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New Proguard_02 (still WIP)


ascottk

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Hopefully the connection I'm using is up to the task (probably won't finish with textures right off). So I apologize if not all of the files make it yet.

 

But I figure he's good enough for a commit with 3 major skins ("Forester", builder imperial, zombie) and some head skins.

 

Here's some screens of the zombie skin:

post-476-1240440648_thumb.jpg

 

Close up of the head:

post-476-1240440659_thumb.jpg

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The zombie one is so-so to tell the truth. IMO he could do with a little more decay (green-ish etc) and definitely more pale - he looks like he has just taken a nibbling from rats but is still going. The teeth are way too white, could do with a little dirt, as well as the face.

 

Also, I know you tried to get a "falling apart" look on his face using alpha cutting, but it really does not look right. It looks too low res beneath the falling off flesh, plus it is red, which it should not be. Remember blood goes brownish after a while. His facial expression is dopey, almost cartoony. IMO a little less vague of an expression would make him all the more scarier. Even an evil grin or an emotionless straight face could work. ATM he looks like he just woke up from a bad dream and is going "Huh? What happened?". If you bend the eyebrows down more into a frown it would work better.

 

Lastly, his armor looks quite clean - cover it with dirt, grime, muck etc. Just look on the net for pictures of moss, grime, muck etc and just clone brush it onto the armor in joints, holes etc, everywhere it could get after sitting in a grave for some time.

 

Don't take this too harshly, just being brutally honest, as it were. Otherwise the other two look splendid!

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The zombie one is so-so to tell the truth. IMO he could do with a little more decay (green-ish etc) and definitely more pale - he looks like he has just taken a nibbling from rats but is still going. The teeth are way too white, could do with a little dirt, as well as the face.

 

Also, I know you tried to get a "falling apart" look on his face using alpha cutting, but it really does not look right. It looks too low res beneath the falling off flesh, plus it is red, which it should not be. Remember blood goes brownish after a while. His facial expression is dopey, almost cartoony. IMO a little less vague of an expression would make him all the more scarier. Even an evil grin or an emotionless straight face could work. ATM he looks like he just woke up from a bad dream and is going "Huh? What happened?". If you bend the eyebrows down more into a frown it would work better.

 

Lastly, his armor looks quite clean - cover it with dirt, grime, muck etc. Just look on the net for pictures of moss, grime, muck etc and just clone brush it onto the armor in joints, holes etc, everywhere it could get after sitting in a grave for some time.

 

Don't take this too harshly, just being brutally honest, as it were. Otherwise the other two look splendid!

Yup. I figured it'll be easier to commit the whole thing now so I have less to commit later. He'll be updated & revised.

 

& to the coders/scripters: this guy is using the new proguard rigs (body & head) & up to date with some of the builder guard's spawnargs. It also has a new hammer sheathe/draw animation for the dynamic attachment system (I couldn't get the positions totally right). There are temporary spawnargs for the hammer & longshort too:

 

// temporary hammer def for the new rig
entityDef ai_weapon_hammer_new
{
"inherit"			"atdm:moveable_warhammer"
	"joint"				"RightHand"
// attachment info when worn on the back:

// sidweways, along weapon axis, forward/back
"angles_slung_across_back_rl"		"-90 0 0"
"angles_slung_across_back_lr"		"-90 0 0"
"angles_stacked_across_back_rl"	"-110 0 0"
"angles_stacked_across_back_lr"	"-90 0 0"

// attachment info when held in the hand:

"angles_hand_r"				"-90 0 90"
"angles_hand_l"				"-90 0 0"


"remove"					"0"
"drop_when_ragdoll"			"1"
"drop_when_drawn"			"1"
"drop_set_frobable"			"1"
"drop_add_contents_solid" 	"1"
"frobable"			"0" // don't frob until the AI drops it
"is_mantleable"			"0"
"clipmodel_contents" "1024" // CONTENTS_CORPSE

// For AI interaction
"AIUse"				"AIUSE_WEAPON"

}
// temporary sword def for the new rig
entityDef ai_weapon_longsword_new
{
"inherit"			"atdm:moveable_longsword"
	"joint"				"RightHand"
// attachment info when worn on the back:

// sidweways, along weapon axis, forward/back
//"angles_slung_across_back_rl"		"-90 0 0"
//"angles_slung_across_back_lr"		"-90 0 0"
//"angles_stacked_across_back_rl"	"-110 0 0"
//"angles_stacked_across_back_lr"	"-90 0 0"
"angles_hip_sheath_l"	"90 0 0"

// attachment info when held in the hand:

"angles_hand_r"				"0 90 0"
"angles_hand_l"				"0 90 0"


"remove"					"0"
"drop_when_ragdoll"			"1"
"drop_when_drawn"			"1"
"drop_set_frobable"			"1"
"drop_add_contents_solid" 	"1"
"frobable"			"0" // don't frob until the AI drops it
"is_mantleable"			"0"
"clipmodel_contents" "1024" // CONTENTS_CORPSE

// For AI interaction
"AIUse"				"AIUSE_WEAPON"
}

 

EDIT: I've been barely able to connect the last couple of hours so several skin textures are not on svn yet. But the base textures are there.

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This just keeps getting better and better :D

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happycheeze.deviantart.com

 

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Gamers Outreach, a nonprofit that uses videogames to raise money for chairty.

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Well, I think all of his files are up . . . at last

 

I didn't see this in our forum but I read on d3world that tga rle compression is essentially a lossless compression (digital shorthand like the flac audio codec). So if I understand this and we have a solid white color about 32x32 . . .

 

No compression would be like:

11111111111111111111111111111111
11111111111111111111111111111111
11111111111111111111111111111111
11111111111111111111111111111111
. . .etc. for another 28 rows . . .

 

And rle compression would be like:

1x1024

 

So this proguard guy has a crapload of textures & I was thinking about removing some of the excess crud like using solid colors where the texture wasn't being used. That'd explain the 128 kb 1024x1024 normal map in his skins directory while another normal map filled with noise was over 4 mb (I removed the noise & that reduced the file size to 2.199 mb). Do people have problems on D3 with rle compression?

 

http://www.doom3world.org/phpbb2/viewtopic...f=2&t=17670

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Do people have problems on D3 with rle compression?

 

We were going to use RLE compression a few years ago, until we discovered it's not really beneficial beyond saving some initial disk space. Video cards don't support RLE, so at load time all the textures using RLE get blown back up to standard TGA, increasing load times. Generally, dds for diffuse and TGA for normal maps with the TGA's being backed up in the high res repo I believe.

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So this proguard guy has a crapload of textures

 

That's another point in favour of re-using textures whereever possible. The more textures that are used the longer a mission takes to load. You can do some very effective things with blends, maskcolors and rgb values.

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That's another point in favour of re-using textures whereever possible. The more textures that are used the longer a mission takes to load. You can do some very effective things with blends and maskcolors.
I thought about that since some skins only change the color. So I'll read up on it.
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My god, I just saw all the textures. :blink: That does seem like an awful lot for one character.

 

Just out of curiosity, are those new versions of the animations that you uploaded with the character? We want to use the same animation bank for all characters now (or at least all using the same skeleton), so having separate animations in every character folder is no longer needed. All characters using the new skeleton should reference the proguard animations.

 

So how would I change the color of the cloth without affecting the cloth's trim?

 

The easiest way is make them separate surfaces. Barring that, you can probably do something with the various mask keywords, though I haven't played around much with them. You can also darken the cloth easily with a blend filter texture that matches the cloth shape. It depends on exactly what you want to do.

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Wow, I just checked out that mesh...it's 7085 polys! :blink: That's an awful lot for a single, headless character. Compare that to the proguard, which is half that at 3608. You've used a LOT of polys in places that probably don't need that level of detail, like the lower tunic, which is 650 polys just by itself. Something like that does not need such a smooth, rounded edge, and probably doesn't need to be double-sided either. That part of the proguard mesh, by comparison, is around 250 polys.

 

polys.jpg

 

No one is going to quibble over a few hundred polys here and there, but you're a good 2000 polys higher than the guideline for character models. Animated polys cost performance even if they don't cast shadows, so I would recommend looking for places to trim back.

 

I also noticed some ways you can cut down on textures a bit. Several of your specular maps just seem to be duplicates of your diffuse saved at half size. If your specular map is just the same as your diffuse, then just point to the same .tga file rather than making a new copy of the file. Also, 512x512 is pretty big for a specular in any case--the remaining ones should be resized to half that (or even further for something small and unimportant like the studs on the leather straps).

 

The uvmaps don't seem to be organized as well as they could be to save space. I know it's tempting to make your uvmaps large for easy detail, but using an entire 1024x1024 texture just for the lower half of the tunic is probably excessive--with a little adjustment you could fit a different part of the mesh in the top half of the image. The armour, for example, could fit in the remaining space, and then you'd only need one image instead of two.

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My god, I just saw all the textures. :blink: That does seem like an awful lot for one character.

 

Just out of curiosity, are those new versions of the animations that you uploaded with the character? We want to use the same animation bank for all characters now (or at least all using the same skeleton), so having separate animations in every character folder is no longer needed. All characters using the new skeleton should reference the proguard animations.

Only the hammer sheath & draw are mine. Also the md5mesh/md5anims with the new joints were not available. & the animation files are not that big.

 

The easiest way is make them separate surfaces. Barring that, you can probably do something with the various mask keywords, though I haven't played around much with them. You can also darken the cloth easily with a blend filter texture that matches the cloth shape. It depends on exactly what you want to do.
Yeah, the colored keyword is pretty effective but I'd like gold trim on green cloth. So I might do some modifications to the mesh in order to separate them. And they'll need modifications (see later in this post).

 

Wow, I just checked out that mesh...it's 7085 polys! :blink: That's an awful lot for a single, headless character. Compare that to the proguard, which is half that at 3608. You've used a LOT of polys in places that probably don't need that level of detail, like the lower tunic, which is 650 polys just by itself. Something like that does not need such a smooth, rounded edge, and probably doesn't need to be double-sided either. That part of the proguard mesh, by comparison, is around 250 polys.

 

No one is going to quibble over a few hundred polys here and there, but you're a good 2000 polys higher than the guideline for character models. Animated polys cost performance even if they don't cast shadows, so I would recommend looking for places to trim back.

Crap, I forgot about how many polys were in the tunic <_< So I'm raiding the proguard for his. It's easy enough to modificate . . . hmmm modificate . . . I like that . . . & I can separate the trim on that mesh. Besides Maya refuses to reduce my tunic any further.

 

I also noticed some ways you can cut down on textures a bit. Several of your specular maps just seem to be duplicates of your diffuse saved at half size. If your specular map is just the same as your diffuse, then just point to the same .tga file rather than making a new copy of the file. Also, 512x512 is pretty big for a specular in any case--the remaining ones should be resized to half that (or even further for something small and unimportant like the studs on the leather straps).
The levels are different from the diffuse or they'll be too bright or too dark.

 

The uvmaps don't seem to be organized as well as they could be to save space. I know it's tempting to make your uvmaps large for easy detail, but using an entire 1024x1024 texture just for the lower half of the tunic is probably excessive--with a little adjustment you could fit a different part of the mesh in the top half of the image. The armour, for example, could fit in the remaining space, and then you'd only need one image instead of two.
The lower tunic is sharing the same uv as the arms. I do a lot of sharing being uv maps/textures between meshes so I can cut down on the # of textures. Believe me, hardly any texture space is wasted. On this guy the arms& lower tunic share space, the armor and pauldrons share space, the forearms and boots and helmet share space. I could save space for the cape & have that as a 512x1024 (front and back overlap). I'm thinking about redoing the cape anyway.
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Yet another progress update :P

post-476-1240537836_thumb.jpg

 

The colors still need to be tweaked, the imperial's red cloth is too dark but it's hard to nail with rgba values in materialeditor (I'm an idiot, I didn't know there was even a material editor in d3). The gold armor looks a lot better imo, and I'm pleased with the green. I did a violet version but it's still too dark.

 

here's the material of the gold armor:

models/md5/chars/guards/proguard_02/skins/proguard02_armor_gold
{
description	"armor_plate"
noShadows	
bumpmap	models/md5/chars/guards/proguard_02/proguard02_armor_local
{
	name	"Stage 2"
	map	models/md5/chars/guards/proguard_02/proguard02_armor
	blend	diffusemap
	colored	
	color	1, .7, .4, 1
}
specularmap	models/md5/chars/guards/proguard_02/proguard02_armor_s
{
	name	"Stage 4"
	if	( parm11 > 0 )
	map	_white
	blend	gl_dst_color, gl_one
	rgb	0.40 * parm11
}
{
	name	"Stage 5"
	if	( parm11 > 0 )
	map	models/md5/chars/guards/proguard_02/proguard02_armor
	blend	add
	rgb	0.15 * parm11
}
{
	name	"Stage 6"
	map	models/md5/chars/guards/proguard_02/proguard02_armor
	blend	add
	red	global2
	green	global3
	blue	global4
}
}

 

539 tris for the new tunic (separated for the trim) and a new cape which was the version I was experimenting with for dynamic cloth. The new cape uses a 512x1024 texture & I'll probably use a smaller texture for the trim but that would make it harder to align normal maps and stuff.

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Well, style and quality-wise he seems to fit in, but I just can't get over that face. It's like his eyes are too asian and his mouth is too low. It's the only part that really stands out as obviously amateurish.

 

Regarding zombies - don't just cut holes in a normal human model, cause that's all it looks like. Dead bodys don't hold their shape very well, flesh is half sloughing off the bone, and the face just looks... well, you can tell they're dead at a glance, even without holes or blood.

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I like this guy :)

 

The zombie one doesn't look like much of a zombie to me unfortunately. Use this picture as a reference if you can (big file warning)

http://fc08.deviantart.com/fs38/f/2008/323...y_deligaris.jpg

I found it on google but you can see the skin tone is difference and how dark the blood is. I think instead of using the alpha blends like you did use a heavy bumpmap to make it appear like a big indent. The bones for the hands I think are too white, they should probably be a little bit more brown, maybe spill some blood all over his clothing too, as a zombie I assume he has been laying around in dirt and guts as well :laugh:

 

The human version is awesome though. Maybe you want to go and fix up some of the older heads we have :)?

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The lower tunic is sharing the same uv as the arms. I do a lot of sharing being uv maps/textures between meshes so I can cut down on the # of textures. Believe me, hardly any texture space is wasted.

 

Sorry, but I think there's plenty of wasted space. Look at the uvmap for that half-tunic/cape thing on his back. You've used half an image for the *inside* of the cape/back tunic, which is barely even seen. It should use the same uvmap as the side players will see; or else be much, much smaller.

 

I was able to very quickly cut the number of textures needed by 50%. Take a look at the image below. The image on the left is your tunic/arms uv. The one on the right is after a few quick modifications. I shrank the tunic uvs by about 10%, moved them to the bottom, and took the cape/tunic uvmap and rotated it to fit in the top. Suddenly six textures can be replaced by 3. And those modifcations took almost no time at all. With a little more work you could easily fit the straps on there too, and reduce the texture bloat by 66%.

 

uvmap1.jpg

 

The levels are different from the diffuse or they'll be too bright or too dark.

 

:huh: We're talking about extremely subtle differences. Compare the diffuse for the boots/arms to the specularmap below. The difference is barely noticeable even side by side; I guarantee no one could tell the difference in game.

 

spec1.jpg

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Well, style and quality-wise he seems to fit in, but I just can't get over that face. It's like his eyes are too asian and his mouth is too low.

Right, I was thinking the same, and that helped me grasp the thought. He really is a solid mofo now; I'm glad he's no longer a toothpick. :) But something about the eyes and width and low position of the mouth... rubchin.gif

 

Use this picture as a reference if you can (big file warning)

http://fc08.deviantart.com/fs38/f/2008/323...y_deligaris.jpg

:blink: I think I just puked a little. IOW, perfect.

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I don't like it yet :P

post-476-1240604885_thumb.jpg

But I'm using animations to distort the original mesh:

 

translated his left eye outward

rotated the lips in opposite directions

translated the cheeks inward

scaled the jaw to be smaller

 

He definitely needs a better normal map and some texture work

 

You can do this to any mesh we have. A combo of translate, rotate, and scaling joints to create head or body variations without new meshes or rigging. I don't know how AFs for the body would react. You would have to modify any animations the character has though.

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Its a step in the right direction, but those eyeballs, especially the one of the right looks really cartoony with those bloodshout lines

|=-=------=-=|

happycheeze.deviantart.com

 

Moddb

 

Gamers Outreach, a nonprofit that uses videogames to raise money for chairty.

|=-=------=-=|

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Right, I was thinking the same, and that helped me grasp the thought. He really is a solid mofo now; I'm glad he's no longer a toothpick. :) But something about the eyes and width and low position of the mouth... rubchin.gif

 

You could tweak forever and still not get as good a result as just starting again with a photo reference for the model and texture... even oDDity didn't try to create faces from scratch.

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