"Timing" of nighttime lights.

[Johaen]

I'm not sure if this is really a "bug", but it sure has been bugging me.



This is a picture of North America as it is right now as I type, 2:15ish PM CST. As you can see, a large portion of the US has the nighttime texture partially on, so that it appears that there are lights on the majority of the country. But there really isn't. Even St. Louis, near where I live, where it's the middle of the afternoon, and where the lights are definitely not on in real life, they are being displayed in Celestia. I believe that there needs to be a change in the timing of when the nighttime texture is drawn, so that it is much closer to the terminator.

[John Van Vliet]

from your screen shot it looks like you are using multitexture setting and not openGL or openGL/Nvidia vertex shading
try scrolling threw them ( ctrl and "v" ) at the same time
some shots no clouds
multitexture 1024 x 768

openGL 1024 x 768

openGL + nvidia shaders 1024 x 768

[Johaen]

Incorrect. That screenshot was taken using OpenGL 2.0. Plus, even in your screenshots, the nighttime lights are showing up in the daylight.

[dirkpitt]

Yes, this is definitely a long-standing annoyance. There are several problems here:
1. Night lights are faded according to the brightness of the terminator, but the terminator itself is not sharp enough
2. Real street lights turn on in a matter of minutes, which may be even faster than the actual transition of day->dusk.
(Some streetlight photodetectors also switch off lights at very late hours to save energy, say at midnight, but that just complicates the picture needlessly)
3. Artificial night lights, such as those on Earth, may need different "on/off" timings than natural phosphorescent glows that may exist on other planets.

[cpotting]

Perhaps this is related. I have noticed that terminator seems to start too soon. Looking at Earth from "above" and you will see that far less than 50% of it is illuminated by the sun.

The net result is that while I can look outside and still see the sun in the sky, Celestia is showing Vancouver Island in pitch darkness, both in the morning and at night. I have had to resort to increasing the ambient brightness to try to compensate, but even this is not satisfactory.

[cartrite]

Perhaps this is related. I have noticed that terminator seems to start too soon. Looking at Earth from "above" and you will see that far less than 50% of it is illuminated by the sun.

The net result is that while I can look outside and still see the sun in the sky, Celestia is showing Vancouver Island in pitch darkness, both in the morning and at night. I have had to resort to increasing the ambient brightness to try to compensate, but even this is not satisfactory.

Ditto That. The sunsets would "look" a lot better if there was some light on the land. Currently, just before sunset, the land is mostly if not all dark.
cartrite

[HB]

Yes, with or without nightlight rendering, Holland remains in the dark during daytime. Such kind of darkness can usually found in areas above the polarcircle. You have to set the date to a summer season to get a more bright country. However, even then is the daylight-period too short.

Kind regards...

[chris]

Perhaps this is related. I have noticed that terminator seems to start too soon. Looking at Earth from "above" and you will see that far less than 50% of it is illuminated by the sun.

The net result is that while I can look outside and still see the sun in the sky, Celestia is showing Vancouver Island in pitch darkness, both in the morning and at night. I have had to resort to increasing the ambient brightness to try to compensate, but even this is not satisfactory.

Ditto That. The sunsets would "look" a lot better if there was some light on the land. Currently, just before sunset, the land is mostly if not all dark.
cartrite

Part of the problem is that right now, light scattered by the atmosphere isn't considered when calculating the brightness of a point on the Earth's surface. In reality, you can see quite well immediately after sunrise, but Celestia will show everything in complete darkness then. A related problem is that shadowed sides of objects on the Earth's surface are completely black, whereas in reality scattering of light by the sky reduces the depth of these shadows.

--Chris

[Johaen]

Part of the problem is that right now, light scattered by the atmosphere isn't considered when calculating the brightness of a point on the Earth's surface.

Any plans anytime soon to consider this atmosphere light scattering to brighten the surface?