Print

Please login or register.
1 Hour 1 Day 1 Week 1 Month Forever
Login with username, password and session length

[kasker]

Your triangulation needs work, I count 138 130 128.

148 minimum for a fully connected mesh, bad practice otherwise =O

Sprites rotating around the up/down/Y axis to face the camera could work pretty well.

[Mithaldu]

However that caused lifeviz to not start at all. So I took a look at constants.pm and added the stair_stone to the two areas that seem to list the textures. Now lifeviz starts normally but the stone stairs do not render at all.

You also have to change the function build_textures() in Viewer.pm.

[ ASCII MODEL ]

And only 148 triangles! This is your lucky day sir.

This is hilarious, i love it! Please tell me you're going to upload the model somewhere.

I'm still thinking about how to implement model choosing easily, but if you guys can keep motivated to make a few more models of various types, we might get enough stuff together to make model sets for all kinds of tastes.

148 minimum for a fully connected mesh, bad practice otherwise =O

I'm not sure what you mean with fully connected mesh, but i am reading it in the way that the eyes and the mouth are connected with 1-dimensional polygons to the frame. This is not necessary as long as there are no holes in the model.



I've been thinking about how to solve the problem of displaying creature/item models in the world and i have been stumbling over the fact that one tile has to accomodate a dragon at least. As such pretty much ALL item and creature models would be fairly small, especially if i tried to display multiple models in the same tile. Right now i'm thinking however that that approach is pretty stupid and i should do the same thing Toady does, which is to display whatever is in the tile as filling the tile and cycle through everything in it over time when there are multiple contents.

So, for example, if there is a workshop in which a sword is lying, a dwarf and a cat, it would first display the dwarf, a second later the sword, then the cat, then the dwarf again, ad infinitum, with all three models being big enough to fill the tile.

[Random832]

148 minimum for a fully connected mesh, bad practice otherwise =O

I'm not sure what you mean with fully connected mesh, but i am reading it in the way that the eyes and the mouth are connected with 1-dimensional polygons to the frame. This is not necessary as long as there are no holes in the model.

Quote wasn't me, by the way. I don't know for sure what it means, but my guess is that it means there are no places where a vertex of one triangle falls on a side of another (which my 128-triangle version does in numerous places)

[Pruvan]

but my guess is that it means there are no places where a vertex of one triangle falls on a side of another (which my 128-triangle version does in numerous places)

Best way to avoid holes in your models is to make as many places connected as possible. At the cost of a handful of extra triangles true, but for this model 20 extra triangles isn't exactly going to murder your computer now is it.

[Mithaldu]

I have no idea what any of you are talking about, but: For the model to be usable in lifevis, 128 triangles is perfectly fine.

[bamjo]

I have absolutely no graphics modeling experience, and little artistic ability. But I've always wanted to give modeling a shot, and I figure this is the perfect opportunity.

I spent the last couple hours fiddling with Wings3D, and although I am still a complete novice I decided to share my first creation.

What's the first thing that comes to mind when we think of dwarf fortress?
That's right....

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

The Musk Ox of course!

Here's my splendid rendition

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

Ok so I didn't make it very far. I feel like I am making headway with the interface, but I am having trouble creating smooth edges and blending polygons together in an organic way. I haven't figured out how to make the face yet.  I am happy for any suggestions or criticisms the experienced artists have to offer.

And thanks Mithaldu for undertaking such an awesome and worthy project!

[kasker]

You also have to change the function build_textures() in Viewer.pm.

Ahha! I'll try that out then, thanks. Would it be too much to ask for a single text file that these all read from =)

I'm still thinking about how to implement model choosing easily, but if you guys can keep motivated to make a few more models of various types, we might get enough stuff together to make model sets for all kinds of tastes.

Steam punk!

I'm not sure what you mean with fully connected mesh, but i am reading it in the way that the eyes and the mouth are connected with 1-dimensional polygons to the frame. This is not necessary as long as there are no holes in the model.

I was a bit ambiguous I admit. What Random832 said basically. It isn't a problem in this situation, when models get more complicated or you do animating it helps keep the mesh predictable and not do funky things.

I've been thinking about how to solve the problem of displaying creature/item models in the world and i have been stumbling over the fact that one tile has to accomodate a dragon at least. As such pretty much ALL item and creature models would be fairly small, especially if i tried to display multiple models in the same tile. Right now i'm thinking however that that approach is pretty stupid and i should do the same thing Toady does, which is to display whatever is in the tile as filling the tile and cycle through everything in it over time when there are multiple contents.

So, for example, if there is a workshop in which a sword is lying, a dwarf and a cat, it would first display the dwarf, a second later the sword, then the cat, then the dwarf again, ad infinitum, with all three models being big enough to fill the tile.

So the cats and flies would be massive? And the dragons would be merely as large as CATS?! I agree this is probably the best way to go.

I originally thought of having bind points as part of the tile models(invisible little squares or vertices that the modeler adds) which determine the location of each object in it, the same way different weapon models are often placed in characters' hands. Then you could brake it down into broad categories and have a bind point for each(stone, items, animals, humanoids, monsters, etc) You'd still have to cycle through when a limit is reached but it makes better use of being able to zoom. You could even have the bind points move(not ones for stone and items of course!) to add some visual activity.

[kasker]

Added this line right after the 'red' entry and nothing changed...
    create_texture( 'stair_stone',                stair_stone );

[Mithaldu]

Argh, dammit, i forgot: You need to up the number of the prepared textures by one in the first line of the subroutine. I always forget that when adding textures myself. ^^

[kasker]

Ok, its working.
About the invis triangles. What are the requirements for a triangle not being rendered. The problem was sort of fixed but there still seems to be arbitrary invis triangles. The two areas highlighted in this picture are the same as far as I can tell yet one doesn't render.

[Mithaldu]

The sand stairs render because they are not surrounded by any tiles with floor, as such the floor border tiles are not being hidden.

The condition for when they are eligible for hiding is the vector of the plane. If the vector points straight north, south, east or west, then it will be hidden if there is a floor or wall tile to the north, south, east or west.

So just try moving one of the two vertices that touches both triangles of the hole by a bit. It also kinda goes with the game. dwarves aren't perfect and unlikely to produce exactly straight architecture in all cases.

[kasker]

Well I did move the vertices but I guess not enough...
Also, I will add imperfections, still figuring things out.

[Mithaldu]

I was a bit ambiguous I admit. What Random832 said basically. It isn't a problem in this situation, when models get more complicated or you do animating it helps keep the mesh predictable and not do funky things.

Thanks for explaining. Also, good point all around. If i ever were to use soft-shading, i'd need to have the models properly divided.

So the cats and flies would be massive? And the dragons would be merely as large as CATS?! I agree this is probably the best way to go.

A bit smaller, just not so small that it would scale realistically.

I originally thought of having bind points as part of the tile models(invisible little squares or vertices that the modeler adds) which determine the location of each object in it, the same way different weapon models are often placed in characters' hands. Then you could brake it down into broad categories and have a bind point for each(stone, items, animals, humanoids, monsters, etc) You'd still have to cycle through when a limit is reached but it makes better use of being able to zoom. You could even have the bind points move(not ones for stone and items of course!) to add some visual activity.

Yeah, i thought about that too. But seriously, for them to make any sort of sense, the models would have to be quite small, which would require the user to zoom in and out all the time. When i'm bored sometime later i could add this in together with a specialized movement mode in order to facilitate "walking through your fortress".

[kasker]

Are there any models that you need particularly more than others? I'll start going through the creatures list otherwise. http://www.dwarffortresswiki.net/index.php/Creatures

[Mithaldu]

Honestly, anything you would have fun with.

Aside from that, I'd think starting with the most frequently encountered things is a good idea.