Well, this is definantly drifting waaaaay off topic, but let me break the
term "full screen alpha blended lit polygons" into simpler pieces and give a
few definitions:
full screen polygon - basically a polygon that takes up the entire
screen -99% of modern consumer level 3D hardware can only render 3 sided
polygons (triangles or 'tris'). So in this case, imagine 10 very large
triangles that take up your entire screen.
alpha blended - A good example of this is EQ's particle system - note how
the particles (when a spell is cast, etc) are translucent? The 3D hardware
term for this translucency is 'alpha blending' - which basically means
taking an arbitrary extra mathematical compenent (the 'alpha' component) to
determine exactly how translucent the triangle or pixel is. For example, a
triangle rendered with a 0 alpha value would be completely non translucent,
a triangle rendered with a .5 alpha value would be 50% translucent and one
rendered with a 1.0 alpha value would be completely translucent (invisible)
lit - 3D jargon for having had 3D lighting information applied. For
example, a 'tri' that has been 'lit', takes into account all the nearby
lightsources in the 3d world and alters it's color to simulate the effects
of lighting on it. For example, at night in EQ, the polys are darker
because the 'sun' light has been turned down, so the lighting on the 'tris'
is much darker.
I hope this helps,
Nindar
--
Nick Shaffner
Programmer: Duke Nukem Forever
3D Realms
-----Original Message-----
From: Rose <
rliu@...>
To:
EQ-Clerics@onelist.com <
EQ-Clerics@onelist.com>
Date: Tuesday, September 28, 1999 4:47 PM
Subject: Re: [EQ-Clerics] lag (was: rez changed)
>From: "Rose" <rliu@...>
>
> Gosh I have to admit Im getting quit an education here.
>
> <snip> <<For example, I can bog down a voodoo II down to 10fps using only
>10 textures if I render them all on full screen alpha blended lit polygons
>(but the number of texels is in the tens of millions).... Anyways I hope
>this helps to clear things up a bit>>
>
>Not really, Nindar, I have no clue what you just said on the part "full
>screen alpha blended lit polygons"...err wanna explain? This is
>fascinating btw...=)
>
>-Imogen from Brell
>
>>