[ZylonBane]

Looks like it's rotting.

Which could be cool, but really isn't appropriate for Shivan craft.

[colecampbell666]

Looks like it's rotting.

Which could be cool, but really isn't appropriate for Shivan craft.

It does look too slimy, though.

[Vasudan Admiral]

Uh, yeah as I said, that's in Blender. The way Blender handles normal maps and how it applies specular to them in its rendering engine is going to be quite different to how FS2 handles them. Hence the 'need to test in game' thing.

[Shade]

The slimyness probably also has something to do with the, for lack of a better word, dented look of the thing. Seriously, every surface looks like it has been the victim of some mad dwarf with a heavy mallet and far too much time on his hands. This, I think, is one trap to be wary of when making normal maps - Flat surfaces are still allowed.

[Vasudan Admiral]

Uh, again - this isn't in game. The strength of the normal map as well as the specular there are because of Blenders rendering system. For the in-game version I'd definitely re balance it. Seriously people, stop jumping at shadows of something that hasn't happened yet.

Edit: To clarify, I'm making it as you see there so that it looks good in the endgame failure cutscene from the Port forum. The normal map dents react very nicely with the shimmering tentacles of lightning:



I'm going to try it in-game eventually, and if it doesn't look right, I'll just keep trying till I get something that does.

[Cobra]

Hurry the hell up with that cutscene!

[Kaine]

Diffuse map, base map, color map whatever you might call it, it's just the basic texture of the ship.

While normal maps don't really have any height informations, height maps do. They're used for parallax mapping.
I don't know how exactly it works, but it seems to move texture parts of ships faster or slower (depending on the map) while you fly around a parallax mapped object.

The 'higher' parts on the texture move faster and the 'lower' parts move slower, so in movement, it looks like it really has some kind of depth.
And the main problem I found out with this is that you need a rather smooth gradient for 3d effects on this, beause otherwise you really the see the moving 'layers', but you don't always want to have rounded stuff with smooth gradients. You can either keep the effect rather weak, or use it for rounded stuff only. It will come in handy (I got some ideas already ), but atm, I won't use it and continue working on normal maps only.


Edit: Damn... this one is though. The model and the textures suck. And the HTL Model even has some fun UV problems..

Edit2: There is something seriously wrong with the mapping of the HTL model. There are so many problems in there, even the original model looks almost better with normal maps...

Parallax mapping is great for curved surfaces, dents, rivets, half exposed pipes etc can be made much more convincing. Like any of these methods it isn't a good idea to splash it around everywhere. FEAR had a fair implementation, using it for emulating chunks out of walls, the effect was only really lost when it drew one too close to a wall edge or when the "holes" overlapped.

Good on you for taking on the Erinyes, I have to agree that the low-poly model looks much better. Obviously one of those models that needs to be made with height maps in mind. Again I wish I had the know-how to get a model in-game (particularly texture mapping). I've always been very fastidious about smoothing and using geometry sparingly (using less triangles smarter rather than just using more)

[karajorma]

It's not that hard to get models into the game. Ask on the moding forum and I'm sure someone can help you through it.

[Spidey-]

actually I think the slimy works fairly well with shivan--gives it a better organic feel

[WeatherOp]

Still no moloch. 

[MiniSiets]

Holy crap! These are insane. Are we to expect all these normal maps being included in SCP 3.7?

[DaBrain]

The current experimental builds suppot normal mapping and pixel/vertex shaders and I'm packing together a public beta test version of the Media VP 3.6.10 right now. I'm just not sure how to upload it.

My internet connection isn't perfectly stable and uploading 1GB won't be easy. (And will take hours with my current upstream of 15 kb/s).

I'd also like to spend one or two hours of testing the completed package before I even start uploading.

[MetalDestroyer]

The current experimental builds suppot normal mapping and pixel/vertex shaders and I'm packing together a public beta test version of the Media VP 3.6.10 right now. I'm just not sure how to upload it.

My internet connection isn't perfectly stable and uploading 1GB won't be easy. (And will take hours with my current upstream of 15 kb/s).

I'd also like to spend one or two hours of testing the completed package before I even start uploading.

FileFront ?

[DaBrain]

No, I'll upload it somewhere else and post the link in the SCP internal.

I'll also give the link to a friend at eXp (Extreme-Players), who offered hosting too.

[Darklord42]

   If this is going to be released internally, whats the point of it being a "public" beta release? Unless I'm missing something which is highly likely.

[Mehrpack]

hi,
1 GB isnt so easy to deliever, so its necesarry to keep the link intern to give time to set up another mirrors.
and a lot of people doesnt have a high upload speed, that need a lot of time to upload this paket to a webspace.
the other thing is, most of the privat webspace doesnt have enough free bandwith for make it public.
my space, for example, has per month 200 GB free. so any MB about is really expensive.
you see, in my example only 190 people can download it, before i ran out of the free traffic and 190 isnt really much.

so pleace be patience , dabrain said that the next version is public and if it didnt, he hadnt post here and ask for places to upload it, i think .

Mehrpack

[MetalDestroyer]

In my case, I can easily have enough space (10 GB for each email account for free) but it's specific to my ISP. However, to upload file, you have to upload within the ISP's modem.

[Scooby_Doo]

Hows this:

[spartan_0214]

I still grumble about the cockpit and it's placement, but the rest of the ship looks really, really cool (and shiny!). 

Über-point for Scoob (+1).

[colecampbell666]

  Flat surfaces! Finally - someone realized!