Hey guys/gals, I have a scene that I draw & in it are multiple objects such as various entities & of course the board/map. The special effect that I want to implement is one in which... there is an "invisible" object that travels through the scene & distorts or refracts the scene behind it as it travels across your view. I don't care if its an obtuse or acute refraction, because this invisible entity will be traveling quite quickly, I just want you to notice that its there, but not really there. Lets also just say that its a simple shape for now, like a sphere or a cube. Any ideas? I took a look at the tutorial that shows an AVI file playing in the background & on the shape that is moving around in the scene.... but that refraction effect doesn't look all that good, in otherwords... you can hardly see a change in the image on the object as it moves. So I hardly view that as a refraction effect, but more like a funny shaped TV screen moving around the screen. I'd rather want the scene to appear ALMOST normal, just a bit distorted behind the invisible object. Tell me there is an easier way to do this besides rendering the scene a few times & performing a cube-map. Thanks : ) [edited by - Luke Miklos on November 13, 2003 3:34:22 PM]

A more advanced option would be to use a shader on the object to show refraction, similar to what you would use on a transparent water surface.

there will prolly be a good shader you can use here

http://www.cgshaders.org/shaders/

you''ll just have to get Cg working with your app for your entity.

Render the scene to a grid of quads/tris and distort it''s texture coordinates.

quote:Original post by Halibut
Or, if it''s a really simply object (like a sphere or a cube), use a dynamice cubemap.

If you''re doing that for the demo contest, please don''t use this option (for instance my graphics card doesn''t support cubemaps as an extension). What Intamin AG said is your best option.

It also depends on target platform. For anything under GF you are stuck with render-to-texture-and-disort, while on GF+ you can do some realy nice fx using cubemaps. It''s just a matter of how low can you go (I made a limit at ARB_VP, CubeMaps and dot3 : anything without this simply won''t run).

You should never let your fears become the boundaries of your dreams.

quote:Original post by _DarkWIng_
It also depends on target platform. For anything under GF you are stuck with render-to-texture-and-disort, while on GF+ you can do some realy nice fx using cubemaps. It''s just a matter of how low can you go (I made a limit at ARB_VP, CubeMaps and dot3 : anything without this simply won''t run).

You should never let your fears become the boundaries of your dreams.

Weren''t you a mod a while back? Anyway: bastard . That''ll require something like a GF3+, which is to my graphics card (TNT2) like Malta is to world domination...

Thanks guys,

I will look into the shader & I will try to please everybody *snicker. I''m having trouble with my cubemap & have posted another thread if you wouldn''t mind checking it out.....

thanks

quote:Original post by Crispy
That'll require something like a GF3+, which is to my graphics card (TNT2) like Malta is to world domination...

Actualy it works on GF1 just fine. It's missing some eyecandy but overall OK. (I can add support for TNT cards but that will kill just about every fx I have)

quote:Original post by Crispy
Weren't you a mod a while back?

No, no such luck

You should never let your fears become the boundaries of your dreams.

[edited by - _DarkWIng_ on November 15, 2003 4:08:24 AM]