Aces High Bulletin Board
General Forums => Aircraft and Vehicles => Topic started by: Widewing on January 24, 2002, 09:08:08 AM
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Having spent well over 2,300 hours in military aircraft, there is one thing that flight sims generally show, that in really interferes with outward vision. Canopy frames. If anyone has actually sat in one of these aircraft, you quickly realize that you simply do not notice the canopy frame. Why? Because one merely tips or turns one's head to see over and around them as an automatic reflex. Really, you don't notice them at all because they are no longer within your focal range. You simply look through them. It's different when a portion of the airframe blocks your view, but canopy frames become, essentially, invisible in the cognitive sense.
To get it right, canopy frames should be thinned and "ghosted" (darkly), so you can see through them to reflect normal human stereoscopic vision, wherein you see the same effect. Here's a simple test to prove my point: When was the last time you noticed the A pillar (at the edge of you car's windshield) on your car? Do you have any memory of it blocking your view? Think about it. Such obstacles to vision effectively cease to exist when you can move your head intuitively, which you cannot do in this type of simulation. If any here have flown a military simulator, you would understand my point. I understand that from a graphical point of view, the canopy frames need to be visible. However, the functional reality, they do not.
My regards,
Widewing
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Widewing, I understand completely what you are saying. I agree with a lot of it. But I think HTC chose to go the way of a "movable" pilot positiont where you can move inside the cockpit: forward, backward, left right as wel as up and down. It just helps to have enough buttons on your stick/throttle setup to utilise this feature.
Westy
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I notice my A pilar often in tight blind downhill turns to the left, you cant see whats behind it- kinda inconvenient huh?
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I can't figure what is an A pillar can someone explain it to me ?
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Originally posted by straffo
I can't figure what is an A pillar can someone explain it to me ?
Sure, automobiles generally have three pillars, A, B and C. Ultimately, these pillars provide roof support as well as window support.
The A pillars support the windshield. B pillars provide structural strength for the roof and are usually directly between the doors (on a 4 door car). Finally, the C pillars support the rear window (back light).
Below is a photo of a Mazda that shows the 3 pillars from the right-rear view. Here you see the C pillar, the B pillar between the side windows and the A pillar alongside the the windshield edge.
(http://us.autos1.yimg.com/autos.yahoo.com/i/b/6263.jpg)
My regards,
Widewing
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Straffo, he's discussing what I would call a "windshield post". The portion of a car that supports the roof, located between the hood and the roof.
Widewing, while I agree with your post I'm not sure what the solution is. This has been discussed many times over, and I've never really seen a solution that could be implemented in a fair way.
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ty I got it ...
For the front view we can use the Keypad 8 view saved with another head position ...
It provide us an altenate front view (to get ride of those ù*^$
^ frames ;))
But there is nothing for the other positions ...(dunno if it would be usable to have an altenate position for the other views ...)
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To get it right, canopy frames should be thinned and "ghosted"
This seems like a good solution to me. Unfortunately, I expect that it would be a huge amount of work and create endless lamenting by "realism" fanatics.
Hooligan
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I certainly would agree to having them "thinned" , but not ghosted out. The do block some of the view regardless. Thinning them to about 50% of their thickness would be a nice compromise IMO. Specially in the 109's.
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I notice tha A and B posts on my truck frequently. Don't really notice the C posts though. Odd.
Generally I notice the driver's side A post when I am making a sharp turn to the left. I notice the B post when changing lanes.
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I have always thought that Icons disappearing behind canopy frames is way over done.
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Good post Widewing.
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AH allows you to move your viewpoint around. I feel this is a good comprimise, although it might do good to have the viewpoint actually move a little quicker. Having clear cockpit bracing is IMO crossing the line--looking around something and looking through it are two different things, although perhaps the ICONS disappearing might be unnecessary. Cockpit bracing most definately WAS a factor in WW2, why else would manufacturers have begun to use less aerodynamic "bubble" canopies?
J_A_B
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I agree, some of the planes are ridiculous to try to look out of. Transparent frames probably aren't the answer, but thinning them a bit might work. The 205 is like flying in a jail cell.
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I just want to point out that this sim has real 3D planes that your viewpoint sits inside of. That means that making a change is not as simple as it may seem.
To make a change like that suggested above would mean modifying the 3D shape of every aircraft in the game. It would also mean that these canopy frames and rails would look very different from outside as well as inside.
I don't think changing them as suggested is viable in a sim that uses real 3D objects instead of 2D "cockpit art". On the flip side, I think that the fact that you can move your head position and save it for every single view is a reasonable compromise for the cockpit frames being somewhat more restrictive to your view than they would be in real life.
As for the icon obstruction, while having the icons not dissapear also sounds like a reasonable change, I'm not sure AH's client software can tell the difference between a canopy frame and say, a wing. It does sound like a nice compromise, I'm just not sure it's something HT can do... well at least not easily. :)
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A few suggestions:
With the game 'as is':
I always setup a separate head position for each view, one that peers around the posts as much as possible. And I have my 'move pov' keys accessable.
With a simple addition:
Have an option that would move your head from side to side / up-down automatically. And have the 'save head position' key remember if you were 'bobbing' or not.
So I'd set my front and back views to not bob, by my side views would always peer about a bit automatically.
Just a thought.
~Lemur
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Originally posted by Raubvogel
I agree, some of the planes are ridiculous to try to look out of. Transparent frames probably aren't the answer, but thinning them a bit might work. The 205 is like flying in a jail cell.
more like a coffin ;)
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I want a 3D stereovision headset with motion sensors.
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Widewing, agree 500% with you. And. IMO, it could have an easy solution.
I'm sure several times all of us have noticed the following effect in 3D games:
You see a house and several trees. the trees are behind the house, but ,for seome reason (bug or whatever), all the trees are visible for you, rendered after rendering the house. It could be used to render any plane and icon after the cockpit polygons. So, the cockpit art will be the same, but any plane or vehicle will be rendered "after" it and will be visible.
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I agree totally WideWing.
Even though you can setup all view directions with the arrow keys and pgup, pgdn and save em with F10 to get the best views around the canopy obstructions, they're still not perfect for every situation.
Adapting the view during combat itself using the keyboard is not an option because you don't have time for it. In a real plane you would move to get a better view, in AH you depend on view system setup and moving your plane (rolling it) to get the con out of the obstruction.
I think your suggestion is a good compromise until we can fly with VR Helmets with an attitude reference unit in it, :)
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Widewing,
Back in CK .91 or so, I argued for the same thing.
What about leaving the canopy opaque, and then just showing aircraft through it? Maybe there could be a small circle of transparency through the canopy frame, with the aircraft in the center? Heck, we can sometimes see hit sprites through the gun sight parts, why not just make aircraft visible through them?
Really, the severely view limiting canopy thing isn't realistic, but it might be kinda hard to implement this because they'd have to draw the aircraft over top of the canopy frame, and not over top of the instrument panel and airframe parts. Maybe this opens a whole new can of worms that they don't want to deal with.
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Oops. I should read the whole thread before I post. It looks like mandable beat me to that one. Oh well, I said the same thing back in CK ;)
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So?
Is this really so hard?
Just put in there a neat 'alternative view head movements customize toggle' function.
An alternative view on the same direction much like the example of the 'default: look front' and 'hat key forward: look front'.
use a certain key toggle and it takes u to alternative view. Any head position programmed under this key toggle and saved will be programmed as an 'alternative view' on that certain direction.
program this toggle into the joystick, and next time with a slight touch of button you'd easily be able to access the 'bob head and look at a little different angle' effect.
For instance, the 109s have this hideous horizontal bar placed across the cockpit when you look 'up, forward'.
You'd press this 'certain toggle key for alt. view'. Now, you are under alternative view mode. Look "up, forward", and press the page down key a bit. This is like when you look up forward, see something but the bar gets in the way, so you lower your head a bit to get a view. Save the head position.
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Afterwards, when u look up, see that the cross bar gets in the way of your 'look up, forward' view, just press the 'alt view toggle' key, and the pre-programmed alternative head position would kick in. Simple to use just like the way someone would switch gun zoom on/off.
Just a matter of one more key, or one more button. And one more alternative view mode to program.
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Yeah, that's pretty cumbersome for me since I have a limited number of fingers, and in the real situation i'd just move my head back or to the side without thinking about it, or my two eyes would let me see around it without any effort at all. I'd rather focus on flying and SA rather than manipulating the views even more than we have to already. Granted AH has the best view system i've seen yet, but still. Why delibarately make it worse than it would be in real life? Aren't we striving for accuracy and game play? It seems like this, suprisingly, would help in both departments at once.
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How cumbersome can pressing a single button be?
ps) at least I think my idea's a lot better than to putting in imaginary 'transparent' bars as a game play concession.
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Stereoscopic vision is imaginary?
And, pushing an extra button when I'm already manipulating flaps, throttle, stick rudder, and views, is just one too many. Actually it's more like two too many since usually the time i need to move views is when im trying to set up a snap shot and some piece of the canopy rail is blocking the plane. So lets see, less than a second, and the plane will pass through the front, as im maneuvering just above stall. I've got to conciously push some other button instead of setting up the shot. How is it a concession again to accurately model the image that your brain sees as you look through a close object with two eyes? Sure, a cyclops would have more trouble with this, but I don't think too many cycloptic pilots were flying around in the war.
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Originally posted by MANDOBLE
Widewing, agree 500% with you. And. IMO, it could have an easy solution.
I'm sure several times all of us have noticed the following effect in 3D games:
You see a house and several trees. the trees are behind the house, but ,for seome reason (bug or whatever), all the trees are visible for you, rendered after rendering the house. It could be used to render any plane and icon after the cockpit polygons. So, the cockpit art will be the same, but any plane or vehicle will be rendered "after" it and will be visible.
Yep, but how does HT program it so that things can be seen only through the cockpit frames, but not every other 3D object in the game? An interesting idea, but again it may not be simple to implement.
That's providing HTC think it's a good idea. I'm not sure that it is a good solution. There should be some definate advantage to having a nice bubble canopy over a big metal birdcage. Maybe having either the plane or the icon rendered "through" the framing might be a decent compromise. Personally I don't think it's a big deal as is with the infinately adjustable views we have, I think it's a reasonable compromise as it is.
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That idea has a "small" problem: the black dots of distant planes. Even if you render them after the canopy frames, they will not be clearly visible.
IMO, the process should start defining a blind area, where the pilot simply cant see anything even repositioning the head. Then, any cockpit polygon outside that are may be rendered:
1 - With transparency (IMO, ugly effect).
2 - Before rendering the planes and vehicles, so, these objects will be drawn "over" the cockpit polygons outside the blind area.
3 - Mostly desirable, rendering the "viewable" distant dots white if they are "blocked" by cockpit polygons.
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What if HTC just implemented a type of padlock that only moved the position of the pilots head, and not the view direction? This would allow a pilot to padlock his primary target, and then still scan for other targets. If a piece of the canopy frame started getting in the way, it would automacally move the head to keep it in view. Of course this would require a fair amount of AI. Maybe it could just work in the forward view, and simply adjust so that the plane that you were trying to turn with would stay visible instead of disappear behind the canopy frame all of the time. I can't count the number of times i've been in lag persuit with a P-47D11 and lost sight of the target long enough to mess up the pass. This simply wouldn't happen if I could move my head around a little, in the last couple of seconds of the pass. A phase where I don't have time to push buttons to adjust my view.
Could HTC even make the pilot head movements scriptable by the customers? Then all they'd have to do is have a angular feedback from the padlock system that allows us to script head movements for angular position of the bandit. We'd have to map out where the various cockpit parts are, and then code our own movements, movement speeds, etc for the bandits position. Everyone could script it to our own preferences , if they wanted to, and HTC would be free of the job of scripting pilot head movements for every single plane. No one would have to use this system, AND it would be fairly easy for HTC to do, compared to making parts of the 3D model of the airframe selectively invisible. It still might be a pretty tough job though.
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CJ, actually we have no padlock at all. The only thing that we have is an "automatic view switcher". A padlock implies that your eyes are tracking all the time (til blocked by some other object) the desired object, not just changing views.
That is, if the "padlocked" target is at your left, the system switch to your left view, nothing more. To have something like your proposal, the first step would be just to implement a padlock in the game, and then, to add some "AI" to the padlock.
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Leph--
By using "one-sided" objects, you can indeed create a canopy frame that is "semi-transparent" from inside the 3D cockpit, yet "solid" when viewed from outside. You simply make an "inner" and "outer" frame object. Both are "one-sided," i.e. they are visible from one side, and invisible from the other. You make the inner object semi-transparent, and face it inward. It will look like "tinted glass" to the pilot. You make the outer object non-transparent, and face it outward. It will look like the solid canopy frame from outside the plane.
You're right tho: it's a rebuild of the canopy area for every plane...
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automatic view switcher.. padlock... whatever.. there's something that allows you to designate targets and it manipulates view directions..
i've used it; i know how it works.. :D
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CJ what I suggested previously is basically the same concept as your idea for 'head tilting pad lock'(which, i think is a very good idea... if HTC can implement it).. except in my 'alternate view' idea, u preset the 'tilt' or 'altered angle of view' and switch between the original and tilted views manually.
One more button may be hard to deal for you, but I think practically that's the closest thing we can get in AH without major reprogramming of the cockpits or implementing limited AIs. The alternate view would need just another set of programmable views exactly same to those we have currently. All you do is switch between those two. Probably the easiest to implement into AH if the idea is ever implemented.
...
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You're probably right about that. With a decent joystick throttle combination, it wouldn't be too difficult to use either
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A transparency effect applied to all the "obscuring" polygons would imply a serious hit in rendering performance for a lot of "old" video cards.
In the other hand, making some cockpit polygons to be rendered before any other moving object would be an easier solution. I suppose all of you have noticed that, sometimes, the hit sprites are drawn "over" the instrument panel.
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It's possible, it's just not simple or easy. It would be a whole lot of work, and the potential benefit isn't that big a deal.
I'd rather have more planes, wouldn't you?
(P-47-N!)
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Well, one thing that I think is also worth metioning is the effects of the 3d modelling: it makes the situation worse in some planes. I have two screenshots to illustrate:
(http://home1.stofanet.dk/stsanta/bar1.jpg)
The bars or whatever they're called are quite small, and the pespective show 'em as same width etc. But, come in closer:
(http://home1.stofanet.dk/stsanta/bars2.jpg)
and the 3d modelling make them very big. They obscure a lot. Unfortunately, due to the way perspective is done in 3d modelling, there's really no good way around it.
It's a bit annoying that the 190s get a really big visual penalty (take A5 in Forward Up view) in the game because of the perspective thing, whereas in real life, the obstruction of that slider was really minor.
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What about little mirrors in the top of the canopy.. The 38s had this as well as the F4us.. I dunno about the other US planes.
But I know for sure the F4us and 38s had em.. In AH you can't see
your hand in front of your face when looking at your 6 in a f4.. Its not as bad in a 38 but the 38s still had em.. So before HTC goes changing the canopy frames look at what planes had mirrors in the top of the canopy.. then go from there..
Cw
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StSanta - from what you showing it looks about right. It all depends on how close you are to the object (in this case canopy bar). When viewed from the cockpit your head is just a few inches away from it hence it covers alot in your FOV.
Kweassa's ideas would work but I'm missing that ever so important sixth finger to press that extra button :D.
Car examples above are actually quite good - it's as close to a canopy as some of us get. The problem with bars is that we get all of them brushed with the same brush when thin ones are, in fact, "invisible". If a bar is thinner than ~1/2 distance between your eyes stereoscopic vision kicks in and you don't notice it, it stops being an obstruction. If it's wider - it's a nuisanse but it "belongs" there. What would be great if we could program that mini stick on the new CH throttles to move pilots head;). Although I don't think HTC would go into all the programming rush just to satisfy a few customers with CH gear... (OTOH if they feel so inclined - don't let me stop you guys!!!:D)
BTW, nobody says it's easy to do, but if the new planes were being "built" with this in mind it would be a great start.
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See Rule #10
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Serious necromancy going on here...
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And since you have 6 degrees of freedom.....
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Seeing as these complaints seem to have been logged before the introduction of the current viewing system, I would say that they have been fixed with that aforementioned viewing system...
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IN..... just for the post count :neener:
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Serious necromancy going on here...
No doubt...7 years worth... :O
Think Smoe has been flying the 109's lately?
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Seeing as these complaints seem to have been logged before the introduction of the current viewing system, I would say that they have been fixed with that aforementioned viewing system...
AH has never had a different viewing system. It is as it was in the beta for AH1.
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Then I don't understand the complaints here. Was there a time before you could save the snap views?
Nevermind then...
I guess I just don't see how the bars are that big of a problem with the the snap view system.
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WOW! Now that's digging deep. :old: