Blog: " Tech feature: Sunlight with Shadows"

[Thomas]

Some info on the engine's newly added sunlight!

http://frictionalgames.blogspot.com/2010...adows.html

[Sexbad]

A very nice addition and I look forward to seeing what outdoor environments look like. I'd suggest, though, that you make the shadows more precise. They're very blurry, and kind of ugly.

[nofsky]

The shadows in the final image looks a little strange in the back, like some parts are missing. But that's because the model is open on the back side, right?

Anyway, I think it looks good. The shadows look a little too blurry for coming from direct sunlight though, do you plan on making that changeable? Or perhaps the shadow map resolution is too small for that to look good? It would be interesting to see how it looks on a more complex object.

Oh, and you're gonna add SSAO on top of everything too? That's a lot of shadows!

Good luck with that Light Pre-Pass Renderer. It's a faster way of rendering lights, it seems, unless my google-fu is very weak today

[Sexbad]

Also bring back motion blur.

[Thomas]

The shadows in the final image looks a little strange in the back, like some parts are missing. But that's because the model is open on the back side, right?

Exactly! I was gonna write about it under the image but then thought nobody would notice

Regarding SSAO: It is already in (all features from HPL2 are), but it is not used in the images as I wanted to focus on the lighting at hand. I have added image of Ambient + SSAO so you can see how that looks
(Compare to: http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_QfesHslH-uc/TL...mbient.jpg)

Motion Blur: Might come back. Hower, tt is not really a favorite filter of mine as it only really shows when you turn your head around and I rather use that gpu-time to do other stuff.

[WindexGlow]

The thing I liked about the motion blur was that sources of light seemed to last longer than those that weren't lit (sun spots). I don't play a lot of games that have mm, but this was the first I saw something like it.

[shotalot]

Why not add full motion blur instead.

By using the opengl accumulation buffer http://www.codeproject.com/KB/openGL/MotionBlur.aspx

Or calculating vectors with the Depth Buffer http://http.developer.nvidia.com/GPUGems..._ch27.html

[Frontcannon]

It would be very awesome if we'd get these updates too so we can use them in the tools you gave us :O

[hollowleviathan]

Definitely they'll be included...in the HPL3 editor in 2 years with the next game.

[rini]

What are Hardware Requirements for HPL3? Double higher than Amnesia? Triple higher?

Amnesia's engine on startup check for Shadermodel 4 avaibility. From hpl.log:
ShaderModel 2: 1
ShaderModel 3: 1
ShaderModel 4: 1
Will HPL3 use Shaders 4?