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Create blury transparent outline around sprite

I was wondering if it would be possible to make a blurry transparent outline.
What I mean is that the image has an outline thay is transparent but blury, so that everything seen through it that has a greater depth is blurry. Like to have a blurry glow effect.
 
N

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Guest
Usually my answer to "would be possible?" questions is yes.

Could you compare it to something you come across in every day life?
Surfaces are a good place to start, although it could be more straight forward to make a shader.

I'm assuming your going for something similar to a tinted glass window (if not you may need to separate out the overall effect you want to achieve into different parts)
Just remember the application_surface is the default surface that everything gets drawn to.

You can copy the part of the application_surface where you want the effect and save it to a new surface.
Once you have that you can draw the surface to itself a few times with a lower alpha and small offsets to give it a nice blur.
Draw the surface in the room then draw a transparent window sprite on top and you have a window that blurs whatever gets drawn behind it!

It sounds like your going for a heat wave refraction type effect. I'd probably start with some basic surface effect tutorials.

So I guess that answers your question. Let us know what you end up trying and how it goes since you already have a thread open.
 
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Generally the answer to "would be possible?" questions is yes.

Could you compare it to a material you come across in real life?
Surfaces are a good place to start, although it could be more straight forward to make a shader.

I'm assuming your going for something similar to a tinted glass window (if not you may need to separate out the overall effect you want to achieve into different parts)
Just remember the application_surface is the default surface that everything gets drawn to.

You can copy the part of the application_surface where you want the effect and save it to a new surface.
Once you have that you can draw the surface to itself a few times with a lower alpha and small offsets to give it a nice blur.
Draw the surface in the room then draw a transparent window sprite on top and you have a window that blurs whatever gets drawn behind it!

It sounds like your going for a heat wave refraction type effect. I'd probably start with some basic surface effect tutorials.

So I guess that answers your question. Let us know what you end up trying and how it goes since you already have a thread open.
Thanks for the reply, I have a 3d first person shooter I'm working on and I am trying to get an effect like the one in the picture. I first thought of using surfaces, but I don't know how to. And I don't know the shader language, what should I do?ghostsscopegui.jpg
 
N

Never Mind

Guest
You need to learn how surfaces and shaders work to be able to use them. Tutorials and Google searches are your friend :p
I guess you could always check out the GameMaker: Marketplace

For now you can always use a black sprite with a hole in it. Just like the good ol' days:


 
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