The Short-term TODO List

[AstroChara]

This list contains things we would like to implement in near future.

Star PSF

• Change default exposure and max irradiance?
• Optimize star rendering to increase FPS
• Make the exposure of the new star PSF adjustable by keyboard shortcuts (like old star styles)
• Implement the exposure system
• Implement transition between point source and resolved object (see Seamless transition to close-up stellar glow #2560)
  • Reimplement flares for very bright stars?
• Remove legacy star styles and comment out GUI elements (to be reused when new PSF styles are added later).
• Remove all previous "large star" shaders
• Use the new star rendering system with all objects with render pseudo-stars, such as globular clusters (see Improve galaxy and globular rendering #544)

Limb darkening

• Complete the limb darkening PR (Limb darkening #2047)
• Use division instead of subtraction for limb darkening
• Remove star glare (which brightens the centre of the disc, now unnecessary) or render it at the same position as the star (so that it appears behind the visible hemisphere)
• Normalize stellar disc brightness and colour (so that the disc-integrated colour/brightness is the same as one without limb darkening) (see https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Limb_darkening)
• Use empirically-derived parameters from the Sun as a default
  • Temperature/logg-dependent limb darkening parameters

Photometry

• Experiment with improving phase function
• Improve LunarLambert (Make LunarLambert phase-dependent; fix brightness normalization #2566)
• Implement opposition effect (see Discord server's #development/Photometry materials thread)

Ring rendering

• Implement ring backlighting
• Do not implement specular reflection on rings

Custom orbits and rotations

• New orbital theories
  • Fix Iapetus's orbit (use https://ftp.imcce.fr/pub/ephem/satel/ > https://www.sai.msu.ru/neb/nss/html/multisat/DephSoue.htm (latest available))
  • Triton orbit (from https://academic.oup.com/mnras/article/454/2/2205/2892708)
• Neptune rotation