Posted: Fri Sep 06, 2013 5:14 am
If anyone is curious, here was the workflow for building models and the workflow for building the faction. As well as a few thank yous and thoughts.
Making Draconium:
July 2012 - Decided to take on building a faction as a challenge. Learning 3d modeling and texturing through a program called Blender.
September-November 2012 - Bases and ships are modeled. Worked with YourPersona on building an export script for Blender straight to .cvh and .mdl files. Eventually, we couldn't get it to work due to an inability to designate the 'up' designation for joints.
November/December 2012 - Draconium languishes.
January 2013 - Weedman slaps me in the face with his balls and begins porting the files over to Milkshape and making the .mdl/.cvh files.
April 2013 - Weedman gets exhausted with Draconium (and slapping me in the face with his balls for which I couldn't avoid if I jumped 5 feet either way) and stops short of carrier and bases. His help was much appreciated, but I understood his job at GeekSquad took up a lot of his time. Congrats on promotion to GeekSquad Leader!
April-July 2013 - Draconium languishes.
August-September 2013 - I finally get motivated to finish it. Weedman gets me set up to finish carrier and bases. I do that. P32 helps add Draconium to Pcore. Draconium launches.
Making models:
- Build model in Blender, texture model in blender, save texture as .bmp.
- For ships, Blender makes an excellent convex hull, which you can export with the ship model. Seriously, the convex hulls on the ships couldn't fit any better.
- Export model and convex hull (if for ship) as an .obj file.
- In Milkshape, import .obj file. Add your hardpoints/joints. Use AMT MDL exporter to make the .mdl and bmp.mdl files, and then again to export the .cvh file. The wiki has a good article about using Milkshape and whatnot.
- Use ICE to add your model to a test core.
- Get LAN server built, put files in artwork folders, launch LAN server with test core, start client and start game. Test.
- Do this over and over and over. And over. Until you get it right. Then do this over again.
- This took a long time to figure out and took contacting many, many people.
Props:
YourPersona - Thanks for investing time in trying to make Blender work as a straight-to-allegiance 3d modeling application - it was a significant amount of time and energy and you deserve credit. And thanks for just helping me get a better handle on Allegiance files and model mechanics.
Weedman - You've got big balls, my friend. Thanks for the guidance in getting Draconium to completion.
PKK/Spunk - LAN server help was enormous. Also, PKK for being involved in orchestrating Draconium's implementation was important.
Maximus - Thanks for the Draconium logo artwork help. We have the same taste.
P32 - We had so much fun with ICE. As Phantom kept telling me: "wir sind tolle Leute"
Dome/Tango/Blake/others who gave feedback - Always very helpful. Even when Ryu told me he didn't like the models. Metz gave me a compliment on a model but immediately retracted it once he realized he was giving praise to someone besides himself. He then complimented himself.
My girl - She is the voice in the base sounds.. they're a little quiet, so feel free to crank up the volume to hear a sexy voice.
I hope you all enjoy a new aspect of an old game... I just wanted to give something back to the computer game I'll never stop loving - it will hopefully give any returning players a reason to be interested, as well as reward those who continue to play. C'mon, this is a fun game that is low on hard drive space and bandwidth, why not keep it installed and log in once and a while.
TA
Making Draconium:
July 2012 - Decided to take on building a faction as a challenge. Learning 3d modeling and texturing through a program called Blender.
September-November 2012 - Bases and ships are modeled. Worked with YourPersona on building an export script for Blender straight to .cvh and .mdl files. Eventually, we couldn't get it to work due to an inability to designate the 'up' designation for joints.
November/December 2012 - Draconium languishes.
January 2013 - Weedman slaps me in the face with his balls and begins porting the files over to Milkshape and making the .mdl/.cvh files.
April 2013 - Weedman gets exhausted with Draconium (and slapping me in the face with his balls for which I couldn't avoid if I jumped 5 feet either way) and stops short of carrier and bases. His help was much appreciated, but I understood his job at GeekSquad took up a lot of his time. Congrats on promotion to GeekSquad Leader!
April-July 2013 - Draconium languishes.
August-September 2013 - I finally get motivated to finish it. Weedman gets me set up to finish carrier and bases. I do that. P32 helps add Draconium to Pcore. Draconium launches.
Making models:
- Build model in Blender, texture model in blender, save texture as .bmp.
- For ships, Blender makes an excellent convex hull, which you can export with the ship model. Seriously, the convex hulls on the ships couldn't fit any better.
- Export model and convex hull (if for ship) as an .obj file.
- In Milkshape, import .obj file. Add your hardpoints/joints. Use AMT MDL exporter to make the .mdl and bmp.mdl files, and then again to export the .cvh file. The wiki has a good article about using Milkshape and whatnot.
- Use ICE to add your model to a test core.
- Get LAN server built, put files in artwork folders, launch LAN server with test core, start client and start game. Test.
- Do this over and over and over. And over. Until you get it right. Then do this over again.
- This took a long time to figure out and took contacting many, many people.
Props:
YourPersona - Thanks for investing time in trying to make Blender work as a straight-to-allegiance 3d modeling application - it was a significant amount of time and energy and you deserve credit. And thanks for just helping me get a better handle on Allegiance files and model mechanics.
Weedman - You've got big balls, my friend. Thanks for the guidance in getting Draconium to completion.
PKK/Spunk - LAN server help was enormous. Also, PKK for being involved in orchestrating Draconium's implementation was important.
Maximus - Thanks for the Draconium logo artwork help. We have the same taste.
P32 - We had so much fun with ICE. As Phantom kept telling me: "wir sind tolle Leute"
Dome/Tango/Blake/others who gave feedback - Always very helpful. Even when Ryu told me he didn't like the models. Metz gave me a compliment on a model but immediately retracted it once he realized he was giving praise to someone besides himself. He then complimented himself.
My girl - She is the voice in the base sounds.. they're a little quiet, so feel free to crank up the volume to hear a sexy voice.
I hope you all enjoy a new aspect of an old game... I just wanted to give something back to the computer game I'll never stop loving - it will hopefully give any returning players a reason to be interested, as well as reward those who continue to play. C'mon, this is a fun game that is low on hard drive space and bandwidth, why not keep it installed and log in once and a while.
TA