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I just spent two hours on this and indeed this is not possible with the solutions I had thought of in my previous post. I am quite disappointed. (more by my own inability to predict that result rather than by Plasma/PyPRP's features)
Simply put D'eux is right. To get the yellow/blue gradient we have to apply that gradient to all the shader and to do that we need to use either a vertex-painted gradient or a transparent texture, but in both cases that won't work because of the blend modes Plasma use.. The vertex colors multiply the texture colors, so the lighter parts of textures are always getting toned down and that makes our clouds go gray.. (only useful for a stormy looking sky). And if we use a transparent texture for the gradient it will only mix using regular alpha mapping which will results in washed out colors..

If we could use some additive mode then we could do something.. Using vertex colors for the gradient in the shader we could then simply add a layer with a low-contrast duplicate black and white texture of the 'base' Cloulds texture and set it to additive. That would sort of compensate for the toned down textures.
Here are some images to show the differences:

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Vertex colors darken the texture and the clouds look a bit sad.

Using a secondary texture to brighten things up.

(Sky texture found through Owhen great skies textures link )

For a shader with two layers of animated clouds it would look like that:

B&W Clouds#2 texture in Additive mode (animated using Clouds#2 settings)
"Clouds#2" texture (animated)
Stencil texture for Clouds#2 (animated using Clouds#2 settings)
B&W BaseClouds texture in Additive mode (animated using BaseClouds settings)
"BaseClouds" texture (animated)

It should work.. At least in theory. Still this is something I'll keep in mind if at some point in the future PyPRP uses an Additive blend mode.
So for now we can do moving skies just fine, but without dusk/dawn effect.

Hey aloys, good to hear you're still thinking about this. Just thought I'd point out that the Add blend mode IS available, and has been since.. err. 1.0.0, I think. I used it all over BoxAge for the light effects and sprites. Just drop in a material layer and change the blend mode in the Map To material tab from "Mix" to "Add".

As a demonstration I threw a sky on my random junk testing age. I probably blew it out a little too much, but it makes a point.

Thanks Aloys for spending some time trying this too... it is frustrating isn't it
You can get so close, but just not get the vibracy of the colouration found in Noloben - still, as you say, a future release might add the correct blending mode.

Nadnerb - you are totally correct, the 'Add' and 'Mix' modes are there and do work. However, the mathmatical calculation that blends the colours of the sky in Noloben is different and is more akin to the 'Hard Light' or 'Linear Light' blending methods used in Photoshop. 'Add' and 'Mix' in Blender just aren't the same, and while they are suitable for blowing the sky out, they don't really add the depth of vivid colour needed. Thanks for the files - I'll check them out.

-: D'eux :-

Actually, the possibility of "the correct blend mode" being added in the future is pretty much nil to 0. The entire list of blend mode flags available for plasma layers is:

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Code: Select all

Test
Alpha
Mult
Add
AddColorTimesAlpha
AntiAlias
Detail
NoColor
MADD
Dot3
AddSigned
AddSigned2X
Mask
InvertAlpha
InvertColor
AlphaMult
AlphaAdd
NoVtxAlpha
NoTexColor
NoTexAlpha
InvertVtxAlpha
AlphaAlways
InvertFinalColor
InvertFinalAlpha
EnvBumpNext
Subtract
RevSubtract
AlphaTestHigh

Of which, a good number of the non-redundant ones are available through the blender plugin interface. Namely:

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Code: Select all

Alpha (set for anything that uses alpha for trasparency)
Mult
AddColorTimesAlpha (used in favor of plain "Add" for more intuitive behavior)
Subtract
AlphaMult (this is what stencils do)

Now, of course this leaves the possibility of a custom shader for the noloben sky, however, inspection of the material used for the skydome in noloben reveals that it is actually quite as simple as addition. Four layers, the first, the plain clouds texture, the second, the "top" cloud texture, third, a simple gradient from black to a dark orange set to "add", and fourth, the islands ringing the edge of the view.

Edit: I updated the test age to more closely resemble the noloben style sky. (and remove some of the irrelevant stuff)

For those short on time or not inclined to download and run every age file they see:

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Compared to the original test, intended to match what aloys showed in his images above (like I said, a little overblown):

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And the blend file, for those interested in seeing exactly what I did.

Nadnerb, how do you open Noloben so that you can see these details?

Nadnerb wrote:Add blend mode IS available, and has been since.. err. 1.0.0, I think.

How the ##### did I miss that?
I never saw that mentionned anywhere.. (Is that mentionned anywhere in the Wiki? )
This is wonderful news!

Also that sky test looks great! I'll have to look at your files later, but the screenshots looks promissing.. That second screenshot looks pretty much like what I ended with in Photoshop, lighting was quite over blown so I had to tone down the additive textures a lot..

Nadnerb wrote:http://blog.zrax.net/?p=15

Aaagh!
Thanks Nadnerb.