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Starsector 0.97a is out! (02/02/24); New blog post: Simulator Enhancements (03/13/24)

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Author Topic: Better venting effect graphics  (Read 3654 times)

Alex

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Re: Better venting effect graphics
« Reply #15 on: October 29, 2020, 12:28:26 PM »

Yeah, I don't think whether it stands out or not is an issue - but whether it feels like a "strong enough" effect seems like a reasonable question.
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Dri

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Re: Better venting effect graphics
« Reply #16 on: October 29, 2020, 01:02:13 PM »

What about shield visual updates? Alex's work must never be done.
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Avanitia

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Re: Better venting effect graphics
« Reply #17 on: October 29, 2020, 01:42:57 PM »

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Retry

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Re: Better venting effect graphics
« Reply #18 on: October 29, 2020, 01:52:32 PM »

What about shield visual updates? Alex's work must never be done.
(Edit: oh, regarding shields: I'd messed with them some here and there, but there was never anything promising.)
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Alex

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Re: Better venting effect graphics
« Reply #19 on: October 29, 2020, 02:24:52 PM »

Adjusted the venting effect a bit. Main thing is making it contour the ship; the original effect was done before "being able to figure that out easily" was a thing in the code. So, now it should look nicer with longer/thinner ships. Also tweaked the colors a bit...

https://twitter.com/amosolov/status/1321925526584516610
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Goumindong

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Re: Better venting effect graphics
« Reply #20 on: October 29, 2020, 02:26:48 PM »

Here we go!

https://twitter.com/amosolov/status/1321869905180925952

And here's a screenshot (the twitter link has an animated gif):



Click image to see it fullsize.

(Edit: oh, regarding shields: I'd messed with them some here and there, but there was never anything promising.)

one thing i noticed is that the effect is not tied to the ship orientation and if the ship turns does not look like its following the ship. As a result, if the ship is changing its orientation it looks like there is some sort of modifier on the ship rather than its dumping something into space.

edit: The contoured version looks a lot better.
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Grievous69

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Re: Better venting effect graphics
« Reply #21 on: October 29, 2020, 02:27:41 PM »

Adjusted the venting effect a bit. Main thing is making it contour the ship; the original effect was done before "being able to figure that out easily" was a thing in the code. So, now it should look nicer with longer/thinner ships. Also tweaked the colors a bit...

https://twitter.com/amosolov/status/1321925526584516610
Damn, that looks menacing.
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Alex

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Re: Better venting effect graphics
« Reply #22 on: October 29, 2020, 02:31:52 PM »

one thing i noticed is that the effect is not tied to the ship orientation and if the ship turns does not look like its following the ship.

Ah - it's particle-based, so when a ship turns or slows or w/e, the particles that are already out there don't get affected. It *could* also be done so that the particles are tied to ship orientation - in fact a slightly earlier version did that - but to me that made it look too... not "pasted on" but something like that. It felt less real and more like an "oh, here's an effect tied to the ship position".
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Gothars

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Re: Better venting effect graphics
« Reply #23 on: October 29, 2020, 02:43:50 PM »

Adjusted the venting effect a bit.

Very nice!

[/quote]

one thing i noticed is that the effect is not tied to the ship orientation and if the ship turns does not look like its following the ship. As a result, if the ship is changing its orientation it looks like there is some sort of modifier on the ship rather than its dumping something into space.

For me it's not the lack of turn following, but that ship forward movement has no effect on it. If a moving and venting ship would leave a little bit of a flux trail (like engines do) that would sell it perfectly.


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Goumindong

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Re: Better venting effect graphics
« Reply #24 on: October 29, 2020, 02:47:19 PM »

one thing i noticed is that the effect is not tied to the ship orientation and if the ship turns does not look like its following the ship.

Ah - it's particle-based, so when a ship turns or slows or w/e, the particles that are already out there don't get affected. It *could* also be done so that the particles are tied to ship orientation - in fact a slightly earlier version did that - but to me that made it look too... not "pasted on" but something like that. It felt less real and more like an "oh, here's an effect tied to the ship position".
Yea when i first looked at it though it didn't look like it was particle based but rather stuck on. Imagine a hose. If you're spraying the hose and turn it you don't make the water from the original spray follow the nozzle but you do make a nice curve in the water as the later water now has a new direction. As you add hoses and spin them you make spirals when viewed from the top. This happens even if add enough hoses such that there is no surface without a hose.

It doesn't look like that effect is happening when the ship turns. Rather it looks like the ship is occluding something that is statically happening below it.

@gothars. But not in the vacuum of space. There is no air resistance to slow the particles down and make that trail. That would only happen if you were accelerating in a particular direction.

edit: The new version significantly reduces the feeling of this effect. Though that may be because the oddy isn't turning all that fast. How does it look when a ship is accelerating or turning fast?
« Last Edit: October 29, 2020, 02:49:14 PM by Goumindong »
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Gothars

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Re: Better venting effect graphics
« Reply #25 on: October 29, 2020, 03:03:32 PM »

@gothars. But not in the vacuum of space. There is no air resistance to slow the particles down and make that trail. That would only happen if you were accelerating in a particular direction.

Mh? Particles don't have to slow down to form a trail, there just have to be fewer of them were you are going than were you are coming from. Of course the trail would dissipate quickly and not hang around like in atmosphere.
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Goumindong

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Re: Better venting effect graphics
« Reply #26 on: October 29, 2020, 03:10:03 PM »

@gothars. But not in the vacuum of space. There is no air resistance to slow the particles down and make that trail. That would only happen if you were accelerating in a particular direction.

Mh? Particles don't have to slow down to form a trail, there just have to be fewer of them were you are going than were you are coming from. Of course the trail would dissipate quickly and not hang around like in atmosphere.

They do. If you're moving at speed x and a particle is ejected from your ship at speed y relative to your ship it will maintain speed x+y unless it hits something out there like an atmosphere.

So if your ship is moving but not accelerating then there will be exactly the same where you're going as where you're coming from. It will look exactly the same as if you're moving at a constant speed than if you're moving at zero speed.



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MesoTroniK

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Re: Better venting effect graphics
« Reply #27 on: October 29, 2020, 03:38:33 PM »

The new vent animation literally looks 100x better! But... I think there is one more thing that could be done to really make the most of it :)

Make the start of the vent sequence more energetic, like a pressured release followed by the steady flow. So right at the onset have a denser wave of particles (that also maybe moves a bit faster).

intrinsic_parity

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Re: Better venting effect graphics
« Reply #28 on: October 29, 2020, 03:45:44 PM »

I think I worked out what looks weird when the ship is rotating. The venting gas is being released from the edge of the ship, so when the ship is rotating, the gas should have some extra velocity due to the fact that the point it's being released from is moving relative to the center of mass of the ship. It looks like the gas just inherits the velocity of the center of mass of the ship. I could be wrong about how the gas velocity is being calculated, and it also could be a lot of trouble to adjust that. 
« Last Edit: October 29, 2020, 04:20:30 PM by intrinsic_parity »
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Midnight Kitsune

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Re: Better venting effect graphics
« Reply #29 on: October 29, 2020, 04:13:18 PM »

The new vent animation literally looks 100x better! But... I think there is one more thing that could be done to really make the most of it :)

Make the start of the vent sequence more energetic, like a pressured release followed by the steady flow. So right at the onset have a denser wave of particles (that also maybe moves a bit faster).
Completely agree here. Something that sells the "violent, dam breaking nature" of the vent, especially at high flux, would help make it even better
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