Question about HEAT BLUR effect and its modding..any chances??.

Hi guys, as most of us here, we like to modify the game to make it look better and better so I wanted to ask you about something I have always hope to improve since lomac days and never happened...the heat blur effect!!...it would be SOOO great to see all that hot air distortion done properly :cry:

So I have spent most of the day yesterday trying to understand the files that I think are related to it:

heatair.fx

exhausttrail.fx

exhausttrail_vs.hlsl

hotair.lua

smoketrail.lua

speedsteam.lua

Im not sure which of those are for the black smoke so I had a look to all of them...sadly, they are quite complex and without any knowledge and not knowing what every variable does its almost imposible to do anything for someone like me who had no idea of programing and such :cry:.

What I want to ask you, as you are far more experts than me, is...do you think it is possible to:

-Increase the LENGHT of the trail

-Make a longer and smoother fade of the trail

-Increase the speed of the flow nearer of the nozzles and make it slower the further away of them.

That would be awesome, but even just by increasing the lenght of the trail it would look sooo much better!!

So...as time goes by and there has never ever been such a mod for EDs flight sim I wonder if the reason is that its imposible to achieve so I ask to you guys...

I find it hard to believe that all this time no one has ever been able to do such a requested thing...so there must be something "bad" with the way its done or something like that but as the parameteres are there I cant undestand why it seems to be so hard to do???

Also if some of you guys know something about all the heat blur stuff I would love you to post it here so I or many as me interesten in this effect can make any progress, if its not a lost cause...

many thanks!!

don't look at these, they are not for heatblur

exhausttrail.fx

exhausttrail_vs.hlsl

smoketrail.lua

speedsteam.lua

you can increase length easy. Edit Config/Effects/ParticleSystem2/HotAir.lua

LifeTime = { 3, -- nozzle speed min + aircraft speed, time

{nozzleSpdMin+0, 2.2},

{nozzleSpdMin+300, 1.2},

{nozzleSpdMin+500, 0.5},

{nozzleSpdMin+700, 0.06}

change this section. First number are aircraft speed in m/s. second numbers is duration of effect particle in seconds... and this is what you need to increase (the duration)

making smoother transittion... sorry but can't help with that one, its somewhere in FX file which I don't understand.

Wow, fast and good!!! many thanks mate!!!:thumbup:

I will try what you said a bit later...about making other improvements to the effect maybe there is someone who understand the code and can help to make something really nice to it...comon guys, lets try to do a nice Heat blur once for all!!:thumbup:

Man!!, it works perfect!!!, I have change the values you told me and now its a lot longer!! and I cant see any performance decrease :thumbup:...

But there are some things I would like to uderstand if possible:

1-Values for speed are knots,km/s, m/s???for time are seconds I guess...

2- The "nozzleSpdMin" value is a constant right??what does it do??...I have tried changing from 200 to 50 and 500 and I cant see any difference.

3- nozzleSpeedMin and nozzleSpdMin are the same (nozzleSpeedMin = nozzleSpdMin)...so whats the reason to make that differentiation??

4- Why are "nozzleSpdMin+aircraft speed" and "time" set in several blocks??, I mean:

{nozzleSpdMin+0, 2.2},

{nozzleSpdMin+300, 1.2},

{nozzleSpdMin+500, 0.5},

{nozzleSpdMin+700, 0.06}

Its not a lineal relation so whats the interpolation between those value pairs??linerar in between?? why define 4 and not 3 or 5 or 6, etc??

5- I guess that the nozzle speed is the speed of the flow coming from the engines so its speed vector should be a negative number because of the positive speed value I see for the aircraft speed??...if thats correct, then:

{-200+0, 2.2},.............. -200 flow and 0 aircraft, then 2.2 sec life

{-200+300, 1.2},..............+100 relative speed in the aircraft speed vector,then 1,2 sec life

{-200+500, 0.5},..............+300 relative speed in the aircraft speed vector,then 0.5 sec life

{-200+700, 0.06}..............+500 relative speed in the aircraft speed vector,then 0.06 sec life

is that the logic behind this????

So, adding new "blocks" to those with higher values would work to increase the speed at which the heat effect is still visible?? for example:

{nozzleSpdMin+1000, 0.04}

6- What means the numbers in bold??:

DistMax = { 1, -- distance between particles, m

LifeTime = { 3, -- nozzle speed min + aircraft speed, time

LifeTimeJitter = { 1, -- result lifetime = LifeTime*(1-LifeTimeJitter)

Also, Is possible to enable heat blur at 0 speed from this file?? I have tried with nozzleSpeedMin but with no success...

At the end, what I would like to achieve is:

1-Longer heat trail.................................................................................done!!thanks Kuky!!:notworthy:

2-Heat blur at 0 speed with engine on........................................................not yet:D

3-Heat blur ar ANY aircraft speed or at much higher speed than now................not yet:D

Many thanks!!

Lets see if we can make this possible guys!!:thumbup:

Man!!, it works perfect!!!, I have change the values you told me and now its a lot longer!! and I cant see any performance decrease :thumbup:...

 

But there are some things I would like to uderstand if possible:

 

1-Values for speed are knots,km/s, m/s???for time are seconds I guess...

 

2- The "nozzleSpdMin" value is a constant right??what does it do??...I have tried changing from 200 to 50 and 500 and I cant see any difference.

 

3- nozzleSpeedMin and nozzleSpdMin are the same (nozzleSpeedMin = nozzleSpdMin)...so whats the reason to make that differentiation??

 

4- Why are "nozzleSpdMin+aircraft speed" and "time" set in several blocks??, I mean:

 

{nozzleSpdMin+0, 2.2},

{nozzleSpdMin+300, 1.2},

{nozzleSpdMin+500, 0.5},

{nozzleSpdMin+700, 0.06}

 

Its not a lineal relation so whats the interpolation between those value pairs??linerar in between?? why define 4 and not 3 or 5 or 6, etc??

 

5- I guess that the nozzle spped is the speed of the flow coming from the engines so its speed vector should be a negative number because of the positive speed value I see for the aircraft speed??...if thats correct, then:

 

{-200+0, 2.2},.............. -200 flow and 0 aircraft, then 2.2 sec life

{-200+300, 1.2},..............+100 relative speed in the aircraft speed vector,then 1,2 sec life

{-200+500, 0.5},..............+300 relative speed in the aircraft speed vector,then 0.5 sec life

{-200+700, 0.06}..............+500 relative speed in the aircraft speed vector,then 0.06 sec life

 

is that the logic behin this????

 

So, adding new "blocks" to those with higher values would work to increase the speed at which the heat effect is still visible?? for example:

 

{nozzleSpdMin+1000, 0.04}

 

6- What means the numbers in bold??:

 

DistMax = { 1, -- distance between particles, m

LifeTime = { 3, -- nozzle speed min + aircraft speed, time

LifeTimeJitter = { 1, -- result lifetime = LifeTime*(1-LifeTimeJitter)

 

Also, Is possible to enable heat blur at 0 speed from this file?? I have tried with nozzleSpeedMin but with no success...

 

At the end, what I would like to achieve is:

 

1-Longer heat trail.................................................................................done!!thanks Kuky!!:notworthy:

2-Heat blur at 0 speed with engine on........................................................not yet:D

3-Heat blur ar ANY aircraft speed or at much higher speed than now................not yet:D

 

Many thanks!!

Lets see if we can make this possible guys!!:thumbup:

sounds interesting, could you share some before/after shots please?

sounds interesting, could you share some before/after shots please?

Of course!!, here you have, the first one is default effect...all other 8 are with increased lenght. It looks a lot better in movement, in fact, the fade seem to be much smoother now as the trail lenght is increased so is possible that in screens you dont notice how far the effect reach because the turbulence is very light but its there and its noticeable in game...lets try to make it better!!:thumbup:

I just wanted to post a couple of videos I made with some adjustments...not best quality but I think they are good enough to see the effect in action and to see how its much more organic this way...

Hope to see more people interested in this...:thumbup:

I have tried long time ago to edit the files to make the effect show at speeds greater than 500kmph but without luck. I think the HotAir.fx is responsible for it, but for the life of me I can't find where (I have to use trial and error but still no luck). If anyone figures this out I am all ear.

I think the heat blur has always been hardcoded to turn off at a certain speed.

I have tried long time ago to edit the files to make the effect show at speeds greater than 500kmph but without luck. I think the HotAir.fx is responsible for it, but for the life of me I can't find where (I have to use trial and error but still no luck). If anyone figures this out I am all ear.

Damn!!:cry:...so then, I dont think I can do any better than you...

I think the heat blur has always been hardcoded to turn off at a certain speed.

Bad news then :cry_2:

That would be probably more important than zero speed heat blur...I cant understand why on earth did they decided to cut off so hard the effect at just 300 kias?¿?¿?¿?WTF?¿?¿? Why???...now, with the longer trail and a way higher max speed value the organic feeling of the effect would be insane!!!...imagine chasing an other aircraft while you can detect it in close combat due to the distortion it generates in the environment...WOW!!:bounce:

I bet if we find a way to increase that hard limit at which the effect is gone automatically it would fade smoothly between the new limits and would look great and be more slight at higher speeds...Oh man!! any genius/programer here to help please???:helpsmilie:

Very Nice. :thumbup:

Any chance you could share with us what you've already done? It looks fantastic! Just the values you used in your videos would be great!

Now if you guys can just figure out Heat Blur Mirage aka heat off hot tarmac and terrain

Thanks for your interest guys!!, really apreciate it!!:thumbup:

Of course, I can give you the file, but the merit is all for Kuky, I just made some adjustments to the lenght and the LoD...here you have, just put the file "hotAir.lua" attached in your DCS world/Config/Effects/ParticleSystem2 folder and replace.

Dont forget to make a backup of the original file, just in case.

Im not sure how it would work in 2.0 as I dont own the NTTR map yet but I guess it should work.

Also, not sure about if it would work with low quality heat effect. I have only tested the high preset.

About performance I cant see any clear impact but not sure what would happen in hot combat zones.

The tarmac effect would be amazing ...sadly I have no idea how to do it, and even doubt it can be done without the correct tools and programing knoledge mate...sorry...:(

Btw I think the best way to really see the difference with this little mod is when watching displays as I made with the video :D (at low speed of course, otherwise the effect gets removed)...it looks alot more fluid and you can see how the hot air mixes with the black smoke (specially in the mig 29) and how it extends over the background giving the feeling that its a fluid what comes out of the engines...I love it!! and I wish I could give you guys a way better thing (like removing the stupid hard 300 knots effect limit)...even so, I hope you enjoy it!!:thumbup:

hotAir.lua

Many thanks for this! I'll try it out in 2.0 and let you know if it works!

Thanks to you mate!

I have attached the original file also, so its easier to go back if needed :thumbup:

Original.rar

New file with little improvements. Hope you like it!

EDIT:

New rar file with 3 options: Long, medium and short trail lenght (note that even the short one is longer that the default DCS one). Compatible with 1.5 and 2.0

Installation:

Just put the file "hotAir.lua" of your preference from the rar file in your DCS world/Config/Effects/ParticleSystem2 folder and replace.

Dont forget to make a backup of the original file, just in case.

Heat Blur.rar

Sorry... I meant to let you know that this mod works just fine in 2.0 as well!

Sorry... I meant to let you know that this mod works just fine in 2.0 as well!

Nice, thanks for the info!:thumbup:

Btw, do you like it?...is there any performance issue with it??

Looks good! I'll have to try it out tonight.

works fine 2.0 thx :thumbup:

Great!, Im glad you enjoy it guys!!

Ive been trying to change the way the effect cuts off when reaching 300 Knots more or less...sadly I cant find a way to do it :cry: ...

I have revised almost all damn game files with no success...I had the impression that maybe it was configured independently for avery plane/heli in the game, as there seems to be some noticeable differences between the different aircrafts in ternm of heat blur but even then (looking in the particular files of an aircraft) I couldnt find anything related with the damn cut off speed...

The shader files are way too complex (specially when I dont know what every variable does).

I will go on anyway...

Thanks guys!!!!:thumbup:

It does look very nice, thanks for this :)

Thanks Mustang!! nice screen!!:thumbup:

I have also teste it in combat (dogfights) and its really nice to look back inside the cockpit after a high "g" turn where you have lost a lot of energy and see how the heat blur of your own engines are distorting the view where the enemy is :D...also, at low speed situations when you are behind the enemy aircraft its really cool to catch him due to the heat trail it left behind, which is very noticeable now specially over the land...it was impossible before :)

BUT the DAMN low speed limit at which the heat fades its just a pity...it would be amazing to have a higher speed to fade the effect and so making it even more subtle at those speeds...

Wow, I´ve been looking for something like this for a long time, gracias!!