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Published May 11, 2006
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Hey everyone!

I must say, I'm really enjoying programming this new engine, I'm producing cool results almost daily, my morale is being kept extremely high, and as an added bonus, I'm really brushing up on my coding skills.

Lightning Effect
As Hopedagger pointed out in my last post, it would be cool to have an actual lightning image to go along with the flash during thunderstorms. I didn't want Mark to have to draw one, and I want as much of the engine as possible to be procedural, so I went about creating a way to make procedural lightning. The effect is actually really simple, you start off with a "start point" in a cloud, then you repeatedly add random line segments to the start point until you reach the ground. Then you just connect the dots, and just like that, you have a unique lightning image, like the one seen below:



Anyways, here's the movie for tonight, it shows off the lightning, and a new snow effect.

Dogfight Engine: Weather Effects II (5.73MB)

Let us know what you guys think. Peace Out!
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0 likes 7 comments

Comments

ildave1
<- HUGE fan of weather effects!

Great work Sapo!
May 11, 2006 01:15 AM
TraderJack
New lighting image every time? Genuinely impressive, I must say.

-IV
May 11, 2006 06:30 AM
Metorical
That's pretty sweet and there's loads of things you could do to make it even sweeter.

1) Mutliple branches - how about lots of little forks or randomly selecting a point and remapping down to create a jumping around affect

You might be interested to know: If you see high speed photography (100fps+) you can see little trails heading down to the ground before the lightning strikes, whatever they touch first is where all the energy goes!

2) Get some different colours in there

3) Make it stop at the ground rather than bottom of the screen?

4) Flashes in the clouds? Maybe blur in when it's in the clouds?
May 11, 2006 06:38 AM
HopeDagger
Awesome -- even more delicious progress! I'm really glad to hear that you've managed to get yourself really 'in' the project and its development. Isn't it a wonderful feeling? [smile]

The lightning looks great. Most of my suggestions were covered by Metorical, but I think that making your lighting have more of a 'glow' to it, somewhat like this. Whereas the centre line of the bolt is pure white, and the light fades out in whatever colour the lightning is.

Keep up the progress!
May 11, 2006 09:34 AM
Samsonite
I hope I one day become as skilled as you are [smile].
May 11, 2006 03:56 PM
Sir Sapo
Quote:<- HUGE fan of weather effects!

Great work Sapo!


Thanks, they're pretty fun to work on too!

Quote:New lighting image every time? Genuinely impressive, I must say.


Believe me, I was impressed when it actually worked too[grin]

Quote:1) Mutliple branches - how about lots of little forks or randomly selecting a point and remapping down to create a jumping around affect


Yeah, I actually just came up with a way to do that, so expect it in my post tonight.

Quote:2) Get some different colours in there


Yeah, straight yellow is kinda boring...

Quote:3) Make it stop at the ground rather than bottom of the screen?


Unfortunately, due to an unfortunate design decision, that's harder than you'd think, but I'm working on it[grin]

Quote:4) Flashes in the clouds? Maybe blur in when it's in the clouds?


I need to do something with the clouds, I think flashes will be the best bet.

Quote:The lightning looks great. Most of my suggestions were covered by Metorical, but I think that making your lighting have more of a 'glow' to it, somewhat like this. Whereas the centre line of the bolt is pure white, and the light fades out in whatever colour the lightning is.


I started to implement that earlier today, but I was interupted, I'll give you guys an update tonight...

Quote:I hope I one day become as skilled as you are .


If I can do it, anyone can...
May 11, 2006 08:24 PM
jdaniel
I really liked those effects. Great work!

Did you know that there are more than 3 million lightning flashes worldwide per day, or more than 30 flashes per second on average? Across the United States, lightning detectors show an average of about 20 million cloud-to-ground flashes per year. :)

May 12, 2006 08:36 PM
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