[1.12.3] Spectra Visual Compilation 1.6.2 "Horizons" (26th July 2022) (2024)

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"Adventure is nearest when farthest from home."

Hello,Avera9eJoe here! This is Spectra, my ultimatum of a visual pack. A well optimizedand yet breathtakingly beautiful revamp of all celestial bodies in KSP, with a pick-and-choose features setup so that you can tailor the mod to what you want.Fly through the geysers on Minmus and Eeloo. Soar across Laythe's glittering bioluminescent sky. Skip acrossthe dust on Minmus, Pol, and Vall. Descend through Eve's mystic clouds. Or like they say, die trying.

Spectra isdesigned for:

• Performance: While made to be prettySpectra is as optimizedaspossible. It runs very well on a high end system and there are ways to squeeze out extra performance as well if need be. In terms of pure FPS values, it's a dead tie with SVE.
• Beauty: This pack has the greatest visuals I could create, and isperfect for film-making, or sight-seeing.
• Stock: Spectra does not effectthe stockparts, colliders,or physics. All that it adds is purely visual, meaning that craft files and saves with it installed behave exactly as they would in a clean installation, only prettier.
• Nostalgia: Many visualpackshave risen and fallen since EVE was first created in 2012.I asked numerous visual pack authors for permission to use some of their effects, and included many of the best concepts of each into Spectra with an additional level of streamline and polish. This makes Spectra a visual compilationof all great packs that came before it. KSPRC's surface textures, Stock Visual Enhancement's storms and lightning, Better Atmosphere's planetary glow, Astronomer's colors, it's all there. You can view the credits at the bottom of the page to see this in more detail.It's a lot to live up to, and so I hope it meets your expectations.

Spectra adds:

• EnvironmentalVisualEnhancements
  •8k clouds to Eve/Kerbin/Jool/Laythe
  •Auroras to Eve/Kerbin/Duna/Jool/Laythe
  • Vibrant glow to all planets
  •Bioluminescence to Laythe
  •Geysers toMinmus/Eeloo
  •Fog toMinmus/Vall/Pol
  •Dust storms to Eve/Duna
• Scatterer
  • Sunflare (Custom version of Sunflares of Maar's Phisunflare)
  • Atmospheres to Eve/Kerbin/Duna/Jool/Laythe
  • Oceans to Eve/Kerbin/Laythe

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Download: Spacedock

Official add-ons:

• RVE64k Kerbin clouds for Spectra(CKAN)(SpaceDock)
• KSPRC city lights(CKAN)

Notice:I recommend installing via CKAN as it is fast, simple, and additionally shows my curated list of recommended mods. Spectra is backwards compatible all the way to KSP v1.3.

Licensing:Spectra is licensed as MIT, meaning you are free toedit andredistribute everything in Spectra so long as you give credit where it is due and don't add a more restrictive license. What's mine is yours, and what you do with it is everyone else's.

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Bad performance? Try these:

• Remove some extras
  • RealPlume,DistantObjectEnhancement, and Scattererall tax your GPU. Removing one or more of them (Or any of the other extras) can improve your frames.
• Remove Scatterer
  • Spectra hasbackup atmospheresthat enable when Scatterer isn't in GameData.Removing Scatterer from GameData will slightly dampen yourvisuals,but greatly increase your performance. I usually run without Scatterer when not recording because I value my frames.

Don't like Spectra but still want to try visual enhancements?

• TryStock Visual Enhancements
• TrySci-Fi Visual Enhancements
  • Both of these packs are beautiful and unique in verydifferent ways.I highly recommend trying one if Spectra doesn't suit your fancy.

Troubleshooting:

• The sky is all white:This is a Scatterer bug. Try re-downloading and reinstalling Scatterer. Re-download is important.
• Duna is completely blue (more than in the trailer/pictures): You probably clicked `save` in the EVE GUI. Pressing save breaks some of my ModuleManager configs. Don't press saveand you'll be fine. If you dopress save,reinstalling Spectra will fix this.

Credits:

@Benzo Kerman

Building almost exclusively the release to 1.6.0

@blackrack's Scatterer

• Atmospheric scattering and tinting with custom configs.
• Ocean shaders.

@JadeOfMaar's Sunflares of Maar

• Spectra uses a more stockalike version of Jade'sPrimussunflare.

Inspiration:

@Astronomer's Astronomer's Visual Pack - Interstellar V2 - I can't thank you enough for what you've done for your ground breaking work on the aesthetics ofKSP. Thank you!

• Bioluminescence on Laythe

@Proot'sKSPRC v1.0.5- concept image post by@drswagbossfrom December2015. Focus your eyes on the textures from low-orbit.

• Surface textures
• Ablation on Moho
• Green-tintedEve
• Warped clouds on Laythe
• Geysers on Eeloo

@Galileo's SVTand GPP- Yourworks are incredible...Thanksfor all the help and advice.

• Lightning
• Terrain scatters

@erona's and @Thesonicgalaxy'sBetter Atmospheres- Theoriginalmod that added glow to non-atmospheric bodies. If you said this is where it all started, you wouldn't be wrong.

• Blue Duna
• Cloud textures

@panzer1b's Sci-Fi Pack- Your pack is incredible! If you don't have the PC torun Spectra, definitely try SciFi.

• Proving that planet glow can still be done in new EVE, and look even better than before.

Edited December 21, 2023 by HafCoJoe
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