A star control 1 remake that may actually get finished

[Dragon]

Definitely my favourite so far . . .  Any other tweaks?

I've played with this image quite a bit and it's definitely my favourite also.  Can I suggest decreasing the number of bright stars and increasing the number of dim stars (a lot). 

I was wondering about the sort-of line structures (the S-shape at the bottom and the bar at the top) are the stars generally distributed like that or am I seeing patterns where there aren't any?  'fraid I skimmed your paper but haven't given it enough time to actually understand it

[EDIT]  I meant to add:  Instead of using BMPs have you tried using PNGs?  They're lossless and should compress down to about a sixth the size of a bmp.  Better yet they're fairly easy to write out from c++ if you use libpng (which rocks!).

[Zeracles]

I've played with this image quite a bit and it's definitely my favourite also.  Can I suggest decreasing the number of bright stars and increasing the number of dim stars (a lot). 

I'll try something similar with sizes, too.

I was wondering about the sort-of line structures (the S-shape at the bottom and the bar at the top) are the stars generally distributed like that or am I seeing patterns where there aren't any?  'fraid I skimmed your paper but haven't given it enough time to actually understand it

The code for the remake is all that matters, pay no attention to that paper! That's just me being my usual pompous self. I think those are chance alignments you're seeing (though, I did think that ``S" was pretty cool), but they're more likely to occur in a clustered set. In correlation analysis one can quantify the statistics of a set of points by looking at different ``moments" of the distribution. A uniform random set is special for being unclustered in all the moments at once, so in a sense it's not really random, there's sort of a higher randomness. This set is clustered in its second order moment - one has spherical structures. If we were to cluster it in its third order moment (I'm not aware of an algorithm for this) then one would be inserting lines (among other things) I think. It's really not important, though.

[EDIT]  I meant to add:  Instead of using BMPs have you tried using PNGs?  They're lossless and should compress down to about a sixth the size of a bmp.  Better yet they're fairly easy to write out from c++ if you use libpng (which rocks!).

Okay. I've been doing this with the language of the lazy, matlab, which I think can do it.

[Zeracles]

Less big stars and more small stars.

With the same clustered set of points as before -


And with a different clustered set, one with less really high density regions -


I'm at home so with my monitor I don't know what these really look like.

[Rider]

They're starting to turn out a little... square...

[Dragon]

'fraid the last two weeks have been slightly ... disrupted.  Hopefully I can get back to Star Controlling now. 

I like the second picture best purely because the overlapping stars in the first picture are a bit saturated.  Hopefully I'll have a demo up shortly so you can see what I'm actually doing with them.  Well I say 'them' but I'm only using one picture at a time to generate a background though it should be trivial to feed all three into the generator at the same time.  I suspect it's going to look a little clipped if I do (which is why I haven't) but... we'll see

[Zeracles]

They're starting to turn out a little... square...

Their geometry is independent of size . . . when they are at maximum brightness (not the same as size) they start to look square because the areas between the four spokes are filled in. The effect may be more apparent when they're smaller. If it's a problem I think the solution would be to alter the brightness range.

Something else I'm wondering about is cover art. The original -

- has stars in it, I could generate a cluster of stars like that.

[Dragon]

Something else I'm wondering about is cover art.

I was thinking of redoing the title screen rather than the boxart just because it's a whole lot easier.



Although if you feel like doing a fairly hires smattering of stars (say 1600x1200) that would be most appreciated


As an aside I always wanted to know whose hand that was anyway...

[Zeracles]

I probably get around to it next week after I've given my talk for the year

So if I do the stars on a black background as say 1200x1200 that would do (just add the image as RGB values to whatever background)? I'm thinking there will be a central concentration such that there's white saturation in the centre, and then it breaks up into a colourful mess at the edges. I can't draw so someone else would have to do the hand . . . maybe Eth could do something like that

[Dragon]

I probably get around to it next week after I've given my talk for the year

So if I do the stars on a black background as say 1200x1200 that would do (just add the image as RGB values to whatever background)? I'm thinking there will be a central concentration such that there's white saturation in the centre, and then it breaks up into a colourful mess at the edges. I can't draw so someone else would have to do the hand . . . maybe Eth could do something like that

Oops, I was actually thinking of stars for the title screen rather than the boxart.  Hopefully I should have a 'front-end' demo out so you can see what I'm aiming for.  The particle system (in general) is putting up a bit of a fight though.  Expect delays

Thanks for the help so far

[Zeracles]

Here's 1600x1200 (squeezed to fit in the window). Now with more colours (every star is probably a different colour), before there were only 7 possible colours (8 if we count black ). The distribution isn't clustered, I thought that might be a bit dangerous since I don't know exactly what you're thinking of putting on it (the clusters might just happen to coincide with foreground objects, then we wouldn't see the stars). I could do it again with clusters of course.



So I saw about the chances of entering being slim . . . could it be entered next year or something (I haven't read the rules)?

[Dragon]

Ta, here's what I'm using it for:



Rather obviously the explosions been edited in and the ship is a) the wrong one and b) not leaving a trail.  But that's the general idea.  I just noticed that I greyed out the stars too much and there are a tad too many of them.  Bar that I'm quite happy with it

So I saw about the chances of entering being slim . . . could it be entered next year or something (I haven't read the rules)?

If I don't make it into the compo I'll just carry on as a normal remake.  Unfortunately that means the release date becomes a bit ... fluid, but it should be either the end of December or April.

[EDIT] Urk, how do I size the image down?  It's a bit large...
[EDIT2] Sorted!

[Zeracles]

Nice, you'll probably change it but I for one prefer the Spathi

there are a tad too many of them.

There were 1000 stars in that one, I'll try 800. And another with clusters too.

If I don't make it into the compo I'll just carry on as a normal remake.  Unfortunately that means the release date becomes a bit ... fluid, but it should be either the end of December or April.

Spectacular work whenever it happens really, and you'll be able to say you did it while keeping the streets safe!

[EDIT] Urk, how do I size the image down?  It's a bit large...

Like in html, [img width=][/img]

[Zeracles]

Now with 800 stars instead of 1000 -



Tell me if it's still too dense. And now, clustered -



Maybe try flipping it for optimal orientation with respect to foreground objects. I could also just keep trying until we get some distribution we like , or do it manually . . . the clustering might not be best for this though.

Oh and what's that you say, Dune 2? Mighty fine game (I never played its remake though) but which lacked the stylistic charms of Dune, you'll have to say something about your plans for that at some point!

[Dragon]

Here's the backgrounds in a mock up (gotta get my particle system working - which implies that I must actually work on it).  I prefer the clustered variety and also the coloured stars so I've not altered them this time.


Hi-res (1600x1200)


Hi-res (1600x1200)

Dune 2? Mighty fine game (I never played its remake though) but which lacked the stylistic charms of Dune, you'll have to say something about your plans for that at some point!

I actually gave Dune some serious consideration as a compo entry;  I had *lots* of saves made and screenshots taken before I realised quite what a huge project it is.  Dune 2 is much easier because the art resources are simpler (far far simpler) and all the grunt work of mapping stages and vehicle stats has already been done.

The game I'm *actually* remaking at the moment is Space Crusade (or at least a tribute that is different enough that I shouldn't get stomped on legally); Star Control is somewhat of a tangent for me.  Unfortunately my next project is going to have to follow that... probably sometime in 2010

[Zeracles]

There's some maintenance going on since about two hours ago and running for most of the weekend which has knocked out my web page from which I was hosting everything . . . and I'm avatarless

Anyway, those look good ahead of some touches to come, tell me if there's anything else I can help with . . . I'm too busy to do any serious coding unfortunately, but if there's any other little arty things like this, I should be up for it.

I actually gave Dune some serious consideration as a compo entry;  I had *lots* of saves made and screenshots taken before I realised quite what a huge project it is.  Dune 2 is much easier because the art resources are simpler (far far simpler) and all the grunt work of mapping stages and vehicle stats has already been done.

One of the strongest aspects of Dune is its fantastic music, tough act to follow, interesting challenge. And the art could be a lot of fun too

Incidentally, I'm about to start reading the novel Dune, I'm pretty excited about it.

Oh yeah and for Dune 2, that nuke was seriously overpowered, a must-fix.