Friday 2010-01-22 Screenshots AND Discussion Thread

[ZaltysZ]

Originally Posted by Skoshi Tiger

I have my pilots licences (though it has been a few years since I flew last) and in my opinion the head shake is probably under modeled if anything.

Modeling of head shake is harder to do than it may look. You can't simply shake camera in the same way as real head is shaken, because then you will get a feeling that it shakes too much. It will be so, because in reality eyes can compensate for the movement of head, but in game they can't as we don't move of course and see only shaking picture. The simple example is the book reading in the car. Despite you can still read it while car is moving, you won't be able to read it in the video, if it has been filmed by high speed high resolution camera attached to your head.

Head shake is almost always lowered down in sims for simulation of eyes compensation and sake of playability. I would say, we should not be concerned about it too much until we get a chance to test it in game. Videos do not depict such things well.

[Skoshi Tiger]

Great video Zaelu That would have been fun to make.

No I haven't flown with a camera mounted on my head, but I do understand that the brain is good at filtering out the distractions like head shake, so that in most circumstances you do not notice it.

Until you try to do something like line up the sights of your fighter and that when it does become very important and noticable. ( Post and ring sights were worse but the reflector sights did have some leeway)

One of the concerns I have is that gamers will go into simulated aircombat and perform all sorts of combat manuvers taking shots at the edge of the envelope when in real life they would not be able to keep their sights on-target. The head shake is one of those methods to simulate the difficulties involved.

And in my opinion I don't think they did too bad a job in the posted video.

Cheers!
My wife has just told me I'm spending too long on the computer

[HFC_Dolphin]

I'm not an expert in real flying, but I think that the shaking we saw in the video was caused because of change of flaps and hard stick movements· maybe in connection with some strong wind.

Anyway, Luthier can explain better as he was the one flying in this video.
Nevertheless, it's pretty obvious that everything is still under heavy tweaking and that SoW team will need our opinion in such matters mostly during beta period. (That's why, after all, this was not an official video release.)

[HFC_Dolphin]

By the way, please keep in mind that especially about WW2 planes' behaviour, Oleg has excellent feedback by a real pilot who's actually flying these birds.
I know the man and I'm sure we can rest assured that he knows what to tell to Oleg and Team.
I'm also sure that Oleg and Team can implement all good feedback in the game. They can do it better than anyone else in the game industry.

Let's wait a bit for official video releases.

[Sutts]

Originally Posted by zaelu

Exactly, if I was to speak my words (even with my bad accent ) and not write them everyone would had understood from my "tone" what I was meaning.

For people that say that I don't know what the reflex visor work... well is quite possible, I don't work in that area but I knew what is doing as I saw it in many movies on the net how the cross-hair stays fixed while camera is moving and I also play DCS Black Shark that has a better representation of the reflex gun-sight in its HUD and has native 6DoF so you can see it working.

@Skoshi Tiger and others that find the movie from SoW representing good or insufficient head shake I want to tell you this.

An honest question and not an "implying" one: Did you ever flew in a plane having attached to your head a camera? Did you watch the video afterwards and have a feeling that you didn't actually "experience" that tremor and shaking?

What I am saying is the shaking in that movie is just for "cinematic" effect and is not depicting reality... you know... simulation. If the aircraft is shaking violently in bad weather we notice it... we even "see" it if we want to check it out but, when we work in those conditions our eyes, brain and mind filter it out. When you add it as a "special effect" you cannot filter it out and it becomes a hinder to the working and is not a good simulation to aggravate the bad environment.

Is like when you go to a 3D movie and you see objects in 3D but then the "cineast" wanted to make an emphasis on some plan of attention and he made one object in middle plan of the image clear and one object closer to the viewer in blur like out of focus. Now, as long as you go with story you will not notice it... you will even more dive into the action but, if you observe the out of focus object and look at it the spell is broken, your mind will try to focus it and then observe it can't do it and then will understand is just a trick.

The same is with this shaking effect, as long as you go with the cinematic effect is nice... but as soon as you try to actually make a dogfight in that shaking plane you will see it's unrealistic and hindering and you will see that in effect you are still, the gun-sight is still in respect to your movements but the cockpit is wobbling around like crazy... the spell is broken.

I sure hope this effect can be toggled or adjustable in final release so everyone would be happy... I will use it if I make a movie though .

I had filmed a bit with a helmet mounted camera and I noticed what I was saying above many times. The movie is shaking like crazy but I cannot remember all that movement. The movement comes from vibrations but also from attention shifting which cannot be (yet) represented in games, maybe some neat depth of field trick that shifts via input from your eyes will do it in 20 years from now. In the little movie bellow you will see that while I ride the bike the camera tremors like hell (I don't recall that tremor) and while flying the motodelta the movie is pretty still, just movements from attention shifting and little actual shaking of the wing that do appear like in the movies, you are still and the plane itself moves but, are not how they are perceived in real time.

Here is the little movie. I was trying to keep my head very still and also the motodelta is a great steady-cam platform but, it still moves differently that I perceived it. And the movie has the worst shaking parts cut out for obvious reasons .

Please note that I don't say I am some sort of an expert giving lessons just making some observations of my own... if they are right maybe they help. And sorry if my post is too long.

Now that was much more constructive feedback zaelu. I can understand your point of view now.

[Abbeville-Boy]

Originally Posted by 13th Hsqn Protos

Cheap shot all you like...... I know I have brought about positive change in this sim.

you need to pm oleg and tell him of your vast piloting history. Then he will add you to his other pilots who advise him. Then you can argue with them and show them your data from years of research on shaking of hand made paper planes.

[Richie]

Even Tree sounded a little excited

[Dano]

Originally Posted by 13th Hsqn Protos

People need to calm down...... constructive criticism is good. Being a fanbois contributes nothing to the game. Zaelu expressed points made by many (plus English is not his native language)

The shaking is too much .... at least 3 real pilots have pointed that out. Lets fix and move on.

For the rest .... yeah nice vid .... but not mind blowing .... even Luthier said that .... chill out .... LOOOOOONG way to go still.

I think half the problem here is the fact that your responses come over as being arrogant and rude, whether you mean them to or not is another matter.

[MikkOwl]

That video looks great! (Spitfire in the Clouds). Despite the nasty artifacting from youtube compression, it looks absolutely teriffic.

Compare it to the british map of Wings of Prey for example. Look near the end where it manuvers a bit and pulls up towards the water where there's tons of sun reflections done very nicely in the water. It's bright, but it's not exagerrated as the Wings of Prey style was.

The shadows in the cockpit look very sharp and appear to be complete and covering nicely.

The instruments moving looks very nice as well. Note the unstable nature of them when throwing the plane around (I recommend reading how mechanical measurement instruments from the era worked, and still do today to some extent. Fascinatingly simple yet effective).

It all looks very, very real to me. Maybe I should look into getting a second 9800GTX+ to be able to run it (SLI.. poor man's upgrade).

I also think the colour shade of the water as well as sky in particular looks superbly convincing. Water has some foaming on the top of waves (I know 'perfect' water in IL-2 has much of this as well) which gives some references to gauge your speed/angle compared to more flat lifeless waters.

EDIT: Comment on the G-forces and head movement - for being a fixed view mode, I can't imagine what could be done to make it better. I'm not sure in real life how much you can keep your head centered behind the gunsight display, but I doubt you can if you are doing sudden violent moves. The delay/lag simulates a neck pretty well.

[Insuber]

Originally Posted by HFC_Dolphin

I'm not an expert in real flying, but I think that the shaking we saw in the video was caused because of change of flaps and hard stick movements· maybe in connection with some strong wind.

Anyway, Luthier can explain better as he was the one flying in this video.
Nevertheless, it's pretty obvious that everything is still under heavy tweaking and that SoW team will need our opinion in such matters mostly during beta period. (That's why, after all, this was not an official video release.)

+1!

And add to that the engine vibrations at some point. So, exaggerated or not, I'd like to think that we have something nice and original modeled there (turbulence under clouds, engine vibrations, high G stutter), requiring tweaking and fine tuning maybe. Don't look at the finger, look at the moon instead ... .

Regards,
Insuber