Models - Accepting donations?

[Springheel]

Looking good, Diego.

 

The coat won't be any more difficult to animate than a robe, so don't worry about that.

 

I think one of the major things making the coat look so modern is the colour. Try black with brass buttons and I think it will look significantly different. I would also agree that looking at images of victorian lapels and pockets would be a good idea.

 

@Springheel: He's called a theoretician, yet the concept art has a ruler/protractor thingy in his pocket and alchemical gear in the background - what kind of work does this guy do?

 

I basically did two concepts for the inventors--one was a more grungy, mechanic-type that would do a lot of the physical engineering and tinkering work, and the other (this one) was more of a scientist who would tend to do more lab-work and theoretical designs. Which isn't to suggest that the two roles are separate in the inventor's guild, but they do tend to specialize in particular fields.

[Diego]

Yipes.. this thread's still here.

 

Ok, I've finally found the courage to "finish" the inventor guy. Since I don't know exactly what's the workflow to make them ingame (there are always so many details, like separating the head, using specific file types, etc) So if you guys accept the model it will probably have some work to be done, I'm a fraid.

 

I did my best with the textures.. textures are hard! I was going to make some hair and a fancy goggles, but I'm really struggling to make transparency work with 3ds max

 

Here it is, I can post some more images and details..

[Tels]

Wow, nice work!

[Serpentine]

Very nice!

[Springheel]

Yep, looks promising (I know what you mean about how hard textures are...I think that's the hardest part of creating characters). Thanks Diego. I haven't forgotten about your pagan either, I'm just swamped with other tasks at the moment.

 

Are you looking for feedback are do you want to upload him as is?

[Diego]

Are you looking for feedback are do you want to upload him as is?

 

Feedback. I can change some things, if needed, before uploading.

 

I feel bad about the hair. Even if I make the same file type with transparency used in d3, 3dsmax doesn't translate the transparency wich makes the work harder.

 

Maybe I could also work on the materials, create additional maps (specular, for example) Is this possible with that md5 model viewer?

[Springheel]

I feel bad about the hair.

 

Yes, I was going to comment on the hair. I'm not sure a transparency is needed, but more of a sense of individual hair strands, either drawn on or with a bumpmap.

 

The only other thing I would suggest are a few more accessories...perhaps a pocket with a tool poking out? It looks pretty good as is, though.

[Baddcog]

Looks pretty good but I feel his proportions are a bit off. Head seems really big, hands seem really small. His neck looks like it's 1/2 the width of his torso, should probably be closer to 1/4.

 

I think scaling the whole body up a bit, then scale the whole mesh down to the size you want him would be best.

 

Hard to tell with the coat, but it seems like his knees should be a bit below the pockets, which would leave his hips about the bottom button, so he wouldn't have a belly, just ribs right on top of his hips.

[aidakeeley]

I'll say from an outsider's point of view that it looks great to me and I'm excited about the way so many creative people are able to contribute to TDM. This coming year really should be the year of the TDM explosion!

 

Nice, nice work, y'all

 

ETA: Oh, I came in here wanting to laugh at the title of this thread. Sounds like an online 'model' requesting 'gifts' for 'posing'.

Edited December 30, 2009 by aidakeeley

[etdarkb]

I am afraid that you have a dirty mind... aidakeeley... I like it.

[Diego]

Springheel

 

Changed my mind. Just let me try something with his hair before I call it done

 

I'll make two maps for the hair, one for the opacity alone. This way is simpler, and if you need everything in one file with an alpha chanel, all you have to do is merge the two images.

 

Some accessories would be nice (something to indicate he's an inventor, after all). But that pocket is normal mapped, that's why I came up with the goggles thing.

 

Baddcog

 

I tested his proportions against a 'perfect' model I have here and it's within the limits of normality This impression may have something to do with the perspective. I remember someone (Oddity?) saying that we should make the models with hands and feet bigger than they should, so they would 'look' normal (even though they aren't that normal)

 

Oh, I came in here wanting to laugh at the title of this thread. Sounds like an online 'model' requesting 'gifts' for 'posing'

LOL

[etdarkb]

Some accessories would be nice (something to indicate he's an inventor, after all). But that pocket is normal mapped, that's why I came up with the goggles thing.

Obviously one would think to a pencil, but it seems there are no pencils in TDM set, so what about some blackboard chalks?

I can easily imagine an inventor with always few chalks (large and colorful like the ones of the street painters nowadays) ready to write any good

idea he might have in any flat surface. (Better a blackboard... but not necessary).

[Bikerdude]

How goes this little thread...?

[Springheel]

Changed my mind. Just let me try something with his hair before I call it done

 

What's the status on this guy, Diego? I'd rather get a copy that's partially finished than none at all.

[Diego]

I never got the chance to work on it again. But I can send you the package (I think it's in the stage of that image above) as soon as I can, which will be in one week or so.

[Diego]

Ok, see if this link works:

http://www.4shared.com/file/PI9se6_C/InventorModel.html

 

Since I can't make a fully working model in-game ready and all that, I'm giving you every piece of the puzzle so you can assemble and modify it at your will. (that's why it's 140MB)

[Diego]

I may have (not sure yet) a few days off.. yay! \o/

 

The mod seems to be pretty well fed on models. What's the next weak point? animations? Some of them could use some work.

 

BTW, does the above link works?

[Springheel]

Yes, I got the character, thanks. Just haven't had time to add them in yet.

 

The mod seems to be pretty well fed on models. What's the next weak point? animations? Some of them could use some work.

 

Sure, animations would be nice. What kind of experience do you have there?

[Diego]

lol I just remembered that the first time I came to this forum was to make animations! For some reason I ended up making models

 

I have some experience in animating with 3ds max, but if you have ready-to-animate files of some other software, that would be better.

 

I wish I have some animations to show.. since it's been a while and I don't have those old files in this new computer.

[nbohr1more]

Looks great.

 

I'd love to see him illuminated by the electric sparks of an Arc Lamp...

[greebo]

Our animations are done in Maya, usually. Baddcog created the rat and lantern bot animations in 3DS though, so there must exist some way to export the .md5anim files.

 

Do you have experience to weight characters? The usual process of a model is like this: investigate the model, fix anything that needs fixing, split the model into separate submeshes (skin, cloth, armour), create the shaders and check it out in-game as static. The model is then resized to fit our existing proguard skeleton. The head is cut off as they need to be swappable for more variation. Then (Springheel, usually) adds a lowpoly shadowmesh to the object. Create an entity so that it can be spawned in game.

 

This entire set of meshes is then imported into Maya or Lightwave and weighted to the proguard joints. There is an in-game exporter for Maya, so I favour this option (I just bind a hotkey to "exportModels;reloadModels" to see the changes immediately in front of me), but if you're more familiar with Lightwave like Spring there is no reason not to use your favourite app.

 

Finally, the gameplay parameters like team, door handling, elevator handling, acuity, etc. are tweaked and weapons are attached.

 

I went through this once (for the revenant) and I can say that you're busy for several days until the model is ready (if you have as much freetime as I have), sometimes longer. I meant to rig your pagan warrior back in March or April, but I ran into size problems and then I got distracted and forgot to get back to it. You'll see it in-game eventually.

[Springheel]

(I just bind a hotkey to "exportModels;reloadModels" to see the changes immediately in front of me

 

Hey, that sounds useful...how do you do that?

[greebo]

Hey, that sounds useful...how do you do that?

Well, it only applies to Maya, so I don't know how useful it actually is for you. I have Doom 3 and Maya running at the same time, and start painting the model in Maya. Each time you save a changed .mb file (and provided you have the exportmodels declaration set up in your .def file) you just execute exportModels tdm_ai_pagan_warrior and then reloadModels. You can combine these two commands and bind them:

bind F8 "exportModels tdm_ai_pagan_warrior;reloadModels"

This allows me to watch my rigging changes in-game. The analogous works with reloadAnims, when watching a testmodel in front of you.

 

I can be more specific, if you want.

[Springheel]

Yes, I frequently have to test animations in-game, but wind up exiting D3 each time. It would speed things up a lot if I didn't have to do that. So if you exportmodels while D3 is running and then reloadanims, it will update all the animations immediately?

[greebo]

Yes, I frequently have to test animations in-game, but wind up exiting D3 each time. It would speed things up a lot if I didn't have to do that. So if you exportmodels while D3 is running and then reloadanims, it will update all the animations immediately?

Exactly. That's the idea behind all these reload* console commands. reloadDecls (for materials, defs, skins), reloadAnims, reloadXData, reloadModels, reloadImages (for changed TGAs)