Simple cloud layer SceneNode

[Klunk]

very nice, work indeed, a couple things you could try adding. I couldn't really tell if your doing it already but we used to stretch the uvs as they get towards the horizon making the clouds smaller and looking more distant. Another thing you could try is using vertex alpha at the horizon of your object it blends the cloud into the horizon nicely and may solve the clouds looking out of scale when the pass in front of the mountains. This may involve adding an extra line of verts and custom shaders as I'm not that keyed up on irrlicht materials.

edit: if you do go down the custom shader path another trick, especially with those kind of cloud textures, is to use a fake "bloom" to the clouds using (if the cloud object origin is 0,0,0) dot(lightpos, vertpos) as the basis.

[tbw]

Thank you for your very useful tips.
Indeed in my project I combine the cloudscene node with a sun scene node, which produces a nice bloom effect if the whole scene is prepared with postprocessing. Regarding the blending of the clouds with the skybox I use ONE_TEXTURE_BLEND material:

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Material.MaterialType = video::EMT_ONETEXTURE_BLEND;
Material.MaterialTypeParam = video::pack_texureBlendFunc( 
                video::EBF_SRC_ALPHA, 
                video::EBF_ONE_MINUS_SRC_ALPHA,
                video::EMFN_MODULATE_1X, 
                video::EAS_TEXTURE | video::EAS_VERTEX_COLOR); 

This material comines the alpha channel of the texture with the vertex alpha. So you only have to place the cloudlayer in the right height by using the the method:

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setCloudHeight(f32 centerHeight, f32 innerHeight, f32 outerHeight) 

the vertex colors are set by

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setCloudColor(const video::SColor& centerColor, const video::SColor& innerColor, const video::SColor& outerColor)

Playing around with this two functions should lead to acceptable reults.

The stretching of the uvs is a really good idea! I will try this out!
Thanks again!

[Granyte]

What could cause cloud layer not to show while the code still compile fine

[jorgerosa]

Thanks for share this, this is really great stuff!

Everything works fine, but only if i comment these lines:

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// cloudLayer1->setTranslation(core::vector2d<f32>(0.008f, 0.0f));    // set translation (speed of the clouds)
// cloudLayer2->setTranslation(core::vector2d<f32>(0.006f, 0.003f));  // set translation (speed of the clouds)
// cloudLayer3->setTranslation(core::vector2d<f32>(0.006f, 0.003f));  // set translation (speed of the clouds)

Then, all the code runs ok, but the clouds layers have no movement, of course.

if I uncomment above lines, CODE::BLOCKS returns:
error: no matching function for call to 'irr::scene::CCloudSceneNode::setTranslation(irr::core::vector2d<float>)'

I cheched the class, there is:

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void CCloudSceneNode::setTranslation(core::vector2d<f32>& translation)
{
        // set the translation
        Translation = translation;
}

So... everything should work fine... what am i missing?.... (I´m using IRRLICHT V.1.7.2 and OpenGl 3.3.0, just in case...)

[serengeor]

Thanks for share this, this is really great stuff!

Everything works fine, but only if i comment these lines:

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// cloudLayer1->setTranslation(core::vector2d<f32>(0.008f, 0.0f));    // set translation (speed of the clouds)
// cloudLayer2->setTranslation(core::vector2d<f32>(0.006f, 0.003f));  // set translation (speed of the clouds)
// cloudLayer3->setTranslation(core::vector2d<f32>(0.006f, 0.003f));  // set translation (speed of the clouds)

Then, all the code runs ok, but the clouds layers have no movement, of course.

if I uncomment above lines, CODE::BLOCKS returns:
error: no matching function for call to 'irr::scene::CCloudSceneNode::setTranslation(irr::core::vector2d<float>)'

I cheched the class, there is:

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void CCloudSceneNode::setTranslation(core::vector2d<f32>& translation)
{
        // set the translation
        Translation = translation;
}

So... everything should work fine... what am i missing?.... (I´m using IRRLICHT V.1.7.2 and OpenGl 3.3.0, just in case...)

Try defining the vector2d variable before function and pass it to it.

[jorgerosa]

Try defining the vector2d variable before function and pass it to it.

Worked like a charm! Thanks serengeor! Im still wondering why... but works!...
Here is the solution, might help someone else, too:

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cloudLayer1 = new scene::CCloudSceneNode(smgr->getRootSceneNode(), smgr);
core::vector2d<f32> xx = vector2d<f32>(0.008f, 0.0f);
cloudLayer1->setTranslation(xx); // set translation (speed of the clouds)

[cobra]

@jorgerosa

Changing:

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void CCloudSceneNode::setTranslation(core::vector2d<f32>& translation)

to:

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void CCloudSceneNode::setTranslation(const core::vector2d<f32>& translation)

Would be the best solution. It should be that way anyway.

[serengeor]

@jorgerosa

Changing:

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void CCloudSceneNode::setTranslation(core::vector2d<f32>& translation)

to:

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void CCloudSceneNode::setTranslation(const core::vector2d<f32>& translation)

Would be the best solution. It should be that way anyway.

Yeah, I also wondered why it's not like that

[mecio]

What is wrong?

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#include "CloudSceneNode.h"
 
using namespace irr;
using namespace core;
using namespace scene;
using namespace video;
using namespace io;
using namespace gui;
 
...
...
 
CCloudSceneNode* cloudLayer1 = new CCloudSceneNode(smgr->getRootSceneNode(), smgr);
core::vector2d<f32> xx = vector2d<f32>(0.008f, 0.0f);
cloudLayer1->setTranslation(xx);
cloudLayer1->getMaterial(0).setTexture(0, driver->getTexture("media/clouds/cloud01.png"));
cloudLayer1->setCloudHeight(0.5f, 0.1f, -0.05f);

I get this error.

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undefined reference to `irr::scene::CCloudSceneNode::CCloudSceneNode(irr::scene::ISceneNode*, irr::scene::ISceneManager*, int)'|

[serengeor]

I get this error.

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undefined reference to `irr::scene::CCloudSceneNode::CCloudSceneNode(irr::scene::ISceneNode*, irr::scene::ISceneManager*, int)'|

Add .cpp file into your project that contains the function.

[mecio]

I have it already but when i hanged

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    void CCloudSceneNode::setTranslation(core::vector2d<f32>& translation)

to

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    void CCloudSceneNode::setTranslation(const core::vector2d<f32>& translation)

message disappeared

[tbw]

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void CCloudSceneNode::setTranslation(const core::vector2d<f32>& translation)

is correct. (MS compiler does not care about it). I will change it a soon as possible and I will re-upload the source/example!

Thank you for the hint!

[eagletree]

This scenenode is excellent. Thanks for the good work.

I loaded it on a couple of Macs now and it works as well there as on Windows, just needed the declaration of the vector2df as on Linux. No other scenenode I've tried has worked on the Mac out of the box (though I've only used a few from here so far).

Thanks again.

[randomMesh]

This is very nice indeed, thank you for sharing.

I got a few notes:

• 1. The demo code linked in the first post still doesn't compile out of the box. You need to apply the changes cobra suggested.
  2. You got a memory leak in the demo. You don't drop the CCloudSceneNodes after usage.
  3. Every time a c++ programmer uses #define, God kills a kitten. Use a static const irr::u32 to save them!
  4. Fix your includes! Instead of including the complete Irrlicht library, only include the needed headers (to reduce compile time).

CloudSceneNode.h:

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#include <ISceneNode.h>
#include <S3DVertex.h>
 

CloudSceneNode.cpp:

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#include "CloudSceneNode.h"
#include <ISceneManager.h>
#include <ICameraSceneNode.h>
#include <IVideoDriver.h>
 

[hendu]

@randomMesh

If you compile irr apps often, create a precompiled header for irrlicht.h; works much better than hand-tuning headers in every file