Advance Lighting differences in shadows rotating the Camera
by Joshua Halls (Xerves) · in Torque 3D Professional · 05/26/2009 (1:43 pm) · 12 replies
Would think this is somewhere, but I haven't seen a lot of mention to it. The biggest issue I see after the few fixes that popped up in the last few days is the shadow rendering at times is not consistant based on position and camera rotation. Even if the sun is not moving the shadows have a tendency to be at different locations by moving around a bit and by even rotating the camera in a different direction.
About the author
Part of the team that works on The Repopulation, a SciFi based MMO using a heavily modified version of the Torque MMO Kit - T3D. I also take care of the T3D version of the Torque MMO Kit.
#2
05/26/2009 (2:03 pm)
If you go into editor and open the shadowViz, you'll see the sun's shadowmap. When the camera rotates, the view of each shadow pane zooms in and out slightly, which causes the shadows to wobble, since their texel density is changing slightly. I suppose this will be fixed along with the other shadow improvements/fixes.
#3
05/26/2009 (2:11 pm)
No, it is more like I move a few feet and the whole area goes from being not shaded to being fully shaded or I rotate the camera 90 degrees and a good chunk of the viewable area is now shaded as it was not before. Could post some screenshots or videos if it would help. 
#4
05/26/2009 (2:27 pm)
@Joshua - try getting the camera to look at a skinned mesh - especially a player or AI - even your own player mesh via camera view and see if that fixes it.
#5
05/26/2009 (2:46 pm)
Camera is in 3rd person already. Here are 3 screens. This is simply from rotating the camera. Note, the building is a DIF as that could matter. I do get this quite a bit of distance from the building as well. 
#6
So test with only one player in the world.
05/26/2009 (3:22 pm)
Do you happen to have skin mesh players that are offscreen? I do know that if a player has been offscreen and not visible at all during the game it will render crazy shadows screwing up the lighting in the entire scene.So test with only one player in the world.
#8
Either one or the other.
05/27/2009 (6:48 am)
ScatterSky and Sun are not meant to be used together.Either one or the other.
#9
The problem only exists when the sun is behind a piece of terrain but above the horizon line. Shadows cast beyond that piece of terrain are correct at some camera angles, and lit as if the piece of terrain isn't there at other camera angles.
This was experienced with a timeofday speed of 5760 on the default terrain in the "simple" mission on a new project with the Full template when the sun was rising. With default ScatterSky sun positions, the sun should rise behind the peak that's just beyond the station from the default player start point.
My first thought was shadow or terrain LOD. But if that's the case, it should be happening when moving closer or further away. This occurs at various distances from the mentioned peak and only when camera angles are changed. If I move in toward the station without changing the camera angle, the light stays consistent.
05/27/2009 (8:37 am)
I had the same issue when adding scattersky, deleting the sun fixed the problem, but it reappeared later.The problem only exists when the sun is behind a piece of terrain but above the horizon line. Shadows cast beyond that piece of terrain are correct at some camera angles, and lit as if the piece of terrain isn't there at other camera angles.
This was experienced with a timeofday speed of 5760 on the default terrain in the "simple" mission on a new project with the Full template when the sun was rising. With default ScatterSky sun positions, the sun should rise behind the peak that's just beyond the station from the default player start point.
My first thought was shadow or terrain LOD. But if that's the case, it should be happening when moving closer or further away. This occurs at various distances from the mentioned peak and only when camera angles are changed. If I move in toward the station without changing the camera angle, the light stays consistent.
#10
05/27/2009 (9:42 am)
We have a lot of mountains in that area so it is is a possibility that it could be happening. I have noticed this when the sun is nearly directly over top (noon) as well. This was happening in Beta 1 as well so it was with the old sun object as well as the Scattersky one (we removed the sun when adding the scattersky).
#11
--Josh
05/27/2009 (9:45 am)
Tom, I will try doing it with nothing but the city today and see if I get the same result. If so, at least it pinpoints the issue and I am sure someone is working on that :-).--Josh
#12
The effect seems very similar to when the weapon was disappearing in Beta 1. I'd have to do a side by side comparison to see if the angles are the same, but can't say for sure otherwise.
06/02/2009 (7:54 am)
Would a video and example mission help in solving this one? It's one of the more obvious rendering quality issues I'm running into with my testing and I've tried all sorts of numbers suggested in other threads for the variables to try and get this to go away, but nothing seems to change it.The effect seems very similar to when the weapon was disappearing in Beta 1. I'd have to do a side by side comparison to see if the angles are the same, but can't say for sure otherwise.
Associate Steve Acaster
[YorkshireRifles.com]
If so, try reducing the shadow distance.