Screenshots!

I'm slowly working over the effects, including all of their textures. Contrails present a unique problem. Particle effects are prohibitively performance expensive and also buggy when used on the scale required for contrails, but only particle effects are able to create a dynamically generated vapor trail. The alternative is a track effect, which, while much more efficient, consists of a single static texture displayed in repeating segments for the length of the contrail. The existing ones I did ages ago where very repetitive looking and had obvious seams where segments joined.

First thing I had to do was make a seamless texture. I tried AI and various paint.net plug-ins, but none produced a satisfactory result. After some trial and error, I was able to find a method of creating a true seamless contrail texture myself. Problem #1 solved. But this was the lesser of the two since it was only noticeable at close range. The repetition killed the look at any range. So I made a second contrail texture using an identical method, so that it had all the same characteristics, but was still unique, and made my new contrail effect consist of the two textures used simultaneously. I made the segments of one of them 25 meters long, and the other one consisted of 18 meter segments. These two numbers do not share any common factors, which means they will never end at the exact same point until the contrail is 18 x 25 meters (450m) long. Half a kilometer before there is any repetition of the combination of the two textures. You can still see some patterns in the contrail, but they pretty well disguised.

Next I applied them to a B-17, but realized that four of these contrails so close together began creating their own pattern. So, I created two more contrail textures the same as the first two. I then made four contrail effects, each pairing a different combination of two textures. Now each engine produced a unique, but visually compatible contrail.

Lastly, I needed to work carefully with the mipmaps to get a good long range look. Without mipmaps, the contrail appears too sharp at longer ranges. With mipmaps, it smooths out, but also creates some unwanted artifacts. However, if the minimum mipmap resolution was kept from getting too low, the artifacts created by the lowest resolution mips disappear, leaving you with a nice smoothly fading effect.

Here are the results:

KoLZ2Qk.jpeg
 
Dan, don't know if anybody else is having the same issue, but I cant see your screen shots, getting the Imgur "Content not available in your region" note.:)
 
Bravo/4 said:
Dan, don't know if anybody else is having the same issue, but I cant see your screen shots, getting the Imgur "Content not available in your region" note.:)
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Crap! I forgot. I'll re-upload when I get home.

Throttle9572 said:
Hey Gecko, how'd you get the dynamic reticle and head tilt? I tried opentrack (the thing that mimics TrackIR) but it doesn't work, even with your Spitfire + Ankor's shaders. Is there some mod to do it? Or am I just stupid?
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If you have the Spitfire and Ankor's shaders installed, the dynamic reticle should be working. There are a good many steps to follow, but they are all explained in the readme files of the two packages.

The head tilt function only works if you run CFS3 via the Real Systems Module included with the Spitfire. It should work with any aircraft, but it will only work with TrackIR. Other software isn't supported at this time. Make sure TrackIR is running before you start the Real Systems Module.
 
I'm not sure of the technical wording in your comments, but I assume, the contrails are height related as per the original ones. If I understand you, the old ones are high memory use? I haven't had an issue with my Schweinfurt missions but my PC is quite powerful.
 
mongoose said:
I'm not sure of the technical wording in your comments, but I assume, the contrails are height related as per the original ones. If I understand you, the old ones are high memory use? I haven't had an issue with my Schweinfurt missions but my PC is quite powerful.
Click to expand...
Yes, they can be height controlled via Ankor's shaders in the same way as the others. There is a particle type contrail effect out there, but it really does eat your framerates for breakfast. This one, and my original are both track effects, which are more efficient.

For those who couldn't view it in the first post:
Shot05-25-26-22-37-39.jpg
 
gecko said:
Crap! I forgot. I'll re-upload when I get home.


If you have the Spitfire and Ankor's shaders installed, the dynamic reticle should be working. There are a good many steps to follow, but they are all explained in the readme files of the two packages.

The head tilt function only works if you run CFS3 via the Real Systems Module included with the Spitfire. It should work with any aircraft, but it will only work with TrackIR. Other software isn't supported at this time. Make sure TrackIR is running before you start the Real Systems Module.
Click to expand...
Okay, thanks!
 
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