DMSmokeEffects Beta3

[arigram 0]

Excellent work so far DM and suprisingly they get better every time as it was possible! Honestly, that's how the effects should look in any modern shooter.

My two requests, if you have thought about it, would be smoke grenades to be less particle-y and thicker and more smoke and debris when shooting a wall, as if real parts of it broke off.

[dmarkwick 261]

Excellent work so far DM and suprisingly they get better every time as it was possible! Honestly, that's how the effects should look in any modern shooter.

My two requests, if you have thought about it, would be smoke grenades to be less particle-y and thicker and more smoke and debris when shooting a wall, as if real parts of it broke off.

Thanks

The smoke grenades should be a breeze to improve, as soon as I identify it's entry in the config file There's another guy doing debris effects (MadDogX) who does it better than I can, I expect that sooner or later those of us who are doing this sort of work (me, MadDogX and MaddMatt) will eventually come together & form some sort of collective effects bundle.;) or at least arrange it so we can do mods that are not mutually exclusive.

[dmarkwick 261]

New 3.2 version can be got here.

Just a new building collapse texture & particle tweak, vid showing new effect

[NoRailgunner 0]

Is this smoke effect just for one building in ArmA? Seems to be too much! Maybe some more of "desert/urban" dust and less density.

Would be nice idea if the weather (like rain) conditions have an affect to this smoke.

dl & test now.

[cruzifer 0]

looks fantastic!

[dmarkwick 261]

Is this smoke effect just for one building in ArmA? Seems to be too much! Maybe some more of "desert/urban" dust and less density.

Would be nice idea if the weather (like rain) conditions have an affect to this smoke.

dl & test now.

During testing the helos often land on 2 buildings. Some buildings make more dust than others, they seem to have multipliers for each type which the config entrys can use.

As for rain - the smoke effects do react to rain. After the fuel has burned away the smoldering smoke effects can turn to steam and extinguish

[Jarvis 0]

Very nice effects DM, Although, I don't think my machine could handle it. I have a question, what files did you modify to do these effects? I used to mod effects for a few other games but can't seem to get used to how to mod this game.

[dmarkwick 261]

Very nice effects DM, Although, I don't think my machine could handle it. I have a question, what files did you modify to do these effects? I used to mod effects for a few other games but can't seem to get used to how to mod this game.

Hi Jarvis The actual smoke effects are new scripts I've written, that play over the default smoke effects (I didn't stop the old ones as I think both effects together looks pretty good) and are called by a trigger. The grenade & building effects are modified from the original config file that you find when you un-PBO the CA PBO file in the game.

You need to copy out the classes you're interested in & put them into your own config file, this duplication overwrites the default ones when you include your mod shortcut.

[LandrosRadick 0]

Is this a clientside only addon like the Tracers or no? Would very much like to use this in multiplayer even if it does bias me to a disadvantage

[dmarkwick 261]

Is this a clientside only addon like the Tracers or no? Would very much like to use this in multiplayer even if it does bias me to a disadvantage

The grenade & building effects are a client-side enhancement. The smoke (at the moment) is SP.

[Jarvis 0]

Hey, yeah sorry, yesterday I was a bit impatient with this engine, as it's new to me. I finally figured out how to make my own mod, edit the coding lines. It's almost too easy for me because I used to code and do effects on the battlefield games. I had wondered how you got the smoke so black/thick and then realized you had completely redid them in PS. I thought there would have been a code line stating what transparency the texture is, but I guess there isn't. A trick I used in Battlefield 2 was making each particle thicker, so I didn't have to have 30 particles as opposed to 10 and the thickness of the smoke would look good still. So I'll probably have to do some PS work myself to try and get the 1 smoke particle show up thicker and darker ingame.

Also one thing I noticed is that this game's effect system is pretty limited compared to BF2, but this game is much better in terms of realism and it's possibilities.

[dmarkwick 261]

Hey, yeah sorry, yesterday I was a bit impatient with this engine, as it's new to me. I finally figured out how to make my own mod, edit the coding lines. It's almost too easy for me because I used to code and do effects on the battlefield games. I had wondered how you got the smoke so black/thick and then realized you had completely redid them in PS. I thought there would have been a code line stating what transparency the texture is, but I guess there isn't. A trick I used in Battlefield 2 was making each particle thicker, so I didn't have to have 30 particles as opposed to 10 and the thickness of the smoke would look good still. So I'll probably have to do some PS work myself to try and get the 1 smoke particle show up thicker and darker ingame.

Also one thing I noticed is that this game's effect system is pretty limited compared to BF2, but this game is much better in terms of realism and it's possibilities.

There is no code line for transparency, but there is a property. It's part of the colour property, whenever you see a colour list it looks something like this:

[0.65, 0.65, 0.65, 0.3],

[0.15, 0.15, 0.15, 0.03];

which will indicate that the particle will go from a mid-grey with one-third transparency to a light grey with much higher transparency. It's in the format [R,G,B,A], I'm pretty sure you'll figure it out

I don't know much about BF's particle system, but ArmA's isn't too bad. You just cannot influence a particle's motion once it's been "floated", once it's gone it's subject to the wind only, and whatever settings you gave it.

[dmarkwick 261]

3.3 improvements:

All files are placed into one single PBO file now. PLEASE DELETE ALL THE OLD @DM FILES.

Added micro-debris sound for grenades. Each grenade is likely, but not necessarily definately, to produce small debris sound effects.

Added building collapse micro-debris sounds. A wall of dust will be accompanied by a wall of crunching, tinkling sounds as dust debris strikes all surfaces.

Lost the fuel station smoke effect, as it was an ugly basic test that was accidentally left in the last release. Also it was interfereing with MapFact's Chinhook helicopters. Mapfact Chinhooks do not call the helicopter smoke scripts for some reason.

New 3.3 beta can be got here.

See example video

[HGuderian 0]

Wonderfull effects. Only a suggest: building debris sound seems to be too much long than the collapse action. I think would be better an half lenght.

[dmarkwick 261]

Wonderfull effects. Only a suggest: building debris sound seems to be too much long than the collapse action. I think would be better an half lenght.

Thanks

The effect is directly taken from the footage I saw of the 9/11 attacks (not the soundfile itself, just the idea), when it became apparent that the dust itself was making the noise, quite separate from the building itself. Those dust particles are spawning the noise (which is only about 10 seconds long in itself), as though they have stuff in them swirling around & colliding etc.

[paragraphic l 2]

Sounds like someone tipped over a complete piramide off tin-cans that is moving your way. I love a rumble sound but I should not sounds metal like.

[joe556 0]

After extracting and using the code in my own missions, I just get an error message ingame just before the effects activate telling me that "DMSmokeEffects\Scripts\DMSmokeEffects.sqf" cannot be found. Any ideas? I extracted the PBO to the addons folder like the readme says. Help!

[NoRailgunner 0]

it's getting better with grenades!

But look at the facts the twin towers height was about 1,377 feet (420m) where do we have such buildings on Sahrani? Too much smoke effect's at all. Would be nice to watch effect-differences between type of building.

Building debris sound is an great idea!

[dmarkwick 261]

After extracting and using the code in my own missions, I just get an error message ingame just before the effects activate telling me that "DMSmokeEffects\Scripts\DMSmokeEffects.sqf" cannot be found. Any ideas? I extracted the PBO to the addons folder like the readme says. Help!

Does the included mission work?

[jammydodger 0]

Great work as usual here DMarkwick, cheers

[joe556 0]

After extracting and using the code in my own missions, I just get an error message ingame just before the effects activate telling me that "DMSmokeEffects\Scripts\DMSmokeEffects.sqf" cannot be found. Any ideas? I extracted the PBO to the addons folder like the readme says. Help!

Does the included mission work?

No, it just shows all of the BIS standard effects. I'm on version 1.08 and I've extracted the PBO to my addons folder, but like I said, it can't find the .sqf file as mentioned in the trigger code.

Any thoughts?

[dmarkwick 261]

After extracting and using the code in my own missions, I just get an error message ingame just before the effects activate telling me that "DMSmokeEffects\Scripts\DMSmokeEffects.sqf" cannot be found. Any ideas? I extracted the PBO to the addons folder like the readme says. Help!

Does the included mission work?

No, it just shows all of the BIS standard effects. I'm on version 1.08 and I've extracted the PBO to my addons folder, but like I said, it can't find the .sqf file as mentioned in the trigger code.

Any thoughts?

Well the setup I recommend is to have it in it's own @DM folder, as it contains a config file that might otherwise conflict with another one in the same addon folder.

[KeyCat 131]

Just tried the latest beta 3.3 but the new smoke effects was showing up as ugly big "blackish" squares rising up in the air, didn't have this issue with earlier betas. Any clues?

/KC

[dmarkwick 261]

Just tried the latest beta 3.3 but the new smoke effects was showing up as ugly big "blackish" squares rising up in the air, didn't have this issue with earlier betas. Any clues?

/KC

Hmm, the only time I ever saw this was when I switched from 12x12 texture array to 8x8 texture array without changing the drop command's relevant parameter. I'm not getting it now (and haven't seen it since, some 2 or 3 weeks ago), have you deleted all previous DMSmokeEffects files?

[joe556 0]

After extracting and using the code in my own missions, I just get an error message ingame just before the effects activate telling me that "DMSmokeEffects\Scripts\DMSmokeEffects.sqf" cannot be found. Any ideas? I extracted the PBO to the addons folder like the readme says. Help!

Does the included mission work?

No, it just shows all of the BIS standard effects. I'm on version 1.08 and I've extracted the PBO to my addons folder, but like I said, it can't find the .sqf file as mentioned in the trigger code.

Any thoughts?

Well the setup I recommend is to have it in it's own @DM folder, as it contains a config file that might otherwise conflict with another one in the same addon folder.

I extracted the whole @DM folder to my ArmA folder and the Addons folder to be sure, butr still no luck. I keeo getting the same error message that "DMSmokeEffects\Scripts\DMSmokeEffects.sqf"

cannot be found and reverts to the vanilla effects.

Are you definietaly sure this path is correct? Since I can't find a folder called scripts or any .sqf files.