SKYRIMLE Realistic Sun for Climates of Tamriel and Vanilla by prod80

[Aiyen]

It was made back before procedual sun was made to sort out the vanilla sun looking bad.. and the CoT one as well. At least in our optic. Prod had some good ideas and made this as a separate mod. However this was a mainly thing that looked much better with ENB. 

 

I would argue that there is not much point in having any sun textures for STEP really... mainly because just about all of the textures around add rays or coronas, all things the default sun do not really have.. it is just a glowing blob and that is it. Which is not a bad thing because once you add rays or any features.. you will have those features all the time because the default sun is just a texture moving across the sky.. just like the moons. 

[oqhansoloqo]

True, though when it's cloudy the rays and the body of the sun itself get faded and blocked by the clouds (or fog I think).  In real life though, I guess the sun doesn't always have a lot of rays coming out - depending on the weather conditions, time of day, or how high on the horizon.  I guess what it comes down to is, in the game - does it look better with rays, or without them?  I think it looks better with some kind of rays coming out and what was done with the glow effect with this mod when looking at the sun.

Edited February 20, 2015 by oqhansoloqo

[EssArrBee]

True, though when it's cloudy the rays and the body of the sun itself get faded and blocked by the clouds (or fog I think).  In real life though, I guess the sun doesn't always have a lot of rays coming out - depending on the weather conditions, time of day, or how high on the horizon.  I guess what it comes down to is, in the game - does it look better with rays, or without them?  I think it looks better with some kind of rays coming out and what was done with the glow effect with this mod when looking at the sun.

I kinda agree, but would like something that is between the vanilla and this mod. 

[oqhansoloqo]

Aiyen, if you are buddies with prod, do you think you could convince him to make us a new alternate version that has a center that is closer to the brightness/color of the rays (but still distinctly different)?  Maybe slightly smaller rays too - is that what the consensus is?

[TechAngel85]

I don't think this one is really for STEP, even with the changes of a new version.

[DoubleYou]

I agree. Vote No for STEP.

[oqhansoloqo]

Then why was the last sun mod in STEP? - it didn't even look nearly as good or realistic as this one.  Granted, the non-warm version of the mod might be preferable to some (although that version of the mod would have been better if the actual sun body was distinctly separate from the corona and rays.  I have an office window facing the sunrise over an intracoastal waterway at work in Florida, "the sunshine state", and I get a good view of the sun every day.  I even walked outside and have taken my glasses off (so as to not be looking through any lenses beyond my own natural ones in my eyeballs) - there are rays around the sun, and they rotate around and shift as I move my head around.  The previous STEP sun mod looked bad because the sun body part seemed to have a very pixelated edge to it (that's what I was seeing in my installation, anyway), and the sunglare from it looked bad in situations where the sun was behind objects...  Then talk about the the vanilla sun textures without any modification - just awful.

 

People talk about the "procedural sun", but isn't that a feature of ENB?  STEP isn't supposed to rely on having ENB installed, I thought.  I thought that STEP was assuming that an ENB is not installed, and that modifications should/must be made to a STEP installation if ENB is installed.  If anything, a note could be made to say something like "you may choose to disregard this mod if you use ENB with the EnableProceduralSun feature enabled or a weather mod that adds a preferable sun".  There are STEP mods that add other things to the game that aren't even modifications of elements of the vanilla game - what they add are completely new to the game.  I ask the question: are shooting stars and rainbows in the vanilla game? ...  They do make nice visual improvements to the game's outdoor environment though.

 

If you don't want this to be in STEP, then can you recommend an alternative mod that is not reliant on ENB that looks better than this one?  Vanilla certainly does not.

[Aiyen]

I doubt that prod would want to mess with textures that in no way affect him any longer.. but I guess you can try to ask him if he pops by. Or just get GIMP and make some changes of your own. The sun textures are really really easy to work with. 

[TechAngel85]

Just because a mod didn't make it into STEP, doesn't mean you can't still use it. STEP is just a Guide, not a Bible and is very flexible. If this mod didn't make it, but you like it...then by all means use it.

 

Remember, when we make decisions we're thinking way broader than our personal preferences since the Guide is used by hundreds or thousands of gamers.

[oqhansoloqo]

OK, so the question remains...

 

"If you don't want this to be in STEP, then can you recommend an alternative mod that is not reliant on ENB that looks better than this one?  Vanilla certainly does not."

[TechAngel85]

Not at this time, no. STEP will stay with vanilla for the time being...until the STEP Lighting Overhaul is compete...shhh! Lol

[oqhansoloqo]

Hmm... OK - didn't know that there was something else in the works.  Looking forward to that. :)

Edited February 20, 2015 by oqhansoloqo

[TechAngel85]

I'm hoping to take it with this release, but I have to get the rest of the staff on board with it. So far, that's been difficult since we're all scattered right now.

[Gekko64]

This sun looks great with ENB, not so much without it

[TechAngel85]

Dropped from Testing for v2.2.9.1.