Previous Thread
Next Thread
Print Thread
Rate This Thread
Hop To
#4429783 - 07/10/18 08:51 PM Stupid cloud pop issue idea  
Joined: Jan 2009
Posts: 4,433
Hellshade Offline
Hellshade
Hellshade  Offline
Hellshade
Senior Member

Joined: Jan 2009
Posts: 4,433
Florida
Answers probably a "No, not possible" but I thought I'd ask anyway.

Since clouds themselves are not huge FPS "hogs" to render, is it possible to tell the sim to just render all the clouds - including those not currently in view - all the time so that they don't pop in and out of existance when they get partially out of view?


Flying Wings Over Flanders Fields: Between Heaven & Hell II
videos at www.youtube.com/hellshade68

#4429792 - 07/10/18 09:47 PM Re: Stupid cloud pop issue idea [Re: Hellshade]  
Joined: Jun 2012
Posts: 7,993
Robert_Wiggins Offline
BWOC Survivor!...So Far!!
Robert_Wiggins  Offline
BWOC Survivor!...So Far!!
Hotshot

Joined: Jun 2012
Posts: 7,993
Lindsay, Ontario, Canada
Originally Posted by Hellshade
Answers probably a "No, not possible" but I thought I'd ask anyway.

Since clouds themselves are not huge FPS "hogs" to render, is it possible to tell the sim to just render all the clouds - including those not currently in view - all the time so that they don't pop in and out of existance when they get partially out of view?



Oh, how I have wanted that issue resolved as well! Any cloud rendering guru's listening? Maybe we have to wait for DX11 porting, if that is possible.

Last edited by Robert_Wiggins; 07/10/18 09:49 PM.

(System_Specs)
Case: Cooler Master Storm Trooper
PSU: Ultra X3,1000-Watt
MB: Asus Maximus VI Extreme
Mem: Corsair Vengeance (2x 8GB), PC3-12800, DDR3-1600MHz, Unbuffered
CPU: Intel i7-4770K, OC to 4.427Ghz
CPU Cooler: Cooler Master Seidon 240M Liquid CPU Cooler
Vid Card: ASUS GTX 980Ti STRIX 6GB
OS and Games on separate: Samsung 840 Series 250GB SSD
Monitor: Primary ASUS PG27AQ 4k; Secondary Samsung SyncMaster BX2450L
Periphs: MS Sidewinder FFB2 Pro, TrackIR 4

#4429796 - 07/10/18 10:15 PM Re: Stupid cloud pop issue idea [Re: Hellshade]  
Joined: Mar 2006
Posts: 2,454
MajorMagee Offline
Member
MajorMagee  Offline
Member

Joined: Mar 2006
Posts: 2,454
Dayton, OH
The basic game engine has some cloud related hard coding in it that gets in the way of doing this in any simple way. Perhaps if AnKor can drop the clouds completely, and go with all new volumetric DX11 clouds then...


Service To The Line,
On The Line,
On Time

US Army Ordnance Corps.
#4429797 - 07/10/18 10:17 PM Re: Stupid cloud pop issue idea [Re: Hellshade]  
Joined: Jan 2009
Posts: 4,433
Hellshade Offline
Hellshade
Hellshade  Offline
Hellshade
Senior Member

Joined: Jan 2009
Posts: 4,433
Florida
3D clouds from DX11 would be really, really cool. Hard coded 2D clouds certainly would seem to throw a monkey wrench into things.


Flying Wings Over Flanders Fields: Between Heaven & Hell II
videos at www.youtube.com/hellshade68

#4429815 - 07/11/18 12:24 AM Re: Stupid cloud pop issue idea [Re: Hellshade]  
Joined: May 2016
Posts: 1,523
BuckeyeBob Offline
Member
BuckeyeBob  Offline
Member

Joined: May 2016
Posts: 1,523
Ohio, USA
I have never found a magic bullet to resolve this issue. At present, the only way to reduce cloud popping is to avoid using certain cloud types, or reduce the overall number of clouds used for the different weather conditions. Unfortunately, both result in a less pleasing and less realistic set of clouds--unless you like mostly cloudless skies all the time. frown


“With Major Lawrence, mercy is a passion. With me it is merely good manners. You may judge which motive is the more reliable.”
#4429816 - 07/11/18 12:34 AM Re: Stupid cloud pop issue idea [Re: Hellshade]  
Joined: Mar 2009
Posts: 7,532
DukeIronHand Offline
Hotshot
DukeIronHand  Offline
Hotshot

Joined: Mar 2009
Posts: 7,532
High over the Front
Nice thought though Hellshade. And one, to non-programmers like myself, sounds like a simple and elegant solution.

#4429838 - 07/11/18 06:29 AM Re: Stupid cloud pop issue idea [Re: Hellshade]  
Joined: Sep 2007
Posts: 1,910
dutch Offline
Member
dutch  Offline
Member

Joined: Sep 2007
Posts: 1,910
EURO-zone
Personally, I think that straight cloud line thats moving from side to side is a far more an game breaker. Think that most not that difficult to stop this from moving.

Last edited by dutch; 07/11/18 06:30 AM.
#4429846 - 07/11/18 09:48 AM Re: Stupid cloud pop issue idea [Re: MajorMagee]  
Joined: Sep 2012
Posts: 418
AnKor Offline
Member
AnKor  Offline
Member

Joined: Sep 2012
Posts: 418
Russia
Interesting idea.
Clouds are not exactly free, but it is indeed not a big deal to render more of them.
My DX9 shaders keep track of visible clouds to render clouds shadows. And even after a cloud disappears from view the shaders still remember it for a few minutes.
The problem is that this approach is not very suitable for on screen rendering - clouds are flat sprites and should be re-aligned depending on camera view. For cloud shadows I just keep them aligned to the sun, but for on screen clouds I would need a more sophisticated algorithm to avoid constantly rotating clouds (which would look silly), but still re-align occasionally to avoid seeing "flat" side of a cloud.
I tried to find what part of cfs3 code is responsible for cloud visibility, but without success yet.

Originally Posted by MajorMagee
Perhaps if AnKor can drop the clouds completely, and go with all new volumetric DX11 clouds then...

That's the goal, but it is really difficult.
I more or less know how to make volumetric clouds work, but I'm currently struggling to make them work fast.

Here are some very early cloud tests from January (still based on DX9 by the way). Not really good looking, but just a proof of concept.


Attached Files volclouds.jpg
Last edited by AnKor; 07/11/18 09:53 AM.
#4429854 - 07/11/18 10:41 AM Re: Stupid cloud pop issue idea [Re: Hellshade]  
Joined: Jan 2009
Posts: 4,433
Hellshade Offline
Hellshade
Hellshade  Offline
Hellshade
Senior Member

Joined: Jan 2009
Posts: 4,433
Florida
AnKor,

If you are well on your way to 3D volumetric clouds as shown by your proof of concept pictures, I heartily endorse moving in that direction!



If it turns out 2D clouds will be remaining, is the following of any use?

If the shaders remember a cloud for a few minutes after the cloud is removed from screen view, then that should be more than enough time to keep rendering it until the cloud is actually 100% out of view of the the screen. The popping effect seems to be happening when the the rendering engine thinks the cloud is out of view of the screen but is in fact only partially out of view. Continuing to render for as long as it is "remembered" would essentially mean that the clouding popping would happen off screen, out of the players view.

As far as keeping the clouds from rotating, is it possible that the same algorithm that currently decides if a cloud is out of view of the screen could then use a simple fixed "last known position" coordinate. Given the relatively slow speeds of the aircraft and the fact that the cloud is already partially out of the view screen, the rotating effect would seem likely to be minimal (and in any case still less jarring than clouds popping in and out of view on screen) before the cloud was indeed actually totally off the screen and out of view of the players.


Once again, thank you for all that you do, sir.


Last edited by Hellshade; 07/11/18 04:51 PM.

Flying Wings Over Flanders Fields: Between Heaven & Hell II
videos at www.youtube.com/hellshade68

#4429861 - 07/11/18 12:31 PM Re: Stupid cloud pop issue idea [Re: Hellshade]  
Joined: Jun 2012
Posts: 7,993
Robert_Wiggins Offline
BWOC Survivor!...So Far!!
Robert_Wiggins  Offline
BWOC Survivor!...So Far!!
Hotshot

Joined: Jun 2012
Posts: 7,993
Lindsay, Ontario, Canada
Ankor

Thanks for chiming in here and voicing your experiences. You have given me hope for great things to come.

Your effort and the time you take to explain things are greatly appreciated.

Best Regards


(System_Specs)
Case: Cooler Master Storm Trooper
PSU: Ultra X3,1000-Watt
MB: Asus Maximus VI Extreme
Mem: Corsair Vengeance (2x 8GB), PC3-12800, DDR3-1600MHz, Unbuffered
CPU: Intel i7-4770K, OC to 4.427Ghz
CPU Cooler: Cooler Master Seidon 240M Liquid CPU Cooler
Vid Card: ASUS GTX 980Ti STRIX 6GB
OS and Games on separate: Samsung 840 Series 250GB SSD
Monitor: Primary ASUS PG27AQ 4k; Secondary Samsung SyncMaster BX2450L
Periphs: MS Sidewinder FFB2 Pro, TrackIR 4

#4430199 - 07/13/18 03:03 PM Re: Stupid cloud pop issue idea [Re: Hellshade]  
Joined: Dec 2014
Posts: 1,340
HarryH Offline
Member
HarryH  Offline
Member

Joined: Dec 2014
Posts: 1,340
Didn't someone once say that using 2 x Nvidia cards in SLI mode cured the cloud popping? If true, that suggests the CFS3 hard coding may be able to take advantage specifically of SLI... Ankor, do you know if this could be the case?


System: i5 8600K @ 3.6GHz,16GB DDR4 @2666MHz. RTX2080, MSI Z370 mobo, Dell 27" G-SYNC @ 144Hz. 2560x1440

#4430200 - 07/13/18 03:09 PM Re: Stupid cloud pop issue idea [Re: HarryH]  
Joined: Jan 2009
Posts: 4,433
Hellshade Offline
Hellshade
Hellshade  Offline
Hellshade
Senior Member

Joined: Jan 2009
Posts: 4,433
Florida
Originally Posted by HarryH
Didn't someone once say that using 2 x Nvidia cards in SLI mode cured the cloud popping? If true, that suggests the CFS3 hard coding may be able to take advantage specifically of SLI... Ankor, do you know if this could be the case?



I want to say that was RAFLouvert who found that to be true on his system. Apologies if I have mis-identified the individual.


Flying Wings Over Flanders Fields: Between Heaven & Hell II
videos at www.youtube.com/hellshade68

#4430242 - 07/13/18 08:30 PM Re: Stupid cloud pop issue idea [Re: Hellshade]  
Joined: Feb 2015
Posts: 152
4L0M Offline
Member
4L0M  Offline
Member

Joined: Feb 2015
Posts: 152
Weymouth, UK
SLI doesn't and can't cure cloud popping.


I7 4770k@4.6ghz WC H80i
Asus Maximus Hero VII
Corsair 1000w rm1000 psu
16gb Crucial Ballistix Tactical@2100
Creative zx soundcard
2 x MSI 970 GTX SLI
55" Sony Bravia 4k HDR
Corsiar 760t
#4430317 - 07/14/18 02:43 PM Re: Stupid cloud pop issue idea [Re: Hellshade]  
Joined: Dec 2014
Posts: 1,340
HarryH Offline
Member
HarryH  Offline
Member

Joined: Dec 2014
Posts: 1,340
I searched and found this (it was indeed RAF Louvert who posted this)

OK, so here is what I've discovered at this point.

With both cards and the HB SLI bridge installed again the cloud popping has gone away. Swapping out the HB SLI bridge with a single soft bridge yields occasional cloud popping though from what I can see it does not appear as prevalent as it was with a single card. Installing two soft bridges, thus utilizing both SLI ports on each card, seems to cut down on cloud popping frequency somewhat further but does not eliminate it entirely, (though to be fair I am not 100% sure about this as it starts to get rather subjective after watching clouds pop in and out for three hours and trying to determine if the frequency is now significantly different than it was earlier). Removing the soft bridges and reinstalling the HB SLI bridge gets me back to where I was in the first place, i.e., no cloud popping. I tested each combination flying QC from St. Omer in October of 1918 with the DH.4 and tried the different cloud options available. There was one instance with the HB SLI bridge, on the large fluffy cloud setting, where one particular cloud well out in front of me would pop in and out as I moved my head slightly in TrackIR. However, when I went out of QC and came back and tested it again with the same settings it was no longer an issue.

I'm not quite sure what to make of this. I am wondering if the HB SLI bridge is somehow allowing data to share between the two cards in such a way that it just happens, out of pure dumb luck, to fix this age old CFS3 issue. Perhaps as one card starts to lose track of the cloud rendering along the screen edges the other card picks up the data stream. I honestly don't know. I also honestly don't know if the issue will stay away as time goes by. Will a Windows update and/or a driver update suddenly make it reappear? It could. Since I don't know why this has currently fixed the issue there is no way of knowing what might "break" it again at a later date.

Full thread here.... http://SimHQ.com/forum/ubbthreads.php/ubb/showflat/Number/4300768/Searchpage/3/Main/408962/Words/%2Bcloud+%2Bpopping/Search/true/re-scored-another-evga-gtx-970-ssc-card-and-am-going-back-to-sli#Post4300768


System: i5 8600K @ 3.6GHz,16GB DDR4 @2666MHz. RTX2080, MSI Z370 mobo, Dell 27" G-SYNC @ 144Hz. 2560x1440


Moderated by  Polovski 

Quick Search
Recent Articles
Support SimHQ

If you shop on Amazon use this Amazon link to support SimHQ
.
Social


Recent Topics
Carnival Cruise Ship Fire....... Again
by F4UDash4. 03/26/24 05:58 PM
Baltimore Bridge Collapse
by F4UDash4. 03/26/24 05:51 PM
The Oldest WWII Veterans
by F4UDash4. 03/24/24 09:21 PM
They got fired after this.
by Wigean. 03/20/24 08:19 PM
Grown ups joke time
by NoFlyBoy. 03/18/24 10:34 PM
Anyone Heard from Nimits?
by F4UDash4. 03/18/24 10:01 PM
RIP Gemini/Apollo astronaut Tom Stafford
by semmern. 03/18/24 02:14 PM
10 years after 3/8/2014
by NoFlyBoy. 03/17/24 10:25 AM
Copyright 1997-2016, SimHQ Inc. All Rights Reserved.

Powered by UBB.threads™ PHP Forum Software 7.6.0