hi

I have a strange lod0 related issue in my shade-c shadowmapping conversion, I would be happy if someone could explain me what possibly happens. or maybe engine related... (earlier I had similar with pssm but don't remember what was the reason maybe level_ent size?)

the shadow of a model disappears when its lod0 model is visible, but only when:

- NOLOD is not set for the depth view (it is better because shadows do not change on lod model change)

- a model has only lod0 and lod1 .mdl files (if has lod2 and lod3 it does not happen)

- shadow area is high (>2500 quants)

- sun tilt is low (<30 degree)

- camera is nearly in opposite of sun direction

left: lod0+lod1 model (bad), mid: lod0-lod3 model (fine), right: model without lod (fine)

...just checked and in case of pssm nearly the same happens when NOLOD is not set...


and the lod offset of the depthview is 0

now I have a guess:

the depth-view without NOLOD applies lod models of a model if exist,
but depth-view looks in opposite direction of the camera,
so what is close to the camera is far from the depth-view's "camera",
if the depth-view finds no lod model for lod2-3 (when camera can see lod0),
it has no reason to cast a shadow by an empty model.

is it right?

I have the same problem. You find the solution ?

yes, as a consequence of my last post:
- you need to use lod0-3 models always if lod needed without disappearing shadows.
- limiting clipping by limiting number of lod models leads always to the above mentioned problem.
- so you have to have 4 lod models and to set the CLIP0-1 eflags to have custom clipping.