Environmental Maps. How do they work?

[KenJackson]

O.K. I just ran a test using five copies of the heavy arena raiment with 5 different configurations.

1, The control: no glow map called out in the NIF but using a texture that had an associated glow map.

2. Glow map test #1: used the same base texture but specified the glow texture in the NIF

3. Dark map test: Used the same textures but specified the glow texture as a dark map

4. Glow map test #2: Used same base texture but specified a texture with a completely different name for the glow texture.

5. Glow map test #3: Assigned a renamed copy of the base texture that did not have a glow map and did not assign a different one.

 

According to the prevalent theory, the first four should have looked identical but 5 would have lacked the glow. In my Morrowind based theory, 1 & 5 should have been identical and 2 & 4 should have had an an identical glow and 3 should have been darker than the rest..

 

But when I equipped 5 NPCs each with a different set of armor and placed them in the game, all five of them were exactly identical, even the one that didn't have a glow texture for the game engine to call. Not one of them had the glow texture applied.

 

I would appreciate it if someone else would replicate this experiment and see what they get.

[DrakeTheDragon]

Did you remember to set the Emissive property of the NiMaterial to something bright? It's usually black, and black light can't exactly shine through a glow map very well.

The Emissive property defines how much light the mesh emits. If it doesn't emit any light, it can't glow, map or not.

 

Oh but Nephenee, please don't do that. By all means question my statements or let them get confirmed. If everybody would only pass on knowledge they got from me, and I made a mistake somewhere, the damage would be all the bigger.

I always try to answer questions to the best of my knowledge, but it's limited and I'm far from uinfallible or omniscient. I admit, you'll never read a definite statement from me, if I'm not 100% sure about its truth, but still don't take anything I say for true unless confirmed by others or yourself. :happy:

 

edit: See? It was 'infallible' not 'unfallible', q.e.d.

Edited March 28, 2013 by DrakeTheDragon

[neomonkeus]

This is something that I miss with modding these days, the expectation that there is always a right answer available if I google enough rather than getting stuck in. I miss the modders curiosity to question everything. I will be following this intently as it is invaluable information for me, as I currently working on the texture code.

What would be interesting is any specific settings for things to work like you mentioned above with emissive colour. Another example I am thinking of atm is parallax mapping. The opening sequence for instance instance had them and from the code APPLY_HILIGHT2 needs to be enabled. Any of these sort of things that you find would be great to know, as specific setting for each game is invaluable. Also seeing as you are familiar with Morrowind map types, it would be great to pick your brains on some additional stuff.

Do you think it would be beneficial to add a rules system that would add the values to the textureslot, even though they are not used, more as a hint to the user, or would that cause additional confusion.

Edited March 28, 2013 by neomonkeus

[KenJackson]

@DrakeTheDragon

Uhmm... No. I didn't remember to do that. As I posted in another thread, I have something going on with one of my lungs that's making it hard to breath, so I'm light-headed and not thinking too clearly right now. I'm overlooking all manner of detail in whatever I'm dealing with. I forgot all about it even after I was talking about the diffuse and specular properties, just a short bit before.

 

So I set the emissive color to white and all four that used the same base texture glowed and the one that used the texture without a glow map remained dark. It looks like Oblivion DOESN'T check the NIFs to see whether or not it should apply the glow map, after all. Damn! I really liked the way dark maps could make thing looks in Morrowind (the few times I saw them used).

 

This switch over from Morrowind to Oblivion is definitely coming with its share of growing pains and discoveries (The lack of "global" scripts is really annoying!). It seems like a quarter of what I know from Morrowind is wrong for Oblivion.

 

Since you were right on the money about the glow maps, you're probably right about the rest, but since I'm rebellious (My Astronomy prof wasn't fond of my habit of punching holes in currently accepted theories.) and I want my dark maps, once I can think straight again, I'm going to take a look and see what I can find myself.

 

Do you think it would be beneficial to add a rules system that would add the values to the textureslot, even though they are not used, more as a hint to the user, or would that cause additional confusion.

As hard drive space is a major issue with me, my opinion is that anything that needlessly makes any file even the slightest bit larger is generally a bad thing. Additionally, as for myself, if the information is in there, I'm going to assume it's being used until experimentation proves otherwise, and as much as I'd like to, I can't double check everything. My vote is that it would just add to confusion.

[DrakeTheDragon]

Ah, how much I missed that enjoyable atmosphere around here. Should've never gone looking into the Skyrim sections to begin with, but my curiosity for the new technology got the better of me.

Now here I am, unwilling to mod for that game and unwilling to share anything I might create for it in future publically ever again. That's what I got for my 'curiosity'. What I found out there didn't kill the cat... but my will to share.

 

This place here, the Oblivion section, feels much more like at home and a place to hang out to me. Jeez, even disagreements are 'enjoyable' around here! Sheesh, I should've just remained in here and never ventured out at all.

 

I know how you feel. I myself migrated to Oblivion from Morrowind, but I must admit I wasn't that much into 'modding' it already. Though I was already messing around with a certain alternative werewolf transformation mod's scripting and the RyuKaissen race back then which fueled my interest in these things. Needless to say the Foot Shields mod from MW was what inspired Scripted Argonian Feet's creation for OB later! (here I'm talking of all this crap I had in mind, yet I never got around to finish any of the foot shields I planned so far before my free time died... feels awkward somehow)

 

To me one script looks like the other. I can read them more or less fluently, no matter the language. So the migration from MW to OB scripting-wise wasn't that far a stretch actually. Comparable to using what I learned about Java at university to self-educate me in C++, once I got my head around the basics. And the differences in the setup and file structure you're encountering now I never realized, as I wasn't that far into this side of MW modding myself back then. But yes, the difference between MW and OB must be comparable to the difference between OB and Skyrim in this regard. NIF file doesn't exactly equal NIF file anymore these days.

 

I don't know anything at all about dark maps myself so far... other than what they're supposedly meant to be used for. If you happen to find out anything new I didn't know yet, which is like... everything you find out about the topic at all, my inborn curiosity demands of me to hear it from you. (I know, I know, my curiosity didn't exactly serve me well the last two years, but still... I can't help it. I 'must' know things I don't know.)

 

As for this parallax mapping... that's again something I know close to nil about. However, I'm pretty sure it was only possible to be used on a very limited number of object types in the game at all, like, almost certainly no equipment items or skin textures, but very well maybe statics and world tiles or ground textures. It's just like the 1st-person problematic. Almost no body slots are even 'considered' to be rendered in 1st-person view at all. Getting tails (or wings in my case) and legs'n'feet to show up, while still letting them be tails and legs'n'feet 'technically', is about impossible. But something in the NIF tells what parts of upperbody and arms+hands will be rendered, yet I still couldn't figure out what exactly by now.

 

I've got no idea whatsoever when I will finally be able to make any use of anything of this again in the far, far future... but regardless my curiosity still demands of me to know these things right 'now'. So whatever anyone of you finds out, I'll be sitting here, desperately awaiting your results. :blink: ;D

Edited March 28, 2013 by DrakeTheDragon