[lowfighter]

Talk to you later, till then check this 2 shot showing how it works in game... The first shot show how such an industrial zone looks just after using AUTOPOP. Second screen shows how the same zone looks after doing the correctios, adding some more objects... The time for doing the corrections and add some more objects for this zone was some 12-14 minutes, i forgot to look at watch exactly when I finished :lol: Anyway it's not a small amount of time, which is of course not very nice!

BEFORE:



AFTER:

[Friendly_flyer]

Neat!

It looks a lot better!

[Bee]

Inspired. :wink:

[Friendly_flyer]

Google earth is our friend!

I've been looking for some pictures of old industrial areas. Most industrial areas have been renewed. The buildings have limited cultural value and are torn down to give way to modern industry (which is lined up perfectly with GPS), but I have found some nice examples:

Small scale industrial shacks (modern, but showing typical small scale structure), Madrid, Spain:


Old small workshops, West Bromwitch, UK. The non-flat roofs, some of corrugated iron, indicate this are was build during or right before the middle of the 20th century.


Victorian sheds, Docklands, London, UK:


Wartime makeshift industry, including half-cylindrical Nissen-hut style buildings, Edinburgh, UK:


Old industrial area, Budapest, Hungar, showing semi-lined up buildings, probably 1950'ies:

[lowfighter]

Nice illustrations!
And notice the pretty high density of objects especially in the last ones, somehow we've got to be as economical as possible (FPS) and still have the appearance of factory area..
I've been mostly looking at pics got with google and yahoo search, but the industrial variety made me dizzy... Tried search with keywords "old factory" "factory aerial view" etc, filtered to black&white images ...
And yes it's bad we don't have old style factory building objects, I've been requesting some weeks ago in the skinner forum for some, but no answer so far.. an experienced skinner could do that in no time ...

[Friendly_flyer]

Isn't FPS not only a question of number of objects, but also largely a matter of number of object types? If we stick to using the same few objects over and over, wouldn't that allow for a fairly decent frame rate, despite densely built up areas?

I suppose number of polygons is an issue too. The more complex objects (like the palm trees) would probably hurt frame rates more than the fairly straight forward box-like buildings (five square surfaces) of some objects.

I got your files, Lowfighter. Tonight is squad-night for me, but tomorrow I'll poor myself a beer and have a look at the map.

[Zorin]

Isn't FPS not only a question of number of objects, but also largely a matter of number of object types? If we stick to using the same few objects over and over, wouldn't that allow for a fairly decent frame rate, despite densely built up areas?

I suppose number of polygons is an issue too. The more complex objects (like the palm trees) would probably hurt frame rates more than the fairly straight forward box-like buildings (five square surfaces) of some objects.

I got your files, Lowfighter. Tonight is squad-night for me, but tomorrow I'll poor myself a beer and have a look at the map.

It is basically the number of different textures loaded in your cache. So yes, if you keep the number of different types down, that should positively effect the number of fps.

Still, the excessive use of short wall and fence objects is absolutely not the way to go. I would try to get a modder to drastically lengthen the segment, which would basically mean that instead of placing and processing like 30 short objects one would have 1 object with 1 texture file. Think about it.

[Friendly_flyer]

Zorin, you sound like a man "in the know". Would you say that it is the number of textures that is the main problem?

[Zorin]

Zorin, you sound like a man "in the know". Would you say that it is the number of textures that is the main problem?

Let the numbers convince you:

3d mesh of hangar: 11,8 kb

Texture of hangar: 256 kb

Plus, for the different LODS, which are already part of the 3d mesh file, the game constantly switches between THREE skin files varying from 256kb - 16,7kb.

Now multiply this with the amount of fences you see in lowflyers picture.

[lowfighter]

Friendly, good you got the files and quite curious how what you'll come up with :wink:

Zorin, as I said before (one needs to read a bit more carefully): I don't intend to use it for LARGE industrial areas, just areas like shown in the last shots, maybe smaller, maybe a bit bigger, so at the object density i have now I'm sure there'll be no trouble. Trouble occurs when you have some 1 Km square or more covered with this model or a denser one, but I don't care too much about that now.
BTW, I agree very much a longer fence segment would be very useful, I used mostly the largest we have, which I thing is 50 meter (too bad the Slovakia ones are so short...) ! Thinks can be done but who has the interest?

[Friendly_flyer]

Zorin, would the number of fence segments add to much the workload for the computer, since they are all the same object?

Thinking, thinking...

For a simple board fence, a very small texture file should do for even a large fence (simply repeating a small segment of planks). Actually, even the smallest texture file should suffice for close up, with no need for changing textures by the program. Likewise, a few factories could be mapped with a very small TGA, simply a window, a bit of roof and a bit of wall.

[lowfighter]

Not sure I understand well what you saying, but I'll take a look these days at the files for the fences I've been using. You see, this fence comes with 4 variants, which differ only in length, same texture for all, and I kind of suspect now after reading your post that the texture used by all is a small one, namely that of the shortest segment (the others are just repeating it over a bigger length)
It's fun having these discussions

[Friendly_flyer]

I was thinking of making new objects, but it seems you have found just what I was hinting at. The ting is, if a small segment of fence can use the same file as a longer segment, then conceivably a very long stretch of fence (lets say 100 or 200 meters) can use a very small file (128 x 128 pxls) for instance, even for the

[lowfighter]

I'm not sure this is how it works, that's why I said I really have to dig the files to comfirm this or not...During next days

[Friendly_flyer]

Installed the map, no problems. Do you have a list over what objects you have used?