Can prop shadows be turned off in the Reader?

[Lowkee33]

In order for the shadow to be based on the small blue thingie, it must be called in rows 22-24 of the RKT4 property, which is where it is located in my attached file.

This is actually my fault.  RKT4 is set in 8 rep sections, and each section represents a different model state.  For these flora, there are three states, 0, 1, and 2.  The first rep of each 8 rep section defines the state.  State 0 is the plopped model.  My mistake was to put that section last (from the template I used, thought I had to).

Anyway, that's fixed now.  Forget everything you have learned .

359 and 360 were simply the last two  tried just before I started chewing on my laptop

Hurts just reading those numbers.  I only hope you hadn't tried 357 and 358 before that   .

Check these out.  The standard version places the rock right where the blue thing is.  The "Moved Down" version places it 16m below.  I did some playing, and the results are pretty close to your picture.  Maybe needs to be moved down some more, or you could have different versions with different offsets.  The move down accomplished by negative values in the 11th and 20th reps.

(Now I just need to make some rocks to match my cliffs... oh but wait, my cliffs aren't close to done...)     

[dedgren]

@Carl:  You've learned far more than I've ever forgotten, my friend.

One K-point, coming up.


David

[smoncrie]

I don't know if this helps, but it does show some unusual shadows.  The lot shown contains a prop based on a Maxis Train car, a viaduct created from scratch, and the TP tree with a vertical offset in the RKT4 (rep 3).  Note how the TP tree is shifted, but its shadow does not shift.

[dedgren]

Thank you, Stephen- yes, there certainly are some odd shadows out there.  The whole motivation behind my original inquiry was to get rid of the shadows cast by PEG's boulders, which are merely awful, and by Steve's (Sorchin) large rock outcroppings, which are truly awful.

I'm amazed at the speed with which the issue was worked through.  Learned a few things, to boot.


David

[cogeo]

The RKT4 not shifting the shadow along with the model, is a known bug. If you need to shift the model, better use my SC4 Model Tweaker (copy the model(s) and assign them new TGI IDs - no need to copy the textures (FSH), they can still be using the original ones).

Also models with 1 Z/R view may cause shadow problems. Automata, for example, don't cast shadows, instead they have the shadow modeled as well.

[dedgren]

cogeo, thanks for the info.

If you need to shift the model, better use my SC4 Model Tweaker

That's what I'd always done in the past- great tool.  I was wondering if it now works happily under Win 7 (64 bit)?  I have an elderly XP machine I use to run the Tweaker on, but it is showing its age.


David

[smoncrie]

Cogeo,

I was just illustrating strange shadows that might give insight into how shadows work.  I was not claiming that these kinds of shadows were unknown.

One reason I showed the RKT4 shadow bug, was that I was thinking that one could remove the shadow by shifting the model and its shadow underground, and then use RKT4 to shift the model back to the surface.  I did not mention this because I thought that Lowkee33's solution was better.

The train prop shown uses RKT0 (1 S3D), and the viaduct to use RKT1 (20 S3Ds).  Both were modified from the originals.

[Lowkee33]

My turn for help

I've made this model and I want it to only use one FSH.  As the image shows, my topic is trash.  I've made the individual trash cans to only use one FSH, and I didn't have this shadow issue:


Up top is the ingame image, and below is the Reader UV mapping.  All of the other mapping is just as tight for the other rotations, and I don't know why the shadow is crossing over.  You can see I've rotated and shrunk part of the FSH, and this does seem to confirm what Cogeo said about shadows coming from the rotation before it.  Any help with this?  Thanks.