"Doomed RTS" is actually a pretty good name for a fantasy mod...
A few more noob-to-noob tips: if you're planning on making this mod on Linux (and doing the whole thing yourself), it'll be worth downloading copies of:
Wings3D - you already have this...
Upspring - for converting the .3ds files exported out of Wings3D to the .s3o models the game uses. There's a Linux version at http://github.com/Kloot/upspring , but you'll need the patch at http://springrts.com/mantis/view.php?id=516 to get it to work. Or if you've got a non-ATI graphics card, the Windows version (link to EXE) should work fine in Wine.
GIMP - for all your texturing and imaging needs.
A text editor - Vim ftw.
And possibly:
Scriptor - if you're going to use COB for animation, you'll need this to compile the scripts. Personally, I'd recommend using Lua for unit animation, because it doesn't need compiling (and I've had problems getting Scriptor to work in Wine, although that's probably just me). There's a copy at http://www.fileplanet.com/subscribe/log ... l.aspx?f=0 .
dxtBMP - You might find it easier to add alpha channels to textures using this instead of GIMP. It's less complex, doesn't try to guess what you're doing with transparencies, and can save as DDS (the preferred texture format, although .tga works fine) whereas the GIMP needs an add-on for DDS support. It's at http://www.softpedia.com/progDownload/D ... 53836.html .
And this tutorial starts where the UVMapping tutorial ends, and is very handy for getting your newly-modelled model into the game.
Also useful are FLOZi's and Spliff's empty mods to start putting files into. And of course you'll be needing the Unit and Weapon Variables pages on the wiki.
Hope any of this helps. Looking forward to seeing how this game turns out!
Yet another doomed fantasy mod?
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Re: Yet another doomed fantasy mod?
Man, you guys are so helpful 
especially good that you suggested uses Upspring over wine, as I was having trouble getting it to work natively (I found your post on another thread - you still using Jaunty?)
The rest of the stuff I'll leave for the moment - I'll probably get back to you once I've moved to the next stage (animation I believe).
I'll clearly need to do some gadget scripting to get the thing to work, but for the moment I think I'll concentrate on making a couple of actual units.
Time to have a crack at this texturing tutorial
Thanks for the help and support,
William
edit: Finished texturing
At first I had some trouble - when it comes to UV mapping I'm not sure if Segment->Projection is the best idea as you end up with polygons scatter all over the place. If you do it manually you can have them all in the same place, or at least organised so that it makes sense.
My first attempt gave me something like this:
Then I remembered Knorke's advice
Then I discovered just how bad I am at GIMP (I'm used to MS paint...):
Think I'll practice a bit with GIMP before moving on - maybe try to draw some concept art for you (as I said, no scanner. No stylus either - dang...).
William
especially good that you suggested uses Upspring over wine, as I was having trouble getting it to work natively (I found your post on another thread - you still using Jaunty?)Lol - maybe it could be an in-joke.PTSnoop wrote:"Doomed RTS" is actually a pretty good name for a fantasy mod...
GIMP comes as standard with Ubuntu, which is handy: it's pretty much a vital party of... everything. As for text editing I quite like Kate, though I've never tried Vim... what are its advantages?PTSnoop wrote:GIMP - for all your texturing and imaging needs.
A text editor - Vim ftw.
The rest of the stuff I'll leave for the moment - I'll probably get back to you once I've moved to the next stage (animation I believe).
I'll clearly need to do some gadget scripting to get the thing to work, but for the moment I think I'll concentrate on making a couple of actual units.
Time to have a crack at this texturing tutorial
Thanks for the help and support,
William
edit: Finished texturing
At first I had some trouble - when it comes to UV mapping I'm not sure if Segment->Projection is the best idea as you end up with polygons scatter all over the place. If you do it manually you can have them all in the same place, or at least organised so that it makes sense.
My first attempt gave me something like this:
Then I remembered Knorke's advice
Then I discovered just how bad I am at GIMP (I'm used to MS paint...):
Think I'll practice a bit with GIMP before moving on - maybe try to draw some concept art for you (as I said, no scanner. No stylus either - dang...).
William
Re: Yet another doomed fantasy mod?
I'd recommend playing around with inkscape (free Vector based drawing tool) to "block out" your texture, then fleshing it out in GIMP
Re: Yet another doomed fantasy mod?
good progress so far.
one thing that i would suggest here, certainly not a golden rule (and in fact there are mods where this step is ignored and it turns out fine) would be once you have everything mirrored, scale it up, and rearrange your uvw map a few times until you've covered as much of the uvw space as you feel is realistically possible.
heres the skin of that model from the WIP thread because you were familiar with it, not trying to toot my own horn, just wanted to show you what i was on about. when i initially unwrapped the model, the unwrapped segments took up about 2x of the space i wanted them to. once i had mirrored every mirrorable face, then it ended up only taking up about 1/3 of my square of uvw space, so i was able to scale up the size of everything. certainly the image i posted isn't of the most optimized variety; just have a look at any of smoths skins for example to have a look at how a REALLY optimized texture is laid out (and conversely, have a peek at arghs units, the textures aren't very optimized in terms of uvw space, but they still look really good, so thats something to consider too)
as you do more and more, you will come up with your own little tricks to regulate and speed up your workflow. the LAST thing you want to think is "oh my god this is taking me ages, how am i going to make a mod of it takes me things long?" as you learn, your skill will rise, and you'll find yourself completing things a lot faster than you thought you would.
basically, you want to do as much optimisation as you feel comfortable with; obviously doing TOO much and splitting up your groups of faces can be counter productive in terms of time.
i like angry tank >:D
edit : i do my graphics stuff on windoze, but if i were to do my skins on linux, it would be with inkscape
one thing that i would suggest here, certainly not a golden rule (and in fact there are mods where this step is ignored and it turns out fine) would be once you have everything mirrored, scale it up, and rearrange your uvw map a few times until you've covered as much of the uvw space as you feel is realistically possible.
heres the skin of that model from the WIP thread because you were familiar with it, not trying to toot my own horn, just wanted to show you what i was on about. when i initially unwrapped the model, the unwrapped segments took up about 2x of the space i wanted them to. once i had mirrored every mirrorable face, then it ended up only taking up about 1/3 of my square of uvw space, so i was able to scale up the size of everything. certainly the image i posted isn't of the most optimized variety; just have a look at any of smoths skins for example to have a look at how a REALLY optimized texture is laid out (and conversely, have a peek at arghs units, the textures aren't very optimized in terms of uvw space, but they still look really good, so thats something to consider too)
as you do more and more, you will come up with your own little tricks to regulate and speed up your workflow. the LAST thing you want to think is "oh my god this is taking me ages, how am i going to make a mod of it takes me things long?" as you learn, your skill will rise, and you'll find yourself completing things a lot faster than you thought you would.
basically, you want to do as much optimisation as you feel comfortable with; obviously doing TOO much and splitting up your groups of faces can be counter productive in terms of time.
i like angry tank >:D
edit : i do my graphics stuff on windoze, but if i were to do my skins on linux, it would be with inkscape
Re: Yet another doomed fantasy mod?
in edge mode, set your hard edges. you'll see results like this:
Re: Yet another doomed fantasy mod?
Great ideaKaiserJ wrote:good progress so far.
one thing that i would suggest here, certainly not a golden rule (and in fact there are mods where this step is ignored and it turns out fine) would be once you have everything mirrored, scale it up, and rearrange your uvw map a few times until you've covered as much of the uvw space as you feel is realistically possible.
might as well use the space if it's there. I don't think Fugly's current texture would benefit much from a higher resolution though 
Still, I'm definitely going to keep that one in mind, thanks for the advice!
If you look at my past project you'll see that I mostly do pixel art: already painting (Photoshop/Gimp) is daunting, vector seem quite frightening, still, if two people (Sinbad as well) are pointing to it, I guess I should give it a try...KaiserJ wrote:i do my graphics stuff on windoze, but if i were to do my skins on linux, it would be with inkscape
smoth wrote:in edge mode, set your hard edges. you'll see results like this:
Was wondering why it was all smooth... does spring support soft edges? A mixture? Organic model would certainly benefit from them.
I've also finished a first piece of concept art in GIMP - I draw this on paper a few days ago - he's called Clock-Face/the Time Lord/Paradox:
The idea is that the big clock distracts the player from the (probably) lack of humanoid... ness.
I'm thinking the hands on the clock could move around like a radar dish, maybe differently depending on the aura he's using. This would be a mid-high level daemon unit with a ranged stun-attack and the slow/speed aura mention above. I'm also thinking he might be able to kamikaze ("time bomb") and stun everyone nearby like EMP.
Already in the time it took me to draw him I think I've gotten better at Gimp, though that's not saying a lot
I'm going to practice a bit more with Gimp, making concept art for some other unit I drew during my last little session: that way I can give you guys an idea of where my head's at and practice my skillz at the same time.
Re: Yet another doomed fantasy mod?
lol its the devils racing shoe 
If gimp seems too complicated (confuses me too) try ultimate paint (older versions are freeware) which has some easy to use colorpattern generator function things. If you use the "magic wand" to select a polygon on the texture you can quickly color it with some funky puttern.
did you get it to animate yet? because thats where i am failing atm
If gimp seems too complicated (confuses me too) try ultimate paint (older versions are freeware) which has some easy to use colorpattern generator function things. If you use the "magic wand" to select a polygon on the texture you can quickly color it with some funky puttern.
did you get it to animate yet? because thats where i am failing atm
Re: Yet another doomed fantasy mod?
Did you notice the pendulum tie?
edit: oh wait... I got it - lol
The tutorial I was following starts talking about placing origins but it gets more and more vague and eventually petters off into a "to be continued..." The first part was good but I got seriously confused: all I managed to do was to save the various sections as .objs and then import them all (with hierarchy) into Upspring...
edit: oh yeah, about this paint program - does it run on Linux/Wine?
I'm talking a bit of a "break" I'll have another look at the tutorials that have been linked here tomorrow maybe.
Oh yeah - for the record I have a week's holidays starting today: I'm using the time to bootstrap this project but I also have 3 weeks of lecture notes to catch up with
edit: oh wait... I got it - lol
The tutorial I was following starts talking about placing origins but it gets more and more vague and eventually petters off into a "to be continued..." The first part was good but I got seriously confused: all I managed to do was to save the various sections as .objs and then import them all (with hierarchy) into Upspring...
edit: oh yeah, about this paint program - does it run on Linux/Wine?
I'm talking a bit of a "break" I'll have another look at the tutorials that have been linked here tomorrow maybe.
Oh yeah - for the record I have a week's holidays starting today: I'm using the time to bootstrap this project but I also have 3 weeks of lecture notes to catch up with
Last edited by wilbefast on 26 Oct 2009, 20:41, edited 1 time in total.
Re: Yet another doomed fantasy mod?
you do a mixture.
also here is an example of a tightly packed uvmap.
also here is an example of a tightly packed uvmap.
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Re: Yet another doomed fantasy mod?
A suggestion: don't let spring ruin your academic life. Work on homework in between bouts of game work. You let one part of your mind rest while the other is still being productive 
I may not know *everything* about animation, but I would be glad to help, wilbefast and knorke. Just send me a pm or ask in the lobby.
I would really suggest learning Lua anims, because they can easily be done on linux, as well as being the same language as everything else non-engine side. Also no compiling.
Anyway, I got a little sidetracked writing this post. I'll try to have some more input later.
I may not know *everything* about animation, but I would be glad to help, wilbefast and knorke. Just send me a pm or ask in the lobby.
I would really suggest learning Lua anims, because they can easily be done on linux, as well as being the same language as everything else non-engine side. Also no compiling.
Anyway, I got a little sidetracked writing this post. I'll try to have some more input later.
Re: Yet another doomed fantasy mod?
edit: this tutorial looks good - PTSnoop suggest it a few posts ago:
http://springrts.com/phpbb/viewtopic.php?f=14&t=13034
LUA seems like the way to go, even though most example are in bo (s?) - I've had a look at the syntax: seems fairly straightforward. Anyway, here's a batch of concepts I just finished GIMPing. I think I've got a grasp of the tool now so may be able to make slightly less crud(e) textures. I don't want to overindulge in concepts but these are justified because they're practice
Demon-/Cursed-/Pandora's Box. A convenient model, and probably the first I'll attempt
Rolls around the battlefield at a slow rate, unarmed but well armoured. It can transport units (because it's bigger on the inside see) and teleport around the map provided you have enough mana spare to pay for the ability.
And at the other end of the spectrum (in terms of difficulty-to-model):
Stalker/Ripper (as in Jack the Ripper). Figured I would need at least a couple of combat units - I've read that the AI cooperates a lot better if the combat attack has a long reach. Also Spring's animation system doesn't seem to appreciate back-swing (to attack with a sword you first raise it, then swing it forward) much preferring a sort of recoiled attack. so I made this guy: his attack works like a sort of jack-in-the-box: he's this demonic spiky-bug thing hiding in a coat. You walks around slowly (cloaked?) and stabs people with his "spinetties".
Since giving Clock-face a tux (it just sort of happened) I've been moving towards a more "Cabbadath" (Chzo mythos) inspired art-style for the daemons. That's one way of avoiding the done-to-death "horns and hooves". I also like Alucard/Arcard from Hellsing: long story short, daemons look cooler if they're well dressed
But that's just my opinion, what do you think?
William
http://springrts.com/phpbb/viewtopic.php?f=14&t=13034
Yeah, I think tomorrow I'm going to dedicate to getting some work done - that way I'll have less hanging over me and I'll be more freemaackey wrote:A suggestion: don't let spring ruin your academic life. Work on homework in between bouts of game work. You let one part of your mind rest while the other is still being productive
I may take you up on thatmaackey wrote:I may not know *everything* about animation, but I would be glad to help, wilbefast and knorke. Just send me a pm or ask in the lobby.
I would really suggest learning Lua anims, because they can easily be done on linux, as well as being the same language as everything else non-engine side. Also no compiling.
Anyway, I got a little sidetracked writing this post. I'll try to have some more input later.
LUA seems like the way to go, even though most example are in bo (s?) - I've had a look at the syntax: seems fairly straightforward. Anyway, here's a batch of concepts I just finished GIMPing. I think I've got a grasp of the tool now so may be able to make slightly less crud(e) textures. I don't want to overindulge in concepts but these are justified because they're practice
Demon-/Cursed-/Pandora's Box. A convenient model, and probably the first I'll attempt
Rolls around the battlefield at a slow rate, unarmed but well armoured. It can transport units (because it's bigger on the inside see) and teleport around the map provided you have enough mana spare to pay for the ability.
And at the other end of the spectrum (in terms of difficulty-to-model):
Stalker/Ripper (as in Jack the Ripper). Figured I would need at least a couple of combat units - I've read that the AI cooperates a lot better if the combat attack has a long reach. Also Spring's animation system doesn't seem to appreciate back-swing (to attack with a sword you first raise it, then swing it forward) much preferring a sort of recoiled attack. so I made this guy: his attack works like a sort of jack-in-the-box: he's this demonic spiky-bug thing hiding in a coat. You walks around slowly (cloaked?) and stabs people with his "spinetties".
Since giving Clock-face a tux (it just sort of happened) I've been moving towards a more "Cabbadath" (Chzo mythos) inspired art-style for the daemons. That's one way of avoiding the done-to-death "horns and hooves". I also like Alucard/Arcard from Hellsing: long story short, daemons look cooler if they're well dressed
But that's just my opinion, what do you think?
William
Last edited by wilbefast on 28 Oct 2009, 11:44, edited 1 time in total.
Re: Yet another doomed fantasy mod?
I really like this project Idea. I too have been disgruntled by the large number nay-sayers in this forum. So I'd like to throw in some of my own two cents here.
More about modeling software.
I myself use Silo, it has an awesome Unwrapping tool (I'd dare say better than wings.) Plus a friggin awesome interface with nothing hidden from view.
You can produce a lot of nice models in Silo and export as OBJ and then to upspring from there.
I haven't tried any hardcore organic modeling in it yet. But I have been working on some stuff for a spaceflight sim.
I could work up an organic design in a few hours to maybe encourage some enthusiasm for this project you got going on.
More about modeling software.
I myself use Silo, it has an awesome Unwrapping tool (I'd dare say better than wings.) Plus a friggin awesome interface with nothing hidden from view.
You can produce a lot of nice models in Silo and export as OBJ and then to upspring from there.
I haven't tried any hardcore organic modeling in it yet. But I have been working on some stuff for a spaceflight sim.
I could work up an organic design in a few hours to maybe encourage some enthusiasm for this project you got going on.
Re: Yet another doomed fantasy mod?
Alright. Here it is.
I never told anyone this before, but for a long time I wanted to do a weird RTS where one side was a bunch of "live-angry-stuffed-animals-with-machine-guns" vesus "gnarly-disgusting-demonic-hellspawn".
This was a scout/radar unit for the hellspawns. He had massive LoS and could shoot off a low damage green goo from his forward facing sphincter. (No that is not a mouth.) It would tower over the other units like a giant but was easy to kill because of his thin wimpy ostrich legs.
I never told anyone this before, but for a long time I wanted to do a weird RTS where one side was a bunch of "live-angry-stuffed-animals-with-machine-guns" vesus "gnarly-disgusting-demonic-hellspawn".
This was a scout/radar unit for the hellspawns. He had massive LoS and could shoot off a low damage green goo from his forward facing sphincter. (No that is not a mouth.) It would tower over the other units like a giant but was easy to kill because of his thin wimpy ostrich legs.
Re: Yet another doomed fantasy mod?
Hey, that's really cool
You should make that mod - seriously! Have something like the Tediz from Conker's Bad Fur Day:
That would be so epic
Funny because I was actually thinking of having this floating eyeball-cluster-Morula-type-thing as a radar...
About silo - unfortunately there's no Linux port and I'd rather not pay for anything that doesn't run natively
Also since I'm not an experienced modeller I think advanced tools would probably be wasted on me - Wings suits me fine because it's down and dirty and very simple
Anyway, today is set aside for course work - maybe I'll finish it all if I don't get distracted (it's 8:53am and I'm already distracted).
William
You should make that mod - seriously! Have something like the Tediz from Conker's Bad Fur Day:
That would be so epic
Funny because I was actually thinking of having this floating eyeball-cluster-Morula-type-thing as a radar...
About silo - unfortunately there's no Linux port and I'd rather not pay for anything that doesn't run natively
Also since I'm not an experienced modeller I think advanced tools would probably be wasted on me - Wings suits me fine because it's down and dirty and very simple
Anyway, today is set aside for course work - maybe I'll finish it all if I don't get distracted (it's 8:53am and I'm already distracted).
William
Re: Yet another doomed fantasy mod?
Hi guys, back and feeling refreshed after a day spent revising linear algebra
First up I decided to practice smoth's edge hardening/softening, so I made various part more or less jagged:
I've been following this tutorial to get the Fugly Tank ready for Spring:
http://springrts.com/phpbb/viewtopic.php?f=14&t=13034
Everything gone swimmingly except for the alpha-channel part, since I'm using GIMP and not the (windows) application that's suggested. I basically made a copy of the original texture, converted to greyscale and blacked out the area I didn't want team-coloured:
But the result wasn't ideal - part that should be TK free seem to have got a dose of it too
I did this sort of thing for Warcraft skins ages ago. I wasn't much good at it then either
Anyway, here's the "finished" Spring Model, with flipped UV, collision mask, height, object hierarchy and so on. Please let me know if anything looks strikingly wrong
Actually you can't see the hierarchy... Here it is in clear:
Oh, and if anyone knows why my alpha isn't working (incompetence?) please let me know. In the meantime, let's start having a go at animation/putting it in game? Huh... actually, what do I do next
I'll check the previous posts...
In case you were wondering - "hang on, this is a fantasy mod, why is there this tank everywhere?" it's because I think it's wiser to start by making something that Spring was "made" for before trying to find the tricks/hacks/exploits necessary to get my fantasy creature not to look like robots.
William
First up I decided to practice smoth's edge hardening/softening, so I made various part more or less jagged:
I've been following this tutorial to get the Fugly Tank ready for Spring:
http://springrts.com/phpbb/viewtopic.php?f=14&t=13034
Everything gone swimmingly except for the alpha-channel part, since I'm using GIMP and not the (windows) application that's suggested. I basically made a copy of the original texture, converted to greyscale and blacked out the area I didn't want team-coloured:
But the result wasn't ideal - part that should be TK free seem to have got a dose of it too
I did this sort of thing for Warcraft skins ages ago. I wasn't much good at it then either
Anyway, here's the "finished" Spring Model, with flipped UV, collision mask, height, object hierarchy and so on. Please let me know if anything looks strikingly wrong
Actually you can't see the hierarchy... Here it is in clear:
- base
- body /* includes axles */
- head
- flare
- l_wheels
- r_wheels
- head
- body /* includes axles */
Oh, and if anyone knows why my alpha isn't working (incompetence?) please let me know. In the meantime, let's start having a go at animation/putting it in game? Huh... actually, what do I do next
I'll check the previous posts...
In case you were wondering - "hang on, this is a fantasy mod, why is there this tank everywhere?" it's because I think it's wiser to start by making something that Spring was "made" for before trying to find the tricks/hacks/exploits necessary to get my fantasy creature not to look like robots.
William
Re: Yet another doomed fantasy mod?
@Quanto - got a link for your spacefighter game? Googling Stellar Assault brings up an old Sega game.
Re: Yet another doomed fantasy mod?
I've taken a bit of a break from tutorial-following to have a go at modelling my evil daemon-box of evil doom!
It's got like evil demon faces bulging out of it
It'll look better when it's textured. Or would, if I was any good at texturing. Ah well, I'm going to have a crack at it anyway. The box is composed on 4 identical faces + top and bottom, so that it can open up. I've decided that instead of rolling on it's faces it'll spin around the Y axis as it moves and opens up (revealing the evil vortex of evil energy inside?) when preparing to teleport or loading/unloading units. When closed it's very heavily armoured, providing the "glass-cannon" daemons with a bit of durability, when open however it is very fragile.
It's got like evil demon faces bulging out of it
It'll look better when it's textured. Or would, if I was any good at texturing. Ah well, I'm going to have a crack at it anyway. The box is composed on 4 identical faces + top and bottom, so that it can open up. I've decided that instead of rolling on it's faces it'll spin around the Y axis as it moves and opens up (revealing the evil vortex of evil energy inside?) when preparing to teleport or loading/unloading units. When closed it's very heavily armoured, providing the "glass-cannon" daemons with a bit of durability, when open however it is very fragile.
Re: Yet another doomed fantasy mod?
cool keep working on it. you'll get there!
Re: Yet another doomed fantasy mod?
Thanks smoth
Here's the finished (?) model and texture, although I'll likely have to come back to it later to fix something...
The face uses soft edges while the box uses hard ones. This time I did the UV map manually, each face had left = blue, right = purple. I also grabbed the box bits together. As a result the output was a lot easier to deal with: I could identify what was what and merge them on top of each other. Then I scaled everything up - basically used every trick I've been taught over the past couple of days
Course, I ended up with some strange leftover triangles...
Which as you can see turned out to be the very inside of the throat. Not sure how that happened, maybe I missed them when I was colouring everything in - I'll have to be more careful next time.
Oh yeah, there was also a polygon near the eye that I missed - I put it into the corresponding hole in the UV map but I did so upside-down! Result, weird looking spot on the texture. Luckily it's possible to go back and fiddle with the map afterwards
Here's the finished (?) model and texture, although I'll likely have to come back to it later to fix something...
The face uses soft edges while the box uses hard ones. This time I did the UV map manually, each face had left = blue, right = purple. I also grabbed the box bits together. As a result the output was a lot easier to deal with: I could identify what was what and merge them on top of each other. Then I scaled everything up - basically used every trick I've been taught over the past couple of days
Course, I ended up with some strange leftover triangles...
Which as you can see turned out to be the very inside of the throat. Not sure how that happened, maybe I missed them when I was colouring everything in - I'll have to be more careful next time.
Oh yeah, there was also a polygon near the eye that I missed - I put it into the corresponding hole in the UV map but I did so upside-down! Result, weird looking spot on the texture. Luckily it's possible to go back and fiddle with the map afterwards
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Guessmyname
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- Joined: 28 Apr 2005, 21:07
Re: Yet another doomed fantasy mod?
You used the autouv thing didn't you?
You can also use hard edges to define uv 'cuts' for Unwrapping UV projections (this is how I do it - more control). It's like papercraft in reverse. Once you've UV'ed the model, you can then go back and reset the hard/soft edges accordingly.
You can also use hard edges to define uv 'cuts' for Unwrapping UV projections (this is how I do it - more control). It's like papercraft in reverse. Once you've UV'ed the model, you can then go back and reset the hard/soft edges accordingly.