Propose replacement for RLAAN' INSTALLATIONS

[Fendorin]

Hello

Because is hard to have a Rlaan life in VS i decide to give a gift for the rlaan faction: a oupost for protect the Rlaan assembly "territory"

is a realy basic Rlaan design a bowl with 4 radiator/wings/hair/flap/thing...'call that like you what)
the outpost is more "civilian" than human more like a gas station on the space highway also Rlaan have a little City inside the outpost very clse to the landing dock

but see below you will understand:




and the habitat complex and the docking way:

[loki1950]

Can not see much Fendorin not enough contrast with the background but i do like what i can see

Enjoy the Choice

[charlieg]

More wondrous work.

[AzarWolf]

cool stuff- why don't you make them a new fighterbase instead of that hideous parking nightmare of a multi-layerd grey triangle? (and maybe replace the factory while you're at it)

[Ares]

looks good.

[Fendorin]

cool stuff- why don't you make them a new fighterbase instead of that hideous parking nightmare of a multi-layerd grey triangle? (and maybe replace the factory while you're at it)

Maybe : but is question of method:

For fighter barack because is more usefull and obviously more visited by player i should take more time for produce a nice station :.

The outpost is a few hours work
and is good for outpost, i wait comcept approvement if it s good i will work of more complex rlaan base

thank

i don't know if you can read my english!!

[Deus Siddis]

Fendorin, after reading some of the information about Rlaan stations on the wiki (albeit still sparse info) I think you should look to Echinoderm Invertebrates as your primary source of inspiration on this:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Echinoderm

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Crown-of-thorns_starfish

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sea_urchin

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sand_dollar

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brittlestar

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Starfish

Only with quadrilateral symmetry of course.

[Fendorin]

yes Deus siddis

is for what i begun by the most tiny Rlaan station : because i was not so clear for me the Rlaan style guide

but i thought the sea star is good idea for rlaan
,the pikes will are difficult for texturing but we could simplify.............

thank

[Deus Siddis]

but i thought the sea star is good idea for rlaan,

Especially the crown-of-thorns sea star. That purple and red one in the wiki pic also has almost the right color scheme too, if it just had some dark silvery areas and more purple than red.

the pikes will are difficult for texturing but we could simplify.............

What you could try doing about the spines is split them into four sections down their length and then in the texture paint solid or similar colored lines down the seams and between the seams paint in other patterns that make it all look natural and planned.

And then cut the spines out with seams at their base where they attach to the wrest of the station.

This way you should get a fairly accurate and simple-ish unwrap and texturing won't be real difficult either.

[Fendorin]

i find solution for the pike just multiply separate 3 object and it's give you

Some things like that:( is just a preview with 20 minutes texturing)

[Deus Siddis]

i find solution for the pike just multiply separate 3 object and it's give you

Some things like that:( is just a preview with 20 minutes texturing)

I think it would be better for both optimization and conforming to the 'organic' rlaan look if you made the spines part of the station mesh and used the "subsurf" modifier to make it look smooth and organic.

Here is how you do it:

1) Create a sphere (either UV for smoothness or Ico for 'urchiness' ) Make sure it is "Set Smooth". If you want you can scale it down on the Z axis like it says on the art style guide.

2) Now apply the subsurf modifier, set this modifier to 1 or 2 levels.

3) Go to edit mode and select individual faces and hit the 'E' key for Extrude > Individual Faces and then radiate them out to a good distance.

4) If the spines do not look pointy enough, select their end faces and hit 'W' > Merge > At Center. Note that this will make them shorter, so you might compensate by extruding the individual faces out farther in step 3 to compensate.

5) Experiment. This is just the basic technique, so use it in a number of ways and make a note of how much you like the results. Try selecting faces in different patterns before extrusion, just scaling down those faces before extrusion, try extruding them a second time and moving the ends in different directions to create curved spines, etc.

[Fendorin]

i tryed but finally i have this résultat :

because is around : ve:5113 ed:11482(in Blender)

and just now my computer bug over this number of point/vertices/edges
and i tryed to smooth the pike is a lot of edges in more for not big effect
also i reduce the pike's diameter and the station look nice and the performance of my computer can accept.....

Do you think is bad? For other rlaan station i will make a long and maybe smooth-transparent pike

Anyway:

this one before:


and after scaling down the base of pike:

[chuck_starchaser]

That's good, Fendorin; I though about Deus Siddis' suggestion and worried it might result in too much geometry.
Thinner spikes not only look better, but they are also better in the sense that the engine doesn't have shadowing capabilities (except for Klauss's GI shadowing, coming soon in Cinemut; but those shadows will be really soft); so, given we don't have real shadows, it's best to de-emphasize the expectation of them. Thinner spikes lower the viewer's expectations to see them casting shadows.
You might want to turn off shadows in the lights, to get more representative renders. You can have Ambient Occlusion turned on, though; since ambient occlusion is something you can bake into your texture set.
What you might want to do is make sure that the bases penetrate the hull a little bit (just a little bit); right now some of them look like they are separated from the hull.
Great-looking base!

[Fendorin]

I don't know how too for create a Ambience occlusion
could you give me a link with a good tutorial??
i can't find in french...... little language alone in the world...

i don't know if Jaks will be agree with this design
For The Rlaan fighter Barack

but personally i thought Deus sidis was a good concil
then for waiting approval....

"the view before landing"

[chuck_starchaser]

Hit [F5] several times till you get to this panel:



What you could also do is a radiosity bake, using the lights on the spikes to bake a lightmap onto the hull. Then you'll have shadows statically cast by all those lights, from the neighboring spikes. That would look really cool, though it would be a bit of work to set it up. You need to cut each spike where the lights are, make the lights' quads a different, emissive material; then the radiosity bake would probably take several hours of computer time. But the result would be spectacular.

[Oblivion]

Cool beans fendorin. The spikes make it less Rlaan though. How about Rlaan-allied species?

[Fendorin]

MAMA MIA!!!!!!!!!!!!!

"Hit [F5] several times till you get to this panel:"



Mon dieu!! pourquoi QUE maintenant ?!!!

i hate Wings 3D

[Fendorin]

Cool beans fendorin. The spikes make it less Rlaan though. How about Rlaan-allied species?

Why it can't be RLAAN???
because no wing's fly?? like purple thing on ship???

[chuck_starchaser]

i hate Wings 3D

Wait till you discover radiosity baking...

EDIT:
By the way, you can "BAKE" ambient occlusion.
From the Render menu, Render Bake -> Ambient Occlusion.
Then you load the baked AO in Gimp, multiply by the diffuse, and add the result to the glow map.
That way it will look in-game like in renders (almost).

[Fendorin]

the picture came to my concept for Rlaan minnig base:

i work on and i hope it can be put in game





the Deus Siddis idea was the best
the model look very "biological" and very "industial"
the texture is not finish but is already good like that no???

i m inspire too the fossilized animal:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Foss ... eocoma.jpg



PS: the world option is very ugly sorry for the little star

[Neskiairti]

hmm i would say give the 'arms' some conture.. like a starfish is bumpy and ridged.. that looks very organic yes.. but.. almost liquid, slug like.

[Deus Siddis]

That's good, Fendorin; I though about Deus Siddis' suggestion and worried it might result in too much geometry.

I tested it in blender before I suggested it-- just start with a low-poly sphere and use fewer spires and spines (the art style guide doesn't say to use too many in the first place, just a fair amount or so). Use only 1 or 2 subsurf levels. Shoot for maybe 10,000 faces, that's not much at all for a station.

Thinner spikes not only look better, but they are also better

And thinner spines are no problem using the method I outlined above, you just have to:

1) scale down the faces before extrusion

2) extrude them two or four times as far out as looks good and then merge the vertices at the end of each extrusion.

And now you have organic, smoothly welded thin spines and spires and none of that pesky overdraw issue.

in the sense that the engine doesn't have shadowing capabilities (except for Klauss's GI shadowing, coming soon in Cinemut; but those shadows will be really soft); so, given we don't have real shadows, it's best to de-emphasize the expectation of them. Thinner spikes lower the viewer's expectations to see them casting shadows.

As you say yourself we have GI, Radiosity Baking and AO Baking.

Some soft Radiosity lighting especially. . .it feels so Rlaan to me.

Cool beans fendorin. The spikes make it less Rlaan though. How about Rlaan-allied species?

Actually it turns out spines and spires are very much in the style of the Rlaan, read here towards the bottom:

http://vegastrike.sourceforge.net/wiki/ ... uide:Rlaan

Yeah I know, that page is kind of a mess, but it contains a Q&A interview between someone and jackS discusses Rlaan stations specifically (amoung other things).

the picture came to my concept for Rlaan minnig base:
i work on and i hope it can be put in game

I like it, fits in well with those organic space blob things you see everywhere in Rlaan space.

the Deus Siddis idea was the best
the model look very "biological" and very "industial"
the texture is not finish but is already good like that no???

i m inspire too the fossilized animal:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Foss ... eocoma.jpg

No problem, I have had some experience modeling alien lifeforms for another project and it seems to have been good practice for the Rlaan style.

PS: the world option is very ugly sorry for the little star

I know, last time I used that feature it rendered stars in the foreground!

[loki1950]

Yeah I know, that page is kind of a mess, but it contains a Q&A interview between someone and jackS discusses Rlaan stations specifically (amoung other things).

That interviewee was most likely Oblivion himself he was a bit of a pest at that time always asking deep questions of our minister of information

Enjoy the Choice

[Deus Siddis]

That interviewee was most likely Oblivion himself

The interview is very helpful, it is most of what we have on Rlaan in the art style guide. What I meant was the information on the page is in need of reorganizing, after all the unanswered questions at the top of it have been filled in of course.

he was a bit of a pest at that time always asking deep questions of our minister of information

I think I might have started to inherit the pest role now. Not that there should only be one pest. . .or only one dozen.

The more canon we get on the wiki the more on target our official content contributions can be.

[Ares]

you stole my project! lol. unfair. yours is about 1000% better then mine would ever be so i guess it's acceptable.
if i may comment though it looks a little too much like a space-starfish might. I reconend a couple more rlaan ship-esque traits? perhaps just the purple color? awesome either way.