Alex72 1 Posted June 23, 2009 da12thMonkey Wow that sounds great. If its possible to change the textures like you say. I dont think units get the white texture treatment with the current IR? It was hard to see anyway when i tested. Also the UAV really needs much heavier zoom. You have to have it at the altitude now where anything can shoot you down if you want to be able to see anything. Maybe that was made for balance. Like too high and too powerful zoom on the UAV's will give too big advantage. But reality is that they are "stealthy" (flies high up) with hardcore zoom. Sounds interesting though. Thanks. Alex Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
soul_assassin 1747 Posted June 23, 2009 the setobjecttexture would not work. As you would constantly have to probe which objects are in the view (and what do u do with the sky? it doesnt have a setobjecttexture slot, neither does grass clutter afaik.). Besides such a massive script texture switch would be impractical. All the pp effects above just a pixelShader framework. Every pixel is taken and manipulated in the same way. Since this is already in 2D space it has no way of knowing anything about the model. We need a vertexShader framework where every vertex gets manipulated according to the objects properties, then gets transformed in to screenspace. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
galzohar 31 Posted June 23, 2009 The current form of IR doesn't even deserve to be called IR, as any similarity between it and a true IR (other than the white replacing the green) is completely coincidental. For true IR you'd have to practically render everything differently, giving pixels their color based on their temperatures rather than their "actual" color, and this is probably no possible without BIS doing it themselves. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
CarlGustaffa 4 Posted June 23, 2009 Even without being temperature based, if you get the IR device some bias and contrast controls, you can make it work better than the default NVGs, giving it some purpose. Probably won't get it to see through smoke though, which isn't very much used anyway on the battlefield. And setobjecttexture doesn't work for units anyway afaik. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Alex72 1 Posted June 23, 2009 Not entirely true. It isnt just b/w NVG. Change contrast and vehicles come out pure white while background is black. So its a bit better than the NVG. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
soul_assassin 1747 Posted June 23, 2009 Not really, at night it just depends weither the object is illuminated. If the tank is in the dark it will be black, if its under a lamp it will be white. Another bug is that the shadow also is calculated hehe so if ur at night under a lamp not only ur white but u see a big white blob on the floor :) Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Panda_pl 0 Posted June 23, 2009 Has anyone tried placing strong light (or few) under the map? this way objects ontop would get illuminated but ground itself (hopefully) not. How about placing light in air at player and taking advantage of the different angle of surface and objects affecting their illumination? Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
galzohar 31 Posted June 23, 2009 Yeah, there's nothing you can see with the "IR" you can't see with NVG (give or take some zoom), which defeats the whole purpose of IR. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
CarlGustaffa 4 Posted June 24, 2009 You can see stuff better with tunable 'IR' than you can with nontunable NVG. Also you could make default NVG a lot worse by reducing their contrast, making them less uber in the game as they are in the real world. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
galzohar 31 Posted June 24, 2009 The NV in the game isn't too uber because of contrast. It's too uber because it let's you see great out to very long distances, while IRL it's quite limited (I think the game's NV model is 150m starlight 300m moonlight). I really don't see any point in making IR if it works more like regular NV than real IR. The whole point of IR is NV that is not dependent at all on light sources or the actual color of objects, and has people/vehicles have HIGH contrast compared to terrain. It's not about high overall contrast, it's about the hot objects sticking out over the cold surface. If you don't have that the IR is 98% non-functional (compared to regular NV). Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
CarlGustaffa 4 Posted June 24, 2009 Why are you comparing with real IR? We can't have it yet, and have to work with what we've got. So, what can we achieve with what we've got? The point of making a fake IR would be to let vehicles that have them have an egde over soldiers being stuck with (now) crappy NVGs. Lower the effectiveness of NVGs, because: they are too contrasty, have too good resolution, and can be used with no hazzle at all (no night optics). Maybe even put some blur and noise postfx on them. Everything to reuce their uberness. In the series Generation Kill we could hear the driver complain like mad over the contrast, not being able to see properly. This is not a problem in Arma1 due to contrast being so great (especially in moonlight, but ok). For all I care, the 'IR' could be just the regular NVG but without all the negatives, using black & white, with some bias and contrast adjustments. Any vehicle with this would have far better vision than the regular grunt, despite not being realistic. I'm interrested in the tactical value of such a device, not so much how it was achieved. A tested trick in Arma1 was to switch to night mode for the IR viewer and apply the effect there. Apart from night sounds and moon that shouldn't be there, it didn't look too bad, with vehicles and people 'glowing' in the dark, way better than any regular NVG would do during the night. My personal feeling is that you can achieve remarkable tactical value, even if the model itself is flawed like hell. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
MQ-9 Reaper 10 Posted June 24, 2009 Would it be possible to make a pseudo FLIR mod which would represent ground textures, trees, bushes and houses with dark/black/grey textures by default, and humans, vehicles, animals with white textures only? It would not work as a real FLIR, but it would be a credible enough emulation. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Synide 0 Posted June 24, 2009 Would it be possible to make a pseudo FLIR mod which would represent ground textures, trees, bushes and houses with dark/black/grey textures by default, and humans, vehicles, animals with white textures only?It would not work as a real FLIR, but it would be a credible enough emulation. No, not until the new tools arrive. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
soul_assassin 1747 Posted June 24, 2009 So this MOD would be a total replacement? So you only have FLIR vision and nothing else? Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
frederf 0 Posted June 25, 2009 Could we get the night vision key (default N) to cycle through: 1. Unaided 2. Night Vision 3. IR BHOT 4. IR WHOT ? Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
EricM 0 Posted June 25, 2009 Good point Frederf. A cycling "n" key would be good. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
NoRailgunner 0 Posted June 25, 2009 This kind of FLIR in UAVs seem to be bugged - in campaign mission "Razor Two" the UAV got shot down but the FLIR was still there and I had to restart the mission. Not nice if the screen doesnt switch back to normal. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Alex72 1 Posted June 25, 2009 Keep working on it guys. I know it will be real good when enough bright minds have teared this IR apart and tools become available. Im so damn happy there are guys like you modders around that can enhance the gameplay for the rest of us. Heck we almost got real good FLIR in ArmA1 even. I never saw it released to the public? The mapfact version that was shown in the discussion thread (will see if i can find it later) and it had WHOT/BHOT. Cant wait to see the results later on. And if there is need for some optics graphics id be happy to help with that. Alex Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
luckyhendrix 10 Posted July 14, 2009 In ARMA I with A.C.E. , we had IR flare (fired from M203) , When you shot those flare ppl who had NVG would see the whole area light up and ppl without NVG would see no differences. We could use this method to simulate IR vision: Stick on every vehicle/person a light that would be only visible for people using a certain type of goggles... Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
galzohar 31 Posted July 14, 2009 It's just not the same thing. While the IR flare done that way can be quite (if not fully) realistic, FLIR done in the way you are suggesting will still have nothing to do with temperature, which is what FLIR is all about. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
luckyhendrix 10 Posted July 15, 2009 (edited) Working with temperature in the current state of ARMA engine is just impossible, this could be a good workaround you'd just have to stick light to all object that are usualy emiting heat , and all other things would stay very dark. Edited July 15, 2009 by luckyhendrix Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
max power 21 Posted July 15, 2009 I think the better way would be to load alternate textures and rvmats for objects that emit infrared radiation. Also, I just wanted to say that the premise that infrared cameras see 'temperature' is not technically correct. Different materials have different heat conductivity properties and different rates and frequencies of infrared radiation. Somethat that does not radiate much infrared but that is very hot would appear dim. Likewise, something that radiates infrared outside of the sensor's band would also appear dim. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
LJF 0 Posted July 16, 2009 Oh my god, brilliant, I only wish I could make myself more useful to the cause :D Soul_Assassin ... ? You're an absolute genius :D I can't wait to see what you guys cook up. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites