G'th
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Posts posted by G'th
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1 minute ago, rettter3 said:
Will you also be doing a 2.5x /2.7x Version? I absolutely love what you are doing and I would really like to exchange Jnsq with this mod (regarding, that Jnsq is basically complete/not being worked on anymore).
Its actually being built directly as a 2.5xish version. Its not exactly 2.5x and is more a mix between 2.5x and 2.7x. I'm thinking the idea will be for people that want it at stock size that I can offer a patch that scales everything down.
And here's Hale. Slightly different color palette on this one, but it looks nice for a little gob of gunk.
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Ovok. Unironically my best creation so far, just for the sake of precisely recreating this little e g g in 2022.
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48 minutes ago, Poodmund said:
Hi Gth,
Looking at your plans it looks like you intend to do a lot of work here, potentially changing the orbits of some bodies, changing the atmospheres(?), changing the surface topology from both a visual and PQS standpoint, which will require new biome maps, new science definitions, changing the overall 'feel' and 'lore' of some bodies by changing the overall visual look and even adding some additional bodies into the mix. At what point does this cease to become a high fidelity visual change and become a complete system remake?
What I am trying to infer is, why constrain yourself by involving OPM at all, why not use this as an opportunity to create a completely original stock system expansion mod and let the bounds of your imagination be your limiting factor, not a pre-existing mod?
It already became a full remake when I realized simply swapping in new color maps isn't really enough to make anything look better to my standards, hence falling down the rabbit hole of becoming a big boy planet maker. (which was ultimately a good thing, as my skills are getting better and better every day now). When I first posted this thread my initial attempt was just a cruddy paint-over of the stock Kerbin color map; I didn't even redo the normals lol; and even still some said it was the best looking Kerbin they had seen.
But, that being said, the idea for the OPM worlds is to stick very close to their original designs, which I've already had a successful trial run with with Laythe; the Laythe in this mod is practically identical to the original in terms of topology, but the height map and resulting color and normal maps are that much better for it after resurfacing it. For the OPM moons, this same idea is going to be carried forward, and that's actually been what I've been doing since I put Sarnus in; I've been in my Play install hopping around these moons and actually experiencing them as a player, so that I can then carry the best parts of them forward. I have definitely taken more liberties with the Stock planets, but thats because they don't have much going for them otherwise.
Obviously of course there's going to be instances where things are fundamentally just "different", but thats something I think is going to be good in the long run. OPM is old, and the audience I'd expect would want to play in this system are people who have already put plenty of hours on the original OPM mod, so having some freshness to it is going help play into that.
I certainly get where you're coming from, but it also has to be said that I don't find working with OPM to be constraining at all. After all, working within the relative confines of the Stock solar system wasn't constraining (creatively speaking I actually work better with constraints than otherwise), and ultimately when it comes down to it, its the same reason when I was doing SOL that I didn't want to just make my own version of the RSS system at Kerbal scale. KSRSS already existed, why go out of my way to make a duplicate mod just for the sake of different visuals? Even abandoning stock entirely would work against that logic.
That all being said, Ad Astra is factually more than just visuals at this point, and it is probably fair to not label it as though its merely a visual pack for OPM and stock,, so I'll adjust the title to reflect what it is, which is more of a reimagining.
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Spread out the yellow banding more and adjusted the blending. I think I'm happy with this for now.
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Did a color swap on the blue bands and filled out the Ring a bit more. Sarnus is definitely gonna be a problem child, I can feel it.
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Initial Go at Sarnus. Ring needs to be filled out a bit more.
Thoughts on the pallette here? I do want blue in there, but may be we can swap some of the more prominent blues for yellows to bring it closer to Sarnus' original pallete, and then I can concentrate the blues to the Poles.
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NuLaythe
And a peak under the clouds
The current cloud set is pilfered directly from the original Huygen config from old Ad Astra. Most likely I'm not going to adopt the textures out of AVP directly, but instead will remake them in this sort of style. The color set likewise is also not final. I'm still undecided on if I want to keep with this look, or go for more of a blue grey look, which I'm leaning towards. It really depends on Tekto, as I'm going to want the balance the visuals between the two moons so that they're distinct from one another, and the more I look at it the more I think Tekto would probably be better off with this, while Laythe get something else (like its original design coupled with my original ideas for it).
But, deciding on all that will be for the EVE visuals stage of things. For right now this initial cloud set works for just having pretty screenshots to reference.
That being said, it is quite amazing thus far. -
1 minute ago, Probird_23 said:
Man, all of this looks so cool!
I have a couple questions though:
1. Will this mod be compatible with 2.5 resale (no weird artifacts resulting from rescale)?
2. Is it possible to switch select planets back to their original state? (Eg. Your minmus back into minty minmus)
Its actually being designed at that scale, so no rescale will be necessary, unless you want to squish back down to stock size, which is a potential option I think we might add.
And sure, but at that point you're on your own as you'd have to make your own kitbashed planet pack. Nothing to stop you from doing that, but its not something that'd be supported. -
annnnd Tylo. Normals are jacked, but it gets the idea across for now. (i'm also aware of that seam, it will be dealt with most harshly)
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Decided to break up the big lava canyon a bit, and added some more bits.
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Pol
Also occurs to me I'm way off on Jool's size relative to its first moon, so thats about to get hella adjusted.
As for Pol itself, first go came out great. The massive canyon in the middle is indeed filled with Lava, and I plan on looking into different things I can do to try and make it emit light, which may be possible? IDK, it didn't work on my first try but may be I just did it wrong.
I think its also going to have an atmosphere as well, to emulate the idea of Pol as a constantly volcanic world; after all, its literally covered in thousands of them.
Also, in regards to Bop and Gilly, which you might find conspicuously absent from their respective worlds, I plan on moving them into the asteroid belt region, to become analogues to the other 2 bodies in that region. -
Nu Mun. Heavily cratered like the original Mun, but just so, so, so much better at it.
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Sike Edition
Current in-progress Pics:
Moho (kind of overly dark, will need to tweak that):Quote
Eve:
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Kerbin and Minmus (Mun to be redone, Kerbin also to be redone, pictures mostly to show off that I managed to recreate most of the original atmospheric look for Kerbin from the old Ad Astra):
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Minmus:
Duna (and Mic and Ike; Ignore what Duna looks like in the picture of Mic, the Duna in the Ike picture is the proper look for it)QuoteMic:
Ike and Duna
Dres (The canyon's shine in sunlight and mimics the look of Bismuth in some places; color pallete for the rest of the planet is still iffy, so that may change eventually)
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And finally Jool, my first Gas Giant, which looks pretty great considering its a barebones first attempt:
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Suggestion, could we get a toggle for the little stabilizer on the rear fuselage?
I know its accurate to the show, but its just so ugly lmao. -
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34 minutes ago, Rutabaga22 said:
I love the idea of giving the kerbol system a "restock"
Yeah that's basically the idea.
Also:
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6 hours ago, Beccab said:
That's great! JNSQ and KSRSS are so heavy these days, I really would love to go back to the stock system and not having it crash anymore because of excessive memory consumption
Don't get me wrong, as a baseline the mod is going to be pushed as hard as I can push it. But I'm also big on accessibility, so in general it shouldn't be that much heavier than stock+OPM was, particularly if one chooses to skip or downgrade the other visual aspects like the eventual EVE and Parallax applications.
6 hours ago, MoeKitsune said:Will you be moving the orbit of Pol to make it closer to an Io analogue?
Probably yeah Pol and Laythe will swap places.
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Should be noted that like KSP, KSP2 is unlikely to be aimed at people with high-end gaming rigs. The stock game is supposed to be super accessible, and KSP2 only really needs to exceed the visuals of stock KSP1, which it of course will.
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3 minutes ago, Rutabaga22 said:
I had an idea. If you want to make dres colorful you could have it be growing bismuth on it's surface.
That is an interesting idea. A very interesting idea in fact, and I think I know q good way to do it.
Nice!
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Added a general roadmap and included my intentions for each world to the OP.
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9 hours ago, Jcking said:
The NAR MEM was an aerobraking/retropropulsion design with ballutes deployed at mach 3.5 and jettisoned at mach 1.5, at which point retropropulsion with a 140,000 lbf FLOX/CH4 aerospike begins bleeding off excess velocity until touchdown.
Right but the issue with it is is that at the weight it was designed at it doesn't have enough deceleration to safely reach a hover before it hits the ground, even aiming for the lowest elevations on Mars. Everything about it would have to increase in relative size to be able to make it work at the same weight, so it becomes a question of whats viable if you could give NASA more accurate models of Mars to work with than what they had by 1969.
There's also the issue that it needs to bleed speed from high orbits over Mars as thats where the MTV would be sitting, in addition to the ascent stage being able to make that same high orbit. So realistically, they'd likely have to do an aero-braking design that then goes for a full retro-propulsive burn to the surface. They'd only need to move up to a 10m diameter that way (which in addition to some structural redesigns would give them enough fuel to do it) and wouldn't need to spend budgets on a may be might work ballute system.8 hours ago, CobaltWolf said:I could see exotic fuels matching the vibe of KSP 2 more
It doesn't really need exotic fuels. Using flourine as an oxidizer is an awful idea even by Soviet standards, and doesn't give the system enough of a boost to justify having to maintain the fuel over a 2 year voyage.
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1 hour ago, Doc Shaftoe said:
"Still needs work" he says about the best looking Kerbin I've ever seen.
You'll come to see that I'm what one might call a perfectionist.
Plus it also doesn't help that as I continue to work on these worlds I get better at it, so my earlier work starts to look worse to me than it did when I originally made it, making me want to re-do it.
Which I'm about to do for Mun
lol
But on that note, here's the initial go at Duna.
lol
AD ASTRA: A Reimagining of Stock and The Outer Planets Mod - "It's Cloudin' Time"
in KSP1 Mod Development
Posted
I agree on Sarnus and Eve; finetuning them gonna be a task to tackle for the EVE stage of things. Sarnus in particular carries that blue hue throughout because the actual planet itself underneath the clouds is solid blue. Thats still going to be a thing (it is for a very specific reason), its just going to be a matter of adjusting it so it looks the way it needs to. Jool ironically would have the same issue if it weren't for the fact that its a dull grey under its clouds, making it basically undetectable.
As for Duna, its due for another redo, and yeah bringing it closer to the original hue is going to be part of the changes; part of the reason for the current tone was actually more to get Mars right rather than Duna right.
I think both it and Kerbins redos are gonna be on the docket today before I keep going with the OPM worlds. I think especially with the success of the two OPM remakes so far that my skills have advanced enough to where these will hopefully be the last redos I do for these worlds. I have (and had) a clear vision for what these worlds ougbt to be and I think now I can get closer to my mental image than I could have the last time I tried.
And I don't think its a coincidence those three worlds in particular are your favorites. All three directly sample various parts of the highest resolution height maps Ive been able to find, those being Mercury, Mars, the Moon, and Ceres. 21k,41k,96k,and 21k respectively, to illustrate that. Working with that much data its pretty easy to see how the worlds that do the least to distort the original data end up looking fantastic.
Mun technically is all four worlds smashed together (in a very curated way), while Dres is a Mercury/Ceres kitbash, while Tylo was a Mars base with Ceres and Mercury brought in for additional details.