Kupu's thread

[NeonSturm]

No, sorry. It takes a lot of effort to create a pack and i have no intention to divide efforts even more when i'm busy drawing new content.

*partially joking, partially optimistic* We would just need a contest. Who makes the best textures

Our "activation states" we currently use are restricted to 1 frame. This is not something i could implement with graphics alone unfortunately.

It was just an example.. was thinking more about this:

• ON
• OFF

With a reddish / greenish status LED next to them (on your speakers, screen or computer front-panel).

The 4-part button-block was something I was about to use in another thread, rotate and give your buttons numbers (have to investigate possibility further)

 

[kupu]

*partially joking, partially optimistic* We would just need a contest. Who makes the best textures

It was just an example.. was thinking more about this:

• ON
• OFF

With a reddish / greenish status LED next to them (on your speakers, screen or computer front-panel).

If you don't ask you don't get! :D I'm sure a community pack will turn everything into a rusty space junk look soon. I'd like to see it / make it. I just couldn't afford to give it the time.

Ah, i misunderstood your diagram, sorry. The input digits could be a nice touch, but we have 2 colour states to show on / off already, blue / orange. I suppose you were just after a redesign? I think Schema wanted to have the big icons with a colour state background. So it's more his design than mine. Not much chance of changing it i think. But hey, making textures for starmade is really accessible! You can always try these ideas yourself? I'm always happy to help people who want to change the game textures themselves if they need it.

 

[Crusade]

Personally, I think TGA support should be there for textures. So you could still use PNGs to save download size, or opt-in to download larger TGA sheets with added layers for specular, emmissive, parallax and any other features that come along.

Just having the option for those people with higher-end hardware that want a better looking game would be good.

 

[NeonSturm]

There is no reason to have StarMade not using them internally as if it would be combined in one file.
Can you explain the difference of the TGA format to me?

I would like to save memory (for many texture packs and self build/mixed versions, download size) by using indexed colours in texture files.
No problem with my hard disc, but the backups get very big.

 

[Crusade]

Well with a TGA file, the alpha channel is just that. It's own separate channel. This channel could be directly read by the shaders. Allowing for an extra layer of detail.
I'm sure with some wizardry one could add even more channels, yes bloating the size of the file, but that's why it should be an optional add-on, much like the official HD texture packs for Skyrim.

 

[kupu]

Yep. Crusade pretty much summed it up.

TGA would allow a true alpha channel. Generally speaking they don't compress as well as PNG on disk size, but size in memory should be identical i think if the colour depth is the same.

We could go even further and try dds compressions but we're yet to look at anything like that. If the launcher could have an opt in download option i'd be happy to push for Targa files.

 

[Tomino_sama]

#picsoritdidnthappen

video on the way

 

[Ithirahad]

No, they are incredibly easy to generate. A block config option could be useful, i'll try investigate how plausible that is.

I think it was something to do with a limited amount of maps loaded per time. As for your aesthetic sensations? try alter the shader! It helps, thats you whole point of the post :p

Now what we could do to get around the limited maps scenarios is place a black / white image on the alpha channel of the normal maps and point a shader to that channel only. However, that won't work with PNG nor would i want to assign specular control to it over other potential maps. Especially when we can just reduce the specular from dangerous blinding levels to acceptable levels.

...But some things should really be super-shiny, and some should be matte. Sooo... Yeah, we need specmaps, or something similar, if possible.

 

[NeonSturm]

But PNG uses some background-colour value for transparency?

I would support TGA too, as long as it is optional and easy to implement (soon buying a new GPU, but

• have to read reviews and documentations about LibGlew and Linux support
• which things in GPU hardware are most important for stuff like StarMade, Dota, SpringRTS, ...
• shouldn't be most expensive or an especially motivated energy-vampire - energy-management is one of the last things optimized in some Linux drivers.

I usually like compressed files, but with a loss-less compression (lossless during load, edit and save process in gimp, paint, ..., not neccessarily during conversion)

Would help if players can distribute blocks separately and for easier installation: http://starmadedock.net/threads/finding-blocks-by-tags-distributing-blocks-separately.2753/

Would not even need code in StarMade, just a pre-launch check-for-updates programm.

 

[Crusade]

Done a little test, a 24 bit TGA file with an alpha channel is 48mb. A lot smaller than I would of guessed. And that's for 256 (216) texture resolution.

EDIT: What about TIFF files? They support extra LAYER data, meaning you could put the texture and normal into one sheet.

As well as height, specular and emission data, with emission being full-color.
Only problem is that a single 256 texture sheet that has layers for diffuse, normals, height, specular, and emission is around 145 MB, worst case scenario.

I'd still love to see other formats as an option. A single file containing the diffuse and other data would be amazing.

 

[Reilly Reese]

So....will TGA happen then or what?

 

[kupu]

@Crusade

Our diffuse files would still need to be only diffuse data i think. If we were in the something like the UDK engine it could be possible using materials, shaders and colour tinting to take information and alter them from all channels independently. But doing that in starmade? Just not worth it. Most likely not even possible.

I'm only suggesting the use of the alpha channel on our normals, Which is currently unused.
(Sure you could calculate normal maps from 2 floats (derivative map)
and also free the blue channel... but thats more performance cost for less quality)

i've not heard much about TIFF files bar Crytif. Not sure wether people can use the layer data. All TIFF's I've used so far have been huge in disk size.

@Thadius Faran

Not my call. Certainly not a priority for starmade right now. Something to think about though for the future.

 

[flpsantoss]

Hey Kupu, what textures are you working now? i Think we have many new textures coming in the next few updates right?

As i understand, the files we have now don't need to make sense as where anything is, but in the future, would be better to have individual files for each block, or group files but each based in one category?

 

[ltmauve]

I think since the graphics are loaded once, during boot, there wouldn't be much extra cost to changing the files away from the grid. However I think it would make editing the texture much harder since you couldn't copy/paste between different textures.

 

[kupu]

@flpsantoss
Yes, I'm currently working on lots of new textures. Last time i quickly counted them it was close to 70 unique textures.
This is mostly terrain work, but that's all i'm going to say about that. :P

 

[SkylordLuke]

c

@flpsantoss
Yes, I'm currently working on lots of new textures. Last time i quickly counted them it was close to 70 unique textures.
This is mostly terrain work, but that's all i'm going to say about that. :p

can't wait to see them! :D

 

[FunnyBunny14]

Please let it be part of the universe update! That update was already going to be awesome, and now you are making the textures for new blocks?

Edit: Darn it! Why doesn't that smiley look happier! My face had (and still has!) a way bigger smile than that!

 

[flpsantoss]

@flpsantoss
Yes, I'm currently working on lots of new textures. Last time i quickly counted them it was close to 70 unique textures.
This is mostly terrain work, but that's all i'm going to say about that. :p

OH that number. KEEP WORKING!!! this game is gonna be so nice in the future that i had to start making videos

 

[FunnyBunny14]

I once referred to starmade as 'HD minecraft in space'. When the new default pack is finished, and you turn antialias on full, that is going to be an understatement.

I can't wait (well, I can of course, but you get the idea: I really, really want those lovely, beautiful textures!).

 

[blurb357]

hey guys blurb here, the current hud, is old, a reminder of beatlebear's time, starmade has come a long way from then, SO WHY DO WE HAVE THE SAME HUD. I am suggesting that the default hud is designed in a joint collaboration between bench and Kupu, kupu because he is the schine arts guy and bench cause he made THIS AWESOME HUD ------> http://starmadedock.net/content/shipyards-hud.1056/ . I am also wondering will we ever have 3D blocks, they have been added to minecraft, and they look awesome, so imagain how awesome they would look in starmade. also REPLACE THE SUNS WITH THESE ---> http://starmadedock.net/content/firey-balls-of-fire-mod-replacement-for-bloomed-suns.753/ THEY LOOK SO GOOD,
blurb357,
signing out