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BlackAdder York
Charter Member
Join date: 22 May 2003
Posts: 283
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12-15-2005 12:27
From: Torley Torgeson ^ What Os said.
The skyline has changed in 1.7 too.
(It was one of the first things I noticed in Preview 1.7.)
Both of these can be confirmed by asking Runitai Linden. Yeah...that's what I meant. It hasn't changed in 1.8. The original shine effect didn't look very natural because the transitions between light and dark areas were too abrupt. Now it looks a bit smoother and more life-like...more like real reflectivity. It's a different world. This was water & skyline in Beta...
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Avatar Central (Aqua 140, 220) - Come in and Equip yourself. Everything under the sun, plus a few Freebies.
The Black Adder...Lord High Executioner, and Harbinger of the Doomed Rat
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Zapoteth Zaius
Is back
Join date: 14 Feb 2004
Posts: 5,634
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12-15-2005 12:30
From: Torley Torgeson Several things come to mind for me regarding this. Firstly, I wish I could turn ripple water on, to begin with. I can't, because I think my graphics card is too old, so I've had to look at photos on the SL Forums and those sent to me inworld. Second, even if it was taxing on my FPS, I would still like to turn it on for still photos—of course, this leads me back to my first, and I can't even turn it on. Third, just like how the skyline and shiny have improved, this is another incremental progression. It looks gorgeous from the stills, I really wish I could see it in action to make a fuller decision. All in all, at least I would have a choice to turn it off.  It doesn't affect me FPS wise at all.. I don't know which part of the PC it is taxing on.. RAM is my PCs weakness, but my video card barely breaks a sweat.. Torster I'll send you lots of piccys in world if you want? 
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I have the right to remain silent. Anything I say will be misquoted and used against me.--------------- Zapoteth Designs, Temotu (100,50)--------------- 
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BlackAdder York
Charter Member
Join date: 22 May 2003
Posts: 283
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12-15-2005 14:46
From: BlackAdder York Since then, of course, I've learned to make highly realistic water like lots of people do for hot tubs and such. Problem is, it takes multiple animated layers as well as texture lighting and particle systems to do it, so it would never be practical on a large scale.  Ummm...may have to eat those words. I took a close look at the water rendering in Asheron's Call 2. Water there is actually one of the weaker elements of what is arguably the most beuatifully rendered virtual world to date, but it looks fairly realisitc from most angles. Turns out, they've overlayed two independent animated layers for the water, plus a third layer for shore effects. The water is also nicely wrapped to the land. (On the downside, the pixel shader technology used is a few years outdated, and suffers from an oily reflectivity problem. And the full shore effects look primitive.) Granted, AC2 doesn't have to draw anywhere near as many surfaces and textures as SL. So it may still be true that multi-layer water would create too much lag with the current rendering engine. Come to think of it, good shore effects are rarely seen. Since good wrapping beats bad shore effects, I'd vote that re-wrap be prioritized when the time is available. The other problem I'd love to see addressed is scaling of the Ripples. Three inch wavelets in a puddle isn't really desirable. And perhaps someday the distortion effect could be extended downward for realism, as it is in EQ2. After that, we can discuss weather...
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Avatar Central (Aqua 140, 220) - Come in and Equip yourself. Everything under the sun, plus a few Freebies.
The Black Adder...Lord High Executioner, and Harbinger of the Doomed Rat
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Argent Stonecutter
Emergency Mustelid
Join date: 20 Sep 2005
Posts: 20,263
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12-15-2005 15:55
From: BlackAdder York It's a beautiful box, but...have you ever heard of something called a 'PC'? I don't want to have more computers running than I need, and I need the Mac... it's a real computer running a real operating system that does what I tell it to with a minimum of backtalk. I don't need the Windows box, and if I can get rid of that pile of used food I'll be MUCH happier. |