Next demo info

[sio2]

Just a bit of info on my next demo. Couple of screenies (big, so you'll have to scroll the window)...

Editing a scene in IrrEdit, complete with my own custom scenenodes for terrain, vehicles, ocean. Note that the water texture is merely a placeholder; in the engine it's pixel shaded and reflected etc.

[sio2]

[Split into two to avoid annoying scrolling problem]

Running in the game engine. The SUV is drivable over the terrain with full physics (Newton Physics engine). I'm just about to add trees. 

[Warchief]

Looks very nice, keep it up.

What's the demo about? Physics? Any new effect?

[sio2]

As I mention, you can drive the vehicle around the terrain. I've managed to roll it on it's roof, but it's tricky. 

I'll be adding some trees for you to avoid driving into. I can also add objects such as fences, cones, etc, just by adding them in the editor.

I also have a racetrack to drive around. 

[sio2]

What's the demo about?

All the things required for a game engine. 

[sio2]

Another screenshot, just for info.

I'm messing around with trees. I have a plugin to insert a tree into the scene (IrrEdit) based off Klasker Trees. It was tricky to implement as a plugin, but in the end I even implemented the Clone function so you can just Ctrl-C to copy a tree in the editor. Copy-and-drag makes it easy to place lots of trees. Eagle-eyed people will notice buttons in the top-right for Oak, Aspen, Willow and Pine trees. 

This is fine for adding scattered trees to a scene, but it looks like a real chore for terrain so I'll be auto-generating a bunch of trees when my terrain is generated. Note that my terrain is my own custom scenenode based off terrain from the 6DX engine.

The trees are lit but they don't yet cast shadows.

[spintz]

I'm curious why you're using terrain from 6DX.  What are the features missing with the current terrain?  Not being mean, just want to know, I haven't done much work on the terrain in over a year, maybe it's time for some features/upgrades.

[sio2]

I had a nice terrain that I wanted to use and it was in 6DX "gridmap" format. I had a few issues (which I posted IIRC) so I ended up just writing my own scene node. Remember that I have 16bit data, it has to load in IrrEdit and I have to be able to compile physics data from it.

Now I have everything working I might take another look and see if I can live with 8bit data, since I'll need to make some more terrain if I do more scenes for the demo. I'd like to do a Rallycross level with gravel tracks, trees, boulders and fences so I need to take another look at my DCC pipeline anyway. I have Bryce 6 so I may give that a go to make the terrain (its great for making skyboxes, BTW  )

BTW Have the gaps been fixed in the tiled-terrain manager?

[spintz]

BTW Have the gaps been fixed in the tiled-terrain manager?

Yup.

[sio2]

BTW Have the gaps been fixed in the tiled-terrain manager?

Yup.

Nope.

SVN97-Stable: Gaps between seams of terrains (due to LOD?). GL and D3D.
SVN97-Development: major triangle dropouts.

[spintz]

Weird, I could have sworn I had that working.  I'll double check it when I get a chance.

So you all know, I'm buying a house, close 1 week today.  Which is why it seems I've yet again stopped working on IrrSpintz.  In 2-3 weeks I'll be back and working on IrrSpintz more.

[Entity325]

While on the topic of terrain, would it be possible to have terrains project in arbitrary directions?

such as wrapping the terrain around another model, and having the "height" be projections along polygon normals?

which is basically a hack-job way to do displacement maps, but has the offshoot of providing automatic, unlimited LOD for the affected model.

provided the settings are tweaked right.

[spintz]

The terrain could definitely use a make-over.  The GeoMipMap algorithm is kind of in the middle of the algorithms out there now.  Also, with the power of new GPU's, brute force terrain isn't so bad of an option anymore.  Unless of course you want large "infinite" terrains, in which case there are other algorithms out there that are more efficient and render better, but are much, much more complex and would take some time to get implemented.

[sio2]

Back to the subject of my thread... 

I've now integrated OpenAL, with the listener, sources, buffers and reverb stuff. [Eagle-eyed people will have noticed the OpenAL redist on my website.] I now have engine sounds and tires that squeal if I push the vehicle too much.  Had to add stuff to IrrNewt to get physics info back from the tires.

Looking at the new release of IrrEdit, I realised that I've been doing things the hard way regarding my plugins. Stupid me! [My exact words I spoke upon this revelation probably break all known obscenity laws.] I'll be going back over my plugins to make life easier when I'm building my scenes, so that's a bit more work.

My biggest problem is that it's too much darn fun. Gotta stop playing and do more programming! I keep trying to roll my SUV down the side of some terrain - tricky but doable. 

[spintz]

I bet my wife could roll the SUV in seconds!!  Probably need other vehicles driving around tho, to fully instigate her road rage and release her driving savy.