27 replies to this topic

[AtlanticWaves]

First timer here.  As all of you I loved pinball in my youth and I've just recently discovered digital pinball.  I'll keep it short I have an eye disease (RP) which among other things makes it hard to see in the low light situations and track fast moving objects (sounds like a great recipe for pinball eh?)  Anyway I'm so excited that I can tweak the ball characteristics on the tables to brighten them up however I want to max it out and need help so I don't spend the next 6 month trial and erroring every table.  What I want is max contrast between ball and table elements.  Reflection helps too because it gives a little more visual information about where the ball is on the table.

 

So far I've changed the ball image to a straight white color removed the decal image and messed with the bulb intensity scale and the day/night cycle lighting.

 

I'm looking for the sweet spot where the table is not to bright and washed out but still the ball glows from it's own settings plus the ambient table light.  It seems to me that the ball brightness is directly related to the day/night scale.  As I brighten the table the ball gets even more white and glows but I want the inverse results where i can keep the table looking normal and increase the ball glowing.

 

My question (finally) Is there some other way under the hood of the table to just get a glowing white ball that is independent of all the lighting settings?  Are there other tricks in the properties panel I'm not doing that would help?  I've seen a flaming ball on some of the FX tables is there a script somewhere for that sort of thing that I could implement on the VPX tables?

 

Thanks so much for your thoughts on this.

 

~ Happy Pinballer (again) from Canada

 

[toxie]

Interesting! To be honest, i never thought about the fact that even visually handicapped ppl could enjoy pinball, as it is so fast, etc.

 

So let me try to understand better:

Is it good enough if the ball would be just always a complete, pure white, or do you also rely on the glow/bloom effect (so that it is a bit 'smoothing out' the white)?

Would it also help if the playfield elements would be rendered differently, e.g. an outline around elements?

Or if the textures on the elements would be darkened or even featured different unique patterns instead of the original texture?

[Thalamus]

Wild suggestion - look for tables with glowball and implement that ?

[AtlanticWaves]

Max contrast is the goal overall.  Obviously i can't have the table too dark or I can't see what I'm shooting at but I can adjust that to my exact liking per table with the Day/Night slider. 

 

The ball: White is best but if you swap a white ball in a table and look at it, it doesn't just stay pure white all the time there seems to be lighting effect on it depending on where it is on the table.  So it's very white when near light but gets darker when in dark areas.  I would like to erase or overcome that effect so the ball is static always bright white.  Extra width of the ball with a glow or bloom effect would help also i think as long as it's not so big that it throws off the how i play the ball off the flipper.

 

The playfield and elements: Darker is better to a point.  But again I don't want to reinvent the wheel the Day/Night slider will work for most tables.  

 

I also have a very limited field of vision which causes problems with fast moving objects which is why the white ball is so important helping me to pick it up after it's been flipped, bumpered etc. After I shoot the ball then I try to pick it up on the field again for my next interaction with the flippers.  

 

I forgot to mention that I use the trails function turned all the way to 100.  This is not as dramatic an effect as on the FX3 tables.  If that trail could be extended beyond the 100 setting and work at all ball speeds that would also be very helpful.

 

I don't mind tweaking code if there is something that will help.  I'm willing to learn and would be more than pleased to have a half dozen tables dialed in to enjoy.

 

I can send you a link to a table I've modified if that is allowed and would help.  

 

~ VIP Canada

[toxie]

Yes, please, a modified table would help, just to get an impression.

 

As for an always white ball: No problem, i could simply implement that as a special mode.

Same (i think) for the ball trails.

 

Just send me the table via PM, and i'll get going. 

[AtlanticWaves]

Re Glow Balls

I downloaded Never Ending Story to see what "glow balls" is and that is in fact what I have been doing myself.  So if you have that table notice the color and look of the ball as it is trapped by the flipper (it's glowing because of the bulb intensity scale setting) now flip it half way up the playfield and see that it look more like a green marble, still bright but not glowing bright.  What I want is the trapped looking ball all the time everywhere on the table.  As I'm researching this i think it might be impossible just using the visual and user tabs settings.  Hoping there is something I can do in the code like placing a light inside the ball lol.  Just thinking out loud.

Thanks for the responses.  
~ VIP Canada

[toxie]

As said, this part i could do for you, and exposing it in the VPX settings. Will look into that tomorrow (i hope).

[Gravy]

Very interesting topic.

 

Would it help if there was a huge crosshair following the ball? So basically a horizontal line and a vertical line that intersect at the ball position? These lines could be perhaps a definable length/thickness or extend to the entire screen height/width, as well as perhaps a definable colour.

Is it your centre of vision or peripheral that is degraded (or both)?

Toxie, does this sound like something that could be implemented in the software itself or would need to be done on a table by table basis?

Edited by Gravy, 27 January 2022 - 12:28 AM.

[AtlanticWaves]

In my case central vision is all I have ~ 10 degrees. The cross hairs might be an interesting fix for the really light tables if I could choose whether the cross hairs are white or black. Would need to be able to tweak the line thickness in order to get it useful but not annoying.

Thanks again

[wiesshund]

Re Glow Balls

I downloaded Never Ending Story to see what "glow balls" is and that is in fact what I have been doing myself.  So if you have that table notice the color and look of the ball as it is trapped by the flipper (it's glowing because of the bulb intensity scale setting) now flip it half way up the playfield and see that it look more like a green marble, still bright but not glowing bright.  What I want is the trapped looking ball all the time everywhere on the table.  As I'm researching this i think it might be impossible just using the visual and user tabs settings.  Hoping there is something I can do in the code like placing a light inside the ball lol.  Just thinking out loud.

Thanks for the responses.  
~ VIP Canada

 

there are various things you can do with said glowball

Look at black knight 2k by Flupper for example

Enable ball 2 the Magma Ball

or

Heavy Metal Rowamet 1983 VPX - VPForums.org

 

some examples of things you can do woth glow ball

Black Knight 2K's Magma ball if pretty damned bright, like you can almost see it blind

 

You can also do somethings using lighting and ball textures, like i did in haunted hotel to make the ghost ball, which is just textures and table lighting

[Schlabber34]

Would it be possible to have a "Disable lighting" for the ball? If set to 1 a white texture should render white. It might also help other people who just want to brighten the ball for better contrast.

 

 

Yes, please, a modified table would help, just to get an impression.

 

As for an always white ball: No problem, i could simply implement that as a special mode.

Same (i think) for the ball trails.

 

Just send me the table via PM, and i'll get going. 

[bigus1]

Try one of my tables with bulb intensity at 10.  You might not need a white ball.  It's pretty full-on and won't go dark

[AtlanticWaves]

 

OK so I've messed around some of the tables mentioned above and by far the best fit for me is what I can attain with the glowball settings in Dark Knight 2K.  

 

Something I absolutely loved about the glowball on DK2K is how it lit up the table in a radius around the ball as it moved around.  That feature is a serious game changer for me as I can see those dark areas much better as the ball interacts with the table.  I want to tweak the RGB numbers a bit and try different colors but the flexibility is fantastic.  Somewhere between the blue ball and the white ball is going to work best for me.

 

So I don't want to put work load on anyone and I have free time.  Can I learn how to add that glowball effect to any table out there?  My daughter is a coder for Salesforce so I have help I can call on.

 

~ AtlanticWaves

[toxie]

Nice to hear that this works for you!

 

But still, if you want to try the new disable lighting option for balls in the video preferences, here you go: https://github.com/v....7.1-66-4b24d2e

If you would then use a bright HDR image for the ball (i.e. with RGB values >1 in the image), then the bloom filter (which you can also scale up/down in the table visual options to tweak the effect) will also add a brightening effect around the ball.

[AtlanticWaves]

Awesome!  I will spend the weekend trying things out.

Again thank you so much for caring about this issue and working to find a fix.

[wiesshund]

 

 

OK so I've messed around some of the tables mentioned above and by far the best fit for me is what I can attain with the glowball settings in Dark Knight 2K.  

 

Something I absolutely loved about the glowball on DK2K is how it lit up the table in a radius around the ball as it moved around.  That feature is a serious game changer for me as I can see those dark areas much better as the ball interacts with the table.  I want to tweak the RGB numbers a bit and try different colors but the flexibility is fantastic.  Somewhere between the blue ball and the white ball is going to work best for me.

 

So I don't want to put work load on anyone and I have free time.  Can I learn how to add that glowball effect to any table out there?  My daughter is a coder for Salesforce so I have help I can call on.

 

~ AtlanticWaves

 

 

Code you can probably figure out and borrow from the Black Knight 2K table or my Heavy Metal table etc

 

Othe than the code, you are dropping several lights that are square and full playfield size on top of the table

 

The GIANT green sheets you see covering the table in BK2K?

Yea those are the Glow Lights

 

ball texture, you simply use what you think clicks with the light
You will probably want a shiney texture, but some dark areas in it can clue you into movement
as you can see those dark areas, if you set them as the decal they roll with the ball

 

 

Easiest thing to do is make a new blank table

 

Then just assemble the glowball stuff on it

 the glowball can usually be run off the rolling timer which usually already exists to handle rolling sounds and shadows

but you could add a glow timer if you wanted if it is easier

 

You can then mostly copy and paste your custom glowball routine and parts to any table

[toxie]

Apparently there is another, older, bug in the build linked above, so please ignore artifacts that could pop up with that one..  :/

[smithy001]

Great to see some out of the box thinking trying to solve issues.

We tried a v-pin once for people unable to use (or miss) a hand or an arm:
If you have a 4 button pin, re-program both left and right flipper buttons on one side.
So the magna save ( or nudge ) button will be the button for the missing hand.

Works fine for most, but not for me. I think I miss the nudging.

 

[AtlanticWaves]

Wiesshund

I will mess around with that and see what I can figure out. I enjoy the process and trial and error.

Toxie

I've tried out several tables with the disable lighting feature and it's working really good even on bright tables in really pleased. Only issue I've run into is with cute ball wizard. The lighting check box turned that table into some freaky Lazer light show lol. The ball had multiple personality disorder, couldn't decide of it was silver or white with flares of light shooting out of the white parts. Quite spectacular actually.

Smithy

Have you ever looked into using a couple of USB keyboard sustain pedals? They are a simple on off switche and I bet you could run then through joy to key to nudge the table.

Edited by AtlanticWaves, 29 January 2022 - 03:04 AM.

[toxie]

Toxie

I've tried out several tables with the disable lighting feature and it's working really good even on bright tables in really pleased. Only issue I've run into is with cute ball wizard. The lighting check box turned that table into some freaky Lazer light show lol. The ball had multiple personality disorder, couldn't decide of it was silver or white with flares of light shooting out of the white parts. Quite spectacular actually.
 

Yes, this is one of the bugs with that new build i mentioned above. It should be unrelated to the disable lighting on balls feature.