speakers / visportals

[Fenn]

I have a small test map (2 rooms, 1 visportaled door). One room has a speaker in it with the following properties:

 

s_shader: weather_rain04

s_volume: 30

s_occlusion: 0

s_omni: 1

s_global: 0

s_looping: 1

 

The problem is I can hear the rain even when the door is closed. The visportal muffles the sound, but doesn't prevent it completly.

 

I noticed in the Thiefs Den demo the the door to the house completely blocks the noise from the rain in the yard. Is there something I'm doing wrong?

 

 

Thanks.

[SneaksieDave]

What comes to mind is that you should check your min and max radii on the speaker (current build of DR shows it graphically too). I haven't played with speakers for a bit, but adjusting of them will determine if the portal cuts the sound off completely, some (as you currently have), or not at all.

 

Edit: the button is 'show/hide speaker volumes', the properties, s_maxdistance, s_mindistance

[Fidcal]

yeah, that distance is in metres which is roughly 40 doom units. I had a problem myself in Den getting this just right - I think it was trial and error.

 

On another matter, the volume should be negative values. I didn't know this myself till recently which is why some sounds were too loud in Den:

 

s_volume negative values to be subtracted from the volume of your sound 0(max) to -60(silent.) Note that the right volume heavily depends on the loudness of the actual ogg file and the nature of the ambient being played. Typical values might be -2 or --6, -8 etc. whereas -20 is barely heard. Just experiment a bit with the value until you're satisfied...

 

[EDIT] Looking back at what I did I see the MAX distance of the nearest rain speaker is OUTSIDE the door. Maybe that's the secret. Not sure if I knew that at the time! Try it anyway.

[Fenn]

Thanks guys for sorting that out. I got it working with a bit of fiddling.

 

I did know about the s_min/maxdistance properties, but it didn't occur to me that these would interact with the visportal, so I didn't bother apply them

[Fenn]

[EDIT] Looking back at what I did I see the MAX distance of the nearest rain speaker is OUTSIDE the door. Maybe that's the secret. Not sure if I knew that at the time! Try it anyway.

 

Are you sure? Wouldn't that mean the the rain is inaudible from inside the house? I can hear it inside, as long as the door is open and I don't move too far from it.

 

I got it working on my little map by having the max distance just inside the door.

Edited May 15, 2008 by Fenn

[Fidcal]

D'oh! Yes - I should have said the MIN! Yes of course - sorry - I was thinking MAX volume which is heard up to the MIN distance.

 

Anyway, you got it working - with the max just inside. If by 'just inside' you mean about 1 foot then I would recommend you try pushing it further otherwise the player will find the rain fade to nothing just inside the door even with it open. I had the max in Den just past that little carpet that is pushed to one side behind the door. It seemed about right that you could hear the rain inside for quite a few feet if the door is open, 3 or 4 paces imo.

[Ishtvan]

On another matter, the volume should be negative values. I didn't know this myself till recently which is why some sounds were too loud in Den:

 

s_volume negative values to be subtracted from the volume of your sound 0(max) to -60(silent.) Note that the right volume heavily depends on the loudness of the actual ogg file and the nature of the ambient being played. Typical values might be -2 or --6, -8 etc. whereas -20 is barely heard. Just experiment a bit with the value until you're satisfied...

The volume could be positive if you think the sound as-is is really soft and want it louder. Usually it's the case that it's recorded loud enough as is and you want it softer, so you usually use negative values. It's an offset in dB, so subtracting 10 is like dividing by 10, adding 10 is like multiplying by 10. Adding 3 is multiplying by about 2.

[Fidcal]

The volume could be positive if you think the sound as-is is really soft and want it louder. Usually it's the case that it's recorded loud enough as is and you want it softer, so you usually use negative values. It's an offset in dB, so subtracting 10 is like dividing by 10, adding 10 is like multiplying by 10. Adding 3 is multiplying by about 2.

But there must be an 'internal' max? I recall trying different positive values and could tell no difference. I'll have to do some more testing. Probably it's not noticeable on some sounds that are already loud.

[OrbWeaver]

It's an offset in dB, so subtracting 10 is like dividing by 10, adding 10 is like multiplying by 10. Adding 3 is multiplying by about 2.

 

Shouldn't that be subtracting 20 to divide by 10, and add 6 to multiply by 2?

[greebo]

Shouldn't that be subtracting 20 to divide by 10, and add 6 to multiply by 2?

Yup. Adding 3 dB would be a factor of 1.4.

 

I always have to look up these conversion equations myself - it's not a very intuitive quantity, and that factor 20 doesn't help either. Unless you're dealing with that everyday of course, then you get a feeling for the numbers.