About MetaVR VRSG's Features

MetaVR VRSG™ features include the following:

• Full-featured, high performance light points.
• High performance light lobes with per-pixel axial and radial attenuation.
• Ability to exploit a multiple CPU computer to support asynchronous paging of both terrain geometry and texture.
• Multiple mechanisms for adding 2D overlays to the 3D display.
• Unlimited number of viewports per channel.
• Rich set of sky models.
• Time options with which VRSG can set the position of celestial bodies in the sky and the light source angles, based on your settings for the date and time, and the database's geographic location.
• Two independent cloud layers you can control in the virtual world display; you can specify the altitude and cloud texture to apply to each layer.
• Particle-based smoke plumes, dust trails, and explosions.
• High-fidelity animated character visualization and a substantial library of characters.
• Selective, model-edge anti-aliasing is available to apply to individual models.

Light points

VRSG supports full-featured light points. Light point processing runs entirely in vertex shader programs downloaded to the graphics chipset, affording exceptional performance. You can expect as much as 20,000 omni-directional light points or 13,000 directional light points per frame at 60 HZ. VRSG light points were developed with input from subject matter experts, such as commercial and military pilots.

Light point features include:

Per-vertex color and intensity with no performance degradation for varying color and intensity within a light string Per-vertex phase shift with no performance degradation for varying phase within a light string Period Duty cycle Rotation rate Real-world size rendered perspective-correct Minimum size specified in pixels Independent horizontal and vertical beam angle

Automatic luminance compensation for size-clamped lights, which prevents volume clamped lights from looking brighter at further ranges Visibility range function of light type and weather conditions, separate from terrain visibility Direction specified in azimuth/elevation Ability to disable directional attenuation on a per-edge basis to support sharp transitions for realistic VASI and PAPI lights Automatic ground clamping and elevation placement at load time by the image generator ASCII description file that enables you to modify light independent of the terrain database

Light lobes

VRSG provides realistic light lobes that yield per-pixel radial attenuation and per-vertex axial attenuation. VRSG light lobes are flexible enough to support landing lights, taxi lights, headlights, and searchlights. You can fully characterize the light lobe radial profile in two dimensions using a texture map. VRSG light lobes do not require multiple database render passes or hardware that can store alpha information in the frame buffer. Instead, VRSG light lobes are rendered single-pass, which results in minimal performance degradation when enabling a light lobe. No drastic impact on fill rate or geometry processing penalties is incurred when enabling light lobes.

Dynamic lighting

VRSG supports a highly optimized dynamic lighting pipeline, which uses per-vertex color, blended with per-polygon material, combined with ambient lighting conditions and directional light sources for efficient and convincing dynamic lighting effects.

Multiple-CPU computer support

If your computer has multiple CPUs, and is running the Windows 2000 or more current operating system, VRSG will exploit the additional CPUs to support its asynchronous paging of both terrain geometry and texture. A second CPU, or multiple CPUs, will remove the burden from the primary CPU of loading terrain geometry and texture images into system memory, constructing the real-time graphics hierarchy from on-disk structures, and CPU-expensive operations such as wavelet decompression of textures.

Heads-up display (HUD) and 2D overlays

VRSG supports multiple mechanisms for adding 2D overlays to the 3D display. You can describe static overlays in an ASCII file without coding. Static overlays can be made dynamic though a UDP-based interface to the visual system. A simulation host can send commands to the visual system to enable, disable, scale, rotate, and translate overlay primitives.

MetaVR provides a plug-in mechanism for users who want to generate overlay graphics using a low-level graphics API. The end user develops a dynamically loaded library (DLL), which the visual system loads at run time. The visual system makes calls into functions exported by the DLL, which pass the thread of execution to the user-written function. From within the DLL, the user can use Direct3D to render customized overlays.

MetaVR also provides a limited OpenGL emulation layer that allows legacy OpenGL-based HUD implementations to be ported to a VRSG plug-in with ease. This mechanism allowed the Lockheed Martin F-22 HUD originally developed for SGI platforms to be easily ported to VRSG.

Multiple viewports

VRSG supports an unlimited number of viewports per channel. Multiple viewports on a single visual channel may be overlapped or spatially disjointed. Viewports can be horizontally mirrored to support applications that demand this orientation (such as rear-view mirror), or display systems whose optics imposes a horizontal reversal of the image.

Sky options

VRSG provides several sky options you can use in a scene. The sky blends with the selected fog color as the sky merges with the horizon. You can also just specify "None" to display the sky as a solid color that matches the color you set for fog.

Time options for virtual world display

VRSG has time options with which it can set the position of any celestial bodies in the sky and the light source angles based on your settings for the date and time, and the database's geographic location. You can specify an explicit time or you can have VRSG obtain the time from your system's clock. In turn, the time setting sets the position of any celestial bodies in the sky, and can optionally override any light source angle setting. In addition, you can have VRSG advance the time in the scene as in the manner of a clock, thus shifting the positions of celestial bodies and light source angles in the virtual world with the progression of time.

Particle-based smoke plumes, dust trails, and explosions

VRSG supports particle-based effects for smoke and dust trails. By default, particle-based effects are not enabled, due to their computational complexity and potential impact on performance. To enable particle-based smoke, locate in the \Effects directory the particle description file "_smoke.par" and rename it to "smoke.par". If the file smoke.par exists, VRSG will use this particle-based effect for vehicle smoke instead of an animated billboard model. Similarly, to enable particle-based dust trails, rename the particle description file "_dust.par" to "dust.par" in the Effects directory. If the file dust.par exists, VRSG will use this particle-based effect for vehicle dust trails instead of a static dust-trail model.

You can also use particle-based effects for one-time animations such as explosions or muzzle flash effects. To do so, you would map the intended particle effect into the file FireMap.ini, DetMap.ini, or ClientMap.ini the same way you would with a billboard-based (.eff) effect file. By editing the particle description files smoke.par, dust.par, and explosion.par, you can create or customize new particle-based effects. Examine the commented syntax in these files for more information.

High-fidelity animated character visualization

VRSG supports high-fidelity 3D animated characters. Animation and rendering is designed to support hundreds of characters within the field of view while still maintaining a high frame rate. VRSG is delivered with a substantial model library of characters and weapons in MetaVR’s .hpx format. Several animations for the characters are also included in the library; the animations portray all commonly used appearances required by the DIS protocol. You can immediately configure and use these models in VRSG.

When you have human characters in a networked VRSG scenario, you can use the VRSG First Person Simulator (FPS) plugin to control your character and view the scenario from the character's point of view.

Model-edge anti-aliasing

You can apply selective, model-edge anti-aliasing to individual models by adding the"+antialias" qualifier to a model's entry in the ModelMap.ini file. This feature is a handy alternative to full-scene anti-aliasing (FSAA) in cases where FSAA is not an option due to its resource usage or performance impact. You can maintain high resolutions and 60 Hz frame rates, yet visually enhance one or more models in a scene.

MetaVR VRSG runs on a variety of computers that run Microsoft Windows operating systems, using a current commercial graphics card.

MetaVR provides other tools that complement VRSG, among them WorldPerfect™ and Metadesic™ Compiler, terrain-generation systems that use elevation points and imagery as source data. These products work hand-in-hand with VRSG to provide rapid terrain creation and high-speed visualization.

You can order VRSG directly from MetaVR.