DP glossy materials

[FC Zvyozdochka]

It is an offtopic, but shader files are very powerful instrument. For example, you can use attached shader file to "renew" significant part of MP2 textures. Actually this file just "tells" engine to replace some MP2 textures with already retextured id1 ones (I mean - with those ones which looks more or less like replacing ones), the very same result could be achieved with simple copypasting and renaming of these textures, but just appreciate the elegance of that solution with simple and small shader file.

instructions: place attached file into your ROGUE/scripts folder. Prerequisites: QRP pack for id1 and MP1

[lucky88shp]

This doesn't work for me! I get checkered squares in places! Do I need to use any cvars to enable this? I am using DP with Rygel Ultra, some item texture packs, QRP textures with normal mapping...Can sum1 help plzz?

[talisa]

@ucky88shp
open console and type 'r_texture_dds_load 1'

thatll solve your problem. the checkered textures you get cuz some of the textures used are dds format, and you need to use that command i just said to make darkplaces load them

[gdiddy62]

FC can you make this without dds files? It would avoid many issues for some.
Thanks for this as this is a thought I've had at times but never knew if it was possible. This and your glossy pack are excellent and must-haves IMO!

Regards

[talisa]

FC himself didnt include any dds files in his gloss pack, all his gloss maps are tga.
but some of the textures that it uses of reflecting_overload mod like the cubemaps are DDS.

so FC himself cant do anything about that. you'll have to ask webangel if she can release a version of her reflecting_overload mod which dont use dds files but instead uses tga

[gdiddy62]

Oh, I didn't know that splitterface. I knew Webangel's stuff was dds but I didn't know FC's pack used some of them..I thought they were independent of one another. It's really no big deal other than how many people don't know how to fix it. I'm ignorant of dds and its value. How is it better or worse than the tga?

[FC Zvyozdochka]

gdiddy62, can't you please tell me, which textures looks like gray&white squares? I've tested pack v1.2 before posting, it worked fine without reflecting pack.

[jakub1]

gray&white squares

i've been putting together new q1 compilation with all the stuff that have spawned recently and those gray&white squares gave me headache too. however, it was all my mistake. webangel mentioned in her thread an exact manual how to rid of them.

step one:
type in console r_texture_dds_load 1

step two:
restart quake (restarting renderer or map in console is NOT enough, have to restart whole game)

it works. i use zvyozdochka's pack 1.2 + webangel's reflection pack simultaneously and restarting the game solved all problems.

[talisa]

@gdiddy
tga is better in several ways...

its the texture filetype that loads fastest in darkplaces

Formats supported: tga (recommended), png (loads very slowly), jpg (loads slowly), pcx, wal, lmp

every texture/image editing program supports tga and thus everybody can edit the textures, while DDS is only supported by a handfull of programs

TGA is a uncompressed and lossless texture filetype, which means the quality of the texture will always remain 100% without any kinda of artifacts or such. while DDS is highly compressed and thus suffers quality loss


it is however high in filesize, but thats cuz of the fact that its uncompressed, unlike other file-types which are all compressed and will suffer small loss of quality each time they're saved which results in quite some quality loss after several times of saving

[gdiddy62]

@FC I'm not having the issue I was just thinking of others.
@splitterface Thanks

[FC Zvyozdochka]

TGA is a uncompressed and lossless texture filetype, which means the quality of the texture will always remain 100% without any kinda of artifacts or such

DDS supports some different compression methods, and it could pure lossless. DDS advantage is built-in mip levels, which could be done with external program without any time limits which exist in realtime rendering. This eliminates the need to generate mip-levels on-the-run ingame, and could look better if engine's algorithm of creating mip-levels is worse than external.

But this interesting fact has almost no practical significance Using uncompressed DDS with pregenerated mip-levels gives only ~1% more FPS in timedemo "demo2" while requiring 25% more VRAM when compared with uncompressed TGA.

So I used TGA in gloss-pack.

[lucky88shp]

Wow I just installed the v1.2 and it absolutely looks awesome! Amazing reflections in some places! Great work, keep it up!

[lucky88shp]

There is one wierd thing I noticed...the command "r_texture_dds_load 1" is not recognized on my system. It says "unknown command". I am trying to use that "animated reflections only" pk3 that splitterface uploaded on page 2 and ofcourse the "additional" shader file from the glossy pack. And I get the checkered box artifacts.
But I definitely see the reflections when I just use this with the single shader file and no overload mod, as I tested couple of areas with and without the gloss pack v1.2. Any1 has any ideas as to why I cant use the reflections overload?

[FC Zvyozdochka]

There is one wierd thing I noticed...the command "r_texture_dds_load 1" is not recognized on my system.

Man, it is more about reflection's overload mod, it has its own thread.
But I think the problem is in the build you use.

[talisa]

yes what FC said could perhaps be the problem.

try using this build: darkplaces-20110702.zip
im 1000% sure FC's gloss plus reflecting&animated-only works on that build, its the build i use myself