Sky Sequencer¶

The Sky Sequencer is used to generate .sq files for use within projects that have integrated trueSKY. It features all settings and variables found within the Unreal and Unity sequencers.

Downloading, Installing and Launching the Sky Sequencer¶

The Sky Sequencer can be downloaded from the downloads section of the website.

Once downloaded, please follow the steps in the installer and install into your desired location. The installer will prompt you to launch the Sky Sequencer upon completion.

The location of the Sky Sequencer executable is: [YourInstallLocation]/build/bin/Release/SkySequencer_MD.exe

Presets¶

There are a selection of presets available with the Sky Sequencer. To load these presets navigate to File/Load from Menu Bar, search for the below path and open one of the provided .sq files. The preset files are found in: [YourInstallLocation]/Applications/SkySequencer/Presets

Current presets available are:

Cirrocumulus
Cirrus
Clear sky
Cumulus
Fog
StratoCumulus
Stratus

Navigation¶

By default the Sky Sequencer’s layout will look like this: See video below.

You can re-arrange the Sky Sequencer’s docked windows to fit your work style with ease. Here is a short video on how to re-arrange the Sky Sequencer’s layout along with a basic overview of the controls.

You can navigate easily through each of the docked windows as you desire and their functionality is outlined later on this page.

There are a lot of similarities between the Sky Sequencer and the Sequencers supplied with our Unreal and Unity plugins. All of the information for these plugins is directly transferable to the Sky Sequencer, however certain properties might be in slightly different locations. This is most notable with properties found on the trueSKY actor/object; they would most likely be within the Sky Sequencer’s global properties - See below.

Windows and their functionality¶

All windows are movable and dockable to anywhere within the Sky Sequencer and they can be closed if not in use. They can be re-opened simply by navigating to Window from Menu Bar and selecting the window you wish to re-open.

Keyframer¶

This is where you can add keyframes to the timeline, as well as access the sky and cloud layers. It has time controls such as the time multiplier and the time scrubber.

Properties¶

This shows the properties of the selected keyframe or layer. When no keyframe or layer is selected, it will show the global properties as well as API options and other global settings. See further explanation below.

There are three distinct properties sections that are found with the Sky Sequencer:

Keyframe properties, which are accessed by clicking on either a cloud or sky keyframe within the Keyframer.
Layer properties, which are accessed by clicking on a cloud or sky layer in the Keyframer.
Global properties, which are accessed by clicking on any empty space within the Keyframer or the Time button under the sky/cloud layers.

This page explains in more detail trueSKY’s time, keyframes and layers information, if you are unfamiliar with them.

Performance¶

This shows a variety of performance metrics and their breakdowns for both the CPU and GPU. This information can compliment information gained from the use of onscreen displays found under View/Onscreen displays.

Screenshot¶

This allows you to set of the resolution of screenshot and then save an image of your scene.

Clouds¶

This gives an overview of the textures used to generate the clouds for trueSKY as well as an overview of some select varaibles of the CloudConstants structure.

Cloud Window¶

This allows you to control of the Latitude and Longitude of the scene, as well as shows the location of keyframes on the globe. A summary view of the current clouds in the scene from a top down view is also displayed on the globe.

Scene¶

Not used in trueSKY 4.3+.

Simulation¶

Not used in trueSKY 4.3+.

Viewport¶

This shows the current view of the scene. The mouse scroll wheel will increase or decrease the field of view of the camera, holding right click and moving the mouse will pan the camera, holding alt + right click and moving the mouse will roll the camera and holding middle click and moving the mouse will change the altitude of the camera. You can use the WASD keys to move around the scene. The camera speed can be altered within the global properties.

Saving and Loading Sequencer Files¶

If you want to save a .sq file for use within your scene, navigate to File/Save as and then save the .sq file into the desired location.

If your project requires .seq files instead, navigate to File/Export as Binary and then save the .seq file into the desired location.

To load a .sq file, navigate to File/Load and locate the desired .sq file. Presets can be accessed via this menu option as stated above.

To load a .seq file, navigate to File/Load binary sequence and locate the desired .seq file.

Note: When saving a .sq file only the camera, layer and keyframe data is saved to the file, this means that any global properties will need to be manually set within your code so as to fully match the results being shown in the Sky Sequencer’s viewport.

Common Questions¶

My clouds appear too bright: There are a few different solutions to this. To control the brightness of the clouds, you can adjust the camera exposure properties within the global properties, or adjust the lighting properties of the directional light and indirect lighting to the clouds.

My clouds are too low resolution: Within the global properties, you can adjust the overall cloud resolution. In most use-cases 512 or 1024 should suffice. Alternatively, you could adjust the edge noise wavelength and size to increase the fidelity of the clouds, which can be found in the global settings. Remember that global properties are not saved in the .sq files and would need to be manually set each time for your scene.