and it is these larger figures that cause the big glow effect. Driving at night now on the MEP reveals just how confusing signal lights really are when you are not familiar with the route.

Now to the glow effect itself using a radius of 0.3. The system works in a similar way to the MLT system with signals further away being drawn a bit larger than they actually are. This leads to a slight fuzziness to the glow until it is some 2 to 3 hundred feet away. With the small radius figure there is no clipping of the ace file either which is very visible using the larger radius figures.

[markus_GE]

MLT sometime ago developed what they call the "Sigview technology". It´s an improved siglight texture with lots of "empty space around the actual light, that is filled with color the farther the signal is away. You need to use a siglight radius of 1.04 with it.

I converted all my routes to this siglight texture, so am I going to have problems?

Cheers, Markus

[James Ross]

markus_GE, on 30 June 2014 - 02:09 PM, said:

MLT sometime ago developed what they call the "Sigview technology". It´s an improved siglight texture with lots of "empty space around the actual light, that is filled with color the farther the signal is away. You need to use a siglight radius of 1.04 with it.

I converted all my routes to this siglight texture, so am I going to have problems?

If you enable the signal light glow, yes.

I think all we really need to do to make the signal light glow work with this "trick" is the original light size (or a scaling factor), but it also doesn't really make sense keeping the special texture.

[copperpen]

Running the 3DTS Tehachapi with a signal light radius of 0.3 and glow light turned on I can see signals out to at least 1.5 miles on straight track, probably the same for curved track as long as no scenery items block the view. The glow is definitely larger than the signal light itself at a distance, but not overwhelming. A big improvement over the old MLT technology.

[Buttercup]

The correct radius for signals using the MLT siglight.ace was the signals original radius times 8.67. To covert the radius back to the original size you need to divide the current radius by 8.67. and use the original MSTS siglight.ace. Lots of info over at trainsim.

[markus_GE]

So, James, you suggest converting all routes back to MSTS standard lights, no matter if these were there originally or not?

Cheers, marksu

[James Ross]

markus_GE, on 01 July 2014 - 05:35 AM, said:

So, James, you suggest converting all routes back to MSTS standard lights, no matter if these were there originally or not?

I would avoid making any wide changes just yet, as we're still developing this feature. We may yet be able to identify these lights and correct for it.

If you want to test it out, though, you should set the signals up with textures and sizes that are realistic and not the "trick" ones - the MSTS standard lights would work.