This release contains a number of new features, improvements and general bug fixes.
The base engine version was upgraded to 4.24.3 which brings with it a number of significant engine improvements and bug fixes.
New & Improved Camera Modelling
The Camera Model has been refactored with the following significant improvements:
- New and improved camera rendering pipeline from lens distortions to noise effects and conversion from radiance to photons, electrons, and digital counts.
- Camera noise effects include; Dark Shot Noise, Read Noise, Photon Shot Noise & Quantum Efficiency Variation.
- Can now render two or more images simultaneously even if they are in different bands (i.e. Visible and MWIR can be rendered at the same time).
- To make it easier to configure cameras, new camera presets have been added for Filmback Settings, Lens Settings & Sensor Response Settings.
- Note that the old Camera Objects remain, but have been marked as deprecated, they will be removed in the next release.
- For full details refer to new Camera Objects; Spec Camera Actor, Spec Camera Capture Actor, Spec Camera Projector Actor & Spec Lidar Capture Actor.
Improved Atmospheric Modelling
The Atmospheric Model has been upgraded with the following improvements:
- MODTRAN has been upgraded to 6.0.2r1.
- Memory issues have been resolved when generating new atmospheres.
- Improved atmospheric transmission for close ranges, down to 1 meter (note: this requires a regeneration of Spec Atmosphere Modtran assets).
- Smoother interpolation of atmospheric effects (note: this requires a regeneration of Spec Atmosphere In-Band assets).
Improved Ocean & Buoyancy Modelling
The Ocean & Buoyancy Models have a number of improvements:
- Shader code has been improved, increasing performance.
- New c++ Infinite Ocean has been added (the old ocean blueprint has been deprecated).
- New option for transparent ocean.
- A new OceanFX module has been added with a high performance (low fidelity) wake system, whereby all moving ships will display a foam trail (but no ocean displacements will occur). The feature allows a large number of ship models to produce wakes while still maintaining a high frame-rate.
Revamped Weapons Modelling
The Weapon module has been re-written, now with weapon pawn (launcher) & components for spawn-able projectiles, rockets & audio visual effects. Users can extend the base components to create their own custom weapon implementations.
Important highlights from this release
- Upgraded engine to 4.24
- New & improved camera model
- Upgraded MODTRAN to 6.0.2r1
- Fixed MODTRAN memory issues when generating atmospheres
- Atmosphere model improved at close range
- New & improved c++ ocean (old blueprint ocean deprecated)
- Improved ocean & buoyancy shaders
- Revamped weapons module
- New LADAR & point cloud writer