Update XR Vessel Development for Orbiter 2010 P1

[N_Molson]

Yes indeed. However I've been contemplating the terrain meshes that some addons use. In theory, illuminating them with this method would be possible, but I'm not sure how it'd work out.

And it's often an handy solution to render Launchpads as vessels (so they can "grapple" the rocket, they can use/save variables, and it's easy to place them at precise GPS coordinates in a scenario). And seeing the service towers illuminated by the exhaust would already be awesome ! Even more, you could add a few spotlight on these tower to have magnificent night launch lighting

 

[Izack]

More on-topic, what exactly had to be done to the XR series for the patch? Was it just the addition of navigation lights? It looks like multilight is universal, so it should apply to all vessels, right? Or will this only work on vessels made compatible with it?

 

[Xyon]

To clarify further: Vessels must be modified to emit light. All vessels should be lit up by defined lights.

 

[computerex]

Orbiter now supports isotropic (point) and directed lights. You create the lights for your vessels with the new VESSEL functions AddSpotLight and AddPointLight. They are fairly simple to use. You can set a thruster as a reference for the intensity of a light. In the picture here by Doug of the XR2's main thrusters, the thruster level is used as a reference for the intensity of the light. All in all, it looks very cool.

I would like to make a request already. It'd be epic if we had the lights for all of the RCS thrusters too. I always missed that in Orbiter. RCS lights with gas plume would look so excellent with the XR2's visuals.

 

[Xyon]

I do agree that it looks slightly odd that the main and hover engines emit light and the RCS do not. However I think it's also possible to go overboard with lights which are, after all, a beta feature.

 

[computerex]

I do agree that it looks slightly odd that the main and hover engines emit light and the RCS do not. However I think it's also possible to go overboard with lights which are, after all, a beta feature.

You can never have too many lights Seriously though, if you see the ET separation on the Shuttle, the translation away from the tank essentially blinds the camera for a few seconds. During reentry, the RCS flashes/plume is visible to the crew. It looks amazing.

 

[Xyon]

True, true. Have you seen the engine lighting on the stock Atlantis though? The SRBs are a little too low-poly to carry the effect well, I think. The whole inside of them lights as one face.

 

[hribek]

When setting up the latest betas, I noticed the XR2 1.1d crashes with 100727 and 100812 and possibly others. I guess that's nothing out of the ordinary - I'll just wait for the newer XR versions linked against the 2010 P1 version, right?

DGIV was kinda buggy as well so I'm sticking to Orbiter stock vessels only. That leaves the issue of not being able to do atmospheric entries very well. If only the Glideslope MFD or some plugin would let you shift center of gravity so that you could maintain high AoA ...

I know about AutoFCS, but that's a bit of an ugly hack to use it with the small gliders.

 

[Keatah]

There are FOUR lights!

 

[astrosammy]

Amazing! I always was forced to se up the ambient light level to allow night EVAs, now there's a nice workaround! :thumbup:

I can confirm that the current XR version doesn't run with the newest beta, I "fixed" it by replacing the orbiter.exe and modules folder in my beta installation with the files from a clean orbiter100606. Of course this disables the new features.

 

[dbeachy1]

Right, the reason the released XRs won't run with the latest beta is because any vessels that extend VESSEL3 have to be recompiled due to class changes in the VESSEL3 object. I still have more work to do on the XRs (adding more lights) before a proper beta, and I'll be on vacation for a week at the beach starting next Friday, so it will be a little while yet.

 

[Xyon]

That's not surprising, considering that the "d" revisions of the XR fleet were designed to operate within the released build of Orbiter 2010, and are not compatible with the changes to the VESSEL3 class which happened since.

Edit: Ack! Ninja'd!

 

[computerex]

..and I'll be on vacation for a week at the beach starting next Friday, so it will be a little while yet.

You'll be spending an entire week at the beach O.O ? And to think, I haven't gone to the beach in nine years :lol:

I wrote a plug-in that creates a light source for each thruster, and sets the range proportional to the max thrust rating of the thruster. In pitch blackness, it looks so cool to see the RCS flash with some nav mode on. Even better yet, for main thrusters if you fluctuate the level randomly (+- 0...0.2) the effect looks amazing.

 

[Moach]

holy cow! that's the pinnacle of awesome! :blink:

specially nice to learn of the new spotlight features :yes: i thought my G42 was looking a little dark once i flew it past the terminator... this will be a nice thing to add!


as for the XR2 - OMG!!! so awesome! :hail:

 

[the.punk]

Excellent work!:thumbup: Can't wait to try this out.

 

[yagni01]

I'll be on vacation for a week...

Vacation?:hmm: What's that?:shrug: