Hi Mike,
I did a very shameful variation to this in the past:
- render 8 quads, tightly packed one behind other
- first quad with proper character, alpha masked
- the rest with color reset to white, keeping the alpha
Don't do it at home! (But it worked for objects in longer distance, like these...).
It was expensive alpha-test wise, but with just a few quads...
Petr
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