MPL3D Solar System Changelog

What's new in MPL3D Solar System 1.2

• New logarithmic brightness system for the stars and the starfield. It is based on the real apparent magnitude of the stars, that fits the logarithmic perception of the human eye, giving a more natural sensation to the star rendering.
• Improved starfield, that applies the logarithmic brightness system and is affected by the 'solar filter' option, as well as new textures for star flares and atmospheres, to be applied accordingly.
• New 3d particle system for stars, including new appearance, new behaviour and more flexibility. This development has been forced due to the exponential camera zoom feature.
• New camera speed algorithm. The camera speed is now directly proportional to the distance to the surface of the closest body. In this way, the closer the camera gets to the surface, the slower it goes, allowing a much better control.
• Exponential camera zoom for planets and moons. Right now, it allows to get 10,000 times closer to these bodies, enhancing the experience of large magnitudes in sizes and distances.
• Textures integrated and applied, pending packaging. V1.2 includes textures up to 4k when available. For the future: to develop an automatic download system with two final package versions, the LITE one, with automatic downloading system for extra textures, and the FULL version, that would include all textures.
• This set of effects allow to display custom rgb colours for stars and star surface. This results into 380 different real star colours, based on spectral class. It also adds a fresnel effect to the surface of the stars.
• Improved algorithm that causes an smoother movement of the surface. New movement is based of star size, and affects amplitude and speed of the oscillation. The bigger the star, the more the amplitude and the lower the speed (frequency). All stars result in different oscillations, and big stars like Betelgeuse now wobble.
• Improved transition for entering the nebulas. Overall improved nebula effect.
• 3d positional sound for the stars. The vibrations of the surface of a star, can be traduced into sounds, that are here applied as a tremble effect. Based on star size, the bigger the star, the lower the speed of the sound (~frequency), this makes almost every star to have its own sound.
• New level of detail (LOD) system based on angular size. The LOD system always base its detail in the general quality mode for objects and textures, HIGH/MED/LOW, that are to be set before launching the simulation. See the 'Configuration' menu.