Space Elevator

CoffeeBot · Post by **CoffeeBot** » Sat Oct 01, 2005 6:24 am

I'm a little confused as to how it all works. I broke apart the llama bfxm file, and saw it had 3 xmesh files, one for the catamarans, one for the cockpit/body, and one for the lights. Do you just create a new object that is the 3-plane piece, put it where you want it, then export the object alone?

tiny paintings · Post by **tiny paintings** » Sat Oct 01, 2005 1:42 pm

CoffeBot: In essence, yes. Then you just merge it with our mesh using mesher (mesher mymesh.bfxm light.bfxm bba).

CoffeeBot · Post by **CoffeeBot** » Sat Oct 01, 2005 10:47 pm

Okay, this is getting obnoxious. Every time I load blender, it opens the older version of the elevator car and three bmp textures (that have no files associated with them anyway) -- all stuff I had done, and deleted, in wings. This happens even when I do File->New->[yes, erase all] -- whatever I had been doing, it resets it to this state.

The bmps only show up in the UV Mapper, in the flyout-list (double arrow icon) next to the UV menu.

I'm afraid this crap is going to start screwing with my models -- and even if it's not, it's bloody annoying.

tiny paintings · Post by **tiny paintings** » Sat Oct 01, 2005 11:34 pm

Try File->Save default settings (Ctrl U). That will change the default that loads as a new scene.

CoffeeBot · Post by **CoffeeBot** » Sun Oct 02, 2005 12:37 am

tiny paintings wrote:Try File->Save default settings (Ctrl U). That will change the default that loads as a new scene.

Aah...that's what I did. So, is there a way to rid myself of those 3 bitmaps listed in the UV menus?

Also, in the creation of models, I assume it's okay to have several blender objects (cube1, cylinder1, foo1) that all get exported into the .obj -> bfxm, etc? Or, will having multiple objects ruin things? I would figure it gets to be a major pita to have to extrude every single part of the model (if not impossible, in a few cases).

CoffeeBot · Post by **CoffeeBot** » Sun Oct 02, 2005 7:02 am

@chuck: check out our elevator forum. posted you some questions. (or will be, in a moment)

tiny paintings · Post by **tiny paintings** » Sun Oct 02, 2005 11:53 am

@CoffeBot: Multiple disjoint parts are okay afaik.

To delete the lingering textures just use click "x" next to the listbox where they appear.

CoffeeBot · Post by **CoffeeBot** » Mon Oct 03, 2005 4:55 am

Heh, now another Blender question -- is there a quick and easy way to take selected faces and smooth them from harsh angles into simple curves?

tiny paintings · Post by **tiny paintings** » Mon Oct 03, 2005 9:19 am

You mean like W,3? Or W->Smooth?
Or, *hint hint*, subsurf and use normals maps

CoffeeBot · Post by **CoffeeBot** » Mon Oct 03, 2005 3:43 pm

Yes, exactly like those.

As for normal maps, I didnt think the VS engine supported them.

Post by **klauss** » Mon Oct 03, 2005 4:46 pm

Normal maps: It will... so feel free to use them. Just create the standard 3-component tangent space ones... not the 2-component compressed ones (warning just in case, I don't think any tool creates them by default).

Tiny: I thought I could hijack this thread a little for a blender/general uv-mapping question. Is there a way to get rid of that zigzagging that sometimes happens when uvmapping stuff? Where, for instance, a straight line is bent across a trapezoidal quad.

tiny paintings · Post by **tiny paintings** » Mon Oct 03, 2005 9:34 pm

klauss: I'm not sure I understand your problem... a picture to demonstrate, perhaps?

Post by **klauss** » Tue Oct 04, 2005 3:33 pm

Oh... too bad I didn't get that yesterday, for now I'm at work and won't be able to even bring a picture until tomorrow (lot of wasted time). I'll post it tomorrow.

CubOfJudahsLion · Post by **CubOfJudahsLion** » Tue Oct 04, 2005 7:47 pm

klauss: AFAIK, using mesh subdivision (W1,W2,W3) instead of subsurfaces. In subdivision, the uv coords seem to be interpolated linearly, and generally tends to look better.

CoffeeBot · Post by **CoffeeBot** » Tue Oct 04, 2005 7:58 pm

@klauss: I just reread your question, and I think I understand what you're talking about. Are all of your seams in the right place? When I was mapping the elevator car, missing a single seam caused that in some places.

tiny paintings · Post by **tiny paintings** » Tue Oct 04, 2005 8:00 pm

CubOfJudahsLion wrote:klauss: AFAIK, using mesh subdivision (W1,W2,W3) instead of subsurfaces. In subdivision, the uv coords seem to be interpolated linearly, and generally tends to look better.

But that is pretty much infinitely less powerful... subsurfs rock!

CubOfJudahsLion · Post by **CubOfJudahsLion** » Tue Oct 04, 2005 8:37 pm

Yeah, they do r0xx0r, but what to do--their spline mapping somehow is less reliable than linear interpolation

Post by **klauss** » Tue Oct 04, 2005 8:42 pm

Anyway, I didn't use subsurfaces. I did plain manual uv-mapping. And although mesh subdivision would help, I'm not sure I can subdivide that much (it would take quite some suvidivision to fix the zigzagging).

Post by **klauss** » Wed Oct 05, 2005 4:13 pm

Ok, tiny. Here it is:

And, in case it's of use, the uv layour

CoffeeBot · Post by **CoffeeBot** » Wed Oct 05, 2005 5:51 pm

Oh, nooooow I get what you're talking about. And, I don't know the answer

Looking at the UV Map, though, it seems like you have quite a few faces that aren't unfolded in the same proportion as the others.

I'll watch for this happening when I do the greebles on the elevator.

CoffeeBot · Post by **CoffeeBot** » Tue Oct 18, 2005 6:57 am

Alright. Time to rejack the thread to show how the station is coming along. Chuck's posted some things about it in this thread but it's in the contributor help section. It's time for some content vetting

Here's a good distance shot of the platform. Only one section is textured, at this point. Just making sure it looks okay before continuing, and doing serious detailing.

For scale, I give you a conveniently located clydesdale. If you can't read it, the clydes is at 3062 meters from my ship...

...and the SES is at 37274 meters (about 12x's the distance)

Here's a view-consuming closeup of the surface. The black dots are crudely contrived holes where the elevators will pass through. I think my jpg compression was on, because the artifacts on the texture are HORRENDOUS.

And, a view of the tail end, near the center tube. I think I need to make a thicker yellow/black stripe

Post by **chuck_starchaser** » Tue Oct 18, 2005 7:56 am

Nice! What a difference a bit of texturing makes! Indeed, the black and yellow stripes need to be visible at some distance. I like the look, already, though. The texture I made for the holes, I calculated their positions so that they formed an octagon.

When put toghether:
http://www.deeplayer.com/dan_w/goodies/greebles/big.png
I think a regular octagonal pattern would look better. I like your choice of color, though; but I also like having some rimms around the holes.

Maybe with your color but with gray lines of about the same luminance, forming the road networks, it would give it detail without strongly giving away the intent. I find this an interesting concept: Putting greebles, but in a way as if you were trying to hide them, or to make them low key... Come to think of it, that's probably what doesn't work with a lot of greebling. If it were done in a more subtle way, it would probably be paid more attention to.

BTW, regarding scale, I took a shot of my llama in the door of Serenity mining base, zooming out. Just by eye, I'd say Serenity would fit comfortably inside the center tunnel...

The little thing in the door is my llama:

But in the pic below, my llama looks even smaller (the little dot in the middle of the entrance)

CoffeeBot · Post by **CoffeeBot** » Tue Oct 18, 2005 5:39 pm

chuck_starchaser wrote: Maybe with your color but with gray lines of about the same luminance, forming the road networks, it would give it detail without strongly giving away the intent. I find this an interesting concept: Putting greebles, but in a way as if you were trying to hide them, or to make them low key... Come to think of it, that's probably what doesn't work with a lot of greebling. If it were done in a more subtle way, it would probably be paid more attention to.

Oh, I know the elevator portals are off. I just slapped them on to give the surface something other than just a grid. As for the color, I'm curious as to why it's not the same grey as the tile you posted above, chuck. I eyedroppered (is that a word?) the grey straight from that pic, so I'm not sure why the colors came out as such.

And, actually, WRT to the elevator locations, I was considering making them more than just textures -- from certain angles, you can tell they're just painted dots, especially on the larger ones. Why not make them tubes that travel through the base -- or at least a little distance into it. Use tiny_painting's baked radiosity to give them a glow of deeper interior lighting,

Also, does anyone know how to get the UV map to unfold into straight lines, in blender? It's really hard to align the top and bottom textures if the maps aren't straight. Yes, I know I can rotate them, but I still can't achieve a "perfect straight" with that.

Post by **chuck_starchaser** » Tue Oct 18, 2005 6:06 pm

CoffeeBot wrote:
chuck_starchaser wrote: Maybe with your color but with gray lines of about the same luminance, forming the road networks, it would give it detail without strongly giving away the intent. I find this an interesting concept: Putting greebles, but in a way as if you were trying to hide them, or to make them low key... Come to think of it, that's probably what doesn't work with a lot of greebling. If it were done in a more subtle way, it would probably be paid more attention to.
Oh, I know the elevator portals are off. I just slapped them on to give the surface something other than just a grid. As for the color, I'm curious as to why it's not the same grey as the tile you posted above, chuck. I eyedroppered (is that a word?) the grey straight from that pic, so I'm not sure why the colors came out as such.

Hmmm... maybe the material has a color? Before texturing it was looking creamy, rather than white or grey. Could be Cephid-17 is a brow dwarf

And, actually, WRT to the elevator locations, I was considering making them more than just textures -- from certain angles, you can tell they're just painted dots, especially on the larger ones. Why not make them tubes that travel through the base -- or at least a little distance into it. Use tiny_painting's baked radiosity to give them a glow of deeper interior lighting,

Sure! That's the spirit! I think we could have windows in the tunnels too, lit from behind. Specially from the bottom side, where the passenger stations are.

Also, does anyone know how to get the UV map to unfold into straight lines, in blender? It's really hard to align the top and bottom textures if the maps aren't straight. Yes, I know I can rotate them, but I still can't achieve a "perfect straight" with that.

I believe you mean vertically/horizontally-aligned. I'd ask Blender questions at elYsiun, if I were you. I posted a question about the problem I was having when mirroring the side-chunk, that the visibility of all the facets got reversed, and I had several replies in no time.

Post by **chuck_starchaser** » Mon Oct 24, 2005 12:11 am

Here's an early preview of what the top deck of the military section will look like. This texture mirrors 4 times to cover the octogonal top of the base. The top-left corner of the texture is the center of the structure.

http://www.deeplayer.com/dan_w/goodies/elevator/tmp.png