Hard Light Productions Forums
Modding, Mission Design, and Coding => The Modding Workshop => Topic started by: Scooby_Doo on May 01, 2013, 05:30:35 am
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My hand at doing cockpits. There's several bugs I still need to work out, look at the weapon load outs, I have no clue why it's clipping them like that. Same thing happens with the damaged gauge either. :mad:
I still need to do some detailing, especially on the side panels and the thottle joystick needs a lot of work.
(http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v356/Shodan_AI/Cockpit15.jpg~original)
(http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v356/Shodan_AI/Cockpit16.jpg~original)
for some reason the players eyes are just below the players neck below the shoulder LOL
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+Cockpit Offset: is you friend in the ship table to control the positioning of the eyes
i think it looks awesome, if blocking the view even more than mine, and obviously there are those clipping errors
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Could you swap positions of throttle and joystick? In most cases, right hand is used for the stick and left for the throttle. Otherwise, looks awesome.
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I'm pretty sure that if the controls can't be switched around, they would make it favourable to right-handed pilots - so the throttle would be on the left and stick on the right.
Other than that: Consider removing the pilot model from the internal cockpit model altogether, and only have it rendered on external view. Having legs and arms in the cockpit often surprisingly decreases immersion, which is the reason most modern flight sims don't have pilots in the cockpits. It also removes a lot of clipping issues.
Placing view point on slightly higher position should help with cockpit visibility forward. How is the visibility backward? Most ships insist on putting a massive bulkhead (or worse, massively wide headrest of the seat) right before pilot's head, restricting visibility with no reason... most ships in FreeSpace have simply horrible (read: nonexistent) rear/shoulder visibility which is one of my pet peeves in the series - there is zero reason for not making the cockpits have reasonable visibility in designs such as Apollo, Valkyrie, or Perseus.
I would love to see a cockpit design with similar layout as modern fast jets - bubble canopy, blended to the fuselage, no massive struts, and free view over shoulders, around the ejection seat's head rest. That's what would make the most sense in a FreeSpace 2 ship, especially after they came up with shields...
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I'm pretty sure that if the controls can't be switched around, they would make it favourable to right-handed pilots - so the throttle would be on the left and stick on the right.
Other than that: Consider removing the pilot model from the internal cockpit model altogether, and only have it rendered on external view. Having legs and arms in the cockpit often surprisingly decreases immersion, which is the reason most modern flight sims don't have pilots in the cockpits. It also removes a lot of clipping issues.
Placing view point on slightly higher position should help with cockpit visibility forward. How is the visibility backward? Most ships insist on putting a massive bulkhead (or worse, massively wide headrest of the seat) right before pilot's head, restricting visibility with no reason... most ships in FreeSpace have simply horrible (read: nonexistent) rear/shoulder visibility which is one of my pet peeves in the series - there is zero reason for not making the cockpits have reasonable visibility in designs such as Apollo, Valkyrie, or Perseus.
I would love to see a cockpit design with similar layout as modern fast jets - bubble canopy, blended to the fuselage, no massive struts, and free view over shoulders, around the ejection seat's head rest. That's what would make the most sense in a FreeSpace 2 ship, especially after they came up with shields...
I'll try moving the cockpit and the pilot down first, my other cockpit model doesn't seem to have the neck issue. Probably because I'm using the default hud and now with things rearranged the center recticle seems to be lower. Otherwise if I have to get rid of the pilot that gets me a ton of extra polys to use.
As for the cockpit frame, it's kinda gotta match that of the real ship and allota the ships have limited rear visibility. Also you have 360deg radar on a high speed fighter at large ranges in space, bubble canopy doesn't serve a big purpose. Also as Paladin said in WC1 I'd rather have armor around me if the shields fail.
Apologies for edits, I derped and hit Modify instead of Quote... should be fixed now. -HT
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So much...obstruction of my view. :shaking:
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Also you have 360deg radar on a high speed fighter at large ranges in space, bubble canopy doesn't serve a big purpose.
Trust me on this - visibility would be a huge factor in combat worthiness of space fighters. Even with 360 helmet HUD projected radar information, seeing the target directly will always be a pilot's first instinctive guidance in a dogfight (excluding BVR engagements).
Also as Paladin said in WC1 I'd rather have armor around me if the shields fail.
And I would rather be able to see the enemy when the radar fails, or gets spoofed, or you're dealing with low observability ships, or electric warfare, or an environment where you have BAZILLION radar contacts and the only way to detect ships from debris is to detect movement. LIDAR would be harder to spoof after you get a contact, but even that can be disrupted relatively easily.
Armour's only going to protect you so much, if you can't see the enemy any armour will eventually fail when you cannot neutralize the threat.
But this is a different discussion than the original topic.
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Could you swap positions of throttle and joystick? In most cases, right hand is used for the stick and left for the throttle. Otherwise, looks awesome.
Done, and the joystick got replaced, it's got a brand new hi-hat version and it's probably more detailed than the entire original freespace 2 models, even after some optimizing, but then it's right there you can see blocky stuff too easily. Now I've got to remodel the throttle stick.
Also you have 360deg radar on a high speed fighter at large ranges in space, bubble canopy doesn't serve a big purpose.
Trust me on this - visibility would be a huge factor in combat worthiness of space fighters. Even with 360 helmet HUD projected radar information, seeing the target directly will always be a pilot's first instinctive guidance in a dogfight (excluding BVR engagements).
Also as Paladin said in WC1 I'd rather have armor around me if the shields fail.
And I would rather be able to see the enemy when the radar fails, or gets spoofed, or you're dealing with low observability ships, or electric warfare, or an environment where you have BAZILLION radar contacts and the only way to detect ships from debris is to detect movement. LIDAR would be harder to spoof after you get a contact, but even that can be disrupted relatively easily.
Armour's only going to protect you so much, if you can't see the enemy any armour will eventually fail when you cannot neutralize the threat.
But this is a different discussion than the original topic.
I guess it would all depend on the universe. In freespace it would make some sense, ships tend to move sluggishly in ww1 style combat style where you can obviously, well ignoring the fact shivan ships tend to be pitch black, see them. WC tends to if you can see them they're already shotting at you. Not sure where SW stands (Ties tend to be really tiny) If you tend to use missile and/or extra long range weapons or move really fast you won't even see the enemy (BVR). Course the simplistic hud we get with scp would be no where's adequate.
So much...obstruction of my view. :shaking:
It'll vary from ship to ship, some will have a much better view, some worse. Also I think the first screenshot the cockpit wasn't tilted correctly, the center reticle seems to be too low.
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Ugh so I tilt the cockpit down, then some of the gauges are too low, so I have to drop the pilot eyes down a bit which puts me back to the beginning..
So far....
straight up view
(http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v356/Shodan_AI/Cockpit17.jpg~original)
target tracking view.
(http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v356/Shodan_AI/Cockpit18.jpg~original)
Yes all those buttons are meshed, they're not normal mapped (normal mapping would fail way too often)
What I really need is the ability to have multiple functions for each of the display boxes (in essence a true MFD). That way you could have the talking head, directives, etc without having a separate box for each of them
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Really nice. Can't wait to see it finished.
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This is takin me back to Allied Force
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More detailing, this time the window framing. This one's for ships that have boxed cockpit windows (Aries, Black widow, cobra... etc)
basically:
________
| |
tilted ones should just need some vertex scaling to make those
-----
/ \
haven't touched bubble canopies yet, those should be easier.
(http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v356/Shodan_AI/screen0010.jpg~original)
Although now looking at it, the caution strip area needs to be reduced (it's meant to protect the pilot as that's where the canopy closes and it prevents rendering leaks)
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Aesthetically it looks spectacular (I continue to be jealous that you make WC ships and not FS ships, Scooby :p) but I have to echo the sentiments of others and say that I wouldn't want to play the game in that mode - just too much loss of visibility IMO.
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Doesn't help that I choose the banshee for this, it doesn't have the greatest visibility. Also bubble canopies will have considerably less framework.
I just moved the body out of the way for this and thinning the struts some.
(http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v356/Shodan_AI/screen0011.jpg~original)
Edit: killed a weird bug, if you looked back the head rest was half gone, and if you looked down a chunk of the seat was gone. Thought it might be because of the eye point, turns out since I recycled cockpit-1 into cockpit-2 I had an area that was for glass (a concept that didn't work, but I didn't take out), that the clear transparency was still there in the alpha channel.
Also discovered if I moved the eyepoint further back I got an even wider view of the control panel so the pilot doesn't have to sit so low in the cockpit.
(http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v356/Shodan_AI/screen0012.jpg~original)
I still don't like the targetting hud, also the text has gotta quite a bit smaller :ick:
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Hmm what I think I really need is a hotkey to quickly peek down at the controls. Have the radar, target/self shields visible but the rest a quick look down to see them fully.
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Head tracking works for that, but yeah, toggle view direction between the control panels and forward direction would be good too.
What we really need, though, is an in-game, player-controllable field of view feature.
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Heck all I would need is about a -25 deg on the X? to do that (key bind and perhaps joystick hat switch).
Also you're going to lose your lower ~180 degree view with a cockpit, unless it's a forward sitting cockpit (like wc longbow, B5 starfury), even real fighters have to deal with it (course you can physically move your head)
Also on another great idea, is it possible to hid certain elements on the hud via scripting? And if not could this be considered for the post 3.7 release? I could do something like this:
Given one hud display panel (a large one) pressing a key, "7" for example, it would toggle through radar, self shield, target shield, ets management, target display,...)
On another hud display give them the same options
And assign those optional sometimes there hud controls to whatever display you want (like the talking head)
and best yet, save those settings to a file so you can load them in the future!
That way you could tailor the hud to fit how you want it to be. Only big downside I can see offhand is the number of subsystems on the cockpit model for each hud display (each display would need a seperate mesh for each type of gauge (uvmap coords would differ).
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Actually, you can have any number of gauges you want mapped onto a single display (they may overlap), then disable all but one, and cycle through them. It's even SEXP-able, so scripting should be able to do that, too.
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Hmmm I see getHUDGaugeColor (r,b,g,a) and setHUDGaugeColor (r,g,b,a) and getHUDGaugeHandle ("string"), just need to find the list of gauge names.
Hmm for some reason setHUDGaugeColor doesn't work in real-time.
edit: well I tried the camera tilting thing and didn't get very far when I realized it was far more complicated using scripts. (i'd have to not only keep track of the main camera, but i'd have to keep track of the ships position and orientation for every frame) ugh
Also is there a way to see the list of hud gauge entries, I see there's a HudGauge, perhaps there something in that that'll help?
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Actually, you can have any number of gauges you want mapped onto a single display (they may overlap), then disable all but one, and cycle through them. It's even SEXP-able, so scripting should be able to do that, too.
How does this work? I can show/hide the gauge name, but that would hide all of that gauge.
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Map a couple of gauges on the same surface, they should be overlapping. Yes, that would mean that you'll have a few gauges stacked on top each other. Then, on the start of every mission (either using scripting or SEXPs) disable all the gauges on that panel but one, and use a variable to cycle which one is on.
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Map a couple of gauges on the same surface, they should be overlapping. Yes, that would mean that you'll have a few gauges stacked on top each other.
Yes, this is easy to do.
Then, on the start of every mission (either using scripting or SEXPs) disable all the gauges on that panel but one, and use a variable to cycle which one is on.
This is a problem though..... hud-activate-gauge-type gauge true/false This will enable or disable the gauge on the entire hud. So basically, the entire hud would be hidden (as you hide it for each panel, the other panels get hidden to) Unless there's a sexp/command i'm not familiar with.
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Another cockpit for ships with more rounded glass, but not complete bubble
nicknamed it "Wolf" for the Mechwarrior Timberwolf/Madcat that I got the idea from
http://fc07.deviantart.net/fs24/f/2007/339/8/c/Timber_Wolf_by_Punakettu.jpg
Just a WIP, the more unnecessary gauges (talking head, objectives, etc...) will be below the important ones. I'll need to figure out how to do the quick tilt head down script, someday.
(http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v356/Shodan_AI/wolfcockpit.jpg~original)
Also this is the banshee, majority of the other fighters you won't see anything in the front view besides just the cockpit, you'll have to look to the side or back to actually see the ship.
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Another update.. more detailing
(http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v356/Shodan_AI/Cockpit19.jpg~original)
(http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v356/Shodan_AI/Cockpit20.jpg~original)
(http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v356/Shodan_AI/Cockpit21.jpg~original)
Some sort of reflection from the glass would work wonders, not sure how to do that tastefully.
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A cockpit based off my most favorite mech in Mechwarrior? :eek: LEGEND!!!!!!!
Getting those nostalgia vibes hard, man. Kudos :yes:
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Another cockpit frame, this time roughly based on the A-7 Intruder
(http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v356/Shodan_AI/Cockpit22.jpg~original)
(http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v356/Shodan_AI/Cockpit23.jpg~original)
Right now I have 3 cockpit tubs (a modern one, an advanced one thats based off the next one, and a macross one). There are 3 basic frames right now: the box, the wolf and now the intruder. Each tub works with each frame
I would like to make at least a Cessna styled (limited visibility), a ww2 bomber and a variation of the sr-71 cockpit frame. Any other ideas would be greatly appreciated.
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These are excellent. Something like this would look awesome my groups Star Wars TOT mod. Maybe someday I will have time to try to create one of these : )
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Next cockpit, the "star", based off of one of Star Citizens cockpit models.
Roughly based on this: http://i.imgur.com/c0BYX.jpg
(http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v356/Shodan_AI/Cockpit24.jpg~original)
(http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v356/Shodan_AI/Cockpit25.jpg~original)
There should be a two seat variant (front-2-back) too.
Think I'll do the Apache's cockpit next.
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The Apache cockpit... not sure what to do next.
(http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v356/Shodan_AI/Cockpit26.jpg~original)
(http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v356/Shodan_AI/Cockpit27.jpg~original)
it's ideal for a two seater.
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You always wanted to fly the Millennium Falcon...
(http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v356/Shodan_AI/Cockpit28.jpg~original)
(http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v356/Shodan_AI/Cockpit29.jpg~original)
(http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v356/Shodan_AI/Cockpit30.jpg~original)
This one would work better for heavy fighters/bombers where you want more protection rather than visibility.
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This is incredibly cool - my love for 3D cockpits knows no bounds. Thanks for the work on this.
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This is amazing work Scooby - Really looking forward to being able to distribute these among FS2's stable of ships - I mean the Generic CP is great, and Fightermedic's RTT version is incredible - but some variety in strut n tub styles would be much appreciated.
Any chance these could be made to work in WC Saga? Or is there a build conflict there., -
If you're still interested in suggestions, I wonder if a 'pit inspired by FS2's Myrmidon is possilble, with horizontal struts and a huge oval view-port that surrounds and extends below the cockpit instrumentation.
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Unfortunately the saga build doesn't have the hud controls, but the cockpit itself is ok. I.e. the gauges will appear like they do in freespace/saga not placed on actual controls.
As for the cockpit shapes, I'm sticking with the stereotypical cockpit tubs, like those of nearly every real-life fighter and quite a few of sci-fi fighters (most of wc, xwing, ywing, a-wing, b5 thunderbolts). The canopy bottom has to be somewhat flat so that a cockpit can easily be placed in it.
Right now I'm doing some work for Deathsnake and once that's done i'll get back to work on the cockpit and the Seagull corvette.
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This looks incredible! Great work. Is it up for download yet?
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well, there is that fresh port of saga to FS open, which supports everything you need
it would be a real shame to waste these cockpits by not using them the best way for WC