[Scooby_Doo]

Since I've started grebbling fighters like mad and since you seem to have the highest details ships.   What are you averaging for polycounts on your fighters/bombers?

[maje]

Poly Range: (We're not too tough about this as long as the detail justifies the polycount and it's not rediculous)
Fighters: 4000-8000
Freighters/Small Capitals: 6000-20k
Large Capitals: 10k-20k
Supercapitals: 30k+

I believe there are no UV restrictions. Normal maps will obey the same restrictions as the diffuse texture, which can be mirrored and overlapped.

Open edges should not cause a problem, but should be avoided anyway.

The model file has several model files contaned in it- the LODS, turrets, and debris. LOD switching is done via the ship's file specifying where the changes in what model is rendered occur.

All models are required to be fully triangulated.

[Scooby_Doo]

4000-8000 sweet 

[Bobboau]

incedently the last requirement in that list is BS, it will give you no gain and actually slow down collision detection and geometry sorting (if we ever get that working again)

[Scooby_Doo]

Isn't triangulation required by all video cards? Besides programs like Max triangulate everything.

[brandx0]

Max's newer poly modifiers no longer triangulate everything.  You can edit each multi-sided poly's triangulation for purposes of the renderer's smoothing, but the data is stored as a polygon and not a triangle.  Older versions of max only had the edit mesh modifiers which did indeed auto-triangulate, but the edit poly modifier is far more powerful now.

[Scooby_Doo]

Hmm actually Max 7 has this, but I've never used edit poly before.  This could be fun 

Except what happens when you export to 3ds and then cob does it re-triangulate?

[Turambar]

you should have used edit poly the whole time, its so much nicer.

also, we dont need to triangulate?!?!

that makes my polycounts seem so much lower!

[Scooby_Doo]

you should have used edit poly the whole time, its so much nicer.

also, we dont need to triangulate?!?!

that makes my polycounts seem so much lower!

Actually i started out in Max 2 or 3 and i don't think it had edit poly.
and polycount != triangle count.  triangle count is whats important.

BTW does PCS2 still require triangles (especially for shielding)?

[EvilleJedi]

auto triangulation occurs at run time when the model is loaded afaik,

max auto triangulates everything in poly :-p go to the display panel and turn off 'edges only' they just aren't visible edges

if the export format needs tris it will force to these hidden edges, if it allows >3 edges it will export the shape that way, however there is no guarantee that the exporter won't flip your hidden edges in all weird ways. I also know that some mesh algorithms really really hate non-tri meshes (picking especially), I don't know if SCP implements these, but if it does, it will have issues if it doesn't auto triangulate on load.

Now I am especially curious about how the move to full GLSL shaders will effect the poly throughput performance. This essentially removes any overhead in the engine for textures and pretty much moves everything to the hardware pipeline. What this gains is the ability to significantly ratchet up the texture data (basically let the video card -> memory transfer  be the limiting factor, not some weird caching and swapping in the engine)  but it will mean that every light will be per pixel. All of the meshes will have to be exported with binormals and more mesh detail will mean a lot more normal lookups.

I'm also concerned about closed meshes on detail meshes (backfaces filled), this would seem to create a culling and occlusion nightmare for the card, most other games either force closed meshes(best option for engine, pain for artists as each lod has to be a unique closed mesh, and textures almost always have to be baked from the higher lod) or approach it with aggressive lodding and layered meshes. (have to be careful to avoid Z buffer issues and how shaders use the geometry)

[Scooby_Doo]

I take that back... I'm not so fond of it anymore.
Why do I have to target weld vertices one at a time?
Why can't i weld certain vertices together?

[EvilleJedi]

because it is a 'target' weld, use the other weld for groups and play with the threshold

if you can't weld a vert in poly mode, then you have a face hidden in there somewhere. Mesh mode allows verts to be welded regardless of intersecting faces, so you can create truly horrifying geometry.

one trick is to go to border mode, do a select all and then go to edge mode with the edges still selected, if you have weird open edges where you don't expect them you will need to rebuild the faces (happens all the time with the poly bridge tool or with improper quick slices) also select all the polys around the questionable area and deselect the visible ones manually, if you still have a gizmo, hit delete, that should kill any sliver or hidden faces.

[Scooby_Doo]

In edit mesh mode you can select multiple vertices and weld them into one vertex.  Very useful when cleaning up after cutting, booleaning.

Well I was trying to connect up correctly two seperate subobjects.  I ended up using boolean cut instead. 

[EvilleJedi]

booleans in max are horrible, I suggest using the bridge tool with quickslice because you can usually produce cleaner results quicker, though some really wacky surfaces require booleans (which still don't always work right)

[Scooby_Doo]

Booleans aren't that bad and will usually produce accurate results quickly unlike quickslice.  You just have to clean up the vertices afterwards.

[EvilleJedi]

boolean has failed me too many times over many years to be seen as quick or stable, sometimes it's the only option, but because of max's hidden triangulation it often produces a lot of cleanup work (if it properly performs union or subtraction in the first place) what amazes me is that max is autodesk and autodesk should know how to do booleans given their other products.

[Scooby_Doo]

First off don't use union or subtraction, use cut instead.  You'll have to remove the unnecessary polys, but you make a better decision than Max does.

[chief1983]

Max is Autodesk in name only, since it only recently ceased to be Discreet, and I doubt they've taken a lot of time to clean up stuff that deep in the engine.

[brandx0]

The original 3D Studio product was created for the DOS platform by the Yost Group and published by Autodesk. Autodesk purchased the product at its second release mark and internalized development entirely over the next two releases. After 3D Studio Release 4, the product was ported to the Windows NT platform, and originally named "3D Studio MAX." This version was also originally created by the Yost Group. It was released by Kinetix, which was at that time Autodesk's division of media and entertainment. Later, the product name was changed to "3ds max" (all lower case) to better comply with the naming conventions of Discreet, a Montreal-based software company which Autodesk had purchased. At release 8, the product was again branded with the Autodesk logo, and the name was again changed to "3ds Max" (upper and lower case).

3D Studio Max has always been published by Autodesk, back when it was just 3D Studio (I started on 3DS Version 4..., that's Studio version 4, not Max 4)

[chief1983]

Right, dammit I forgot about that.  Well, I doubt it was the same group of awesome guys working on it that do the AutoCAD and such, right?