Fog out horizons

    The current fog layer does not interact very well with the skybox (atmosphere: horizon) - in fact I don't think it does anything with it: you just see the horizon image through the fog effect.


    However it would look much better if the section of skybox seen below the 'horizon' level was faded out. (Just open a blank model with 100% fog intensity and fly up/down to see what the fog currently does.)

    Hey Gadget, just a quick question: have you tried dialing up the fog height, as well? By default, the fog layer indeed is quite thin, but the effect gets a lot stronger by maximizing the height.


    You observed that there is no fog below the ground. The height of "zero" is interpreted as the height where ground (or water) would be. If the fog would continue increasing to infinity below the ground, the lower half of your second and third image would be 100% white. We decided against that.

    I know what it's currently doing, but the effect of fog is that you get a straight line band across the horizon:


    With 100% fog, then yes - I would expect the lower half to be 100% white. With 50% I would expect the lower half to be 50% obscure. (Hence the feature request ;) )


    Currently I would have to do some post-production on any external shots to get it to look right - so I may as well keep it off and do the whole fog effect in post. (Or I spend the time to model a HUGE ground plane, Or use fences/hedges/walls to obscure the horizon... which negates the whole point of the fog effect.)



    Second fog request:

    That there is another setting for visible distance, where the clearly visible geometry fades out into the mist(*) dependent on the distance from the camera rather than the height from the ground-plane.

    (* desaturates, looses contrast, softens shadows and blurs)

    Quote from Gadget

    With 100% fog, then yes - I would expect the lower half to be 100% white. With 50% I would expect the lower half to be 50% obscure. (Hence the feature request ;) )

    I understand what you mean but that's not how fog works. Even for very thin fog, at infinity, all light light will be absorbed and it will be completely white. The skybox and horizon plates are a problematic case because they are assumed to be infinitely far away but they contain content (trees and so on) which are apprently not. That's why we don't show the fog for skyboxes, it just doesnt work properly in most cases.


    Regarding the mist: The diffusion is calibrated to match the behavior of real fog by water droplets. Changing this behavior would allow to create non-water sci-fi fog for artistic freedom, but that's what we usually don't allow to keep the settings clear.

    I am 110% behind the concept of realism, however the reality is that I am only really interested in the aesthetics of the final product - I don't really mind if you show a rainbow by working out the physics and mathematics to calculate the sun's angle and the refractive index of water droplets in the sky or if you just slap a filter on the camera lens.


    I would like to be able to create scenes where the trees and buildings fade into the fog and visibility is reduced so far that you wouldn't want to drive in it.



    (If you are aiming towards realism, then there should also be a tie-in between the sun's shadow sharpness and the fog. And the bloom of distant lights should be greater.)