Best screenshots

CaptKev · Post by **CaptKev** » Wed Mar 07, 2007 10:13 am

Could somebody please point me to the best information on planet coordinates (valid ranges, sizes etc.)?

Can you have a moon orbiting an OXP planet?

Arexack_Heretic · Post by **Arexack_Heretic** » Wed Mar 07, 2007 12:23 pm

not orbiting as such. no moon in oolite moves around much.

you could however script a series of plotted relative locations, that are chosen randomly, giving the player a sense of the planets moving around and some being (gravity) linked.

IMO however, not many will notice much.
As there is no overview map of a system and unless you have to navigate around the system by eye, there is not much point in remembering the relative position of planets.

CaptKev · Post by **CaptKev** » Wed Mar 07, 2007 6:28 pm

I've thought of a way to get nebula into Oolite without wrapping it around a planet, but I just wanted to run it by everyone to see if there's a flaw in my logic.

If I created a large flat mesh in 3DS Max, then textured it on one side with the nebula image and positioned it behind the sun and any other planets/moons with no rotation, would this work?

LittleBear · Post by **LittleBear** » Wed Mar 07, 2007 6:46 pm

Very Cool planets!

I added a few to some systems in Assassins.oxp, so if you have a poke around the planetinfo, that may be helpful.

Bit of info I worked out by trial and error was:-

Radius : The normal Oolite planet has a radius of 5000. So you can scale up or down from that. I made Gas Giants 50 to 100 times the size of the the main planet (but put them really far out).

Position : Don't know what the units are but they don't relate to wpm or other systems. They're X Y Z. X is the left / right position. 0 is dead center, left have - co-ordinates, right +. Y is the up down position. Z is distance (I think from w/s point). You can add a nebule effect with the Sky_blue values (see the Assassins planet info). Not at all sure what these numbers represent, but punch some in and see what happens, often gives a very pretty effect with high vaules.

I just played about with the numbers until I thought "Yep, looks nice there."

Textures : Oolite seems to "swirl" the texture about so the planet dosn't look like its PNG that much. The swirling though means an image of randam colours actually looks rather nice in game! The planets on my Avanta are all in game shots of some of the Assassins planets. But if you have a look at texture PNGs, they don't look much like the textures.

EG : Simple texture and sky_blur high:-

Gareth3377 · Post by **Gareth3377** » Wed Mar 07, 2007 7:40 pm

Bloody hell, that looks awesome (am trying my best to avoid any assassin spoilers). I think having systems with moons and other planets is an ace idea.

It's a shame there wasn't a 'gases' commodity in the trading items otherwise you could have gone scooping the gas giants as a different (if not tiresome) career.

Arexack_Heretic · Post by **Arexack_Heretic** » Wed Mar 07, 2007 9:00 pm

Those be the prettiest nebulea meself ever laid me eye upon!

CaptKev · Post by **CaptKev** » Wed Mar 07, 2007 9:37 pm

@LB, you've managed to create some excellent effects there, how did you achieve the nebula ray effect?

Top image - what I've managed to achieve so far using the Oolite standard nebula effect (better than the standard little fluffy clouds, but only just).

Bottom image - what I really want to see!

Arexack_Heretic · Post by **Arexack_Heretic** » Wed Mar 07, 2007 9:41 pm

Oo!

'tis fulla stars...

LittleBear · Post by **LittleBear** » Wed Mar 07, 2007 9:55 pm

Wow! That'd be cool. On how I did it, its really the native code thats producing the effects! Heres how the system looks in game:-

Now heres the planetinfo entry for this system.

Code: Select all


"gas_giantC" = {
        position = "7000000 8000000 25650000";
        radius = 240000;
        orientation = "0.0 1.0 0.0 1.0";
        texture = "hitsplanet2.PNG";
        seed = "1 2 3 4 5 6";
        "polar_color_factor" = 2.5;
        "rotational_velocity" = 0.04;
    };

(Defines where the giant will be)

"6 107" = { 
        "sky_blur_alpha" = "0.85";
        "sky_blur_cluster_chance" = "0.60";
        "sky_blur_scale" = "15";
        
	"script_actions" = (
                 debugOn, "addMoon: gas_giantC",
		         debugOff
			);
(sets the system up. The first number is galaxy, second is Planet Number)

Its just those three lines of code starting Sky_ that are making the nebula. The same vaules in different systems can produce different effects though! I think the pointyness comes from the scale and the higher the alpha and cluster values, the denser the nebula.

Obviously this gives the feel of flying through a nebula rather than seeing one at a distance, but looks nice and is easy to do. Just play about with some different vaules and you get all sorts of colours and shapes comming up.

CaptKev · Post by **CaptKev** » Wed Mar 07, 2007 10:05 pm

@LB, Thanks for the info, I'll have a play around with the values a bit more.

This is what I currently have for all systems:

Code: Select all

	"universal" = {
            "sky_blur_alpha" = "0.15";
            "sky_blur_cluster_chance" = "0.1";
            "ambient_level" = "1.5";
            "sky_blur_scale" = "128";
	};

JensAyton · Post by **JensAyton** » Wed Mar 07, 2007 10:44 pm

CaptKev wrote:
Bottom image - what I really want to see!

I’m not a fan of that sort of look. It’s been done, repeatedly, and if anything it’s even less realistic than Oolite’s current look.

ramon · Post by **ramon** » Wed Mar 07, 2007 11:05 pm

CaptKev wrote:
Top image - what I've managed to achieve so far using the Oolite standard nebula effect (better than the standard little fluffy clouds, but only just).

Yeah, that's really nice, how do you do it? I want my Oolite to look like that. I think it's a nice subtle effect. I'm not really a fan of the Littlebear ones......(sorry Littlebear you can forgive me though

)

LittleBear · Post by **LittleBear** » Wed Mar 07, 2007 11:14 pm

Admit it has a rather "acid trip" look!

This is as I've used high vaules. If you wanted a more subtle look, then just do a universal = in planetinfo and keep the values low.

CaptKev · Post by **CaptKev** » Wed Mar 07, 2007 11:14 pm

@Ahruman, if every system looked like that it would be too much, but one or two would be nice.

@ramon, the code below is what I use for the nebula effect:

Code: Select all

   "universal" = {
            "sky_blur_alpha" = "0.15";
            "sky_blur_cluster_chance" = "0.1";
            "ambient_level" = "1.5";
            "sky_blur_scale" = "128";
   };

Cmdr. Eisenesel · Post by **Cmdr. Eisenesel** » Fri Mar 09, 2007 4:54 am

This one is my favorite screenshot I've managed to get so far....

And a not quite as good pic featuring current HUD...