Proposed Model for Mechanist Interceptor MK 212

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Oblivion
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Proposed Model for Mechanist Interceptor MK 212

Post by Oblivion »

:P New ship at last!

Found some quality time with my PC.
Reviewed what needs to be done, and settled first on making Zeog's concept.. and ta-da!

Zeog's original concepts:
Image
Image
Image

:P
some art.. CLICK IT! :wink: hehe
http://i80.photobucket.com/albums/j200/ ... rMK212.png
Note: The planets' textures will be submitted soon, if I find a way to render it into a square. :(

The Mugshots:
Image
Image
Image
Image
Image
Image

Close-ups
http://i80.photobucket.com/albums/j200/ ... se-Up1.jpg
http://i80.photobucket.com/albums/j200/ ... se-Up2.jpg
http://i80.photobucket.com/albums/j200/ ... se-Up3.jpg
http://i80.photobucket.com/albums/j200/ ... se-Up4.jpg
http://i80.photobucket.com/albums/j200/ ... se-Up5.jpg

INGAME TEST SCREENS:
(No spec map yet)
Image
Image
Image
Image

finally, me getting clobbered, it's still not scaled, so I got told 'gently' by the relay base that "You don't fit in my docks, chum".
:D

To Do:
1.Scaling
2. Damage and Spec maps
3. Texture baking with radiosity. I don't know how to do it in max. Anyone knows how? Please pm me. I'll try it with blender tho, I'm clumsy there. :!: If anyone can do it for me, please do and post teh baked textures here, I just can't grasp blender's workings. :wink: I need just the basic textures baked, so I could make the spec maps from it.
4.adding target vertices... will see if I can do that.
5. Making one LOD.
6. Make a units.csv entry.
7. Make the hud image...
8. Beg for commitment. :wink:

The files are here, enough for you to test it yourself ingame (or bake it... :lol: I'm desperate for radiosity).
http://www.filelodge.com/files/room44/1 ... MK212.bfxm
http://www.filelodge.com/files/room44/1 ... rMK212.PNG
http://www.filelodge.com/files/room44/1 ... 212GLO.PNG
http://www.filelodge.com/files/room44/1 ... 212DMG.png
http://www.filelodge.com/files/room44/1 ... 212PPL.png

Note: Both DMG and PPL maps are only 1x1 black png's. They're there because they're linked in the bfxm. But they're just fillers for now.
Last edited by Oblivion on Mon Sep 25, 2006 7:18 am, edited 1 time in total.
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Post by Oblivion »

here's the face count:

Image
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Post by loki1950 »

she looks sweet Oblivion whats the handleing like.

Enjoy the Choice :)
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Post by Paslowo »

I wonder if it's a very small capital ship, gunboat, or even a ship type of it's own.

I would like to make one of those types for my chassias.
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Post by loki1950 »

it's to be an interceptor so maybe the size of the Derivative,Oblivion did metion that the scale was wrong :)

Enjoy the Choice :)
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Post by jackS »

*drool*

A beauty. An absolute beauty.

Two quick canon-related notes that can be changed by some texture alteration, the first much more pressing than the second.

1)This is to be a missile-based interceptor, with both the front and rear extensions of the main body of the craft being mostly full of missiles (see original text: http://vegastrike.sourceforge.net/wiki/ ... rceptor.7D ). I took the 3 clusters of 3 round spots at the front to be missile launchers (perhaps a bit on the smaller side and not as many as originally envisioned, but it's yours to interpret - it's rather more important that people be able to think "missile launchers" than one worries about exact size and number thereof if there comes a tradeoff between aesthetic and functional intent), but I couldn't see the rear facing launchers, which I'd like to see redressed..

2)the three rear ridges are decoy launchers - more evocation of a perpendicular or trailing capacity for decoy launch (your choice) might be in order - a trailing launch is already somewhat plausible, so this is more a "if you have the time and interest".


At 5000+ polygons, this is a ship worth LODing - and I think it'll be a good design to practice your LOD skills on, as many of the parts of the vessel can fairly painlessly devolve into more primitive shapes :)

I'd say more, but I'm working on borrowed time for a camera-ready post-deadline sort of thing today (not _too_ stressed though, it's all just editing, proof-reading, and hammering things until they fit in 12 pages :-P ).

@Paswolo&Loki re: Scale - see the original concepts with human figure for reference - those are pretty close to where it's going to end up size-wise (as an interceptor).
Last edited by jackS on Mon Sep 25, 2006 8:14 pm, edited 3 times in total.
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Post by jackS »

as a complete aside -

The genesis of this model may be interesting to document in the wiki in terms of going from textual description to concept model to polished, high-poly model (and eventual LOD construction)

one more thing, and not an aside at all (I'm waiting for other authors to turn over the locks on some files, so I have a few minutes to ruminate)- as good habit-building practice, someone (and here I mean one of the artists, or a designated "synchronizer") should take it upon themselves to update the model list as to the status of this vessel (the overwhelming majority of the ships, although only a handful of the installations, have entries in the model list now). For those who've forgotten, the model list is here: http://vegastrike.sourceforge.net/wiki/ ... :3D_Models
I apologize for the incompleteness of this list, both in number of entries, and in the lack of nuance/sloppiness in differentiation of production and of factional usage. Both of these will eventually be addressed - but it'll be a lot easier to convince myself to allocate time toward going back and fixing the entries if the page is being updated to reflect our art submissions :)

(and it even has a section (Unassigned) for those who are submitting models not associated with entries in the ship list, so that we don't lose track of those...).
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Post by loki1950 »

didn't see him on first look :oops:

Enjoy the Choice :)
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Post by Kangaroo »

8) Cool!

Although you might save work for LODs for futher models if you reduce polycount on small details.

I mean, if a cylinder forms the core of the model, it is fully acceptable to make it highly detailed. But if a cylinder is used as a small pipe, it might get away with 4 smoothed sides. That can be clearly seen in your Rlaan carrier with the glowballs.
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Post by Oblivion »

@EVERYONE: SORRY FOR THE LARGE PICTURES :P If it interferes with viewing please change the links to url.

as for me, I prefer waiting for the pics to get loaded rather than to click at all the links to see the pics. :wink:

@Loki:
whats the handleing like
Fast, smooth.
8) at least in my edit of the units.csv. heh (based it on the gawain+ancestor).

@Paslowo:
Interceptor.
as for scale here's a tentative one (tho the results in game seem to vary no matter how I resize it in wings). I don't know how big the derivative is. Since it's a missile interceptor, I'm thinking it could eb as big as a fighter, maybe??

JackS: does resizing in wings3d (comparing it with an imported ship from VS with a scale of 1 in the units.csv) be enough as a method of scaling?

Image

@JackS:

1) :oops: I didn't truly know where zeog based the concept. I've only seen Interceptor Mk273 in the vessels list. So I didn't know what the structures meant, and made assumptions as to functions. :P Will set that to rights. :wink: Editting textures is easier now I've finished the base map,and I always work in layers.

Rear facing thrusters coming up :arrow: cargo bay hatches out :arrow:
9 missiles too small? They get reloaded automatically, :wink: after all mechanists specialize in automations (The empty spaces alternating with the racks hold the ammo). tho making them larger would make the number even smaller. I'm curious - this interceptor is against small ships or as attacks on capships?

2) Decoy launchers, yep. I was wondering what they were for, as they obviously were not engines.
The genesis of this model may be interesting to document in the wiki in terms of going from textual description to concept model to polished, high-poly model (and eventual LOD construction)
will try. But I don't know a lot html editting yet. But I'll make some words up. Tho, it'll probably be only useful by 3dsMaxers. :wink:

regarding the list: I'm not really sure which is REALLY going to be acceptable and which is not. So I'll probably leave the editting up to higher authority. :wink: But I'll see to some of it.

@kangaroo:
yeah :roll: . Scrap those. I ahven't yet learned to unwrap and texture them by hand then. :P

QUESTIONS: (Wiki info is inadequate with this stuff. :( )

1)LOD's finished and waiting. With questions:

Should I scale LOD's along with the ship? or does VS automatically scale the ship?

And if I add thrusters, lights etc. (animated) Do I need to LOD them too? I've seen the way ancestor did it. With Three successive squares that the blink.ani map was assigned to. The question: When and where do I add these submeshes? Not in the units.csv,a s I haven't seen it there. Do I add them when I model?

LOD comparison, with estimated size that the LOD kicks in (40x40 pixels) Virtually no difference at that distance.

Image

The LOD is ultra light.Here's a polycount (average, as the number increases a bit when exporting)
Image


2)Map Size?
It is painstakingly detailed, so resizing may affect the textures, especially text. Here are 6 renders. Done with a 2048x2048 map, a 1024x1024 map, and a 512x512 map. The text blurs in the 512. :(

http://i80.photobucket.com/albums/j200/ ... apped2.jpghttp://i80.photobucket.com/albums/j200/ ... Mapped.jpg

http://i80.photobucket.com/albums/j200/ ... apped2.jpghttp://i80.photobucket.com/albums/j200/ ... Mapped.jpg

http://i80.photobucket.com/albums/j200/ ... apped2.jpg
http://i80.photobucket.com/albums/j200/ ... Mapped.jpg

3) What about the guns? I've modelled the guns themselves and not just the mounts. They're spinally mounted after all. I've named them Prometheus 12... cheeky i know :lol: need help with what to do next. I've tried placing a laser beam on one of the target vertices on it's tip. It just doesn't seem right tho when I fire it (see screenies later).

What about the turret and missiles? How do I assign them a target vertex? With missiles especially, do they ahve separate missile turret submeshes (that would interfere with this ship's design).

SECOND INGAME TEST SCREENS:
(Target vertices all skewe, i don't know why :? .

Image
aliasing on the hud image... What causes that? I notice it only happens when I set the ingame res to 800x600.

Image

Image
Spec mapping always makes it spotty. I don't know why. I can't get it to look silvery as intended.

Image
Thrusters are skewed.
They were meant to spout from the top 2 thrusters.

Image
Me, taking a shot at an unsuspecting Dosty. Note scale ingame. The laser beam looks much too big for it and seems to come from somewhere under the gun.

Image
Dosty tries to run.. mwahaha! :twisted:

Image
As a punishment for my crimes... guess who they're shooting at? :P

Image
And the andolian cavalry descends on me..

Image
The new ship explodes. Me inside my pod with bombers threatening it. :shock:

So I need help, with how to place the target vertices. I'm using wings to determine position of vertices in the obj mesh.
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Post by Zeog »

You have done a really nice job Oblivion! :D
But as there still seems to be a little confusion around, I'd like to add some things. The model I made was just a layout concept in the sense that the main parts of the ship are right. The original description is in the wiki: http://vegastrike.sourceforge.net/wiki/ ... or_Mk._212

Now here is a list of things, that I didn't model because I considered them to be details and not something for a layout concept, and few other things that seem unclear:

The scale: the ship is 32 meters long. 16 meters for the main section, each of the extensions is 8 meters long. Of the hexagonal front and rear extensions the width of each of the hexagon's side is 2 meters. The main hull has alternating side of 2 meters and 4 meters with a 2 meter one "down".

The missles: Both of the two hexagonal extensions on front and back are divided into 24 equilateral triangle sections. Each of the section houses a missle according to the original description.

The "spikes" on the front were just intented as place holders of weapon mounts, not the weapons themselves. As a mount they need to be more stable and require some more support structures.

The three engine pods are the only engines the ship has. They are supposed to be moveable (when the engine supports this someday). You may align them to point exactly rearward if you like.

Since the ship geometry is rather simple, many small gadgets and communication devices are mounted on the outside of the front and rear extenstions to "pad" it up to the size of the main part.

Disclaimer: This is just what the original description says and not an order. ;-)
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Post by Oblivion »

:( ouch. That's a lot of mistakes. I really hadn't seen the textual description and I thought it was some sort of older version of Mk273.

1) Scale. I still don't know how to scale it. Any help on that?

2) Hmmm. My model seems really off in that sense. I can't change the mesh anymore without backtracking a really long way.

3) I was asking about that. Should I cut out the current weapons or are they fine there?

4) Umm. yeah it would have been better :wink: . Currently when you engage thrusters the animation point straight out at the back and not at the intended angle. But again. It's a bit too late to change that. :wink:

5) Heh :D . I couldn't make it as low-poly as I wished. The red "eye" spots are the ones I intended to be the sensors. Does sensors mean satellite dishes :?:

:wink: Truthfully I'm getting tired of this model already. :P I never worked this long on a single model before. I've also started the documentation as JackS requested. I hope this model is enough as it is? :wink: I really wouldn't want to do all that work again. lol

And please someone tell me what I'm doing wrong with the target vertices.

The ship is nearly finished.
-I've managed to find a way to create blinking lights using redlight.ani and some squares.
-And I've added a row of decoy launchers in the ridges, both along the length and on the rearmost face.
-I've added two missile racks in the back in addition to a loading bay. I hope it is satisfactory, jackS? Zeog? :wink:
-I've fixed the spec map spotting
-Added some in-texture glow effects on the lights.
-Finished all the maps.
-Appended the LOD and the LOD of the lights mesh.
-Tested it in-game

The only thing missing: Target vertices.
I still don't know why the guns don't fire from the exact spot I defined, even the thrusters too. :(

Image
Image
Image
Image

Help? :wink:
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Post by jackS »

Oblivion wrote::( ouch. That's a lot of mistakes. I really hadn't seen the textual description and I thought it was some sort of older version of Mk273.
neh. Such happens. They aren't that well marked. (As for the naming schemes, they're interesting temperature points in different scales, although one can assume the 212(F) to have been designed before the 273(K)).
Oblivion wrote: 1) Scale. I still don't know how to scale it. Any help on that?
I can play with scaling it. The proportions look reasonable, so if I scale it to length, we can see how big it gets in the width/height dimensions - it's probably just fine, even if not exactly to specification - as long as it's comparable, the shape certainly evokes the right images.
Oblivion wrote: 2) Hmmm. My model seems really off in that sense. I can't change the mesh anymore without backtracking a really long way.
It has missile launchers in the front and back. Everything else in that respect can likely be smoothed over. No worries.
Oblivion wrote: 3) I was asking about that. Should I cut out the current weapons or are they fine there?
keep em - we can still paste vweaps onto them at a later point in the units.csv, and they're not too far into left field.
Oblivion wrote: 4) Umm. yeah it would have been better :wink: . Currently when you engage thrusters the animation point straight out at the back and not at the intended angle. But again. It's a bit too late to change that. :wink:
Let the engine side folks worry about that.
Oblivion wrote: 5) Heh :D . I couldn't make it as low-poly as I wished. The red "eye" spots are the ones I intended to be the sensors. Does sensors mean satellite dishes :?:
sensors means "sensors" :-P *cough*
Oblivion wrote: :wink: Truthfully I'm getting tired of this model already. :P I never worked this long on a single model before. I've also started the documentation as JackS requested. I hope this model is enough as it is? :wink: I really wouldn't want to do all that work again. lol
You won't have to do all that work again - at least not until we've so filled in the model list that we loop around and start re-dressing things done nowish ;-). (This being an event that we all know is... to put it politely, a long road's travel away from the present day)
Oblivion wrote: -Appended the LOD and the LOD of the lights mesh.
-Tested it in-game
I trust that you're using the word "append" in the metaphoric "adding of LOD specification to top level mesh" rather than the mesher append sense, yes?
Oblivion wrote: The only thing missing: Target vertices.
I still don't know why the guns don't fire from the exact spot I defined, even the thrusters too. :(
I don't know why the target vertices aren't working for you, but I can play with gun placement in an easy but time consuming fashion, so don't worry about it :).
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Post by Oblivion »

I just saw stranj's thread... heh 8) man I could cry.

I'm going to try to model ships like that. :P

Okay. Everything's good to go then. I'll be posting the entire folder needed for ingame insertion on thrusday, including master files. As well as a proposed units.csv entry (That's just for testing, :wink: )

Yup, when I say everything I mean everything... EXCEPT target vertices.

It's exactly how you see it in the latest screens.

With the LOD's, yep properly added. (I mean linked in the top-level meshes, not appended, as in xba, sorry for the choice of terms :wink: ). I checked the file sizes of the bfxm's with teh LODs and without em. And they seem properly bloated. :P I don't know if it works tho, since I haven't tried zooming it that far away in my own ship. Anyway, The testing was smoother than with the unLODed models I've tried ingame before. So it must be working.

And tho I can't do it on my own, I'd like to know how it's eventually solved. I'm guessing it's a problem with scaling in Wings. When I import it, the scaling measurements mught not be the same as the one used in-game. Hence, why the thrusters and the guns all seem to originate from a smaller model ingame.

Well... I don't know how to fix that. I'm barely literate at Wings. And scaling it in 3dsmax is out of the question, as the axes as well as scale methods are different.

EDIT: Hmm.. I'll see if I can upload the basic package here. The 1024x1024 maps, the model, and the hud image.

http://www.filelodge.com/files/room44/1 ... mk212.bfxmhttp://www.filelodge.com/files/room44/1259832/mk212.PNG
http://www.filelodge.com/files/room44/1 ... 212GLO.PNG
http://www.filelodge.com/files/room44/1 ... 212DMG.PNG
http://www.filelodge.com/files/room44/1 ... 212PPL.png
http://www.filelodge.com/files/room44/1 ... 12-hud.png

the sprite file is missing. Just copy one of the .spr files, rename it to mk212-hud.spr and change the image links in it to point to mk212-hud.png

Okay that's it. The amster files will be posted on tuesday. Let me know if something goes wrong with the mesh submitted.
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Post by z30 »

Oblivion wrote::( ouch. That's a lot of mistakes. I really hadn't seen the textual description and I thought it was some sort of older version of Mk273.

1) Scale. I still don't know how to scale it. Any help on that?

Help? :wink:
In the case of the PR mod ships I'm using the NewCon landing pad, a spreadsheet with normalized length values (Ferret length is 1.0) and a digital ruler :

Ferret

Image

Raptor

Image

The problem is with capital ships, there is no ready way to compare sizes as can be done with the fighter class.
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Post by Oblivion »

Thanks. But loading VS up in my machine takes a long time. So as much as I can, I avoid in-game back-and-forth testing. ;) I don't think VS ships are scaled in the docking pads, as clydesdales look about only as big as two llamas. :wink:

I inputted a value of 1 too for this ship in the units.csv. but still, it seems to have grown a bit larger than it actually is in wings. :)
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Post by jackS »

z30 wrote: In the case of the PR mod ships I'm using the NewCon landing pad, a spreadsheet with normalized length values (Ferret length is 1.0) and a digital ruler :
Egad :-/. If you're just doing all-axis scaling, use

Mesher --dims <meshname>

and it'll spit out the box coordinate (maximum/minimum vertex X,Y,Z values).

Multiply by the units.csv scaling factor and voila - dimensions of vessel.
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Post by Oblivion »

.. rpoblem is with vertices too. scake ungame isn't thesame as scale in Wings.
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Post by Nano_Lite »

NICE!!!!! :D
BE GOOD.
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Post by Fendorin »

what happen with this ship????

i think is not ingame
is it possible to push it in game????
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Post by Sindwiller »

Easy sailor. Usage of more than only one question mark is evidence of a twisted mind... :P
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Post by Fendorin »

Sindwiller wrote:Easy sailor. Usage of more than only one question mark is evidence of a twisted mind... :P

?
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Post by ace123 »

I'm not sure--it looks like an awesome ship. Hopefully someone has downloaded the mesh files.
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Post by pyramid »

@Oblivion, Is there any chance your mesh and textures are still recoverable in which case you might repost them for download?

*EDIT*
Oblivion has probably backups of some of the ships he has done and when he can dig the archives up, he'll provide the meshes and textures. :mrgreen:
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