Have we all got little suns?
- Thread starter ste
- Start date
I get all that scale and distance stuff, but for whatever reason it still looks off.
The line around it kind of gives you a point of reference. You know when you get to that line you can look around and get a feel for its size. The line is about the width of the sun from the sun, so I'm about 2 widths away from the sun and thats the size of it.
You should be able to get closer, make the sun appear larger on screen but while still feeling like you are 2 sun widths away to give it the scale.
Its pretty hard to explain. But something is telling my brain that the object I'm looking at is not very big.
The line around it kind of gives you a point of reference. You know when you get to that line you can look around and get a feel for its size. The line is about the width of the sun from the sun, so I'm about 2 widths away from the sun and thats the size of it.
You should be able to get closer, make the sun appear larger on screen but while still feeling like you are 2 sun widths away to give it the scale.
Its pretty hard to explain. But something is telling my brain that the object I'm looking at is not very big.
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Yaffle
Volunteer Moderator
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vh5kZ4uIUC0 may help with the problem.
ETA - you are about the orbit of Mercury from our sun. So it feels right.
ETA - you are about the orbit of Mercury from our sun. So it feels right.
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Could just be me but, I thought the suns look different sizes. But they all look freaking awesome.
There have been a few discussions around this. The fact is we, as Humans don't seem to be very good at scale. Without any frame of reference you can't determine size. People have the same problems with the space stations in Elite. Quite a few sci-fi games get around it by forcing you to fly apparently very close to the planet or adding more 'space furniture' to help you.
Yaffle
Volunteer Moderator
And this is before the solar flare added extra coolness. Or hotness, depending on your point of view.
I understand what you're saying OP, and I agree, you can definitely tell the scale is off with the suns. It's more a limitation of the engine (actually, it's more a limitation of current mainstream technology in general)
I think the biggest issue that draws attention to it, for me, is the fact that the game so absolutely perfectly handles the trickery involved with scale for every other area, so for the suns where the tech is the, for lack of a term, "weakest", it's more noticable.
Not sure what they can do to improve this too much without significant changes, but it's not a HUGE deal for me. I just headcannon that the view is actually being altered like photoshop real-time by the screen. If it was a real sun , it'd be extremely bright, so the computer hides that and rendors a digital sun, which explains any potential graphical glitches as well
I think the biggest issue that draws attention to it, for me, is the fact that the game so absolutely perfectly handles the trickery involved with scale for every other area, so for the suns where the tech is the, for lack of a term, "weakest", it's more noticable.
Not sure what they can do to improve this too much without significant changes, but it's not a HUGE deal for me. I just headcannon that the view is actually being altered like photoshop real-time by the screen. If it was a real sun , it'd be extremely bright, so the computer hides that and rendors a digital sun, which explains any potential graphical glitches as well
What engine limitation or tech? We will be able to go much, much closer to the stars in the retail game, and even try to scoop fuel from their "atmospheres". Same goes for gas giants. Also, the same pretty much happens with planets right now (we view them from a very high orbit). Have in mind that the plan is to actually land sometime in the future on them, and (as every other object in the game) they are 1:1 scale!
FDEV have communicated to us that the mass lock limit is set high right now, and as they update their PG code and get more LoDs on them we will keep getting closer and closer until we can actually...crash into the object if not careful.
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Except you can't tell the scale is off because it isn't. You may not be appreciating the scale but that is different. In real life the Sun and Moon can look like they are on a similar scale because they are just spheres in the sky. You don't look at the Sun and appreciate it's size.
I dont think its a tech issue, I think its a visual problem with that line of influence you see in supercruise.
Its like the influence line feels oval but it follows your pov. Its much further away from the sun when you look at it directly rather than the sides.
Basically what I'm trying to say is if that line around the sun is how close you are when you are looking at it straight ahead the sun should look much bigger than it does.
The planets dont have this problem, yes you are closer to them but they still give off the right sense of scale.
Its like the influence line feels oval but it follows your pov. Its much further away from the sun when you look at it directly rather than the sides.
Basically what I'm trying to say is if that line around the sun is how close you are when you are looking at it straight ahead the sun should look much bigger than it does.
The planets dont have this problem, yes you are closer to them but they still give off the right sense of scale.
Yaffle
Volunteer Moderator
Think about an eclipse - the moon appears larger than the sun.
Space is difficult to judge scale, there is no reference point or haze to give an impression of distance or perspective. When you look at a mountain on earth you know it's big, because you can see trees on it. You know how big a tree is. It will look hazy because of the air inbetween you and it.
No such deal in space. Look at the moon landing pictures, it's impossible to tell how big boulders are, or how far away. This effect has been used to add to the nonsense that the whole thing was faked. Space is different in every way to our familiar, and our poor brains have not evolved to deal with it.
Space is difficult to judge scale, there is no reference point or haze to give an impression of distance or perspective. When you look at a mountain on earth you know it's big, because you can see trees on it. You know how big a tree is. It will look hazy because of the air inbetween you and it.
No such deal in space. Look at the moon landing pictures, it's impossible to tell how big boulders are, or how far away. This effect has been used to add to the nonsense that the whole thing was faked. Space is different in every way to our familiar, and our poor brains have not evolved to deal with it.
Is the line you mean the orbit of an object around the star? It will be an arbitrary distance from the star depending on what is in the system. Sorry if I misunderstood maybe post an image.
Edit - sorry do you mean the line that marks how close you can get to the star? If so don't sweat it, that will change as you can get closer and scoop in the future.
Edit - sorry do you mean the line that marks how close you can get to the star? If so don't sweat it, that will change as you can get closer and scoop in the future.
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The fact that we have a better sense of scale for planets has a lot to do with the fact that our brain automatically associates rocky planets with a certain size, gas giants with a bigger size, moons even smaller, etc.
With stars we don't have that, we only know one star from up close, and for all our brain knows, all other stars look the same. Stars also have a huge variety in sizes which makes your brain doubt whether it's a dwarf or a giant. They look the same yet one is 1000 times larger than the other.
In this video I kind of lose it at Arcturus, my brain won't handle the increasing sizes 
but this is a nice size comparison video.
http://youtu.be/HEheh1BH34Q
but this is a nice size comparison video. http://youtu.be/HEheh1BH34Q