24 réponses à ce sujet

[Troggyf06F]

 I want to get into 3D modeling, will blender work with dao?

[Adinos]

If someone writes export tools for it - and there is a pretty good chance it will happen, as Blender is pretty popular. In fact, there is one person who has expressed his interest in writing such a tool - so, just wait and see what he (or others) come up with.

[Adinos]

If someone writes export tools for it - and there is a pretty good chance it will happen, as Blender is pretty popular. In fact, there is one person who has expressed his interest in writing such a tool - so, just wait and see what he (or others) come up with.

[Vince B]

I believe both indio and Adinos have said they plan to create exporters, although it may be a while before they are available.  I believe DA:O itself was created with 3ds Max, so an exporter for it may be available sooner.  Hopefully, since DA:O and the Tool Set should be released today, we will know more soon.

[Toryss]

Chances are that it will. You might have to wait for importer/exporters to be created though, but that's with any software (Maya for me). As far as I know, Blender can already export Obj files, I'm just hoping that the toolset allows us to import them, ala Marmaset, etc.

[Toryss]

Chances are that it will. You might have to wait for importer/exporters to be created though, but that's with any software (Maya for me). As far as I know, Blender can already export Obj files, I'm just hoping that the toolset allows us to import them, ala Marmaset, etc.

[SilentCid]

I really don't see why the toolset wouldn't accept obj files. Since that's the most universal form known to man.

[Adinos]

No, the toolset cannot import obj files. In order to get model files into the toolset, you either have to create the MMH/MSH files directly, or create files in a specific XML-based format - the toolset comes with utilities to convert those files to the game format.



Now, Lightwave OBJ/MTL files are really only usable for non-animated models, so that's a bit of a restriction, but if you just want to create static props/placeables, you should have a OBJ exporter/importer very soon.



Animated models are more interesting, but writing an export/import tool for those will take a bit longer.

[CID-78]

No software will work until the community has produced plugins/exporters for them. blender will most likely be on that list. there is a few guys working on it among them is adinos.

[Murdoc_Jones]

Why wouldn't they include the exporters they use since they are releasing a toolset? seems very odd.

[tazpn]

Bioware indicates there are legal issues with third parties regarding distributing their max exporter so I would not expect one from them. Many developers do not release their exporters.



Having said that do expect one from me at least in some form and I'm sure some of the other users as already stated. I've already got an MMH, MSH to FBX converter which will enable at least viewing of models in 3ds max, XSI, XSI ModTool, MotionBuilder and presumably Maya. Blender does not support importing of FBX files directly though apparently supports export (I've not tested it and jester01 is probably going to tackle that.).



You could in theory start rigging new clothing with my tools but I'm not sure I would dedicate too much time doing so this early in the release cycle. Also I've not gotten the final release yet (still downloading) and have heard they will need some tuning to work smoothly.



Anyway XSI ModTool from Autodesk is a completely free download on perfectly capable 3d editor and should be considered as a tools for creating custom content for the the game. I'm a max user so cannot really comment on it too much but I like some things it does much better than max.



I'll try to support non-max tools to some degree but they will not be my primary focus at this point.

[Jalida]

If you don't mind me asking. Then what does the toolset capable of doing? Anything I could possibly dream of with the exceptions of importing new character models?



Thanks,

[Vince B]

If I remember correctly, there is a COLLADA importer/exporter available for the XSI ModTool. If that's true, since Blender imports and exports COLLADA (1.3.1 & 1.4), the ModTool could act as a gateway for Blender created content. The latest version of Blender at present, 249.2, does have an .FBX exporter. Since I have no way of viewing the output, I can't verify how well it works.

@tazpn, if it would be useful, I could export something from Blender in .FBX format and post it on MediaFire so you could look at it. It would be just a few meshes with simple .dds textures, no vertex colors, and no collision. I'd include a screen shot so you would know what it's supposed to look like.

A couple of questions if I do this: for DA:O, is the specular map the alpha layer of the normal map?  Also, DA:O can handle DXT1, DXT3, and DXT5 formats, right?

Modifié par Vince B, 04 novembre 2009 - 05:10 .

[Ambaryerno]

Any chance of getting an exporter for AC3D?

[tazpn]

Vince, blender has trouble with the COLLADA and 3ds formats I can convert to. 3ds didn't contain any skeleton or weights while COLLADA failed with a parsing exception in every model I tried.

I think my wording in favor of modtool may have been a little strong. blender is as popular if not more so. Just thought I'd say that it should not be overlooked as it looks free and capable and from my perspective I can probably be reasonably compatible with it.

I've included a FBX viewer in my code (its the sample viewer from FBX toolkit with modifications for reading MMH directly and handling DDS files) so you could try that for testing. If that can view the file then I could probably convert it without too much additional effort once I can write out the model files. I've got quite a bit of concern about how to handle FBX to MMH conversion and what additional information is required and available but that is for another day.

I've not really delved too far into the DDS formats supported so far as the classes I used handles them all.

Ambaryerno, no plans from me for AC3D at this point. I figured that one of 3ds, FBX, or DAE would be supported by most editors. How well is still to be decided.

[Adinos]

I have a tool (almost ready) that is primarily focused on manipulating existing models, without having to export them to a 3D program and back - this includes scaling, retexturing and "mirroring". This tool also servers as a model browser, allowing people to quickly browse through the game models.

I would, however, like to get a few people to beta-test this before I release it. If anyone is interested in helping out, send me a PM with an e-mail address.

Modifié par Adinos, 04 novembre 2009 - 10:07 .

[Elvhen Veluthil]

I'd be interested Adinos, but I don't have the toolset. As soon as we get it though, count me in.

[Adinos]

Actually you don't need the toolset to use my tool...but you need to have the game installed.

[Ambaryerno]

taz,



I'd need to double-check, but I'm pretty sure that AC3D can import/export 3DS format. So I guess if the content creator can import 3DS models, this would be a start.



Adinos,



The tool you're working on sounds like it could be pretty invaluable for part of the sword mod I've been considering (rescaling the one-handed swords--and possibly daggers as well--because frankly they're just rather absurdly oversized).

[Martin E]

I haven't checked (don't have the game yet) - but I'm guessing that they are using a proprietry file format for the models - akin the the MDLs for NWN1 (XML format ?).



Again a guess - but the toolset will probably only scan the standard folders + an import/export folder (?) for standard format files for props and placeables - including any custom content.



If it's anyhting like NWN1 - some degree of simple customisation of textures etc. could be accomplished with a text editor (for ascii format of the model files) followed by 2da file tweaking to add the necessary references for the revised items so that they can be added in the toolset.



All guesswork on my behalf - so probably wrong.

[tazpn]

Bioware is using custom formats. But they are GFF v4 (General File Format that is binary) for most files backed up by XML files for the rest. The model and model hierarchies today are in this compiled format however there is an XML source format as well that the game can supposedly read. The schema is documented partially on the wiki.

Materials where texture references and shader declarations are in xml file seperate from the mesh and hierarchy objects which should allow easier tweaking.

So presumably if we import/export to the xml format and then use the toolset compilers to get final assets it will work pretty well for testing. One of my next goals for the FBX converter is to write out these xml files. I see a lot of hand editing of these files in the early days and probably some tools will eventually popup to allow for easy refinement (such as Adinos's viewer/editor)

The 2DA tweaks are beyond me at the moment but I agree that they are probably key to referencing the models for use in toolset or in game. The 2DA files included in the game are compiled to GFF format (which lays out sheet, row, column information of a table) so tools are going to be required to author them (and of course those are part of the toolset).

[Murdoc_Jones]

"The Bioware 3dsMax exporter runs inside 3dsMax, not inside the toolset. So it doesn't function as a toolset plugin."



Again, why not release that? It's what Epic and Valve do. Also it would serve as a basis for the modders to try to port those scripts from max to other packages, and this is beside the point that most of the industry traditionally uses 3dsmax anyway.

[Murdoc_Jones]

Sorry can't edit my post from work... yet i can still post, weird.



anyway:



It can't be a legal issue because hundreds of developers do it every day along with thousands of community people. An exporter would most likey be a seperate program tied with a script, there is absolutely nothing legal or illegal about this with any 3d app that I know of, unless they are using formats that they don't have rights for, which is extremely unlikely.



edit: Also thanks to all working on exports, can't wait to see the results!

[Adinos]

I suspect that BioWare's 3DSMax export plugin uses some 3rd party library that they do not have redistribution rights for.

Anyhow, we don't have to struggle with anything like NWN2's Granny, so I'm fairly confident that there will be a community solution to this issue.

Modifié par Adinos, 04 novembre 2009 - 05:23 .