n3xtd : Transparency and masking problem

[banban73]

Hello there,

I played a bit with n3xtd (many thanks to Tmyke !) and I have achieved some parts of my little hobby project, that is displaying the Earth (3d) and the great circle flight path of an airliner form one point to another.
Up to now, I can display Earth, airplane, 3d path, etc but I would like to simulate night/day with night lights texture as found on NASA website.
In order to achieve this effect, I must have one texture for daytime, one texture for night and I thought of a mask texture which can rotate to simulate time passing by.

Does anyone know how I could use masking in textures ?
Things I have tried so far are :
-to set one sphere with day texture and another sphere, slightly larger, with a combination of night texture and mask (in 2 layers or in 2 textures) -> result : depending of the material type selected, various failures (only mask appears, or only lights, or none but the day colours shade or lighten.
-to load night texture and mask as images, create a new image by combining the two and creating a texture from this image. -> Result : not only there is no masking but the process is not at all frames friendly.

On irrlicht forums, one gives the advice to play with shaders to achieve masking but I don't understand anything about shaders. Is there really no other way to do this ?

Thanks for any answer that would keep me away from the shaders !

Best regards

Alban

[banban73]

Hello again,

It seems Ogre can achieve masking between texture layers in an easier way than irrlicht. I will try this instead of begin intensive shaders study.

Anyway, thanks for people who read the previous post.

Best regards

Alban

[max_aigneraigner@web.de]

good luck, tell us if you got experience in shader programming!.
I only can tell you how to implement them into n3xtd..

yours
walker