Hi there, I'm rendering a 2D scene using Ortho in a front to back way to optimize the speed at which the program renders since there are a lot of overlapping layers. First, here's a screenshot of what goes wrong: http://www.spaceartist.net/screen5.jpg I'm rendering the background first(the blue water), then I'm rendering the rocks. The rocks overlap a lot, but I would only like the completely 100% opaque surfaces to not be touched again after render. This part works, but the portions of the texture where it is translucent also are never touched again. Since my Z compare is ZFUNC_LESS, when alpha is drawn, the Z is set and subseqeunt rendering on that pixel fails. This results in those blue edge lines you see. The solution is simple if it exists in D3D, which is what I would like to know. I want to disable Z writes for pixels being written that have an alpha value that is less than 255. Is this possible? I do not want to overdraw the whole sprite when alpha is only in the perimeter of the sprite. Thanks! Marvin

Hi Kamikaze, yes I believe that is the usual way to render, but essentially, all sprites have alpha on them, but just at the edges(and real fading alpha here, not something I can alpha test away). I would be forced to overdraw on every sprite, which I don't want to do. I think it will really lag on older cards.

Thanks!
Marvin

Oh I just had an idea..but I'm not sure if it is supported on other cards:

enable ZWrite
using Alpha test set to exclude pixels with < 255 alpha
Draw to depth buffer only
disable ZWrite
Turn off Alpha test
Draw regularly Front to Back

Will that work guys?

Thanks!
Marv

You have to draw twice:

1) draw with Z write, alpha-rejecting all pixels with alpha < 255
2) draw without Z write, alpha-rejecting all pixels with alpha >= 255

Note that this probably won't do what you want, though. For blending, you really need to render far-to-near.

Also, using Z write reduces the effectiveness of early Z and hierarchical Z, so overdraw acceleration (available on most modern graphics cards) won't actually kick in.

hplus0603, yes thanks, that works. Since it's a 2D engine performance shouldn't be a problem for modern cards. But are these renderstates even compatible with older cards?

D3DRS_ALPHAREF
D3DRS_COLORWRITEENABLE
D3DRS_ZWRITEENABLE

Would these work on Intel Cards? And if they don't work, then reverting to back to front drawing would still be very slow on older cards:/

Thanks!
Marvin