Varying weather conditions

[brett.morris]

Hi All,

 

We are currently implementing sky and weather conditions and have a requirement to have user control over various parameters such as cloud level and whether it is a fine or stormy day, etc.

 

The problem we have is that it is difficult to map a 'cloud level' or 'weather condition' (a scale from fine to storm for instance) parameter to the set of lighting varibales required to produce a sensible output.

 

What is the recommend method to achieve varying weather conditions independent of time of day?

 

My current approach is to set up a discrete number of keylines (in the same manner as the Tropics and Heaven example), one for each weather condition, and switch between them.

[frustum]

We will provide new system of environment presets in month.

[brett.morris]

Can you please provide an overview / expand on the new system as this many effect our development?

[frustum]

This system will provide editor and run-time parts. The base element is "sequence". An sequence contains a number of render parameters which can be interpolated by time. This system will allows to mix many sequences with different weights. Sequence will have access to almost all of render and material parameters. Moreover engine nodes can be controlled by sequences also.

[steve.brodie]

Denis, i think it would be a good idea to have a look at what Lumion is doing with interpolation of prerendered cubmaps out of something like terragen. I dont think most users need volumetric clouds.

 

We just want awesome looking clouds.

[binstream]

Steve, we'll take this into the consideration.

[ulf.schroeter]

It might be a good idea to refactor the volumetric clouds into a stand-alone object e.g. ObjectClouds. This would also allow multiple cloud layers when needed.

[steve3d]

in fact, in most cases we just want a sky cube or sky dome texture to make a sky. but if we have a option to switch from dynamic clouds to static texture, that would be great.

 

Currently, We are using a ObjectMesh to make a sky dome.

[ulf.schroeter]

If you are using static background textures you could also use ObjectSky for assigning static cubemap texture directly. This option is a little bit hidden (see here)