City lights on the dark side of planets

Astrobe · Post by **Astrobe** » Sat Mar 12, 2016 9:05 am

One thing I miss in Oolite is seeing "civilization lights" on the dark side of planets, like there: http://visibleearth.nasa.gov/view.php?id=55167

I'm wondering if there would be a shader/texture trick that would let us have this.

Ngalo · Post by **Ngalo** » Sat Mar 12, 2016 4:26 pm

Actually this could probably be done quite easily by spawning a few ship entities with lots of flashers on the night side of a planet; it's was somewhere near the bottom of my to-do list a while ago but must have fallen off.. Unfortunately I'm rather busy right now trying to make an improved replacement for CustomShields and otherwise make life a bit fairer for those poor defenceless NPCs, so don't expect me to do it soon.

Advice if you want to DIY: make sure they spawn a few metres above the surface as ships in contact with the surface will be removed.

Norby · Post by **Norby** » Sat Mar 12, 2016 10:36 pm

Ngalo wrote:
lots of flashers

[wiki]Trails[/wiki] show that you should not use too much flashers else you must buy a new computer or accept low FPS.

Another way is using shaders, there is an interesting example in [wiki]Flying Dutchman OXP[/wiki] which can make transparent models. In this case you must check oolite.gameSettings.detailLevel and spawn only if shaders or extras are set.

and more · Post by **cim** » Sun Mar 13, 2016 12:27 pm

Ngalo wrote:
Advice if you want to DIY: make sure they spawn a few metres above the surface as ships in contact with the surface will be removed.

Use visual effects rather than ships if you want to do it this way, as they don't collide and don't need any non-flasher model components.

Day · Post by **Day** » Tue Mar 15, 2016 5:16 pm

I like the idea

EyeCandy which could even later spawn new functionalities (like drowning if you try to land on an ocean, well except if it's a Moray !!).

Astrobe · Post by **Astrobe** » Sat Mar 19, 2016 11:30 am

I noticed that Griff's station has that kind of feature: on can see the station's lights on the dark side. Can it ported to the planetary textures?

Commander Smivs · Post by **Smivs** » Sat Mar 19, 2016 11:50 am

Astrobe wrote:
I noticed that Griff's station has that kind of feature: on can see the station's lights on the dark side. Can it ported to the planetary textures?

Unfortunately not. Ships and stations have had lighting since Oolite v1.74 depending on the OXPs used, but these are generated by shaders or emission maps applied to the models. Planets don't work in the same way, mostly being procedurally generated and although they can have textures applied to them the facility to add emissions is not yet possible.

Post by **Disembodied** » Sat Mar 19, 2016 12:21 pm

How about if we made the planets hollow, cut little holes in them, and put a really big light inside? And remember, there's a fine line between genius and insanity ...

spara · Post by **spara** » Sat Mar 19, 2016 1:16 pm

Wasn't there something like a shady planet branch or something? Wasn't it supposed to do something like that? What happened to that?

Post by **another_commander** » Sat Mar 19, 2016 1:29 pm

spara wrote:
Wasn't there something like a shady planet branch or something? Wasn't it supposed to do something like that? What happened to that?

It went stale long time ago and there have been many changes in the planet drawing code and shaders since then, so it may not be such a simple job bringing it up to date.

In any case, I think that shaders would be the way to go about implementing this request. I doubt that flashers or other look-alike effects would be able to cut it.

Website · Post by **Cody** » Sat Mar 19, 2016 2:31 pm

Disembodied wrote:
And remember, there's a fine line between genius and insanity ...

I've been in my mind, it's such a fine line,
That keeps me searching for a heart of gold.

Commander_X · Post by **Commander_X** » Sat Mar 19, 2016 7:50 pm

Cody wrote:
I've been in my mind, it's such a fine line,
That keeps me searching for a heart of gold.

<Didn't have to google this one >
Out of curiosity, enjoying them Canadian musicians lately?

Website · Post by **Cody** » Sat Mar 19, 2016 8:51 pm

Commander_X wrote:
Out of curiosity, enjoying them Canadian musicians lately?

<grins> You mean the Be Good Tanyas? Yeah!

Commander_X · Post by **Commander_X** » Sat Mar 19, 2016 9:44 pm

Cody wrote:
<grins> You mean the Be Good Tanyas? Yeah!

Heh, that's cool too! ... although I expected a comment back about either Neil Young/musician, and/or Neil Young/Canadian

Astrobe · Post by **Astrobe** » Fri Aug 26, 2016 11:28 am

Shy bump for 1.86.

Oolite Bulletins

City lights on the dark side of planets

City lights on the dark side of planets

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