Hard Light Productions Forums

Modding, Mission Design, and Coding => The Modding Workshop => Topic started by: HotSnoJ on January 30, 2002, 01:16:00 am

Title: Ship engines
Post by: HotSnoJ on January 30, 2002, 01:16:00 am: How do i get the blue stuff on to my models?
Title: Ship engines
Post by: LAW ENFORCER on January 30, 2002, 01:50:00 am: the glows are done in a .pof editor and the thruster flame itself has to be modeled then mapped with texture.
Title: Ship engines
Post by: HotSnoJ on January 30, 2002, 01:56:00 am: ok. BUT HOW DO YOU DO THAT?! What program do you use to do that?
Title: Ship engines
Post by: LAW ENFORCER on January 30, 2002, 02:09:00 am: a modeling program.... you model a thruster, map it then convert it (with the rest of the model into a .pof with PCS)
Title: Ship engines
Post by: HotSnoJ on January 30, 2002, 02:17:00 am: ok. can i do that in truespace 2. Do i extract the engine ani and save a frame as a bmp and the file name and in MODView change it to ani for that tex.

------------------
You CAN thank me NOW!
Valkyrie MK3 ("http://freespace.0catch.com/normal.html")(first one)
Icq, 121212745
Yahoo, hwfreak15
Title: Ship engines
Post by: aldo_14 on January 30, 2002, 03:13:00 am: Specifics;

1 - Create an object for your thruster
2 - extract the first frame of the ani to BMP, and use it - the conversion program recognises this as a special case and sets it to the ani when converting
3 - texture it. You'll want to try and use per-face mapping if possible - the thruster texture will be aligned exactly as the object is mapped (i.e. if your BMP is the wrong way round, so is the thruster)
4 - set the axis to the base of the thruster - the tip on the flame at 0% power
5 - glue a light to the object, name it thrusterxxa, and glue to your main hull.

Note; xx = number
Also, for LODs, thrusterxxa is the level 0 detail (most detailed), thrusterxxb is LOD1, etc. glue the thruster to its LOD parent (i.e. glue thrusterxxb to detail1 object).

ONe final thing - try and avoid having a white 'tip' to the thrusters - something my earlier models (Pre-Valkyrie 2, methinks) have, which annnoys the hell out of me.
Title: Ship engines
Post by: Starwing on January 30, 2002, 11:25:00 am: Quote
Originally posted by aldo_14:
ONe final thing - try and avoid having a white 'tip' to the thrusters - something my earlier models (Pre-Valkyrie 2, methinks) have, which annnoys the hell out of me.

Does anyone know where this comes from? It also happens when I render thrusters in TS. And it annoys me too.
Title: Ship engines
Post by: Anaz on January 30, 2002, 12:45:00 pm: it is because the flame is too long, and you are getting the base of the flame on the timp (follow? it is tiled)

I know this for a fact, I tried to put thruster flames on a cruiser (http://dynamic.gamespy.com/~freespace/ubb/noncgi/biggrin.gif)
Title: Ship engines
Post by: HotSnoJ on January 31, 2002, 02:36:00 am: Ok thanx for the help.

Now on to LOD. How do I get differant levels of detail (ie model wise)
Title: Ship engines
Post by: LAW ENFORCER on January 31, 2002, 09:31:00 am: make the LOD
gule it to a light
call it detail XX (number)
(normal other stuff here, glue to hull etc)
convert....
it should be it MV32
When I do it, the LODs end up in whatever order I glued them in, although this may be because I use letters....

[This message has been edited by LAW ENFORCER (edited 01-31-2002).]
Title: Ship engines
Post by: HotSnoJ on February 28, 2002, 03:35:21 pm: HOW do I glue things in Truespace?
Title: Ship engines
Post by: LAW ENFORCER on February 28, 2002, 03:59:10 pm: look a few buttons along from left, one that says glue as child (default)
click and hold, (pull out menu) let go on 'glue as sibling'

Click items you want to be toghter.... easy...
Title: Ship engines
Post by: USS Alexander on February 28, 2002, 04:09:38 pm: Quote
Originally posted by hotsnoj
ok. can i do that in truespace 2.

TS2 = BAD for fs use 4.2 or higher
Title: Ship engines
Post by: mikhael on February 28, 2002, 07:07:35 pm: Quote
Originally posted by USS Alexander
Quote
Originally posted by hotsnoj
ok. can i do that in truespace 2.

TS2 = BAD for fs use 4.2 or higher

Why is TS2 bad? Straight question, as I don't have TS4 (and don't intend to buy it, I'm content with TS3 and LW6).
Title: Ship engines
Post by: USS Alexander on March 01, 2002, 07:40:04 am: Well my exoirience is that ts is bad cause it ****s up the textures in ts, and some don't apply at all, although referd in pof data.

I only had problems with ts2 so.
Title: Ship engines
Post by: LAW ENFORCER on March 02, 2002, 01:53:36 pm: I don't model OR texture in TS2 - just glue.... (and axis):p
Title: Ship engines
Post by: HotSnoJ on March 03, 2002, 05:25:15 am: What do you use to map it then?
Title: Ship engines
Post by: LAW ENFORCER on March 05, 2002, 06:20:48 pm: MS3D....
Title: Ship engines
Post by: aldo_14 on March 06, 2002, 03:41:43 am: Quote
Originally posted by Starwing

Does anyone know where this comes from? It also happens when I render thrusters in TS. And it annoys me too.

Either the axis (tip) of the flame is set badly, or it's simply that the flame model is a 'cube' type - namely that the tip is a flat face at the 'back' of the model, and the thruster maps badly onto it.... look at (eg) the Vesuvius in wireframe mode in modelview, for example.

Unfortunately, I'm far too lazy to actually fix this, as it's not a major prob for me.

Oh, and TS2 is bad for FS2 because (AFAIK);
1/ It uses DOS (8 character) names to store textures and sub-objects.
2/ It doesn't have box-mapping
3/ I don't think you can do UV be face, either.... (not sure, though)