Atmosphere

Again, a post of graphics features. I've delayed the coding of 'game things' mainly because now I'm not sure wether Antares will be a trading game or a simple combat space simulator. Also I'm considering rewriting the engine to OpenGL 3.2 so it doesn't get obsolete in a few years. It seems a though task.

Anyway, the new features are atmospheres and object shadows over the planets.

Atmospheres are rendered by pure raycasting, while object shadows are done by drawing the object with a special matrix that project the vertices on a plane, and a simple darkener shader.

Picture time!

This picture shows the ship landed on a Venus-like moon. The atmosphere is yellow and you can see the gas giant. You can also see the ship shadow on the ground.



This is an arid (Mars-like) planet seen from space



Another view of an arid planet



Another one, almost on sunset



Landed in an Earth-like planet



Space view of Earth-like planet



A closer view



Zoomed view of a moon of Earth-like planet from surface



A view of the ship at few meters altitude, you can see the shadow



A sunset