Major A wrote: > May I suggest a straight-forward solution: > > - For 2D panels, disable GL_DEPTH_TEST altogether.
No objections here. It wouldn't even complicate the code much at all. The only downside is that the traditional 2D panels are essentially legacy features. All current development happens in 3D mode. > - For 3D panels, they should be made "real" 3D panels -- needles > should be some 2mm closer to the viewer than the scale. Opinions differ on this one. While some instruments (like the A-4 attitude ball) pretty much have to be 3D, I don't think this is the right model for "typical" flat panel instruments. The first problem is of course that having to figure out 3D offsets is a pain. It's too easy to get offsets wrong, the numbers are all magic (does anyone really know how far a GS needle is off of the backplate?), transformation math is all 3D instead of 2D, etc... The other biggie is that 3D objects don't give you control over rendering order. Many of the panel instruments make good use of the alpha to cut curvy holes, etc... In 3D, this would all have to be geometry. The nice circular holes in the panel gauge faceplates would have to be approximated with 10-20 vertices, which is significantly chunkier. And finally, in the real world cockpit designers compose panels in 2D anyway. I honestly find it more intuitive to think about a panel in flat isolation and then "paste" it onto cockpit geometry. Moving individual instruments around in a 3D editor is a little scary -- how do you get them all onto the same plane? Andy -- Andrew J. Ross NextBus Information Systems Senior Software Engineer Emeryville, CA [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://www.nextbus.com "Men go crazy in conflagrations. They only get better one by one." - Sting (misquoted) _______________________________________________ Flightgear-devel mailing list [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://mail.flightgear.org/mailman/listinfo/flightgear-devel
