Hard Light Productions Forums
Community Projects => The FreeSpace Upgrade Project => Topic started by: starbug on January 15, 2016, 04:33:18 am
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I was wondering is anyone working on the NTF asteriod base that houses the iceni? As compared to the rest of the FSU assets it stands out in a big way in mission 2 and other campaigns. I was thinking of giving it a go.
Now when it comes to upgrading an exsiting model what advice would you veterans give to making a high ploy model of a retail model, ie do's and don'ts.
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Noone is currently working on one, as far as I am aware. There was a model by ragingloli floating around (the same guy who did the Hatshepsut, and whose work is the foundation for the new Colossus), but it was completely unusable for conversion.
That said, there are only very few dos and don'ts for making new models for retail ships. The most important thing is that any highly recognizable shapes are preserved; the overall silhouette must remain the same. Similarly, the overall color scheme should not change, unless there are very compelling reasons to do so (for example, the MVP Fenris and Leviathan models have differing glow colours; this is a useful visual hint to players, and so a departure from the original color scheme was warranted).
Furthermore, subsystems must remain in the same places they were in retail.
You have free reign to do whatever you want to do within those constraints (And, of course, the realities of making game assets; Sure, your million polygon, 8192^2 textured navbuouy may look mindblowingly awesome, but it's not a good idea to use it ingame).
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Thanks for the advice E, will keep that in mind :) :) :)
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Is the Ragingloli's model still available anywhere? His Colly was also in no shape to be converted, but it did helped create the current version eventually. His Boadicea might be still be of some use as well. It sure did look wonderful.
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Is the Ragingloli's model still available anywhere? His Colly was also in no shape to be converted, but it did helped create the current version eventually. His Boadicea might be still be of some use as well. It sure did look wonderful.
Yeah, that's a good question. I'm sure somewhere here is some good, helpful soul who can try to do some cleaning. FSU is, at least, community project.
I'd like to take look on a model and textures, and see how bad it is. You guys are keeping it in the same stage for years, with the same excuse while there is no model impossible to be cleaned out, fixed and converted.
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Here you go: https://www.dropbox.com/s/ijxc1995s3ombov/Boadicea.7z?dl=0
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Also make sure you keep the screwy docking port so that the old Derelict joke about a holographic docking bay holds true. :p
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Thanks, The E. This is a great start.
StarBug, the thing you should be aware of is that the Boadicea in particular is the single most complex model in FreeSpace, with tons of live debris subsystems. As well as cleaning up and making LOD0 look great on its own, you need to match the retail model subobject-by-subobject, including all LODs, and import the high-poly Iceni model as well. How much experience do you have with creating POFs?
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Hm, converted it into 3ds, it's not bad looking at all.
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It is nice looking, but it needs a lot of work. I started cleaning it up sometime last year and lost motivation. I honestly think it might be easier to essentially rebuild the mesh from scratch using the ragingloli mesh as a guide.
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I have made a few custom capital vessels and got them pofed ok, i admit i am no veteran.
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Well, if you'd like to focus on the subobject geometry and textures, then leave the hierarchy and model conversion to others, that's perfectly acceptable. :)
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don't see anything wrong with the model, a lot of subojects that need to be merged, but other than that everything is looking superb
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don't see anything wrong with the model, a lot of subojects that need to be merged, but other than that everything is looking superb
Yes, that's what you'll see after a very quick glance. But as I recall, a simple merge caused a lot of vertex issues and polygon overlaps. Tons of things that needed to be cleaned up... not to mention optimized. And none of that even takes into account the sub-object requirements that Galemp has mentioned.
Basically, it's a nice looking model for a render (currently), but needs a lot of work to be usable in the game engine and even more work to make sure will be a proper replacement for the retail model. I'm not saying it isn't doable, I'm just saying don't underestimate what needs to be done. :)
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Just looking at the model: All that really needs to be done is to redo that asteroid. Something actually sculpted, not just taking the old asteroid and hitting the smooth button a few times.
Looking at the retail pof, its not actually that complicated. The Iceni is the root object, then there's 2 asteroid subobjects, and all of the structures poking our are their own subobjects as well. There's just a lot of live debris too. I'd be happy to convert it once all the pieces are done properly. :)
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Crappy hierarchy, tons of non magnifold subobjects, polygon overlaps... And tilemapping. Yeah, lots of fun.
...but actually model is less nightmare than I expected. Merging all of the parts would be time consuming. Adjusting all subobjects to the asteroid is the worst job here. I personally would make the most important parts [like hangar] magnifold with asteroid. And of course, someone would have to texture it.
Currently I already have too much stuff on my workbench, but maybe in the future I will take it.
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:bump:
(http://i66.tinypic.com/24l8s5y.jpg)
Cleaned it, resmoothed etc but I guess it requires some more cleaning and optimalization. Also I reworked the asteroid. First and very early WiP.
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:eek2: Looks like a great start! :yes:
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thumbs up man
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Woooo hoooo! Looking awesome!
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Almost looks like a luxury hotel. Imagine the view from those big windows :D
NTF resort, come visit our awesome rock in space!
ps: we've got ping pong tournaments too.
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So I'm going to bring up the standard problem: those windows are the size of mountains and make the model look too small.
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So I'm going to bring up the standard problem: those windows are the size of mountains and make the model look too small.
...than stop it, delete your post and don't make my day even worse. Currently I just stretched some random tile on it and I will find or make better texture before I finally bake all. I'm not sure if it's not even original mapping.
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Yeah I expect the scale could be embiggened a lot just with texture work on those surfaces.
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Finally, a Rebel ship that screams:
(http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v109/NarfPics/FS2WoF/5.jpg)
Really nice job so far. :D