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skydomes, skyboxes, ...???

Started by mirrormack 9 replies 1.8k views
Original Post
mirrormack
mirrormack
i''d like to create a skydome (?) just like in morrowind, but i''m pretty confused. first i did a skybox, but the textures require a lot of work, and it looks crap. textures for a skydome would be easier to draw if the dome was quite flat (?). i''ve read few tutorials how to build a skydome, but they just show a picture of a dome and say that "render it with nice textures", which isn''t very useful. next i created a skydome using a 3d modelling app, but gluing the texture to it is a real pain, and it still looks crap. any tips from you who''ve done it succesfully? how is it done in morrowind (or gothic)? it looks like it''s quite flat... please no windows apps (i''m running linux), i''d like to hear about the theory.
spiffgq
spiffgq
quote:
Original post by mirrormack
i''d like to create a skydome (?) just like in morrowind,
but i''m pretty confused. first i did a skybox, but the
textures require a lot of work, and it looks crap.
textures for a skydome would be easier to draw if the dome
was quite flat (?).

Skybox textures were hard? They are very easy compared to skydomes/skyspheres because they have less warping.




SpiffGQ
mirrormack
mirrormack
i thought that skybox textures have lots of warping
and skydome textures only a little (if the dome is quite flat).

that''s weird.

anyway, i did a big, but flat dome and used a 2048x2048
texture. it eats lots of memory, but looks ok. still there
is a big gap between the horizon and the dome, but so
there seem to be in morrowind as well. i need add few
cloud layers to it to see it in action, before i can say
if it really looks good or not.
IDispatch
IDispatch
Did you try TerraGen? It''s very easy to create skybox textures with.
Yann L
Yann L
If the fact that the sky will be static doesn''t bother you, then have a look at Marlin Studio''s 360° sky textures. They are very high quality, but the CD is not cheap. Check out their free samples though.
mirrormack
mirrormack
quote:
Original post by Yann L
If the fact that the sky will be static doesn''t bother you, then have a look at Marlin Studio''s 360° sky textures. They are very high quality, but the CD is not cheap. Check out their free samples though.


yes, if it''s static, i don''t want to touch it. it was ok
to have static enviroments in the 80''s, but i think it''s
time to move on...
Yann L
Yann L
In that case, forget about skycubes. Use a skydome, lots of Perlin noise and keep in mind that you can compute most of it on the GPU (no need for huge textures wasting precious memory).
mirrormack
mirrormack
quote:
Original post by Yann L
In that case, forget about skycubes. Use a skydome, lots of Perlin noise and keep in mind that you can compute most of it on the GPU (no need for huge textures wasting precious memory).


i can use GPU instead of huge textures? that sounds great!
any tutorials around (or short descriptions of how to do
it)? i wouldn''t want to do any tiling, if that''s the
case.

but i''m still wondering if i need some kind of geometry
correction for the clouds or is it just ok to slide them
on the dome''s surface...

i found a page with perlin noise and clouds (thanks for the
right words!):

http://freespace.virgin.net/hugo.elias/models/m_clouds.htm

mirrormack
mirrormack
hmm... the skydome is pretty interesting. wouldn''t it work
correctly if i used the dome for the stars as they are
far away outside the atmosphere and then add a straight
plane for clouds? as the planet under my feet doesn''t
curve that much inside my line of sight, and the clouds
follow the ground they should move on a plane (unless they
go up or down). the plane geometry would intersect the skydome
geometry, but that wouldn''t matter...
mirrormack
mirrormack
ok, i just finished coding the clouds. currently the
skydome has all the stars and the clouds float above the
player on their own layers (at the moment, three). the
clouds are billboards, and generated when they float
into the picture. my test code handles around 200 small clouds
at the same time, but as the cloud textures are 128x128
they don''t eat much memory and i could generate lots of more
of clouds. they look really nice in three layers.
the lowest layer is the sparcest, but the fastest. the upmost
moves slowly and the clouds are thicker. volumetric clouds
would be cool, but i think i''ve had enough of clouds for some
time...
mirrormack
mirrormack
finally! it took me a while to fix few bugs, but if you are
interested, take a look at this page:

http://www.hut.fi/~vhelin/lg.html

there are two pictures of the clouds, but they don''t beat
the feeling of seeing the parallax effect in action.

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