Chains

[R Soul]

These chains were made after looking at the chain_highpoly model and noticing unnecessary sharp UV seams.

These ones appear more smooth. Note that they are NOT drop-in replacements for any existing models.

 

They were made with Blender's physics engine to get realistic curves.

Variants:
Chain3: hanging straight down.

Chain3_bent_1: hanging with gentle curve
Chain3_bent_1_h_hoops: suspended from horizontal hoops to embed in a surface.
Chain3_bent_1_v_hoops: same as above but with vertical hoops.

Chain3_bent_2: hanging with sharp curve
Chain3_bent_2_h_hoops: suspended from horizontal hoops to embed in a surface.
Chain3_bent_2_v_hoops: same as above but with vertical hoops.

 

 

Download:

http://www.mediafire.com/file/jlkp94ok3ac3rr8/Chain3_RS.zip

 

I'm also open to suggestions for other things (e.g. longer ones).

 

How's it hangin?

Edited June 26, 2018 by R Soul

[ERH+]

How about various L and U shapes that's will fit these, also inlets and wheels to form visible parts of mechanism.

[demagogue]

These look great! This is a great public service you've done. Thanks!

 

Longer straight ones would be great, so you could have a long one in a factory to climb or have something big hanging.

 

Are they articulated, as in, when you bump them will they swing? That's a trickier task.

[R Soul]

I've updated the link in the first post. There's now a set of double length ones, all in the same format as the shorter ones.

 

There's also a single link for helping to connect a group of these, for example draped over some poles.

 

I also forgot to mention these come with a skins file so you can vary the appearance.

 

Screenshot, with a rusty skin applied to all:

 

Download link in first post.

 

Here's a video showing how the hang was made, followed by moving the ends closer together to get a steeper curve. Note that the second part takes a lot longer than the first. That's the best way to stop the thing flying apart due to the physics going mental:

Edited June 26, 2018 by R Soul

[demagogue]

If they behave like that in game that's great!

[Springheel]

They're just static models, not md5meshes.

[R Soul]

I'm willing to have a go at making a swinging version. I had a brief look at a rope in the training mission and it looks like I have to create a mesh with bones defined. Blender has md5 import/export plugins so I'll see how it goes.

[Springheel]

I made one or two years ago, but more variations are always good.

[R Soul]

I imported an existing md5mesh into Blender and copied its features (bones and vertex groups with matching names), but have yet to look at getting it into TDM. Is there any documentation out there that say how to do it?

[Obsttorte]

http://wiki.thedarkmod.com/index.php?title=Getting_Characters_and_their_Anims_into_Doom

http://wiki.thedarkmod.com/index.php?title=Category:Models

[RPGista]

I was looking into it, you can check the thread I made, Im gonna post a rough setp by step there right now: http://forums.thedarkmod.com/topic/19391-md5-models-and-animations-blender/

 

Its not that complicated, but there are a few things which you are trying to do that I didnt go into. I think for the chain to work as a physical object you will need to make it a ragdoll. I have no idea how to do that.

[R Soul]

Thanks for the replies.

 

"Getting Characters and their Anims into Doom" seems to deal with converting Maya files to md5. With Blender I can export directly to md5.

 

I started looking the existing chain and found its definition in tdm_base01.pk4\def\tdm_rope.def. I copied that into its own file and replaced the model/anim references.

 

There's a reference to an .af file. I looked at the original one (tdm_defs01.pk4\af\) for the chain which started with instructions to use the inbuilt AF editor

 

The models page has

Setting up Ragdolls for Custom Joint Hierarchies

(filed under S for Setting)

 

I'll have a go at following the instructions tomorrow.

[demagogue]

Yeah my original question asking if it was articulated was meaning does it have an .af / Articulated Figure file.

You're doing the Builder's work.

 

Now after you've learned this, if we could get some articulated fabrics like deformable sheets and drapes and clothes...

(Granting I don't know how possible or stable they'd be. But for that matter we could use more static fabrics too.)

[Springheel]

Yeah, it would be great if someone with access to cloth dynamics made some covered furniture. The only ones we currently have access to have terrible uvmaps.

[peter_spy]

Yeah, it would be great if someone with access to cloth dynamics made some covered furniture. The only ones we currently have access to have terrible uvmaps.

 

Working on it, as I'll need them in my mission, but it will be a long while before these models will be available.

Edited June 30, 2018 by Judith

[R Soul]

I got swinging chains working (long and short versions), added simplified collision models to the static models, and have added a new one of those:

(This could be used for a boat or some other large object that is being held in place)

 

For the swinging chains, I used this video to see how to associate bones with vertices, and this tutorial to generate the TDM files. At first I had a bit of trouble getting things to work properly, and was getting all sorts of errors. Then I must have found (or stumbled upon) the correct method and things went more smoothly from then on.

 

The skin property can be used on the swinging ones, but I'm not sure if there's a way to list skins for entities as we can with models.

 

Here is the updated file:

http://www.mediafire.com/file/jlkp94ok3ac3rr8/Chain3_RS.zip

(Same link as before)

Edited July 4, 2018 by R Soul

[R Soul]

Double post and proud.

 

I've just updated the above file. The readme has been updated and the skin file has been modified to include the new static chain (and the single link) and to have these materials show up as 'matching skins' for the swinging entities.

 

edit: minor update - two of the short curved chains were using flat shading. I've updated them to make them smooth. Same link as above.

Edited July 4, 2018 by R Soul

[demagogue]

This is great. Thanks!

[R Soul]

I made a breakthrough. I wanted to have some variations of a chain that's fallen down onto a flat surface, but no matter what variables I tried it was very hard to stop the links flying apart due to the physics system being unable to do the calculations. It turned out to be because my links were very low poly, whereas the ones in the Youtube example videos were very high poly.

 

In Blender each link is its own object, and the mesh is one of the things that it contains (it also contains materials, properties, modifiers etc). When an object is duplicated (Shift-D), its mesh is identical, but it's a new thing, so modifying one will have no effect on any others. That's like in DarkRadiant when some brushes are converted to a func_static, which is then duplicated. Although it looks the same to us, each mesh is unique in memory/the file system. In many ways that's safe because one object can be tweaked to suit a specific need, but it also makes it a chore to edit them all.

 

In DarkRadiant we can have multiple entities using the same model, which is better for memory, editing and possibly performance. Blender also allows objects to use the exact same mesh: duplicate using Alt-D instead of Shift-D or select an existing object and choose another mesh (https://docs.blender.org/manual/en/dev/editors/properties_editor.html#main-view)

 

With all links using the same mesh, it's much simpler to use high poly links when running the physics calculations, and then replace them with a low poly links before exporting.

 

Screenshot of the collapsed models:

 

The two long ones were the best I could manage before learning how to share one mesh among all links. The three compact ones were only possible using the new method. These all have simplified collision models.

 

For each of these collapsed chains, there's a variant where one of the links at the end is broken, and the skins file has been updated to include them all.

 

Updated download link:

http://www.mediafire.com/file/jlkp94ok3ac3rr8/Chain3_RS.zip

 

I'm getting concerned about the folder structure. There are now 26 files in the 'dungeon' directory.

 

Also, something I worked on today:

 

This was also only possible by being able to make switch all links from high poly to low poly.

[Bikerdude]

Very impressive work fella.

[Obsttorte]

 

I'm getting concerned about the folder structure. There are now 26 files in the 'dungeon' directory.

You can create a subfolder 'chains' or similar. Good work btw.

[RPGista]

Very impressive. I love the idea of having as much interactive and realyime physics as possible in tdm.

[R Soul]

RPGista: Just to be clear, those Blender videos I've posted are only for generating static models. The moveable versions are straight down only, although they could be positioned so they appear to continue from one of the static models.

 

Obsttorte: Thanks. I know about subfolders but I'm wasn't sure of the best structure to use. I've gone with the general formation (straight/types of curve) as root folders and within them are the models of varying lengths.

Download file replace, same link as before:

http://www.mediafire.com/file/jlkp94ok3ac3rr8/Chain3_RS.zip

 

Anyone who's already added any of the these chains to their FM should extract the updated file, change the model property of each chain entity to point to the 'subfolder' version and then delete the 'chain3' files in the main 'dungeon' folder.

Edited July 7, 2018 by R Soul

[peter_spy]

I made a breakthrough

It's pretty usual for modelers to make a low poly version first, then add some loops for subdivision, use high poly version for simulation, and then revert to low poly or bake the high to low poly after simulation for better effect. It works especially well for fabrics.