Environment Textures

Quia · Post by **Quia** » Sun Dec 10, 2006 8:22 am

I know Adaven is working on these, is there anyone else? It'd be nice if we could get a pack together, before people make too many for them to all be included in one pack. I've got four done, so we're already almost halfway there.. I put the bmp's and 512 previews of all of them here.

CronoDroid · Post by **CronoDroid** » Sun Dec 10, 2006 3:35 pm

The 3rd and 4th ones are really spiffy! Good job!

Uh, you can't use them with FAZ R3 Beta right now, can you?

Adaven · Post by **Adaven** » Sun Dec 10, 2006 7:28 pm

I've got an alpha environment pack done, I've just been having trouble getting it uploaded. Let's see if this link works: Environments 2048 - A

Included are replacements for all 10 of the environments. Quia's 1 and 2 are the first 2 in the pack. I tried throwing them in my regular artwork folder to test the colors out on R2, but I kept crashing so one of the files may be corrupt, if you guys spot a problem, let me know.

I had most of a pack done a month or two ago, but realized that they were way too bright, much brighter than the current ones (which people already complain about). So this time around I toned everything down (Including Quia's number 2), but I may have over done it. Please let me know if things are too dark or if you think a little brighter won't hurt your eyes.

Does anyone know how many environments the game actually uses? I found 10 in the artwork folder, but I don't think I've ever seen environment9 or 10 in game, and they both seem to have a different sphere mapping. I'm not even sure if the replacements I made for them will map correctly. Together we've got at least 12 textures done, so unless they change the code to use more, people will have the opportunity to pick and choose what they want.

I really like Quia's work, he's using that macro to compensate for the distortions and has more varied colors than mine. His 3rd one also looks like it uses the same source material of one of the original MS environments, but in much higher resolution so I'd really like to see it in game.

Anyways, I would really appreciate if guys test these out and tell me what you think needs to be done to make them better.

madpeople · Post by **madpeople** » Sun Dec 10, 2006 7:57 pm

want that pack linked in the stickie?

i was about to install it, until you mentioned about the crashes, and i have a squad game now-ish, so i don't want to test it in that.

i'm also not sure if it is responsible to link to things that may have a corrupted file in, so maybe i should wait to see if anyone can confirm or deny a broken file before linking?

Adaven · Post by **Adaven** » Sun Dec 10, 2006 8:14 pm

yeah, I'd hold off for now until we can confirm. It could just be that I accidently copied over a model file instead of a texture file when I tried it. Or it might just be because of the general increase in crashes I've been having (both alleg and system).

Here's what I can say for sure: the first file in the pack is good. I got it working in the training missions. I'll try adding them one at a time and see what happens.

If you are going to test these, definitely back up the original files so you can quickly revert if there's any problems.

The high-res textures look better, certainly, but resolution isn't holding them back as much as color depth. A lot of the details are in subtle shading that looks great in 24-bit on photoshop, but disappear in the game's 16-bit. That's one of the reasons I'd really like to try Quia's 3rd one. The highly varied colors make better use of the palette and should theortically show less banding.

<EDIT> 1, 2, & 3 in the pack check out okay.

Psychosis · Post by **Psychosis** » Mon Dec 11, 2006 2:58 am

I like quai's but the rest of the alleg ones just sucked.... and thanks for turning the brightness down, i may have to actually play with the environments on now! /mrgreen.gif" style="vertical-align:middle" emoid=":D" border="0" alt="mrgreen.gif" />

Quia · Post by **Quia** » Mon Dec 11, 2006 7:22 am

QUOTE I really like Quia's work, he's using that macro to compensate for the distortions[/quote]
Thanks, but I'm very much a she. /wink.gif" style="vertical-align:middle" emoid=";)" border="0" alt="wink.gif" />

I tested out the rest of the textures, 8, 9 and 10 crashed Allegiance. 8 was the wrong size, I tested a cropped version and it works fine. You can grab the fixed mdl here. As for 9 and 10, I have no clue. It's not your files, I tried saving one of the working textures as environment10bmp.mdl, and it still crashes. Must be something more than just the mapping that's different about those two.

Here's a screenshot of #3 for you, Adaven. link

Psychosis · Post by **Psychosis** » Mon Dec 11, 2006 8:30 am

so leave 9 and 10 out, and the rest should work?

awesome, thanks m'lady.

(and btw, girls dont exist on the internet, its just shiz playing dirty again)

Adaven · Post by **Adaven** » Mon Dec 11, 2006 8:45 am

Oops, sorry about that Quia.

Thanks a lot for fixing 8, I guess I rushed through things a little fast, and that 3 looks hot.

I checked the models out. 9 is definitely setup differently, like cylindrical mapping or something. I actually couldn't even find a model for 10, maybe I was dreaming.

So yeah, psy, leave 9 and 10 out and grab quia's updated 8. If there is one or two of the others you don't really like you can simply rename 9 or 10 to that number and use it instead.

madpeople · Post by **madpeople** » Mon Dec 11, 2006 10:31 am

Quia wrote:QUOTE (Quia @ Dec 11 2006, 07:22 AM) I'm very much a she. /wink.gif" style="vertical-align:middle" emoid=";)" border="0" alt="wink.gif" />

say what!?

Adaven wrote:QUOTE (Adaven @ Dec 11 2006, 08:45 AM) If there is one or two of the others you don't really like you can simply rename 9 or 10 to that number and use it instead.

nooooo! DON'T RENAME .MDL FILES!

you need to convert them to bmp.mdl with the new name, you cant just rename them else you crash, they have the name they were converted to with encoded inside them.

you probably know this, but its always best to make sure