3D OSG clouds - first step

[Zan]

Hi Stuart.

That's good to know, then no time should be wasted on that But maybe the clouds could be rotated randomly about the 'up' axis if there is no shaders? Then it wouldn't probably look that errorneous...

[papillon81]

Hi,

I hope to get some help here. I switched my machine from the fglrx (proprietary) to the radeon opensource driver for my HD4670 card. To my surprise, it works really well with a very up-to date xorg stack (especially mesa from git). Even all shaders, except the 3dclouds one, work. The 3dclouds shader did not compile initially due to a "mat3x3" statement in 3dcloud.vert, which is not available in GLSL 1.10. Changing this to "mat3" makes it compile, but the 3d clouds do not show up. Instead I get a very strange view:

fgfs-screen-018.jpeg

Now I hope to get some help here from someone with more knowledge about shaders than me.

BTW: the fps here is very low because of a test with KMS enabled. When switching this off, I get almost the same FPS numbers I got with the fglrx driver.

Cheers,
Chris

[Gijs]

Chris, looks like we finally got sunbeams, altough they do look a little ofheading!

[papillon81]

Well, you are right. However this only looks like this in a certain view and angle. When changing the angle it will look like single beams but not necessarily from one direction. And it changes in a matter of seconds...

Would be nice to get some help with this.

[stuart]

Well, I'm pretty sure that changing a mat3x3 to mat3 isn't the right thing to do. However, from reading the vertex shader, that particular call is only used to determine some lighting variables, and so shouldn't affect the position of the sprites, which obviously is what is happening from your screenshot.

Assuming you're running CVS, can I suggest you change the code as follows:

Code: Select all

float n = dot(normalize(-gl_LightSource[0].position.xyz),
                normalize(mat3x3(gl_ModelViewMatrix) * (- gl_Position.xyz)));;


to

Code: Select all

float n = 0.9;

This will replace the lighting calculation with something much simpler.

Let me know if that makes any difference.

-Stuart

[papillon81]

Hi Stuart,

thanks for your help. Changing the shader changed indeed something. The clouds are still messed up, but it looks different now:


I tested this with KMS enabled and disabled.

Hope you can make something out of this..

Cheers,
Chris

[planetacancun]

This video shows the new clouds in FG. So I see the difference between what I had and now. Thanks devs!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k4oMOFnD6bw

[MaverickAlex]

nice video!

Really shows the true extent of the work done developing the clouds. uunfortunately my graphics card doesnt support them, but it great to see.

[Liam]

Mine doesn't support them either, but wow!

[planetacancun]

This video shows the new clouds in FG. So I see the difference between what I had and now. Thanks devs!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k4oMOFnD6bw

Thx guys. I do my best effort to make them be worthy of showing off here. I recorded this video like 4 times before it was good enough to show it here.

My 4 yo son loves to fly the F-16, and he was flying really fast through the clouds, and it does create an immersion effect with the high speed. Like really flying in the sky I'm going to try record a super fast video, maybe reducing the size so I can get more FPS. Like terminator said, "I'll be back!"

[stuart]

Hi Stuart,

thanks for your help. Changing the shader changed indeed something. The clouds are still messed up, but it looks different now:
http://img4.imageshack.us/i/fgfsscreen028.jpg

I tested this with KMS enabled and disabled.

Hope you can make something out of this..

Cheers,
Chris

I'm stumped, I'm afraid.

The change I suggested should have just changed the lighting, not the geometry of the clouds. Are there any other error messages?

I think there must be something broken in your cards GLSL implementation.

Sorry I can't do anything more.

-Stuart

[planetacancun]

My last video to show off the clouds on an F-16. I called it Vertigo Flying Low

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dSqjA5YKoEk

Excellent clouds.

[papillon81]

Stuart,

I just tried the 3d clouds again and it seems like the xorg driver has again made some progress. When I now apply your changes, the 3d clouds work correctly:



The fps rate drops considerably, but still it works I dunno if we should just wait for xorg/mesa to further improve their shader support instead of doing changes to our stuff. The new stencil shaders do not compile currently. Will debug that too.

Cheers,
Chris

[eotunun]

I took a closer look at Flight Simulator X the recent days, and found that you lot bat the s*** out of the Microsofties when it comes to the look of clouds. Excelent work!

[kyokoyama]

Papillon81, if you look closely, some of the clouds touch the grounds...?