SDF textures are commonly used for rendering text and simple graphics in both 2D and 3D applications. They allow for smooth and crisp graphics using small raster graphics as an input, and relatively simple shaders. If you’re unfamiliar with them, I recommend reading the Valve whitepaper. Antialiasing when rendering SDFs seems to be a recurring problem, and I set out to find a good method that worked for any input. As a demo, I’ll be using the following SDF texture. I’m using white to represe... See More

NASA logos projected onto a capsule My most recent project has been Conformal Decals, a decal mod for Kerbal Space Program where the decals are projected onto the vessel, instead of being just a flat mesh on top of it. This seemed to be an easy task, since Unity has a projector component that appeared at first glance to do exactly what I wanted. After some experimentation, however, I realized that the projector only works effectively for unlit effects, li... See More

While working on drills for ReStock I realized I needed some particle effects for when the drills are in use. I wanted the effect of small rocks being kicked up from the ground and falling back down, but my attempts at a texture for the rocks all ended up looking more like potatos. A lumpy excuse for a rock Here on earth, we have plenty of potato-shaped rocks due to erosion in water and wind, but in space theres no such forces to smooth out rocks, and they... See More

The Cube’s innards can be removed with the pop-out handle There is a surprising amount of empty space around the optical drive The Optical drive in a G4 cube I was messing with was malfunctioning, and wouldn’t fully eject any disks. Since the computer wont take standard slot-loading disk drives (the connector is upside down) and is somewhat bigger, I would need to buy something off ebay if I wanted to replace the part. I... See More

While looking through a pile of computer hardware I found an original Apple ADB mouse, the one that shipped with the Apple IIgs and several models of mac. It’s an extremely simple piece of hardware, with only a single button on top and a mechanical ball on the bottom. Interestingly, the cable on the mouse is very short, since it was designed to be daisy-chained with an ADB keyboard. My idea was to transplant the internals from a cheap bluetooth mouse (one I have kept in my ba... See More