Since I am forced to do nearly a complete re-write of my next lightfix upgrade (for FSX) I am putting some time in correcting the sun as well. The new sun will work very well with ot without bloom, however bloom will enhance it correctly. It adds a larger corona, hot-spot and correct size lens flair with the right aura for sunrise and sunset.
I am working to get rid of the hard pixel lines (as seen in the last image) and soften the overall effect so it blends. It responds correctly to haze layers and will diffuse as it should with or without bloom enabled.
There have been other fixes posted for this however they over-saturate especially with light bloom enabled. This update will not do that and allow the best of both worlds to come out.
With the upcoming DX10 patch and Vista, bloom and water can be used with a significantly reduced hit on performance and with the DX9 changes for XP, bloom is possible all the time if you have the right hardware.
I still have work to do on it but here is a progress images set:
EDIT: I remove the image tags to lighten the thread per forum rules
Bloom on
http://www.simviation.com/yabbuploads/newsun1.jpg
http://www.simviation.com/yabbuploads/newsun3.jpg
http://www.simviation.com/yabbuploads/newsun2.jpg
Bloom Off
http://www.simviation.com/yabbuploads/newsun4.jpg
http://www.simviation.com/yabbuploads/newsun5.jpg
Still working on the blend elements without bloom enabled:
http://www.simviation.com/yabbuploads/newsun6.jpg
Because Aces removed alpha-fade from FSX it has made the job of getting the lights correct with the least amount of visual annoyance very difficult. I have had to give and take in some areas I was not very pleased with.
I should have the new package posted in a few weeks. I am still working with it and verifying the upcoming patch will not present any new issues that would force an update.
Also note that the sky and clouds are not default. They are from Flight Environment X. The set I use is as follows:
Clouds: Building Cumulus - or- Realistically Dense
Sky: Manny Special - or - Natural Haze
Water: Depths of Realism -or - Dark
Water Animation: Medium Pacific
Some of those themes must be downloaded from within FEX. I can not say enough good things about the program. Although there are very few water replacements I like because they tend to be too green or too blue, but, the ones I posted above are very realistic.
NOTE: The latest REGISTERED version of FSUIPC4 has undergone a good change, however, unlike FS9 the ability to set gradual layers should NOT be used due to problems with simconnect which cause major stutters. If you use FSUIPC4, get the latest version and although you can use the General Visibility Limits, make sure Graduated Visibility is NOT enabled. More information is posted at Pete Dawsons forum under the October update thread. Please read it before using the new version FSUIPC4, which he has also posted in that thread, not on the main site.
Pete has added warnings to the FSUIPC GUI so you can see which settings are causing stutters. With the right settings FSUIPC4 works fine with the ASX weather engine however I am finding the default real world weather engine seems to be doing an equaly good job if the Random Extend METAR maxima feature of FSUIPC4 is ENABLED.
I also set the processor affinity for ASX to my 4th core (core 3) instead of all of them to take the load off of core0 which is needed by the sim. The same can be done with a dual core by setting processor affinity in the Task manager for the ASX weather engine process to core1 and uncheck core0.
As I said, FSUIPC4 seems to be doing a good job now with the default weather control so I have not been using ASX as I did in the past.
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looks good
