Try this modeling software. It's extremely lowpoly and modeling with it is like playing with legos! Thanks you Japaneses...
http://www.simtel.net/product.download. ... hp?id=9334
Alternativly check out their website.
http://www.doga.co.jp/english/software/index.html
DoGa L series modeling program
With the right now how you can add any model you want into the model libraries of L2. Say I add various leaf models, an apple or two, a few branches, and a trunk, well then I could make multiple nearly distinct trees with alarming ease. That make this pretty much an extremely powerful tool for those who don't know crap about lathing or extruding models.
Wouldn't it. Somehow I doubt mit has the time and energy to write a modelling program, though. It'd be easier to build an export module for some existing program, although even that'd be hard (and in many cases, would require an expensive (cough, Gmax) and probably unsupported (cough, cough Gmax) SDK.
I've always kinda thought about making some modular bits that could at least be assembled in the model converter we have today: that is, turrets and wheels. Like, making a set of military vehicles with different turrets... cars with different wheel options... characters, perhaps, with different legs and torsos etc. Main reason I haven't is the complexity of the thing. Any one set of modular bits would have to share the same texture, and all be compatible (fitting together properly etc) and that'd take an awful lot of pre-planning and work. Cars/wheels would be simple enough, I suppose, but not very exciting.
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I've always kinda thought about making some modular bits that could at least be assembled in the model converter we have today: that is, turrets and wheels. Like, making a set of military vehicles with different turrets... cars with different wheel options... characters, perhaps, with different legs and torsos etc. Main reason I haven't is the complexity of the thing. Any one set of modular bits would have to share the same texture, and all be compatible (fitting together properly etc) and that'd take an awful lot of pre-planning and work. Cars/wheels would be simple enough, I suppose, but not very exciting.
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making the parts share the same texture isn't hard.
for a while now i have been modelling/mapping models as seperate pieces then combining them in the modelling program to make the actual model. i'm finding it far easier and possibly even faster.
if using UVMapper this works, don't know about with other programs though: model one part, map it, save the template. model another part, then when mapping, load the template from the previous model as a background image so you can see whats already used. save the template for the new model. then combine the two seperate pics into one pic useing any drawing program. repeat for any further pieces you have. eventually you'll have a single texture that fits all the models.
for a while now i have been modelling/mapping models as seperate pieces then combining them in the modelling program to make the actual model. i'm finding it far easier and possibly even faster.
if using UVMapper this works, don't know about with other programs though: model one part, map it, save the template. model another part, then when mapping, load the template from the previous model as a background image so you can see whats already used. save the template for the new model. then combine the two seperate pics into one pic useing any drawing program. repeat for any further pieces you have. eventually you'll have a single texture that fits all the models.
Um... no. Making parts share the same texture isn't hard, agreed. Making a bunch of high quality parts sharing a high quality texture (ie, something that isn't just plain colour or repeated patterns) is very tricky indeed.
Exporting the template for multiple bits is trivial. The difficult bit is making it all fit the same template while giving each bit enough detail to be worthwhile looking at. And actually, that's not the right approach: the right approach would be to work out in advance what kind of textures each modular piece needed; then making a texture with a bunch of materials and details on it; then mapping the parts to fit the texture. Which is backwards, of course.. normally you'd map the parts individually and paint the texture to suit.
Anyway that's why it's hard. And that's why any sensible game would have multiple texture support, which'd get round the whole issue..
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Exporting the template for multiple bits is trivial. The difficult bit is making it all fit the same template while giving each bit enough detail to be worthwhile looking at. And actually, that's not the right approach: the right approach would be to work out in advance what kind of textures each modular piece needed; then making a texture with a bunch of materials and details on it; then mapping the parts to fit the texture. Which is backwards, of course.. normally you'd map the parts individually and paint the texture to suit.
Anyway that's why it's hard. And that's why any sensible game would have multiple texture support, which'd get round the whole issue..
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Aye, that's what I'm thinking/saying :) It might work ok doing it the "traditional" way if you were going for a simple, low-poly, top-down view sort of world, perhaps. But I just think, if the point is to give people modular vehicles, using the workarounds we'd have to do today, then they're going to want to be able to see the difference between each variant. And so, you'd want to make the camera zoomable and so on. And yeh, unless you're gonna make each "set" of components use a texture that's like 4096x4096, or something, you're not going to be able to get much detail on there for each bit.
Hmm. Having said that, a 4096 jpeg wouldn't be all that large, and would have room for at least 6 or so interesting vehicle textures... [ponders... ] [it's what I did with the infantry/space marine sorta characters on the model library, and also with some of the driver/buggy vehicles: one largish texture for a few variants. But still not very varied)
I saw the chem plant btw... though I'm not sure if I've seen the latest texture. The model was fine, the mapping wasn't that great - very inefficient, I think.. I assume that's what lithunwrap (or something) did to it. Eg, don't need to texture three oiltanks separately... should be combined into one large piece on the uv map. A drawback of separate mapping/modelling progs. I tend to map everything by hand as I go along, so you can easily duplicate parts on the texture.
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Hmm. Having said that, a 4096 jpeg wouldn't be all that large, and would have room for at least 6 or so interesting vehicle textures... [ponders... ] [it's what I did with the infantry/space marine sorta characters on the model library, and also with some of the driver/buggy vehicles: one largish texture for a few variants. But still not very varied)
I saw the chem plant btw... though I'm not sure if I've seen the latest texture. The model was fine, the mapping wasn't that great - very inefficient, I think.. I assume that's what lithunwrap (or something) did to it. Eg, don't need to texture three oiltanks separately... should be combined into one large piece on the uv map. A drawback of separate mapping/modelling progs. I tend to map everything by hand as I go along, so you can easily duplicate parts on the texture.
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