Near Sunset Lighting Issue?

[ryanbatc]

I've been around FSX for a while now and I presume this is just one of the "bugs" with the FSX lighting engine?

This happens with panel lights fully on just prior to sunset....



I'm running DX9 with Acceleration, Win7 x64 SP1

[maherd]

Hey Ryan, something you may want to try is turning off Dawn/Dusk smoothing in FSX.cfg
path: C:\Documents and Settings\*\Application Data\Microsoft\FSX\fsx.CFG
edit: DAWN_DUSK_SMOOTHING=0

This will not eliminate twilight lighting issues...but it should improve them. Dusk lighting in FSX is very challenging, particularly if you are using lightmaps as we do in the RV7. There is one set of art tuned to look good in day light; and another set tuned to look good a night. What dawn/dusk smoothing tries to do is blend the two looks to make the twilight look. This worked OK before cabin lightmaps and fancy specular materials. However not so well with the new materials. One option is to compromise between day, night, and twilight quality to get a good average. My preference has been to emphasize the day and night looks instead. But it hepls if DAWN_DUSK_SMOOTHING is off.

There is another consideration in this picture, which is actually typical in new RV's. The new LED style panel lighting is very often coloured in striking blue or red. The quality of the led lighting is disconcerting, but it is characteristic in new home-builts. This is actually a user edit, so we can drop in alternative panel light colours (builders will want test various alternatives). Regrettably this doesn't affect the state of dawn dusk lighting.

One last comment and I hesitate because all repaints are a gift from god - getting the panel colour just right can be tricky. The value (brightness) of the panel colour should ideally be more than the blacks in the gauges. The ‘blacks’ of the gauges should always be the darkest darks in the cabin. This is because the FSX environment lighting needs room to maneuver – room to take the colour darker yet. So the colour choice should work in high and low light as well as at night. The panel texture might be brightened by 10% and still read as very dark. But sit in the scene nicely.
Lol, sorry for the long post.
Cheers,
Danny

[ryanbatc]

Thanks for the explanation. While we're on the topic of RV VC lighting - have you considered (or is it possible) to add options to the config panel? For instance maybe the user wants a red backlight instead of the bluish-purple at present? Or maybe normal gauge lights (soft white)? Would that be difficult to model?

[maherd]

Yes this can be done, and it's what I mean by user edits. It's not so likely to go into configTool, but I can give instructions on how to edit this effect. If it's more convenient these effects could be downloaded too.

This is the file that controls the gauge colour and brightness at night.
%\Microsoft Flight Simulator X\Effects\btsFxRV7_cabin.fx

Danny

[bliksimpie]

Yes this can be done, and it's what I mean by user edits. It's not so likely to go into configTool, but I can give instructions on how to edit this effect. If it's more convenient these effects could be downloaded too.

This is the file that controls the gauge colour and brightness at night.
%\Microsoft Flight Simulator X\Effects\btsFxRV7_cabin.fx

Danny

Mind sharing how to change colour to more white or red as maherd suggest

[alehead]

I would like to know how to edit the effect file... looked at it just now and have no idea where to start...

Andrew