scottb613, on 02 January 2023 - 03:56 PM, said:
I looked at your first upload - skydome mapping is PERFECT as far as I’m concerned - the skydome with clouds painted on the texture looks so much better. Thank You.
Great, thanks for the feedback!
scottb613, on 02 January 2023 - 03:56 PM, said:
When I tested the Clouds01 in the same version - the mapping appeared different than the previous version - the old versioned seemed better. I only had a few minutes to play with it - I’ll do more testing tomorrow and provide better feedback - as I have to run out. I haven’t looked at the flattened version yet…
scottb613, on 03 January 2023 - 02:57 PM, said:
I've looked at the sky in detail - and your "flattened" dome to display "Clouds01" is much better. It adds more of a perception of overall distance to any given scene.
Okay, that's good to hear. I will continue trying to improve the horizon edge, which might get exposed on some routes at present
scottb613, on 03 January 2023 - 02:57 PM, said:
One thing that's been a minor issue over the years - is we can't blank out the "Clouds01" completely using the [Ctrl] [+] and [-] keys - it's always present. As a result - I think many of us have resorted to using a completely alpha'd out "Clouds01" - as when "Clouds01" is present - it seems to reduce the overall brightness of the sim. When blanked - a bright sunny day seems more like a bright sunny day in the sim. This is what I run 99% of the time.
Interesting, I wasn't aware that it did not go all the way to clear, but you're right; having looked at the code, it's... complicated... and tied into the whole dusk/dawn issues, but I have managed to provide
a quick fix in Unstable Version U2023.01.04-2136 - hopefully that helps until we can fix the dusk/dawn issues
scottb613, on 03 January 2023 - 02:57 PM, said:
I've messed with "Clouds01" a bunch today and tried a number of different variations - and nothing I can do with Clouds01 seems to actually improve the look of the sky over what I can with Terragen (ray traced clouds) alone. Granted "Clouds01" adds movement and is needed if we ever want to see dynamic weather. If dynamic weather is a goal - we'd need a better system for handling "Cloud01" textures or multiple textures to implement realistic transitions and changing conditions. I realize we can add precip and such now via activities - I'm talking about using different textures or combinations of textures.
We do need to keep the separation of sky and clouds - at least in some form - because we already have dynamic weather (
weather file) and, e.g. the clouds need to cover the moon and the moon has to be in front of the sky :)
But I do want more dynamic weather (and more types of weather) which is all going to need more of something - whether that is more cloud-like textures (e.g. thunderstorm clouds) or more meshes (e.g. lightning or just cloud sprites)
scottb613, on 03 January 2023 - 02:57 PM, said:
I've included more test files - linked below. A new version of Clouds01 (no border) - a new 7.5K x 7.5K light Cirrus Terragen Skydome (trying smaller) - and - a clear blue Skydome I've used on my system for years.
Thanks!
Genma Saotome, on 03 January 2023 - 11:36 PM, said:
Feedback: As the sun descends into the western horizon its diameter increases by at least 10x. The waters of the planet don't boil off as expected. :lol2: Hopefully an easy fix.
Does this work-in-progress presently apply to the night sky as well?
The stars in the night sky follow the same dome as the sun and blue sky, so they might look better, but it depends on whether the star textures we currently have are designed as dome textures (think fish-eye)
The sun itself and its "effects", along with the moon, are currently unchanged and will be addressed later
scottb613, on 04 January 2023 - 08:43 AM, said:
In the interest of trying to help ORTS be better and move the ball forward - like my Skydome - the Water textures are in both the Elvas and TS File Libraries - as Public Domain. The water base texture started life as a granite countertop advertisement - edited a bit - it looks better in person - as it has flecks of appropriate color beneath the surface that seems to reflect the sunlight. My attempt was to match inland water as I see it here in the Northeast US.
Thanks very much!