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Infinite Shadows Missing In Workspace
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These pages are a copy of the official truespace forums prior to their removal somewhere around 2011.
They are retained here for archive purposes only.
Infinite Shadows Missing In Workspace // New Users
Post by johnhoward // Sep 2, 2007, 6:02pm
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johnhoward
Total Posts: 231
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I have followed the directions given in another post:
http://forums1.caligari.com/truespace/showthread.php?t=3395&highlight=missing+shadows
I did find the 'enable shadows' checkbox in the LE, and yet there are still no shadows for the infinite light.
Has anyone succeeded at this? |
Post by TomG // Sep 4, 2007, 7:39am
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TomG
Total Posts: 3397
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Infinite lights cannot cast shadows in real-time. The setting in the LE mentioned there lets you enable shadow casting for the offline renders (and the argument in the thread there is that the setting should be exposed at the top level of the light, and not require the user to go into the LE to set it).
However, even if you do set it in the LE, you are only enabling shadows for offline renderers and not the real-time engine. Only certain lights can cast shadows in real-time, those being Omni and Spotlight.
HTH!
Tom |
Post by johnhoward // Sep 5, 2007, 2:26am
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johnhoward
Total Posts: 231
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Thanks for the reply. I do hope this will be fixed in future, since infinite light with shadows is what is needed to simulate sunlight on and in architectural models, so it would have been a very valuable tool to have in real-time.
Please tell the boss I said so. |
Post by Jack Edwards // Sep 5, 2007, 2:39am
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Jack Edwards
Total Posts: 4062
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If I remember right is a DX9 limitation.
Try using a directional light. It's a cylinder light which is very similar to an infinite light and casts shadows in DX view. To make it cover a wider area just increase the size in the panel in the stack or LE. |
Post by johnhoward // Sep 6, 2007, 3:10pm
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johnhoward
Total Posts: 231
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Thanks Jack, that's what I'm doing now - using a directional light at a great distance to try to approximate the parallel rays of infinite light. It's a little clumsy, but works OK. The real-time shadows are too soft, but at least I can see them and where they will land in render. I sure hope they fix this soon. |
Post by Jack Edwards // Sep 6, 2007, 3:34pm
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Jack Edwards
Total Posts: 4062
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I don't think it's broken. From what I understand directional lights are DX9's version of the infinite light. Hopefully one of the devs can correct me if I'm wrong.
You shouldn't have to move it far away since I believe it's calculated the same as an infinite light. Set the size to include all of your scene that's visible in the camera. To increase the sharpness of the shadows, raise the shadowmap size to 1024 or 2048.
Also be aware that shadowmaps require that the surface recieving the shadow to have sufficient geometry to calculate the shadows. So if you're projecting the shadow against a plane. Try subdividing it a few times and see if that helps.
Let me know if that solves it for you. :)
-Jack. |
Post by johnhoward // Sep 8, 2007, 2:19pm
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johnhoward
Total Posts: 231
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Jack, thanks again. You are right - the directional light IS an infinite light which I just proved with some shadows of 2 identical objects and the shadows stay the same size regardless of distance from light, thus proving parallel rays. (In the manual 'parallel' is refered to as "in one direction" which I failed to understand.) It does help to keep the light fairly far from the subject because when it gets too close, the center is visably brighter than the edges. Moving it far out is not a problem since I can select the light in LE and aim it using the "rotate" tool - I don't need to see it or click on it.
And increasing the shadow map size did indeed sharpen up the shadows. I even pushed it up to 4096 for a bit more sharpness. At last! I have sunlight. Thank you very much. |
Post by Jack Edwards // Sep 8, 2007, 2:50pm
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Jack Edwards
Total Posts: 4062
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You're welcome, John! :) |
Post by Steinie // Sep 9, 2007, 4:54am
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Steinie
Total Posts: 3667
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Why does the Infinite Light and the Directional Light have the same Arrow symbol in workSpace? You can tell the differance in LE but visually they look the same. Just wondering on the the reasoning behind the similarities. Shouldn't Directional Light have a ball on top of it's symbol like the icon does? |
Post by Jack Edwards // Sep 9, 2007, 6:15am
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Jack Edwards
Total Posts: 4062
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Or maybe be a cylinder with an arrow pointing out to show direction. It's a good suggestion Steinie. :) |
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