news

Aqua Breakout Bug Fixed 22nd April 2008

The Aqua Breakout shutdown code bug is now fixed.

 

Bug Fixes 22nd April 2008

Just a quick update to say I've fixed bugs in Aqua Breakout, 3D Breakout, Direct3D Terrain 0, Direct3D Terrain 1 and Terrain 3 which prevented users from exiting the programs via the Escape key.  No idea where the issues arose from since the programs always used to work fine and suddenly stopped without me even changing a line of code - maybe something Microsoft did in a windows update or DirectX update.  There is still a problem with the shutdown code in Aqua Breakout making it hang on exit which I will sort out soon, but the program does at least exit now.

 

Geo-MipMapping 14th October 2006

I've recently been continuing my exploration into the world of terrain programming, and in particular William H. de Boer's Geometrical MipMapping concept.  I've written my own interpretation of his ideas, generating my terrain per frame rather than generating and storing the terrain in memory at runtime, which means the memory footprint of my program is small and the terrain can be altered in realtime, but it also offers good performance, rendering a patch of terrain from a 1025*1025 height map at around 350-500 frames per second on my system.

I'm also using triangle strips stitched together with indices rather than triangle fans, and I've come up with a new terrain shadowing technique which while inflexible, at least doesn't slow rendering down at all.  The program also includes slope lighting and procedural texturing.

I will be uploading a demo when it's been optimized and polished a little more but in the meanwhile heres a screenshot.

 

New Terrain Demos 20th April 2004

I've added two new programs - D3D Terrain 0 and D3D Terrain 1.

D3D Terrain 0 shows a full detail section of terrain generated from a 512*512 height map at run-time.  Although it's a very nice looking program in it's own right it was done mainly to show the problems with terrain rendering in full detail.  Even with a modest 512*512 grid, the program is rendering up to 524,000 triangles per frame and the vertices alone use 16 Mb of video memory.  A 1024*1024 height grid would use 64 Mb of video memory.  Hence anything bigger is not feasible with this rendering method, hence the need for LOD algorithms.

D3D Terrain 1 shows a couple of interesting terrain lighting / texturing techniques, Slope Lighting (which D3D Terrain 0 also uses) and Procedural Texture Mapping.  Slope Lighting shades the terrain so sections facing away from the sun will appear in shadow.  The technique has no impact on frame rate though.  Procedural Texture Mapping makes the terrain colour depend on it's height, so higher sections appear white as if covered by snow, whereas middle sections are green and the lowest section are sandy coloured.  The procedural texture map is generated at run-time from the height map.  The program also uses a detail map and multi-texturing.

Download them from the demos page.

 

Music Update 8th June 2003

Thanks to a fantastic little program called Disk2FDI written by Vincent Joguin, which can read Amiga discs onto the PC, without the need for an Amiga, I've been able to recover all my old music mods from when I used to write and sequence music on the Commodore Amiga. Hence I've been able to record all the music that was on the music page again in perfect quality using the Amiga emulator WinUAE.

Details on the music page.

 

Breakout Games Update 25th November 2002

I've changed the controls for both Aqua Breakout and D3D Breakout.  They are both now played on the mouse which I think is a big improvement.  Check out the demos page for the new versions.

 

Windows XP support 20th November 2002

After fixing some small problems with Aqua Breakout, D3D Breakout, D3D Maze and D3D Grass I can now confirm that all the programs should now work under Windows XP.

 

Slow Progress 16th September 2002

Things have been going slow round here, mainly thanks to driving lessons and my driving theory test, which I've now passed.  With that out of the way I'm now learning proper collision detection and working on a demo that will show it in action.  The ability to detect collisions between bounding boxes, spheres, elipsoids, and any scene geometry should greatly enhance the range of programs I'm able to create, and the content of those programs.

 

Demos Update 23rd May 2002

I've uploaded the new version of Aqua Breakout with the realistically animated water.  As always, you can get it from the demos page.

 

Aqua Breakout Improvements 19th May 2002

Despite saying that Aqua Breakout was finished, I've been busy making some big improvements to the water. Instead of being programmed by a simple sine wave, the water now reacts to the movements of the game objects (barrels, bat and ball) in a realistic and convincing way.

 

Software Rendering Demo 12th May 2002

I've added a simple software rendering demo, including source code, which you can find on the introduction page for the tutorials. The demo and code may prove useful for anyone trying to learn the techniques described in the tutorials. The code shows a simple DirectDraw / DirectInput / Win32 initialization, and then shows the 3D pipeline, matrices, 3D transformations, back-face culling and triangle filling in action.

 

Aqua Breakout Finished 11th May 2002

The final version of Aqua Breakout is now available on the demos page. The last things I added were a few bits and pieces to make the garden look more interesting - a swing, some patio furniture, a dirt border and a garden rake, and I also made a new pillar for under the game arena. In the future I will probably add sound-effects, power-ups and multiple levels to turn it from a 3D demo into a game with more substance, but that will have to wait while I work on other projects. As the program stand though, it's certainly a lot more attractive than it was a few weeks ago, and I'm pretty pleased with how it's turned out.

Enjoy.

 

Demos Update 10th May 2002

Another new version of Aqua Breakout has been uploaded with some added details behind the fences - a shed, some hedges and a nice backdrop. I've also improved a few areas in the garden, fixed a couple of bugs and improved in-game framerates.

 

Demos Update 9th May 2002

Although it still needs some final tweaking and some areas still need a little work, I've uploaded the new version of Aqua Breakout. Same program fundamentally, but visually much improved. You can download the new version on the demos page.

Also a reminder that the demos are intended for Win98 and WinME and haven't been tested on Win2K or WinXP. Also they all need DirectX 8.1 to run, and the D3D programs need a decent 3D card.

 

Aqua Breakout Update 7th May 2002

Work continues on Aqua Breakout. I've added a house with door and windows, a patio with wooden decking, and a stone wall. I've also found a much better sky texture and added environment mapping (where supported) on the water and window glass which gives it a nice shimmer. The new version should be available in the next week or so.

 

Demos Update 29th April 2002

I've updated the D3D Maze program. The program can now cope with task switching and you don't have to choose your settings every time you run it. I've also reworked the controls, adding mouse support and changing the keys to traditional FPS keys. Check it out on the demos page.

I've also been working on Aqua Breakout, although I haven't uploaded the new version yet. I've added surrounds to the play arena: a garden with grass, path and fence and also some sky.

 

New Features Added 29th April 2002

Welcome to the news page on sbdev. In the future you'll be able to see when I've updated the site just by checking this page. The other changes I've made are to move the demos to their own page, plus there's a new guestbook.

I would also like to thank everyone who has contacted me about either the site, the demos or the tutorials in the past. It's been fascinating to hear what everyone thought of the demos. In particular I've enjoyed hearing from other programmers who are learning the same things as me. It's been a pleasure to read and reply to all the e-mail's.

Enjoy your visit.

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