Light probes (sort of) and fixes for Custom Showroom

0.8.1258.26213

• Custom Showroom:
  • Ambient from environment now uses third-order spherical harmonics instead of small cubemaps;
  • Each car has its own ambient-from-environment values;
    So it’s almost like proper light probes in real renderers now.
  • Questionable light source from 0.8.1253 is removed;
  • UI adjusted;
  • Bugfixes;
• Icon for Kunos content changed.

Mostly Custom Showroom-related changes

0.8.1253.26152

• Custom Showroom:
  • Screenshot settings for Custom Showroom (third button from top in the column in top right corner);
    Press F8 to make a shot with last used settings. Other F8-combinations are not changed.
  • Make semi-transparent PNG or even HDR screenshots;
  • Disable ground, but keep reflections;
  • Adjust darkness of cars’ ambient shadows;
  • Adjust blurness of the ground reflection;
  • Adjust camera auto-rotation speed;
  • New type of light: infinite plane with some sort of ambient light fading away;
    Not sure if it has any sense, maybe I’ll remove it if it’s useless.
  • Shadows for point lights fixed, both reflected and a bit on top of them;
  • New dithering effect in HDR tab, to reduce banding;
• Hopefully, no more windows or dialogs created outside of the screen (or screens);
  For Mica, it’s a new fix for an old fix, maybe it would work now? 😅
• New option for automatically switching to unpacked data in Quick Drive for modders;
• Automatic search for missing tracks is fixed (don’t forget to enable it in Settings/Content if you need it);
  Mods registry is updated as well.
• SRS compatibility with CefSharp fixed (more fixes are coming);
• Awesomium removed (it was an old and terribly slow engine, please, migrate to CefSharp);
• Loaders for acdriftingpro.com and assetto-db.com are fixed;
• Search for missing content in Google and stuff improved.

Filtering documentation, search in Settings

0.8.1237.25873

• Filtering updated and slightly changed here and there;
• Finally, filtering documentation!
  • Popup hints for search inputs;
  • New section in About;
• Search in Settings;
  I’m still adding keywords, so it might not be very good for now.
• AI driver nationality is taken from skin if set;
• New option to mark Kunos content with a specific icon enabled by default;
• Default theme fixed;
• Special icons for replays and KN5 files for Windows Explorer;
• Generic mods handling improved;
• New “Install Recommended Plugins” button in Welcome dialog;
• Content installation with 7-Zip plugin is going to be fixed;
  As soon app is updated, I’m going to re-upload an update for the plugin — don’t forget to download it in Settings/Plugins!
• Option for bold title links;
• Various fixes and performance optimizations for UI and core.

Custom Showroom, Paint Shop and other changes

0.8.1213.25548

• The Setup Market caching fixed (with new caching server), option to use it was reset to default (enabled) to avoid overloading.

For more changes between previous release and this one, please, use this link.

Bugfixes, bugfixes, bugfixes

• Car analyzer:
  • New diagnostics for cars about missing or empty LUT-files;
    With those issues, AC’s “log.txt” can easily reach gigabytes in size.
  • If there are any critical issues with car (from analyzer), there’ll be a warning in Quick Drive next to Drive button;
• Custom Showroom and previews:
  • Object-space normals support;
  • Materials dialog improved;
  • Save and load (optionally) camera position with presets;
  • Load camera from any other preset, including previews preset;
  • Camera tilt option;
  • Press F8 in Custom Previews style editor to create a 1920×1080 screenshot;
  • Specify file name for preview images;
  • New option to hide ground at all, apart from shadow;
  • With PNG extension of previews file name, result image will be semi-transparent;
  • New tone mapping functions;
  • Tone mapping functions are synced to have similar brightness with similar input params;
  • Blurred reflection are independent from reflections resolution now;
  • Brightness of visuals for area lights now should me more accurate, and also, just in case, customizable;
  • A couple of buttons in settings to reset heavy settings for previews as well;
  • Live reloading for animations, driver position and driver model;
  • Shifting animation;
  • Move driver around and save its updated position to “steer.ksanim” (should exist before that);
  • Copy driver position from “steer.ksanim” to “driver_base_pos.knh” (should exist before that);
  • Bloom on-off option renamed to “HDR” since this is what it is;
    Use “Bloom” slider option on “Misc” tab to adjust bloom.
  • CPU consumption fixed;
  • Hi-res screenshots montage fixed;
  • Windscreen shader with area lights fixed;
  • Car auto-alignment for previews fixed (thanks to Schnipp for pointing out, very slippery bug);
  • Movement speed fixed;
• The Setup Market integration:
  • Disabled by default;
  • Lifespan of caches doubled (but now you can decrease it);
  • New enabled by default option for taking setups list from a small proxy-server to decrease TSM server overload;
    Very sorry about it.
• Quick Drive:
  • Random time fixed;
  • Missing car skins issue fixed;
  • Last position races fixed;
  • Car description fixed;
• Online:
  • Context menus in online section for car and track;
  • New option to fix server names even more;
• Interface:
  • Loading progress in Windows taskbar;
  • No more car description in online section or in race grids editor to avoid messing up UI;
• Shareable RHM presets (just need to specify its settings location);
• Odometer by Stereo integration;
• Sidekick’s odometer integration;
  For both apps, the larger value will be used. If something will get messed up, use “Recaulculate” button in Stats section to fix it.
• New AI limitation feature allowing to prevent AIs from using specific tyres and more;
  Very unreliable and questionable solution, still deeply WIP, and might not be around for a long time. For more information, please, go to About section.
• New batch actions for car skins: set names from IDs, add a prefix to names;
• Processing inline LUTs improved;
• New option to display car’s steer lock;
• Now, if RSR app is enabled, minimum temperature will be set to 10 °C to avoid banning (optional);
• Race results dialog:
  • Total time/delta (make dialog wider to see details about laps);
  • Remarkable things per driver;
• Additional content installation:
  • If installation of downloaded content failed, press a button to install it manually;
  • No more auto-deleting for content failed to install;
  • Warning about missing 7-Zip plugin if needed;
  • Ctrl+V will work at that window as well;
  • Apps installation fixed (now, empty folders will be included as well);
    Sorry for issues with Sidekick! Please, make sure folder called “odometers” is there if you installed it via CM.
• Hold Ctrl while opening car skins or setups section to force it to open in a separate dialog;
• Hold Ctrl before opening color picker to immediately go to pick-a-color-from-screen mode;
  And hold left mouse button in process. Try it in Livery Editor, for picking colors from preview!
• Sidekick optimal ranges integration fixed and improved;
• Same for RaceEssentials;
• Generic mods disabling fixed;
• Saving of race grids’ additional params in non-custom modes fixed;
• Steam overlay laggy integration fixed (might consume a bit of CPU now when window is active);
• Encoding support fixed;
• Message about syntax error in LUT-file fixed (now it shows car ID);
• UV export issue fixed;
• Accumulating DOF with hi-res shots fixed (it will take a lot of time though);
• Content download fixed;
• A lot of smaller UI/core improvements and fixes.

Mods, batch actions and sorted themes

0.8.1129.23321

• Appearance:
  • Light theme fixed;
    • New previews preset for Light theme;
  • New White theme added;
  • More customizable things (more examples and small gallery are coming);
  • Now, themes can be installed as any other content;
  • Option to increase the size of title links;
  • Lite mode is less annoying (sorry about that!);
• Long promised batch actions!
  • Hold Ctrl or Shift and click to enable it, press Escape to go back;
  • During multi-selection mode, use right mouse button to switch between active object;
  • Various actions including removal, packing, cleaning and fixing UI values;
    More will be added later.
  • Supported all apart from tracks, user championships and server presets (working on it);
    Now, this definitely makes that old Cars Manager thing completely irrelevant. Please, stop using it, it might even be harmful at this point.
• New Mods tab! Still WIP:
  • Manage JSGME mods from CM;
  • Hard links for mods installation to avoid wasting space;
  • Switch between JSGME presets;
  • While installing any piece of new content, try to install it as a JSGME mod — this way, you will be able to easily remove it later;
    Please, keep in mind existing JSGME limitations — for example, new files added to installed this way car won’t be removed while removing mod.
• Custom Showroom:
  • FMOD integration;
    Press Y to toggle engine sound or open car params section and adjust values there. But don’t forget to install a special plugin first! Linking with gas pedal is planned, but no promises (I think it should use values like ENGINE_DATA/INERTIA, but I have no idea how).
  • Screenshots are taken in 1920×1080 (plus multiplier) resolution with no regard to window size;
    Temporary fix, customizable resolution will beforee available later.
  • Tiles issue with high-res screenshots fixed;
  • ImageMagick Montage plugin updated;
    It consumes twice less RAM than before, and also, now, it won’t take all memory available, but processing might take more time.
  • Modify materials from Custom Showroom;
    • Fork, replace (as with textures);
    • Adjust parameters;
    • Patched ksEditor material library is integrated as well;
      Shaders still can’t be changed, but maybe I’ll add this option later.
  • New lights are white;
  • High CPU usage fixed;
  • Shaders fixed and improved to be more accurate;
  • Hide ground without showroom;
  • Generate base textures for color grading LUTs directly from CM;
  • New button in settings allowing to reset the most heavy options to save showroom from crashing, but keep most of current settings;
  • Dialogs behavior fixed;
  • Keys pressed in tool window now work as hotkeys in showroom as well;
  • While saving color grading textures, use PNG to save space (otherwise, preset will be too big);
  • Save modified model state and wheels positions;
    It won’t affect online checksums or the way car looks on a track.
• Some UI changes:
  • Car specs tooltips in Quick Drive section;
  • Rating and favourite icons in object lists;
  • Quick Switches panel behavior reworked;
  • Animations reworked with Google guidelines;
• Server presets:
  • AC Server Wrapper integration improved:
    • Content settings reworked, now supporting packing and local files;
    • Packing fixed;
  • Option to fit most params at a single tab;
  • Pickup mode enabled by default;
• AC settings:
  • Toggle messages;
  • Toggle VR camera shake;
  • Move damage displayer around;
• Car analyzer:
  • Obsolete sound detection (works not always though);
  • AI shifting points diagnostics fixed;
  • Repairing weight and torque/power things got a new, possibly the best, solution;
• Uploading (for sharing replays, for now; more will be ready soon):
  • Settings reworked;
  • New destinations:
    • Dropbox;
    • Mega;
    • Microsoft OneDrive;
    • Yandex.Disk;
  • Nothing apart from access tokens are stored;
  • Authentication process is optimized;
  • All login params can be found in Authentication.data instead of Values.data;
    You’ll have to re-login to Google Drive because of it.
• Install content from Microsoft OneDrive as well;
• Copy link to a remote file or local file, switch to Content Manager and press Ctrl+V to install it;
• Race Essentials integration;
• Double-click car, car skin, track or weather in Content section lists to open it in Quick Drive section;
• Curves in drive section enabled by default;
• Changelog loading fixed;
• Track skins;
  Some description will be ready a bit later, sorry.
• Some more fancy hints, plus some options for debugging them if you want to test a skin;
• New system configs (some of them) and sets of textures installation support;
• Car packing moved to batch actions, with some options added;
• Settings for some plugins;
• Online timeouts adjusted;
• Notification for installed setups;
• Change filter for cars while changing tyres;
• Track authors per layout;
• Kunos drivers and fonts are labeled;
• Car classes list is now fixed;
• Hold Shift to adjust sliders more accurately (for now, only works with some of them);
• A lot of various UI and core fixes.

I’ll try to upload new versions to GitHub as well

• Right-click issue fixed.

AC 1.7 Special

AC 1.7 released, and now it has an official support for custom launchers! So, no more replacing original launcher and related problems. So, I strongly recommend you to switch to a new Official starter (and, in case it tells you your AC version is obsolete, here is the latest launcher — other starters could mess up with AC updating).

Some recent changes:

New control buttons for AC 1.7

Such as ABS, traction control and MGU-K buttons.

RSR support

It could be even better if RSR devs would help with integration, but at least it works. Also, you can use this Chrome extension if you want to start races directly from browser.

Sim Racing System support

Again, same situation — SRS devs didn’t want to integrate it, so it might be buggy. Still in development, but could be used even now. And, just in case there’ll be any issues, you can always join to the race through Online tab.

Chromium plugin (“Awesomium”)

I personally like how IE works — it’s fast and smooth — but if you’re experiencing any problems with it (for example, if you don’t have IE 11 installed), you can always switch to using Chromium engine. Just go to Settings/Plugins and download it.

Improved Online section

Now CM can ping up to hundreds servers at once. Sadly, it affects accuracy, but you can choose what you prefer (accuracy or pinging speed) in Settings/Online. Also, I’ve added new sorting types and made interface more user-friendly (but, again, you can always switch to the old compact look and change sorting from context menu of the label with number of servers).

Some other improvements, such as booking or totally rearranged “Latest & Shortcuts” section (I’m going to remove it completely and replace with fixed tabs in Online and LAN sections) are coming.

Replays

Replays section was seriously updated. Now it can show what car was used, supports filtering and even sharing (only with Google Drive for now, but still).

Screenshots

This section is mosly a placeholder at the moment. I have to find a way how to render previews quickly without damaging scrolling smoothness first.

First release on GitHub

Still a beta-version. You can find the latest tested build here.