SilverLining version 2.12 is now available from our download page for Windows, Mac, and Linux. If you’re updating from a previous version, be aware of one big non-backward-compatible change: the Atmosphere::BeginFrame method has been renamed to Atmosphere::DrawSky, and Atmosphere::EndFrame has been renamed to Atmosphere::DrawObjects.

We made this change because in modern engines, you might not want to draw the sky as the first thing in your frame. We’ve added an optional parameter to Atmosphere::DrawSky that will cause it to not clear the depth buffer, which means you may now draw SilverLining’s sky box at the end of your frame instead of the beginning if you wish. This can save fill rate, since the sky will only be drawn into empty parts of your scene after the scene’s non-translucent objects have already been drawn. With this strategy, you would want to clear the depth buffer yourself, draw your scene’s non-translucent objects, call DrawSky to fill in the sky box, call DrawObjects to draw the clouds, and draw your own translucent objects.

Version 2.12 also contains some important fixes for people using Atmosphere::SetWorldUnits who are using units that aren’t one meter, prevents state leakage in our DX10 and DX11 renderers, and boasts much faster initialization times with cumulus clouds. We also reduced the default setting for ground-albedo, which will reduce pinkness at the horizon for everyone.