cockpits

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Dhudeme
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cockpits

Post by Dhudeme »

I want to modify my own. but beeing a total newbee could you please explain it to me in detail. Please
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hellcatv
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Post by hellcatv »

take a look at the cockpits folder

in there you see a lot of folders named blah.cpt
then within those you see a file with the same name
edit that...you can change gauges...you can even specify a background image (check out the privateer remake mod on the front page for examples of how 2d cockpits could look)
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Dhudeme
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Post by Dhudeme »

yes but how do I edit the .cpt files
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Dhudeme
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Post by Dhudeme »

Oh, I got it some text editor, right.
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Post by Dhudeme »

could you tell me about .xmesh files now please :roll:
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f1gm3nt3d
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Post by f1gm3nt3d »

xmesh is the old model format for vegastrike I think it is deprecated but still supported. What you really want to use is the .bfxm format. Theres a conevrter in the artwork forum AFAIK. Also you need to download the opensource modeling program ?cube?(ehm sorry don't remember but there should be a sticky in artwork for taht too the same thread also has the plugin to export with.) Thats for editing the 3d cockpit models. You also had to do something crazy like re-order the polygons in some kind of way, suppousedly the plugin was suppoused to do this but if it was a complex cockpit (~100 polies in my experience) it would thrash it all up. If you're talking about the layout of the various HUD things then I have no clue.
pifactorial
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Post by pifactorial »

xmesh is just a raw 3D file format, which has been all but phased out in favour of the binary BFXM format. You can easily convert to and from both file formats (and some more mainstream formats) using the "mesher" tool included with vegastrike. You can also read about the xmesh format specifications, and unit modding in general, here.

As far as making meshes for cockpits, I can't help you.

EDIT: Busted! You got here before me, f1gm3nt3d. :x
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Post by pincushionman »

.xmesh is still supported, and support probably won't be entirely phased out. It's reasonable for an in-progress format, as you can touch it up by hand in a text editor and change small things such as the texture properties.

Then when it's done you can convert the finished product to .bfxm and submit it.

But if the modeling program you're planning to use supports export to .obj, I'd suggest you use that instead. Vegastrike can load .obj directly now.

As for the cockpit stuff, the reason a strange conversion has been needed is that cockpit meshes have not been sorted on-the-fly as all other objects are, requireingmeshes to be pre-sorted by distance, to improve performance. There's been talk of scrapping this feature and sorting cockpit meshes like everything else (because of the aformentioned "not-working" problem), but don't take my word for it; Hellcatv would have to give you the final word on that.
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Dhudeme
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Post by Dhudeme »

OK I get it now. What about those HUD images .png I replaced radar.png with my own image with the same resolution and size and I got a error message. Well after that I tried another program and then it didn't show an error but when I ran vegastrike the radar image stayed the same. :?
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Halleck
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Post by Halleck »

I think that the radar image is just some lines drawn by the program.
Dhudeme
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Post by Dhudeme »

So how CAN you change it
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hellcatv
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Post by hellcatv »

just include the radar with the front cockpit bitmap...we should eventually add better support
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Post by Dhudeme »

yes ofcourse :roll: In other words I don't get it
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Post by st_jack »

On a side note with cockpits, can we add animated images? (I know in the privateer remake they have, but how? Also, as I added in another thread, check this out for a cockpit: http://www.captainsim.com/767/
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