Path: chuka.playstation.co.uk!news From: Robert Swan Newsgroups: scee.yaroze.programming.3d_graphics Subject: Re: Transparency with TMDs Date: Fri, 14 Aug 1998 14:29:51 +0100 Organization: I wish! Lines: 36 Message-ID: <35D43BCF.34C0@mdx.ac.uk> References: <35D4377D.19535005@ndirect.co.uk> NNTP-Posting-Host: nova.mdx.ac.uk Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit X-Mailer: Mozilla 3.01 (X11; I; SunOS 5.5 sun4u) Alex Herbert wrote: > How does transparency work with non-textured polys? With textures it's > easy - switch on the ABE bit and set the TSB component for transparency > type. However, non-textured polys don't have a TSB component, so how do > I set the transparency type? When I set the ABE, the transparency type > seems to be random, although more often than not it's subtractive. I'm > trying to mix different types of polys so setting the attribute doesn't > help. Any ideas? hmm, this sounds very interesting, I must admit. Off hand I cant remember exactly what to do to set a non-textured polygon semitransparent but I know it is possible. When you create a primitive in some of my newer routines you specify wether it is to be solid or transparent (far superior to setting the (1<<30) bit in the model handlers attribute member) so it can be done, but what you say about getting different semitransparency types sounds excellent. My understanding was that you could only get 50%+50% with either textures or non-textures polys so what you say sounds cool. Ill dig out which bit it is tonight (i hope) Do you get random methods of semitransparency when you are only using non textured primitives in your scene? reason I ask is I seem to remember reading that non textured primitives are drawn using the current semitransparency method, but there was no way of setting this within the tmd (not that i checked if this wasnt true), meaining if you can control the semitransparency method with the texture, it might 'remember' that method and apply it from there on to other primitives in the ordering table. Ill take another look as this sounds like what I expected to be able to do with dynamic tmds but thought i couldnt. Robert Swan ps, was it my html docs you were saying were wrong? (blushes) I knew they were but am too lazy to take them down!