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XCOMUFO & Xenocide

Xna Progress Release 0.2


dteviot

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Nice work.

 

Now, stupid questions time. Has anyone tried setting the oceans to a single blue color, to see how the Geoscape looks? I kind of assume the colors indicate ocean depth, and I'm not sure that's needed, at least at this point in time.

 

With

http://veimages.gsfc.nasa.gov/7105/world.t...3x5400x2700.jpg

Without

http://veimages.gsfc.nasa.gov/7117/world.2...3x5400x2700.jpg

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Red Knight:

 

Second, I've had a look at your bump shader, and I think there's a small error in your logic.

Specifically, this part here.

	float dotL = max(dot(normalFromMap, Input.LightDirection), 0);
float sunlight = clamp(dotL * 3, 0.25, 1.0);

// Night lights bitmap.  (Note, lights start going on at twilight)
// and make lights ramp up quickly to full
float nightTerm = saturate((0.2 - dotL) * 3.0);

 

I believe the night term should not use dotL, it should use dot(normal, Input.LightDirection), because there IS no directional light at night.

Also, the sunlight = clamp(dotL * 3, 0.25, 1.0) produces enhanced bump effects in the twilight regions.

 

Finally,

Some minor artifacts which I'm just pointing out before someone else does (I'm not suggesting we need to fix them any time soon.)

if you look at antarctic, you can see the seam where the left and right edges of the bitmap join (I suspect the normal is not correctly calculated for the edge.)

There's also an interesting artifact at the pole, due to the fact that the polar strips are triangular, not rectangular. That one's my fault, but to fix it, would need compressing the bitmap in those strips.

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Resolution is exactly the same, file is a little diffrent in size, this isn't the bump maping I was talking about this is just the ocean change dteviot was asking about. I think the single dark ocean color is nicer as well.

yea, I know that this is not the bump mapping. But I thought a single color ocean would not look that nice. However, I stand corrected. Anyway, I still like the multi-color ocean better ^_^

Edited by Mad
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Resolution is exactly the same, file is a little diffrent in size, this isn't the bump maping I was talking about this is just the ocean change dteviot was asking about. I think the single dark ocean color is nicer as well.

yea, I know that this is not the bump mapping. But I thought a single color ocean would not look that nice. However, I stand corrected. Anyway, I still like the multi-color ocean better ^_^

 

Gotcha, I didn't know what you meant by numbers.

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I believe the night term should not use dotL, it should use dot(normal, Input.LightDirection), because there IS no directional light at night.

Also, the sunlight = clamp(dotL * 3, 0.25, 1.0) produces enhanced bump effects in the twilight regions.

Yes that is a mistake indeed recalculate it from the light direction back for the night term (it wasnt supposed to do that) but the difference is so small that I didnt see it.

 

About the poles, yes that is a problem that can only be fixed with Fuller Coordinates.

 

Greetings

Red Knight

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Now, stupid questions time. Has anyone tried setting the oceans to a single blue color, to see how the Geoscape looks? I kind of assume the colors indicate ocean depth, and I'm not sure that's needed, at least at this point in time.

 

Just tested and I think that the current EarthDiffuseMap.jpg looks better.

Maybe the one with single blue color would look better with some glossyness applied to the water but right now I think it looks too dead/mat.

Edited by taz0k
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About the poles, yes that is a problem that can only be fixed with Fuller Coordinates.

Greetings

Red Knight

Actually, I believe I am using Fuller Coordinates. (That is, the spherical mesh is composed of triangles that are (as close as possible) to equilateral triangles of uniform size.

The problem is due to the fact that the bitmap we're using for our textures has had Mercator projection applied to it. That is, as you approach the poles, the scale on the rows change. Effectively, features are stretched horizontally as we approach the poles.

A simple way to hide this artifact (from the amount of work it requires from me) would be, because the texture mapping works by cutting the texture into 30 horizontal strips and then putting them onto the sphere, modifying the top and bottom strip on the diffuse and normal textures to have a single colour/normal. I.e. In the texture, it's a flat area, of uniform color. The north pole being ocean, and the south pole being antarctica, I don't think many people would notice the deviation from reality.

 

Edit.

It occurs to me the easiest way to see what's going on would be for me to write a little program that takes a (texture) bitmap, and then overlays a grid showing how the bitmap is cut into triangles that are then pasted onto the surface of the sphere. A graphic artist (Darkhomb) can then see where the texture needs tweaking.

Edited by dteviot
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Even if you use Fuller coordinates you have to modify the textures to make use of them properly. That involves creating a different projection over the textures.

 

For an example take a look at the 3rd point: Dymaxion Air-ocean World Map, 1943

 

You have source code that do the transformation and some extra explanation here: Source Code for Coordinate Transformation

 

Greetings

Red Knight

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We would be talking about these 2 areas, the seam and the stretched triangles?

 

If the seams are just because of the normal then yes I will take the normal off on the top/bottom

The "seam" is probably from joining the left and right edges of the normal map.

To explain, the normal map is created by taking each pixel in the "bump" heightmap, and then comparing it's value to the pixels above, below, left and right. However, at the left edge, there is no pixel to the left, and on the right edge, there's no pixel to the right. This probably results in texture maps with "odd" values along the edges. (This is a classic problem with bump maps. It's difficult to compute the normals along the U-V edges.

I think (but I'm not sure) the simplest fix for the seam would be copy the normal on the leftmost but one column to the leftmost column, and similar for the right column.

 

Should be easy enough to prove the seam is from the normal map by turning off the normal map and seeing if the seam disappears.

In GeoscapeScene.cs, change

		effect.CurrentTechnique = effect.Techniques["RenderGlobeWithBump"];

to

		effect.CurrentTechnique = effect.Techniques["RenderGlobeStandard"];

Of course, the best solution would be update the normal map generator to fix the normals at the seam itself.

 

 

The "triangles" at the pole are due to the Mercator projection.

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The attached diagram shows how the Geoscape cuts the earth texture into strips, and then the strips into triangles, which are then pasted onto the sphere.

There are a couple of points to note.

  • To make the cuts more obvious, this image only uses 10 horizontal strips. The sphere used in Xenocide uses 30 strips.
  • There are 6 triangles on the top strips. However, the leftmost and rightmost triangles on this strips are not drawn. That's because the north pole is a single point. Which means that the top left corner, top right corner, and top centre (and in fact all the pixels on the top row of the bitmap) are the same point on the globe, so the leftmost and rightmost triangles collapse into a line (in fact the SAME line, because the leftmost edge of the bitmap joins to the rightmost edge when we wrap the texture onto the globe.) when rendered onto the surface of the globe.
  • Same effect happens on the south pole.
  • The effect wasn't noticeable with 30 strips at the north and south pole because the "missing" triangles are just water, and just snow at the south pole.
  • Unfortunately, when we add the bump map, the south pole's texture ceases to be uniform, and the distortions become apparent.

tesselate01.JPG

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The only thing that I changed was the "Copy Always" to "Copy if newer". The strange thing is that if your video card doesnt support a bigger than 2k x 2k target in content pipeline why it does it with a Texture2D.LoadFile ...

 

I found that Texture2D.FromFile actually scales down the image to fit. I loaded a 4096x4096 image that way and after checking the Width/Height values they were 2048.

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I'm currently working on "Equip Soldiers", and am starting to suspect that I will need artwork to create a screen. Specifically, I'm going to need a "background" image with a soldier and backpack, and a set of sprites (preferably as a texture atlas) to represent the various pieces of equipment. As an interim measure, I might be able to copy assets from UFO2000, but I'm not sure that's a good idea.

Can anyone suggest how I could do a purely textual "equip soldier" screen? And does anyone think that's even a vaguely good idea?

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A purely textual Screen might be difficult to handle, but it's not a bad idea. But I guess you would have to cut back on some features. For the hands it's not a big deal, you can anyhow take any item with them and only one item fits per time and hand. However with the backpack etc this is more difficult. But I suppose you could just make "slots" so there are infinitve (or just many, like 15) slots for the hands, x slots for the backpack, y slots for the belt etc etc. and each item eats up z slots.
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Finally, SVN working again. Latest check-in:

  • Merged in Staff Sargeant's FxCop and End of Month Psi Training patches
  • Silenced a number of FxCop warnings
  • Aeroscape, added a "real time" button, and doesn't show rounds where nothing happens.
  • In Equip craft screen, double click on weapon to assign to first empty pod on aircraft
  • Updated Research notes.
  • Started creating CombatantInventory

Notes:

  • I would appreciate it if people would have a look at the research notes (docs/research.html) and check they make sense.
  • Edit: Mad & Darkhomb, would you two please start putting together the 0.2 Progress Release. Thanks.

Edited by dteviot
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Rapidshare

--------------------------------------------------------------------

Xenocide 0.2.0.1740

http://rapidshare.com/files/64723115/Xenocide_0.2.0.1740.zip.html

 

Xenocide Audio Pack

http://rapidshare.com/files/64724903/Xenocide_Audio_Pack.zip.html

--------------------------------------------------------------------

 

Megaupload

--------------------------------------------------------------------

Xenocide 0.2.0.1740

http://www.megaupload.com/?d=RSLBEWOA

 

Xenocide Audio Pack

http://www.megaupload.com/?d=HV03OYYM

--------------------------------------------------------------------

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Guest Azrael Strife
Rapidshare

--------------------------------------------------------------------

Xenocide 0.2.0.1740

http://rapidshare.com/files/64723115/Xenocide_0.2.0.1740.zip.html

 

Xenocide Audio Pack

http://rapidshare.com/files/64724903/Xenocide_Audio_Pack.zip.html

--------------------------------------------------------------------

 

Megaupload

--------------------------------------------------------------------

Xenocide 0.2.0.1740

http://www.megaupload.com/?d=RSLBEWOA

 

Xenocide Audio Pack

http://www.megaupload.com/?d=HV03OYYM

--------------------------------------------------------------------

 

Wouldn't it be better to upload the release into our FTP server? it is an internal release after all so we can't expect heavy traffic.

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It is not an internal release. This is a progress release for the public and we can put them on the FTP if they want to. I just made it avail on those sites as mirrors to save bandwidth. Edited by Darkhomb
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Guest Azrael Strife
It is not an internal release. This is a progress release for the public and we can put them on the FTP if they want to. I just made it avail on those sites as mirrors to save bandwidth.

Well, actually as long as we don't make a specific thread and/or post news in the main site about it, this is an internal release in almost all aspects bar the fact anyone can download it, but most people just don't read programming forums (workshops).

Anyway, it was just a suggestion for simplicity, I hate rapidshare :P

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Guest Azrael Strife
sheesh, guys, give an old man some peace! I'm posting it on the main site right now

Well, the add/edit news of the site is ready, if you want to upload it (you need someone to upload the database) ^_^ let me know and I'll get the stuff packaged and ready.

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sheesh, guys, give an old man some peace! I'm posting it on the main site right now

Well, the add/edit news of the site is ready, if you want to upload it (you need someone to upload the database) ^_^ let me know and I'll get the stuff packaged and ready.

ok, let's take this to the CMS thread, but what's about the authentification framework?

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Cool, can you also add the audio pack as well and explain the 2 parts?

 

Edit - Old? you're 26 :huh:

Old enough for my taste... :P

 

Hey I am just trying to make it easy to navigate...

And you're right to do so! I was just kidding :) Thanks for the help!

Edited by Mad
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I have updated Wikipedia and requirements: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Project_Xenocide

 

Can you do that on the web page?

 

Greetings

Red Knight

I suppose I could, but I do not agree. It works perfectly on my Notebook with Fx5200 Graphics... Anyway, updated, but let's make sure that we do not exclude too many people by demanding something we don't need atm...

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I didnt knew that FX 5200 had PS2.0 :) so that is a very interesting news ;) change it back ...

 

Greetings

Red Knight

It depends... It does have the shaders, but often they work very badly (e.g. Halflife 2). However, in Xenocide I haven't had problems until now (apart from the pretty low - but playable - framerate...)

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I didnt knew that FX 5200 had PS2.0 :) so that is a very interesting news ;) change it back ...

 

Greetings

Red Knight

It depends... It does have the shaders, but often they work very badly (e.g. Halflife 2). However, in Xenocide I haven't had problems until now (apart from the pretty low - but playable - framerate...)

Thanks for your efforts.

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