[Tea Monster]

Blender's MD3 exporter still works fine. I use NPherno's MD3 tool to re-export so that I can define different models within the MD3. But for simple stuff Blender's exporter works fine.

[Hellbound]

That's true, but I can't use Blender to export since it's rather pain in cock to import motionbuilder data to it.

[Spiker]

 Hellbound, on May 29 2009, 01:24 PM, said:

pain in cock

Ouch! That's gotta hurt.

[Hellbound]

Yeah, I did so many painful things, that 'pain in ass' sentence is now very minor for me

[Alan]

I suffered another hard drive failure, and I don't have the money or the will to buy a second replacement drive for a cheap laptop that can't get anything done.

I will be unable to finish the modification resources section until I can get the money saved up for a computer that doesn't suck ass. Right now, I'm posting from my Wii. I may come in from time to time to check things out.

[Spiker]

Any software to edit/create *.anm files?

[Hendricks266]

On RTCM, there's a tool called ANIM2PCX or something like that, which is just about the only tool available.

[Skulldog]

Does anyone have a complete list of startup command lines for eduke32? Such as no startup screen Command.
I know a couple of them -j, -m -s -map.
just want to make a bat file to launch maps without the startup screen.
I know you can just disable it on startup with the check box. Just woundering
if it has a command. Also would like to know all of them.

[Skulldog]

Nevermind, i found it. -? list all commands.

[The Commander]

Make Your Own Reticule,

http://www.spaminati...e/reticule.html

[chicken]

Found a nice texture site.
http://www.benclowar...resources.shtml

[BlackDays]

Can I get an answer to these questions:

How do you set up the Normal/Specular maps for use in Polymer?

I read in an older 3DR thread that you can use the Alpha channel of the texture to hold the Height map. Is this true?

To use a specular or Normal map do I need to set up definitions for my textures?

EDIT: Nevermind, I figured it out by snooping around the HRP thread.

[Mark]

Lets suppose I have a model named chair.md3 and a chairtexture.png to go with it.
What lines would I need to type in and where would they go to use it in the game? Or is it way more complicated than I'm making it sound?

[Roma Loom]

something like this:

open
D:\Games\Duke Nukem 3D\highres\sprites\props.def

find a suitable place between the existing definition blocks and write down ze code!

model "highres/sprites/props/chair.md3" {
scale 1 shade 0
detail { file "highres/detail/fabric.png" detailscale 0.1 }
skin { pal 0 file "highres/sprites/props/chairtexture.png" }
frame { name "SomeFrameName" tile 556 }
}

where
scale is adjusted experimentally after looking on the model ingame
detail is optional thing which defines the detail texture which will be blended with your own texture
"SomeFrameName" is the actual framename stored in the model itself, you can see what's the frame name is by opening the model in NPherno's MD3 Compiler for instance, or by looking in the model using hex viewer - which is a bit more complex.
oh, and the 556 is a sprite number in build which will become substitued by your model.

[Mark]

Thanks. That should be enough to get me going.

[Carl Winslow]

I managed to lose track of the MD3 export plugin for 9/2008 someone had made, and the link from when I got it no longer works. anybody still have it by chance?

[The Commander]

 Colon Semicolon, on Sep 19 2009, 05:41 AM, said:

I managed to lose track of the MD3 export plugin for 9/2008 someone had made, and the link from when I got it no longer works. anybody still have it by chance?

The one in the attachment of my post should work.

http://forums.duke4.net/index.php?showtopi...ost&p=13515

[Carl Winslow]

Yeah, that worked fine. thanks.

[Mark]

I've been looking through here and other threads about modeling software and naturally get confused. All the hassles of having multiple programs and scripts and plug-ins all working together, sometimes, and dealing with UV maps, baking, conversions of this or that and tons of other technical stuff. I am looking to create relativly simple geometric shapes and applying simple textures to them and export them in the md3 format that Eduke uses. I have no ambitions at this time to get heavy into modeling so the simpler the program the better. Any suggestions for an "all in one solution" or am I dreaming?

[Tea Monster]

Blender is free, but has a steep learning curve.
Milkshape is charged for but the price is low.
Misfit Model 3D is free and looks pretty straight-forward.

People seem to get along fine with Milkshape, but its just a game modeller. There are loads of tuts on the net though. The good thing is that it exports nearly anything so you are set when we switch to another format.

I've never really used Misfit, but the latest version does kick out MD3 files and it can animate. It looks a bit clunky on the inteface, but it looks like it will do the job. It is limited on formats though.

[Mark]

I'll check out Misfit3d first. Like I said before, its just for creating very simple shapes. Basically to add details to buildings or walls because it is either a pain in the ass or impossible to create those details in Mapster. I'll check into Milkshape. If its under 50 dollars U.S. I'll consider it if it looks like what I want. Thanks.

[Parkar]

Another option might be gMAX. It's a free version of 3ds max that was intended to be a modders version of 3ds max. It cost the developers a lot of money to make plugins for it so it never really took of though. If I rember correctly it exports to ase which can easily be converted to md3 using the md3 compiler. It might be a bit tricky to get a hold of but it should be around on the net somewhere.

It's similar to blender in terms of modeling capabilities. Blender porbably has a few more fancy modern tools since gMAX is a few years old. On the other hand it's probably a bit easier to learn then Blender.

Edit: Not sure but there might even be a md3 plugin for it. At least one of the more common engines format did get a plugin, might have been md3. Then again if that was, people where would probably already be using it.

Edit2: Here is a link: http://www.turbosquid.com/gmax

Edit3: Seems my first edit is correct. It does infact export to md3.

[The Commander]

gMax 1.2 Download: http://apb.game-maps...act=view&id=531
gMax 1.2 : Registration Bypass: http://apb.game-maps...act=view&id=686

Also, another handy tool for people on Win XP (Not sure if it works on Vista or Win 7 someone let me know please.)
DDS Thumbs in Explorer: http://apb.game-maps...act=view&id=634

Lets you see thumbnails of DDS textures in explorer.

If you can work out how to use gMax, then you will have no problem in moving on to programs like 3DS Max.

[Mark]

I loaded up Misfit 3D and had shapes created in about a minute or 2. But trying to figure out how to select or group faces together and prepare them for applying textures is beyond me. I was hoping it would be as easy as importing a texture and choosing a menu button to wrap it around the model. Or kind of a cut and paste to the seperate faces of the model. Then export the model and the skin as a pair of files. No such luck. Someone made a long video showing the many steps required to apply textures and I'll have to watch it a dozen more times and see if I can figure it out.

[The Commander]

gMAX can do what you said above easily enough.

[Mark]

Either I'm a total numbskull or we have different meanings for "easy enough".

I loaded up gmax and it is way more complicated than the other program I tried. After creating a simple shape I went through the ton of menus and windows and could not find the words texture or apply textures or anything remotely similar. I'll have to browse the web for tutorials on this one too. Plus I didn't see md3 support unless I missed it.

I know these modeling programs will have a learning curve and I won't learn it in just a day or 2, but I thought doing the very simple things I mentioned before would be easy for a novice in the first few minutes or hours.

[The Commander]

Press "M" when you have what you wanted selected.

[Mark]

Thanks. It sends me in the right direction. Pressing M brings up the materials editor window which has a materials navigator button which brings up a hard drive menu to choose a texture. I did that and now have a texture in its own small window but I still need to figure out how to make it my working texture. The materials window just keeps displaying its default grey sphere and not my chosen texture. A google search shows a bunch of sites with gmax users Q and A and tutorials. I'll have to check them out.

[The Commander]

I think gMax will only display .TGA and .BMP files in the viewer windows.

[Mark]

So far these tutorials say they are for someone who has never modeled before and teach tiny step by step. I'm finding them lacking They are still skipping steps and assuming you have some knowledge of the program.

I guess it takes a real talent to dumb yourself down to try and teach a program that you just fly through now without hardly a thought. Great tutorials are hard to make.