visual pack [1.12.3] Spectra Visual Compilation 1.6.2 "Horizons" (26th July 2022)

[blackrack]

6 hours ago, Avera9eJoe said:

That's... odd. No explanation here but that's certainly good to know. @blackrack have you any thoughts? It seems as though installing Kopernicus Bleeding Edge fixes the rainbow main menu.

Huh, that's good to hear. @R-T-B what are these lighting fixes? Do you modify anything in the main menu scene relating to scale or the position/direction of the light?

[R-T-B]

53 minutes ago, blackrack said:

Huh, that's good to hear. @R-T-B what are these lighting fixes? Do you modify anything in the main menu scene relating to scale or the position/direction of the light?

We patch all atmorims to point to the nearest/brightest star type object, but...  I really doubt that would affect the main menu.  If it does, it's kind of a mystery to me how.

[Selphadur]

How do you make cloud layers more volumetric? Now they are flat. Using Spectra with EVE Redux. Thanks!

[HafCoJoe]

6 hours ago, Selphadur said:

How do you make cloud layers more volumetric? Now they are flat. Using Spectra with EVE Redux. Thanks!

Hey there! Can you explain to me what you mean by flat? Is it different in appearance than any other SVE cloud mods you've tried like SVE or Astronomers?

[Terminal Velocity]

why does kerbin look like the sun?

[Selphadur]

1 hour ago, Avera9eJoe said:

Hey there! Can you explain to me what you mean by flat? Is it different in appearance than any other SVE cloud mods you've tried like SVE or Astronomers?

I mean layers are flat. Like when you fly into clouds you can see those layers being flat. I would like to make them like comparison pics in EVE Redux: 

Instead they are flat (like a thin film surrounding whole planet with painted clouds on them).

 

You can see clouds here similar to what I have:

 

But also when you fly through them you have this same cloud layer thin as a film, without any depth or volume (volumetrics) to them.

[HafCoJoe]

38 minutes ago, Rocketry101 said:

why does kerbin look like the sun?

I don't know. Could you give any more information? 

20 minutes ago, Selphadur said:

I mean layers are flat. Like when you fly into clouds you can see those layers being flat. I would like to make them like comparison pics in EVE Redux: 

Instead they are flat (like a thin film surrounding whole planet with painted clouds on them).

 

You can see clouds here similar to what I have:

 

But also when you fly through them you have this same cloud layer thin as a film, without any depth or volume (volumetrics) to them.

Sorry but I can't see any difference between the left and right comparisons  

[Selphadur]

13 hours ago, Avera9eJoe said:

I don't know. Could you give any more information? 

Sorry but I can't see any difference between the left and right comparisons  

There should not be any.

I was wondering how to make clouds look volumetric as in top two pictures. Now they look like bottom ones. And when traversing these they are just thin film, withou any transition or "fluffy" clouds. Just plain thin film.

[HafCoJoe]

6 hours ago, Selphadur said:

There should not be any.

I was wondering how to make clouds look volumetric as in top two pictures. Now they look like bottom ones. And when traversing these they are just thin film, withou any transition or "fluffy" clouds. Just plain thin film.

Oooh gotcha! Sad to say but that isn't possible with EVE The way it draws clouds is by wrapping a texture all the way around the planet, and adding cloud particles across it based on the texture's transparency. You can see it on all cloud layers in all EVE packs. I did some experimentation, and from what I remember I tried to minimize the effect as much as possible, but I wasn't able to remove it. I agree too that it looks silly flying through it.

EDIT: I also remember that I was optimizing for higher performance as well, since cloud particles in EVE are one of it's biggest FPS sinks (UV noise being the other).

Edited February 8, 2021 by Avera9eJoe

[Tenebrous Nova]

Hello! First off, I'd like to say this is a gorgeous mod and does everything right without going over the top. I'm particularly pleased with the inclusion of effects from other graphical mods like the Moho ablation effect and Laythe bioluminescence.

The only thing I've noticed that seems odd is the terminator line of Jool. I wondered if this could've been caused by other mods but it still seems to be present without them. You can see on the right that it's partly lit up on what should be the dark side.

I've also noticed that when a moon goes behind the dark side of a planet, they look strange. In this case, Vall.

Edited February 8, 2021 by Tenebrous Nova

[Selphadur]

3 hours ago, Avera9eJoe said:

Oooh gotcha! Sad to say but that isn't possible with EVE The way it draws clouds is by wrapping a texture all the way around the planet, and adding cloud particles across it based on the texture's transparency. You can see it on all cloud layers in all EVE packs. I did some experimentation, and from what I remember I tried to minimize the effect as much as possible, but I wasn't able to remove it. I agree too that it looks silly flying through it.

EDIT: I also remember that I was optimizing for higher performance as well, since cloud particles in EVE are one of it's biggest FPS sinks (UV noise being the other).

So it is not possible to add those volumetrics to Spectra? I mean you see in one picture there are those volumetrics. Are these particles you are talking about? If so how can I add those (I am not too worried about performance).

Thanks!

[HafCoJoe]

2 hours ago, Tenebrous Nova said:

Hello! First off, I'd like to say this is a gorgeous mod and does everything right without going over the top. I'm particularly pleased with the inclusion of effects from other graphical mods like the Moho ablation effect and Laythe bioluminescence.

The only thing I've noticed that seems odd is the terminator line of Jool. I wondered if this could've been caused by other mods but it still seems to be present without them. You can see on the right that it's partly lit up on what should be the dark side.

I've also noticed that when a moon goes behind the dark side of a planet, they look strange. In this case, Vall.

Hm, those are both effects of EVE. Are you using Scatterer too or running without it? I'll try and see if I can improve that in the next update. I'm not sure if it's doable though, since EVE has a hard time handling lighting up the planet glow when in an eclipse.

59 minutes ago, Selphadur said:

So it is not possible to add those volumetrics to Spectra? I mean you see in one picture there are those volumetrics. Are these particles you are talking about? If so how can I add those (I am not too worried about performance).

Thanks!

Ah sorry for the vague explanation- yes, particles = volumetrics. Whenever you see someone mention volumetrics or clouds or cloud particles they all mean the same thing: generating a bunch of 2d textures at random angles/positions on a texture wrapped around the planet based on the texture's transparency in order to add the appearance of fog clouds as you pass through. Spectra does already has volumetrics, though- you can see it in your images. When you fly through a large cloud, do you see only a thin line, or do you also see fog particles as well?

[Selphadur]

10 minutes ago, Avera9eJoe said:

Hm, those are both effects of EVE. Are you using Scatterer too or running without it? I'll try and see if I can improve that in the next update. I'm not sure if it's doable though, since EVE has a hard time handling lighting up the planet glow when in an eclipse.

Ah sorry for the vague explanation- yes, particles = volumetrics. Whenever you see someone mention volumetrics or clouds or cloud particles they all mean the same thing: generating a bunch of 2d textures at random angles/positions on a texture wrapped around the planet based on the texture's transparency in order to add the appearance of fog clouds as you pass through. Spectra does already has volumetrics, though- you can see it in your images. When you fly through a large cloud, do you see only a thin line, or do you also see fog particles as well?

That image was not made exlusivly with Spectra. I took it from EVE Redux to show as an example as I do not get these types of clouds. Only thin film layer.

[Tenebrous Nova]

33 minutes ago, Avera9eJoe said:

Hm, those are both effects of EVE. Are you using Scatterer too or running without it? I'll try and see if I can improve that in the next update. I'm not sure if it's doable though, since EVE has a hard time handling lighting up the planet glow when in an eclipse.

Yes, I'm using Scatterer. The other relevant mods I have are the one that adds parallax effects to the terrain and Stock Visual Enhancement's effects for the Outer Planets Mod (I removed the rest of the mod) since few mods take those particular planets into account, Planetshine, Kopernicus, Distant Object Enhancement and DiRT. Thanks for the reply!

Edited February 8, 2021 by Tenebrous Nova

[Terminal Velocity]

sorry about saying kerbin looked like the sun it was just one of my plant pack stars. All the visuals are working fine. 

[HafCoJoe]

3 hours ago, Tenebrous Nova said:

Yes, I'm using Scatterer. The other relevant mods I have are the one that adds parallax effects to the terrain and Stock Visual Enhancement's effects for the Outer Planets Mod (I removed the rest of the mod) since few mods take those particular planets into account, Planetshine, Kopernicus, Distant Object Enhancement and DiRT. Thanks for the reply!

Hm... I just got home and looking at that picture again, that's definitely not normal. Could you remove SVE-OPM and see if this still persists? I'm guessing this is a compatibility issue with that mod. My guess is that it messes with the settings for planet shadows, and removing it will fix this.

2 hours ago, Rocketry101 said:

sorry about saying kerbin looked like the sun it was just one of my plant pack stars. All the visuals are working fine. 

Ah good to hear its looking better!

3 hours ago, Selphadur said:

That image was not made exlusivly with Spectra. I took it from EVE Redux to show as an example as I do not get these types of clouds. Only thin film layer.

Have you played with any other visual mods to compare? This is normal behavior for EVE cloud packs (And EVE/EVE-Redux are interchangeable, cloudpacks work the same for both, just more optimized in EVE-Redux).

Edited February 9, 2021 by Avera9eJoe

[Tenebrous Nova]

21 minutes ago, Avera9eJoe said:

Hm... I just got home and looking at that picture again, that's definitely not normal. Could you remove SVE-OPM and see if this still persists? I'm guessing this is a compatibility issue with that mod. My guess is that it messes with the settings for planet shadows, and removing it will fix this.

It seems to be caused by OPM, not the SVE files! Odd.  I took out both, which fixed it. When I put OPM back, the issue returned.

Edited February 9, 2021 by Tenebrous Nova
Found the actual reason.

[Terminal Velocity]

can i do this without texture replacer because i removed texture replacer before i saw this mod for a reason. Also there is bug with tantares parts the whole map goes black when i launch the craft

[HafCoJoe]

22 minutes ago, Tenebrous Nova said:

It seems to be caused by OPM, not the SVE files! Odd.  I took out both, which fixed it. When I put OPM back, the issue returned.

Aha! Yeah, Spectra isn't sadly compatible with any solar-system altering mods  I don't use any myself, and so I haven't had the drive to make it compatible. It would involve learning a few new things with EVE and Kopernicus which I don't look forwards to. That said, if I were to do it for a specific planet pack, it would probably be OPM. 

17 minutes ago, Rocketry101 said:

can i do this without texture replacer because i removed texture replacer before i saw this mod for a reason. Also there is bug with tantares parts the whole map goes black when i launch the craft

Aye  You don't need TextureReplacer at all. In fact it doesn't actually use the mod at all anymore. The only things it requires are ModuleManager, EVE/EVE-Redux, and Scatterer, and Scatterer is only a heavy recommendation. It still adds atmospheres even with it uninstalled.

EDIT: It looks like I forgot to remove the blurb about TextureReplacer in the main post when I dropped it as a dependency. I just fixed that now.

Edited February 9, 2021 by Avera9eJoe

[The Minmus Derp]

For some reason, oceans aren't specular. How to fix?

[HafCoJoe]

Just now, The Minmus Derp said:

For some reason, oceans aren't specular. How to fix?

What do you mean by Specular, and is it different from the default Scatterer appearance?

Edited February 9, 2021 by Avera9eJoe

[The Minmus Derp]

Yes. It's not reflective, its like a wall instead of a mirror

[Terminal Velocity]

3 minutes ago, Avera9eJoe said:

 

Aye  You don't need TextureReplacer at all. In fact it doesn't actually use the mod at all anymore. The only things it requires are ModuleManager, EVE/EVE-Redux, and Scatterer, and Scatterer is only a heavy recommendation. It still adds atmospheres even with it uninstalled.

EDIT: It looks like I forgot to remove the blurb about TextureReplacer in the main post when I dropped it as a dependency. I just fixed that now.

thanks now know why it says no texture replacer on ckan. Now i can use my suits without werid bugs again

[Tenebrous Nova]

9 minutes ago, Avera9eJoe said:

Aha! Yeah, Spectra isn't sadly compatible with any solar-system altering mods  I don't use any myself, and so I haven't had the drive to make it compatible. It would involve learning a few new things with EVE and Kopernicus which I don't look forwards to. That said, if I were to do it for a specific planet pack, it would probably be OPM. 

Ah well, it's only a minor issue and doesn't seem to affect anything else. I'm too used to OPM to remove it now and to be frank, your work is too gorgeous to remove either.  I'll just convince myself that there's some sort of super dense population of nocturnal bioluminescent microbes living in Jool's upper atmosphere similar to Laythe that partly light it up, or some other atmospheric phenomena. It's not like anyone can prove that there isn't. 

Edited February 9, 2021 by Tenebrous Nova

[HafCoJoe]

1 minute ago, The Minmus Derp said:

Yes. It's not reflective, its like a wall instead of a mirror

Ah I see. I disabled the reflections on purpose because they were a bit of a framerate hog, as well as seeming rather hokie/gimmicky with craft appearing gigantic if you zoomed out. You can turn it on manually though if you go into GameData/Spectra/Spectra_scatterer/Scatterer_Settings.cfg, and setting whichever values you want to True instead of False.

 

Just now, Tenebrous Nova said:

Ah well, it's only a minor issue and doesn't seem to affect anything else. I'm too used to OPM to remove it now and to be frank, your work is too gorgeous to remove either.  I'll just convince myself that there's some sort of nocturnal bioluminescent microbes living in Jool's upper atmosphere similar to Laythe that partly light it up. 

 sounds good. It isn't that noticeable on the day to day basis, but it definitely is an eye sore. You might be able to ask the creator of OPM if it messes with planet shadows at all? I remember that it was planet shadows/eclipses that was causing this in my testing. I ran into it as a bug and was able to fix it.