Redspear wrote:
As currently displayed, you can see the 'metal plate' texture pattern beneath the purple areas. I think it would look better if you couldn't; more like they marked more functional or pronounced areas as in elite.
To be fair, in large part that perception comes from the original elite wireframes but they're about as classic as you're going to get. The original Oolite textures change things somewhat but in this the areas display no obvious 'transparency' to a texture layer beneath.
IMO the original FdL texture does you no favours here re your current approach. Specifically, the purple wedge shapes on the top and underside of the model now look like an odd paint job rather than features. With your current 'texture and engines only approach' there's only so much you can do here.
The transparency is intentional, and is common to all the ships. To me these are just painted areas, and to have an opaque colour on these areas would not look at all right in my opinion. In fact when I am developing the texture they start off as strong solid colours (which really doesn't look good at all) and I then adjust the transparency to get the effect I am looking for, rough metal plating with a thin coat of paint. Incidently, if you look at Giles' original textures, they also have a transparency - you can see the underlying grey mottling through the colour.
Odd paint job? Well, yes it is, but that is all it is I think. Certainly without the painted wedges/triangles this ship in particular does look incredibly angular, and they do serve to break it up very well. So in fact it is a fairly faithful reproduction of Giles original design.
I remember when I was doing the textures for the old shipset, the FDL was by far the hardest to get to look good, and I honestly don't think it ever did, really. I was pleasantly surprised how well this turned out in fact, as I was dreading it for all these reasons.
Redspear wrote:
As with the 'viewscreen' areas that you typically add to your textures, making them opaque should help them look more functional than decorative.
Ah, the 'blue bit'! An Oolite enigma. Almost certainly not a window due to scale (the one on the Asp for example is some 30m wide), so you are right - I call it the 'sensor' and consider it to be the sensor for the viewscreen, scanner and ASC etc. It is based very much on the 'deflector' on one incarnation of the USS Enterprise, and therefore does glow. It is only half as bright on these as on the Smivs'Shipset ships, by the way. In fact I have been wondering recently if it is still too bright, so I will tone it down further, but perhaps not as far as totally non-emissive.
Redspear wrote:
Just an opinion. Feel free to ignore and please continue
I do appreciate all the feedback I get, and it certainly won't be ignored (although I may not act on it
). Input like this can often focus my thoughts, like the sensor thingy where I was dithering over whether to darken it more. With your help I have made the decision to do that.
Thanks.
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Alien Systems
