Orchid XP v8 wrote:
> I liked Crysis more than HL2, so I guess it's up to what you want out of 
> a game.

Same here; I'm about halfway through Ep1, and I just haven't picked it 
up in more than a week.

...Chambers

Post a reply to this message

> A GPU implementation of instant radiosity presented at this year's 
> SIGRAPH.  Yeah, objects move around and affect GI.  be very afraid...

Yes I think dynamic GI is getting more and more realistic on the GPU, it 
makes a huge visual difference that is often hard to pin down (ie it just 
"looks better" but it's not massively obvious like adding reflections).

> Of course, that's only in the triangle mesh-world, not in the world of 
> perfect sphere surfaces...

I don't understand the fascination with perfect mathematically described 
surfaces, they are inflexible and slow to render.  If you use sub-divided 
triangle meshes you can make the output perfectly smooth all the time and of 
course do whatever transformations you like very easily by just transforming 
every vertex.  AFAIK all film-quality 3D animation is done with triangle 
mesh based renderers, and we can probably assume they have worked out the 
best way to get photo-realistic quality.  And the huge benefit for games 
(rather than offline rendering) is that it's very simple to reduce the 
triangle count to keep real-time animation.

Post a reply to this message

> this is an insanely amazing Crysis mod shot too:
>
>
http://www1.picturepush.com/photo/a/1578869/1024/Crysis/crysis64-2009-04-11-19-45-23-44.png

Imagine how long that would take to render in POV, media, DOF, refraction! 
And I don't think the result would be *that* different (maybe the refraction 
would look slightly different, but a normal person probably couldn't tell 
which one was correct, especially during animation).

Post a reply to this message

>> I liked Crysis more than HL2, so I guess it's up to what you want out 
>> of a game.
> 
> Same here; I'm about halfway through Ep1, and I just haven't picked it 
> up in more than a week.

HL2 was technically astonishing. (Remember, at the time the only other 
game I'd played was HL1. Oh, and Quake II.) But it wasn't all that much 
fun to actually play.

HL2:EP1 added even better graphics, but wasn't greatly more fun to play. 
(God I hate zombies!)

HL2:EP2 was graphically better still, but - far more importantly - it 
was *fun*! I actually played it more than once. (Didn't do that with HL2 
or HL2:EP1.) The final battle is absurdly difficult, but other than 
that, it's really rather entertaining.

Post a reply to this message

scott wrote:

> I don't understand the fascination with perfect mathematically described 
> surfaces, they are inflexible and slow to render.

Really? I was under the impression that splines can describe any 
possible surface. Triangles, on the other hand, can only give a crude 
approximation to curves.

Post a reply to this message

scott wrote:
>> this is an insanely amazing Crysis mod shot too:
>>
>>
http://www1.picturepush.com/photo/a/1578869/1024/Crysis/crysis64-2009-04-11-19-45-23-44.png

>>
> 
> Imagine how long that would take to render in POV, media, DOF, 
> refraction! And I don't think the result would be *that* different 
> (maybe the refraction would look slightly different, but a normal person 
> probably couldn't tell which one was correct, especially during animation).

It wouldn't have all those glitches that games have though. (Like grass 
that rotates as you run past it, or "mist" that has sharp edges where it 
intersects things.)

Post a reply to this message

On Thu, 24 Sep 2009 09:25:52 +0100, Invisible wrote:

> I was under the impression that splines can describe any possible
> surface.

"When the only tool you have is a hammer, everything looks like a nail."

In my current sleep-deprived state, that seems a relevant quote.  It may 
not after I go to bed, sleep, wake up, shower, and come back up here in 
the morning.  But right now it seems relevant.

Jim ZZZZzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz.................

Post a reply to this message

>> I don't understand the fascination with perfect mathematically described 
>> surfaces, they are inflexible and slow to render.
>
> Really? I was under the impression that splines can describe any possible 
> surface.

How do you render a splined surface directly?  Even POV converts them to 
triangles first!

> Triangles, on the other hand, can only give a crude approximation to 
> curves.

In practice display devices are made of pixels, so using triangles you can 
always get exactly the same output as using the true curve.  Have you ever 
seen any "crude approximations" to curves in film CG?

Post a reply to this message

>> Really? I was under the impression that splines can describe any 
>> possible surface.
> 
> How do you render a splined surface directly?  Even POV converts them to 
> triangles first!

It's news to me that POV supports splines in the first place.

>> Triangles, on the other hand, can only give a crude approximation to 
>> curves.
> 
> In practice display devices are made of pixels, so using triangles you 
> can always get exactly the same output as using the true curve.

Only if you have the original curve to hand.

> Have you ever seen any "crude approximations" to curves in film CG?

Have you ever seen any curved surfaces in computer games?

If you *insist* on using triangles, you're going to need a hell of a lot 
of them to fake the appearence of a good curve. That means you either 
need a triangle mesh of absurd dimensions, or you need to generate the 
triangles on the fly.

What all known computer games do is use a static, very low resolution 
triangle mesh and then smother it with lashes of low-level trickery to 
give a vague semblance of curvature.

Post a reply to this message

>> Imagine how long that would take to render in POV, media, DOF, 
>> refraction! And I don't think the result would be *that* different (maybe 
>> the refraction would look slightly different, but a normal person 
>> probably couldn't tell which one was correct, especially during 
>> animation).
>
> It wouldn't have all those glitches that games have though. (Like grass 
> that rotates as you run past it, or "mist" that has sharp edges where it 
> intersects things.)

I don't think modern games have those glitches anymore, the grass is true 3D 
geometry not just billboards, and the mist billboards usually compare depths 
of existing pixels to avoid the hard edges with geometry.  Some games even 
have true 3D volume textures and rendering for smoke and mist, I don't know 
if Crysis uses this or just cheats with multiple billboards.  Maybe the 
glitches you mention are on a game from 5 years ago or on a very badly 
written modern one.

Post a reply to this message