Archie Smoke - Colour Parameters

[Mike Dora 171]

I'm reading Norman MacMillan's 1973 classic "Offensive Patrol" just now, the story of the RFC/RAF squadrons on the Italian Front in 1917/18. As well as being a fascinating narrative, it has a number of nuggets for the likes of us. For example, a footnote on p.77 tells us that "British AA shells burst with white smoke, enemy with black, Italian with _red_." (emphasis added).

 

Now we already know about the first two colours, which are already incorporated in FE. However I would like to try to adjust the colour of Allied archie bursts in the Italian Front mod to "red" - after all there were many more Italian archie units there than British ones.

 

Looking at the various effects files, I see that colours are defined as four-parameter groups, eg:

 

ParticleColor[01].Value=0.300000,0.300000,0.300000,0.000000

AmbientColor=1.000000,1.000000,1.000000,1.000000

DiffuseColor=1.000000,1.000000,1.000000,1.000000

 

So my question to the effects experts is, what do these four values represent? Or put another way, what would people recommend to produce "red" archie smoke?

 

BTW I'm assuming it would be a greyish/brick red colour, not something lurid like pillar box red.

 

Thanks

 

Mike

[+Stephen1918 1,474]

Looking at the various effects files, I see that colours are defined as four-parameter groups, eg:

 

ParticleColor[01].Value=0.300000,0.300000,0.300000,0.000000

AmbientColor=1.000000,1.000000,1.000000,1.000000

DiffuseColor=1.000000,1.000000,1.000000,1.000000

 

So my question to the effects experts is, what do these four values represent? Or put another way, what would people recommend to produce "red" archie smoke?

 

BTW I'm assuming it would be a greyish/brick red colour, not something lurid like pillar box red.

 

Thanks

 

Mike

Mike,

 

I played around with the exhaust emitters for the engines (because it was easy to see what was happening right away) and came up with this - it looks like the 4 numbers are for:

 

Red, Green, Blue, Transparency

It appears that the maximum value is 1.000000, although it doesn't crash if I go higher than one.

 

I don't know how much you know about color thoery for computers, so forgive me if I seem to be talking down to you.

 

Generally, for RedGreenBlue (RGB), if all three values are the same, you get a shade of gray. Higher numbers are lighter/brighter. Lower numbers are darker/duller. Red and green together makes yellow. All 1's would be white, all 0's would be black.

 

so 1.000000, 0.000000, 0.000000 would be bright red

1.000000, 0 .900000, 0.900000 would be pinkish

0.500000, 0.500000, 0.500000 would be medium gray

 

The last number is transparency, 1 means opaque, 0 means clear

 

The engine emitters have several particles, each with a slightly different color. For the explosions, try making one of them reddish, and leave the others grayish or yellowish. It will take some experimenting to get the right combination, but I'm sure that, with patience, you can get the effect you want.

 

Let us know how it turns out.

 

Stephen1918