Skybox vs SkyDome

I am getting with both my applications and the demos a skybox instead of a skydome.

  Code:


            // create a skydome
            SceneManager.SetSkyDome(true, "Examples/CloudySky", 5, 8);



Is this something I am doing wrong, setup on my system is wrong or are others getting this as well.

I am using the Example.FrameWork in my app but I see this with the samples and demos as well.

thanks,
theMouse

Hi, what you see is indeed a sky dome. If you pitch the camera to look down, there's the bottom plane of the "sky box" omitted, that is the thing called a sky dome in Axiom/OGRE. I'm guessing you wanted to see a half-sphere or a sphere when setting up a sky dome. Such needs to be managed as a usual model, there's no explicit support for sky-spheres currently.

Ok, so either way. Its a box.

I really appreciate your answer. As I have been asking for a while and never really got a response.

And yeah I guess I expected a hemisphere. Or at least the corners not to be so obvious.
In 3ds max I have created a sky "dome" by taking a sphere cutting it in half.
Created a material by select a darker blue, at the top and lighter blue at the bottom. Adding several points along the way
to make the blending less consistent, like the sky.
then lastly flipping the hemisphere inside out.
If the a procedural texture is out of the question,
a panoramic image properly mapped will look good as well.
for example: http://www.3dmotive.com/product-skydome

I'll put it on my todo list.
thanks again

Yup, it's a box and I think the matter for it was in some history - supporting low-performance platforms where one plane less for the sky box has made a difference. But could be the story again with mobile devices (have not a good overview there).

A sky-sphere is easy to do, needs a non-lit material with fog enable, and an entity not casting shadows. Then also the correct triangle winding (and/or back-face culling set for "none"), and eventually to be put into a render queue to be rendered before all other things in the scene; the last only in the case one wants the depth write to be off for the material, to win some little speed. Then in FrameStarted event one does

  Code:

skyDomeNode.Position = currentCamera.DerivedPosition;
skyDomeNode.Orientation = currentCamera.DerivedOrientation;


semantically ment: skydome world transform == the current camera's world transform

semantically ment: skydome world transform == the current camera's world transform

BAD! I ment ..

skydome world position == current camera's world position

i.e. excluding the orientation of a camera (and camera scale is not computed at all). sorry.