Anybody here creative?

[firlefanz]

Hello,

I am new to this forum and to Celestia.
Celestia is a great program, very nice, thanks to the makers and supporters

My background:
I am an hobby game developer, and I am writing a space shooter.
In search of getting some ideas and especially for planet's names I found celestia, installed it and it is very nice. Now I got an idea how it must look like in space

Right now I am working on my 3D interactive planet-map to chose the next mission from.

I was thinking about some fictive (but realistic sound) planet names, I need 30 of them.

So I think here are the right people when it comes to fictive, but 'realistic feeling' space stuff.

Some idea for 30 planet names, or any idea where I can get some?

I think there are also fictive planets or stars in Celestia?

Am I in the right place to get some creative ideas for creating a nice space-game or isn't any interest in something like this here?

Thanks for your interest,
Firle

[rthorvald]

Some idea for 30 planet names, or any idea where I can get some?

Welcome, Firle
There are a great deal of creative people here... Just take a look at http://www.celestiamotherlode.net...
As for realistic-sounding world names, that is quite a challenge; it is difficult to come up with something that does not sound pretentious, or will hang together naturally if you need a whole series of them.

When i designed the Ran solar system, that was actually the hardest part of it all: i needed about a hundred names that should belong to each other... I spent a lot of time going through various encyclopedias, religious and mythical texts etc. in search something that could give me a complete nomenclature, where every name had real meaning, and all names together almost told a story. (I ended up using a nordic creation myth that did all that.)

I suggest you look around; there are many websites that might give you ideas. A good place to start might be the Encyclopedia Mythica, here: http://www.pantheon.org.

-rthorvald

[Tetzauh]

Another thing that could do is to name the planets like real scientists do, namig them by the parent star and then assinging a letter to it. For instance in the Cancri System you have Cancri b, cancri c and Cancri d.

Or you could name them according to features, like the explorers on earth named the places they were discovering (Colorado, for instance means "very red" in Spanish). Larry nieven has planets called "bright eyes" (due to mirror li-ke vegation) Wemadeit (first colonized ever) and wunderland (in german)

Isaac Asimov has a great deal of planets in his works. most of his are made-up words... but if you give a latin or greek "feel" to the words, thay may catch, like terminus or trantor.

[Dollan]

Hi there, Firle...

Names are often the hardest part of the creation process. In my case, I've long had the names of my primary planets of interest for some time. Ghellhonus, Baahki, Tsevorda, these all basically came to me out of the blue and, to myself anyway, sounded good enough to use. Even now, the process starts with a neat sounding name that "sticks" with me (most recently, I've acquired a liking for the name of Dilmun, which was a mythical or semi-mythical country in the Middle East or Africa; thus this is the latest world on my long "to do" list).

However, when I decided to create entire solar systems for these worlds, I was faced with the need to come up with a *lot* more names. Even if I only created the system's planets and major moons, I often come across the need for 15 to 30 names per system on average.

The easiest thing for me to do is to find names that seem to match the original planet's name. For instance, one planet I have is Hokul'ea . A Hawaiian word, I decided to delve into the Hawaiian pantheon and came up with other planetary names that fit the theme, such as Maui, Lono, Kanaloa, etc.

Other times I have a planet name that is completely fictional, such as Tsevorda. In this case, I had to sit back and think about the "feel" of that name, and how I would like other names related to it, in that fictional language, to sound. Eventually I came up with names such as Alyannik, Celae, Ashe, and so on.

In the end, I think it is simply a matter of deciding what sounds the best to you and going with it. You can always get some peer review and what not later on and do some changes if you need to!

...John...

[Michael Kilderry]

Sometimes I put some thought into what I name my planets, such as Jovalera (play on Nova Terra, meaning new earth) and sometimes I just throw anything together (Meringue, The I Like Eggs Comet). The names may sound silly, but they do suit since they are sort of bright, colourful and "silly". Just pick whatever you think would suit your planets.

Michael Kilderry

[firlefanz]

Hello,

wow, thanks a lot for those many ideas. I already thought I am not the only one who made some thoughts about this matter.

The game's name will be 'Commando Xenidis', so I think I'll get myself a greek dictionary and get some cool names out of it, sounds like a good idea.

If anybody is interested look here:
http://www.ericbehme.de/comxenidis.html

These are older screenshots. It will be a 2D shooter (but with 3D graphics), and right now I am creating a 3D Planet-Map, this is why I downloaded Celestia, which is absolutely brillant. You can use your next mission on that 3D Planet-Map, this is why I need 30 Planet names.

I'll come with some other questions later

Thanks,
Firle

[firlefanz]

Hi!

After searching in a greek dictionary, I found some planet names that sound cool I think:

Asteio
Diaskedasi
Paichnidi
Kinigi
Noima
Ennoia
Chronos
Fora
Eleytheria
Xenos
Akro
Orio
Synoro
Tafos
Mnima
Skarfalono
Pontikos
Botsalo
Chaliki
Toxotis
Trela
Thyella
Kataigida
Zesti
Kapsa
Kafsonas
Thalassa
Potamos
Chloi
Prasinos
Galanos
Kokkinos
Kitrinos
Aspro
Melapsos
Epitagi

Some of them I'll have to throw out, I only need 30.
What additional information should I add to each planet's description?
I found StarGen, which had some info, but I think this is too much, I am not sure which is important and which not:

Temperture range
Equatorial radius
Density
Eccentricity of orbit (???)
Escape velocity (???)
Molecular weight retained (???)
Axial tilt
Planetary albedo (???)
Exospheric Temperature (???) Temperature inside?
Length of year - Does this depend on how far it is from the sun?
Length of day - How fast the planet rotates?
Boiling point of water - Depends on Temperature range?
Hydrosphere percentage (???)
Cloud cover percentage
Ice cover percentage
Planet type - What could I do here?
Distancy from primary star - Is the primary star the sun?
Mass
Surface gravity
Surface pressure
Surface temperature

If I want to use lets say 5-8 of those, which should I use?
The planets gravity should be like on earth, so my players can walk on it

Thanks a lot for some experts suggestions, I want to make it with some kind of nice looking detail and realistic sounding.

Thanks,
Firle

[chris]

The only fictional solar systems that I have time to create are for testing new Celestia features. Like Runar, I rely on names from mythology. The two stars in my test binary system are Nyx A and Nyx B, named after the Greek goddess of night. The first three planets are named after the fates--Lachesis, Clotho, and Atropos--who are daughters of Nyx. When I needed to add more planets, I used the names of Nyx's other daughters: Aether (Light), Moros (Destiny), Thanatos (Death), Hypnos (Sleep), Morpheus (Dreams). If I exhaust those names, I'll have to do some research and find more relatives of Nyx.

--Chris

[firlefanz]

Hi Chris,

thanks a lot for the info, your planet names sound cool

I have already taken 30 of the above list, they do also not sound bad.

Right now I am fighting with some 3D functions, the light from the sun is not working right, and I want to add some animated clouds on the planets, some asteroids and perhaps bumpmapping.

Here is what it looks like right now:



Thanks for a the suggestions.
Firle

[Michael Kilderry]

Where can we find the game when it is finished?

[firlefanz]

Hi Michael,

this is the game's homepage, but the screens are a month old:

http://www.ericbehme.de/comxenidis.html

This is the forum, there are always newer screens and screens of the models etc.

http://www.ericbehme.de/phpBB2/index.php?language=german

The games name is Commando Xenidis, right now I am having a fight with D3D, after I have won it, there will be new screens. I think it will be finished end of this year.

If anybody is interested in joining our team, perhaps as level designer, beta tester or something, let me know

Firle

[Guest]

One thing you will find with bumpmapping is that it is somewhat tedius to implement...It also will cut your frame rate down a bit....Personally bumpmapping is not a necessity imho...You might consider specular mapping with a textureless second pass mesh with depth buffer disabled....Also in doing clouds a simple mesh overlapping with an alpha texture is sufficiant....Animated textures will also cut into your frame rate and slow your game down....Of course using vertex arrays helps sigificantly in cutting the overhead of millions of tiangles etc...Its all a matter of what you need...

Now for atmospheres I would use a billboard that always points towards the camera....You can do this either by getting the current tranformation matrix of your object and camera and normalising or use the angle you use in your camera code to project the correct rotation of your billboard (eg: camera is facing 360 degrees by 180 degrees you would find the median of your vertical rotation which of course would be 180 degrees and subtract. This would be your vertical rortation for your billboard. On the horizontal plane just find the inverse rotation in this case 360 would be 180 on the horizontal plane...There is tons of tutorials on the subject...Just google...

Haze I did using fog which I cutoff relative to the camera or observer....the start and end factors for fog can be used to manipulate how fog looks obviously....

Make sure you have lighting enabled and have the 4th variable in your light vertex as 1.0f for omni lighting model...

glEnable(GL_LIGHTING);
float light_pos[] = {0.0f,0.0f,0.0f,[b]1.0f[/b[};

I have a comlete function I use to calculate the lighting model which should include everything you need to enable lighting...

Code: Select all

void initMeanBrightness(int num) {
   float mean_brightness;
   float light_color[4], p[4];
   int i;
   GLuint light_num;

   for(i=0;i<curr_planets;i++) {
      if(planet[i].planetInfo.isStar == true) {
         p[0] = planet_pos[i][0];
         p[1] = planet_pos[i][1];
         p[2] = planet_pos[i][2];
         p[3] = 1.0f;
         mean_brightness = absd(distanceToPlanet[i] - distanceToPlanet[num]) / SOLAR_MAG_DIST;
         if(mean_brightness > 5.0f) mean_brightness = 5.0f;
         if(mean_brightness < 1.0f) mean_brightness = 1.0f;
         switch(planet[i].planetInfo.starNum) {
         case 0:
            light_num = GL_LIGHT0;
            break;
         case 1:
            light_num = GL_LIGHT1;
            break;
         case 2:
            light_num = GL_LIGHT2;
            break;
         case 3:
            light_num = GL_LIGHT3;
            break;
         case 4:
            light_num = GL_LIGHT4;
            break;
         case 5:
            light_num = GL_LIGHT5;
            break;
         case 6:
            light_num = GL_LIGHT6;
            break;
         case 7:
            light_num = GL_LIGHT7;
            break;
         default:
            light_num = GL_LIGHT0;
         }
         if(planet[i].planetInfo.starType == PULSAR) {
            light_color[0] = (planet[i].pulseColor[0] * planet[i].pulseAlpha / curr_stars);
            light_color[1] = (planet[i].pulseColor[1] * planet[i].pulseAlpha / curr_stars);
            light_color[2] = (planet[i].pulseColor[2] * planet[i].pulseAlpha / curr_stars);
            light_color[3] = planet[i].pulseColor[3];
         }
         else {
            light_color[0] = (planet[i].planetColor[0] / curr_stars);
            light_color[1] = (planet[i].planetColor[1] / curr_stars);
            light_color[2] = (planet[i].planetColor[2] / curr_stars);
            light_color[3] = planet[i].planetColor[3];
         }
         glDisable(light_num);
         if(displayMode == PLANETARY && distanceToPlanet[i] < AUtoKM(starSys[curr_system].sysBoundry) || displayMode == SURFACE) {
            glLightfv(light_num, GL_POSITION, p);
            if(i != 0)
               glLightf(light_num, GL_CONSTANT_ATTENUATION, mean_brightness);
            else
               glLightf(light_num, GL_CONSTANT_ATTENUATION, 0.85f);
            glLightfv(light_num, GL_DIFFUSE, light_color);
            glLightfv(light_num, GL_AMBIENT, black_mat);
            glLightfv(light_num, GL_SPECULAR, light_color);
            glEnable(light_num);
         }
      }
   }
}


Of course this is all based on the fact you are using OpenGL and not DirectX...of which I know nothing about...

Result of some of the simple effects I used in OpenGL without many extentions...

http://celestialvisions.net/pics/earth.jpg

Good Luck!

[firlefanz]

Hello Guest,

your earth picture lokks very good and now I want to have something like this, too. Too bad I am using DirectX8.1 with D3D, Doooh!

Firle

[Rassilon]

Well you should be able to convert what I did to D3D...I believe everything is available in D3D that is in OpenGL....But of course you should be using the DX9 SDK...

[firlefanz]

Hello Rassilon,

I will try to translate it to DirectX8.1, it is really looking very good, but since I am a D3D beginner this could be difficult...

Firle

[Rassilon]

It will not be difficult taking it one step at a time....Dont try to directly translate what I did but simply try to understand how I did it in a logic sense and do the same...

[firlefanz]

Welllllll, this will be the main problem. I just looked at the code. first thing is I am a Delphi and not C++ developer, but perhaps I can do it. But the next thing is I know nothing about OpenGL and not much about D3D.

I don't understand what GL_LIGHT0 etc is, I don't understand glLightf etc. This all is totally new for me. Too bad because the effect really is veryvery nice.

Firle

[maxim]

All 'GL' names are variables or functions call from the OpenGL library. Just get a OGL manual from the web. There you will find everything being explained (it's mostly quite simple).

maxim