64 réponses à ce sujet

[Karma]

So this is the semi-working process I'm using now:

Import the DA2 mesh into 3ds Max using this script
Add the material(s) to the mesh
Tweak the vertices/polygons/elements as needed (in this case, make the loincloth lay flat)
Import a similar DAO model with Eshme's tools
Cut the skin and edit normals modifiers from the DAO model stack
Attach the DAO mesh to the DA2 mesh (with the option to "Match Material IDs to Material")
Delete the DAO mesh (select its UVW map, collapse to, select "element", delete)
Paste the skin and edit normals modifiers
Add the Unwrap UVW modifier and edit it
Move the skin modifier to the top of the stack
Resize the mesh to fit the skeleton***
Do the bone reweighting***
Export the model using Eshme's tools
Tweak the mao references as needed with Notepad++
Tweak the mmh references as needed with a GFF editor

At this point, I can see the model in the toolset and in-game, but the bones weights are off in places. I have not yet tried to resize the DA2 model or do any bone reweighting because I don't quite understand how it works yet. Some of the bones were moving what seemed to be the wrong body parts. (I had a left ankle moving the right leg at one point.) Like alschemid, I was seeing weird "envelopes" in some cases. I think 3ds max has an import/export weight table tool, but I don't know how to use it yet.

alschemid wrote...

...there are some crusts objects in your file that are huge.

I don't even know what a crust hook is. Whatever crust hooks, props, and other-random-things-I-have-not-yet-heard-about-in-my-week-long-adventure-into-modeling-but-are-in-my-model-anyway come from the DAO model that was imported. I would delete them, but I have no idea what they do, so I just hid them and pretended they didn't exist.

alschemid wrote...

Also your mesh is using bones from the face that is why it was complaining about the numer of bones, but even removing them max couldn't export your model.

Is there a list of what bones should be in what sections of the body? I just copied-and-pasted the bones to the DA2 model from the corresponding DAO model. When I import the DAO models, the entire skeleton usually comes along for the ride... I have no idea which ones are safe to delete from the scene and which ones aren't.

Modifié par satans_karma, 19 août 2012 - 12:24 .

[DarthParametric]

alschemid wrote...

I use Blender because I am more familiar with its interface and I have less steps to go than in Max, and I love the copy bone weight script too.

Yeah sorry, didn't read your previous post properly. I thought you were using Blender to import the original DA2 MMH then exporting the mesh as an OBJ for use in Max. I should probably post less at 4am....

satans_karma wrote...

I don't even know what a crust hook is.

Crust hooks are attachment points for VFX. Used for some spells, in cutscenes, etc. It's just a Max helper, so the size should be irrelevant. It's just the position that is important.

satans_karma wrote...

Is there a list of what bones should be in what sections of the body?

DA1 models should always include the full rig, regardless of whether the mesh "needs" it or not. So for example a head mesh will have all the arm and leg bones, and a body mesh will have all the face bones. If you have imported a vanilla DA1 model, you should never need to touch its rig. There shouldn't be any "extra" bones.

[alschemid]

Eshme wrote...
You get any indication of a consistant shift in the bones list?

I have tried to compile here the first bone and the shift... but I don't see the pattern yet...

Eshme wrote...
And would you do this on a model (save your work first), with the skin mod being active. copy paste in the Listener (F11) the following without quotes and press enter:
"for i = 1 to $.verts.count do skinOps.ReplaceVertexWeights $.modifiers[1] i 1 1"
Should reply OK

With Edit Envelopes active, which bone in the bones list now has all vertices colored red? Should be the first!

It is always the first, on the 5 models I have tried.

[Eshme]

Looks like its the bones are in alphabetical order, thats the pattern. It shouldnt be. Leads me to think its not the "replacevertexweights" function, but the "addbone" function that was changed.
99% i will be able to fix it, in either way.
Thanks for that

[alschemid]

satans_karma wrote...
Cut the skin and edit normals modifiers from the DAO model stack
Attach the DAO mesh to the DA2 mesh (with the option to "Match Material IDs to Material")
Delete the DAO mesh (select its UVW map, collapse to, select "element", delete)
Paste the skin and edit normals modifiers
Add the Unwrap UVW modifier and edit it
Move the skin modifier to the top of the stack

I would do the other way around, attach the DA2 mesh to the DAO mesh, as I suggested in my steps, because when you do this without deleting/collapsing the DAO skin, Unwrap UV, Edit Normal modifiers, the new mesh piece will use the modifiers from the DAO mesh, the bone weight will be adjusted properly, seriously just minor tweeks once this import bug is fixed and as DahliaLynn said rigging is a major pain, so I would get all the software can give me to avoid tons of boring work later.

Also if you create a new Dragon age material with the correct textures and apply to the mesh you don't need to create the mao manually, nor edit the mmh file, it is all done by Eshme's plugin.

As DarthParametric explained crusts are for VFX, spells, the props are also helpers object to attach the game's props - weapons, shields, etc - to the character, and collision meshes are used to avoid you walking through the character. Don't delete any of them, just hide, but for any reason you do delete them and have to create them from scratch they should be the same type (mesh for collision, helpers for crusts and props), be attached to the appropriate parent, and in the Eshme's plugin->Model Manager you need to tell it what type they are.

satans_karma wrote...
Is there a list of what bones should be
in what sections of the body? I just copied-and-pasted the bones to the
DA2 model from the corresponding DAO model. When I import the
DAO models, the entire skeleton usually comes along for the ride... I
have no idea which ones are safe to delete from the scene and which ones
aren't.

All the models you import will have the full skeleton, plus the helpers (crust, props, collisions), never ever delete them unless you know what you are doing, the mesh won't use all the bones though, only the ones around it, to see which bones the mesh are using you can click in the skin modifier and it will show a list on the rollout of the bones used. For exemple the boot model uses only 11 bones you can add or remove them using the button over it Bones: Add or Remove, it will not delete the bone, it is just assigning or not the bone to the mesh, creating/removing the envelop associated with the bone and applying/removing it to/from the mesh.

Yeap, there is a weight table, I only use it when I need total control over the vertex, like 3 bones influencing it the same amount, so I put the values manually, other than that I just use the Abs Effect parameter to assign weight to the selected vertex.

Modifié par alschemid, 19 août 2012 - 01:46 .

[Karma]

alschemid wrote...

All the models you import will have the full skeleton, plus the helpers (crust, props, collisions), never ever delete them unless you know what you are doing, the mesh won't use all the bones though, only the ones around it, to see which bones the mesh are using you can click in the skin modifier and it will show a list on the rollout of the bones used. For exemple the boot model uses only 11 bones you can add or remove them using the button over it Bones: Add or Remove, it will not delete the bone, it is just assigning or not the bone to the mesh, creating/removing the envelop associated with the bone and applying/removing it to/from the mesh.

I haven't deleted anything; I just hid things from view. However, I would still like a list of which bones go with which body parts (armor/body, boots, gloves, head, eyes, hair, and beard) if such a list is readily available on the web somewhere. Many of the non-human models appear to be unibody, so divying up the bones properly amongst the parts is a bit confusing for me. Most of them I can figure out, but there are a few bones that I've seen in weird places (chest in the gloves?) and some that I think should be there but aren't. Also, can the same bone be in more than one body part (e.g. can/should the elbow be in both the armor and the gloves)?

How should I alter the mesh to fit the skeleton. In the model I'm currently working on, the main joints (knees, pelvis, shoulders, and elbows) appear to be in approximately the right location except for the hands. The arms of the DA2 model are a tad shorter and at the wrong angle. How do I lengthen and rotate the arms without distorting the geometry and affecting how the head will attach to the body?

Last question... for now. In Step #16 of the tutorial I linked and in a non-DA video that I watched, the colors of the envelopes/vertices/whatever appear to be more varied than what I see when I start to edit the envelopes. They had blue, green, yellow, orange, red... I just have red. Is that how it's supposed to be? Is there a set of pictures somewhere on the web that shows the extent of the "colors" for each bone?

EDIT: The red-only happens when I attach the meshes together.

Modifié par satans_karma, 19 août 2012 - 03:37 .

[Eshme]

Updated my script to v5.46 here http://social.biowar...m/project/2336/

Import issues with max 2013 should be fixed. If not i prolly just got a version check wrong.

[alschemid]

satans_karma wrote...
However, I would still like a list of which bones go with which body parts (armor/body, boots, gloves, head, eyes, hair, and beard) if such a list is readily available on the web somewhere.

I don't think there is a list somewhere, but you can import a model and see in the rollout the bones it is using.

satans_karma wrote...
Many of the non-human models appear to be unibody, so divying up the bones properly amongst the parts is a bit confusing for me.

The game has a limitation of 67 bones per mesh, so simple monsters that don't need facial expressions and fingers usually have only one model with head and body in the same mesh, others that need facial expressions have the body and head in different model file, and the humanoids ones have the lower leg, lower arm plus hand, body, head, hair, eyes, eyelashes, beard are all separated.

satans_karma wrote...
Also, can the same bone be in more than one body part (e.g. can/should the elbow be in both the armor and the gloves)?

Yes, they usually are, since you want a smooth transition in both parts when the bone rotates, you know that the parts are separated, but when the elbow bone moves/rotates both parts should move properly as one whole thing, not only the glove but the lower arm too, in your example.

satans_karma wrote...
How should I alter the mesh to fit the skeleton. In the model I'm currently working on, the main joints (knees, pelvis, shoulders, and elbows) appear to be in approximately the right location except for the hands. The arms of the DA2 model are a tad shorter and at the wrong angle. How do I lengthen and rotate the arms without distorting the geometry and affecting how the head will attach to the body?

This is basic modeling, go into the Editable Poly modifier choose which element you want to use to edit (e.g. vertex, plane, element, etc.) and move them around. An old Max 2007 tutorial of mine that tries to explain the basic.

satans_karma wrote...
Last question... for now. In Step #16 of the tutorial I linked and in a non-DA video that I watched, the colors of the envelopes/vertices/whatever appear to be more varied than what I see when I start to edit the envelopes. They had blue, green, yellow, orange, red... I just have red. Is that how it's supposed to be? Is there a set of pictures somewhere on the web that shows the extent of the "colors" for each bone?

The colours show how much influence the bone has over the vertices going from 0% (blue), 25% (green), 50% (yellow), 75% (orange) 100% (red). To see the influence for each bone you have to select skin modifier->envelop and select the bone in the rollout. Again old post tutorial thing.

@Eshme: Thanks! Downloading it now.

Modifié par alschemid, 19 août 2012 - 04:01 .

[Karma]

alschemid wrote...

This is basic modeling, go into the Editable Poly modifier choose which element you want to use to edit (e.g. vertex, plane, element, etc.) and move them around. An old Max 2007 tutorial of mine that tries to explain the basic.

That's basically what I was doing. The small sections that were getting stretched/shrunk and rotated were just appearing more distorted than before, so I thought maybe I was doing it wrong. I guess I'm just being overly picky. 

(A related question: What's the difference between editable poly and editable mesh?)

alschemid wrote...

The colours show how much influence the bone has over the vertices going from 0% (blue), 25% (green), 50% (yellow), 75% (orange) 100% (red). To see the influence for each bone you have to select skin modifier->envelop and select the bone in the rollout. Again old post tutorial thing.

I saw that in the video tutorial I watched, so I know how to do it in theory. What I'm interested in is how far the influence of each bone should extend. For example, if I move my elbow, my wrist moves a little as does my shoulder. I can probably figure out proper weights for the major bones, but what about the "plates," "twists," and facial bones? I'm not really sure what some of them do, let alone how to weight them appropriately.

[alschemid]

satans_karma wrote...
That's basically what I was doing. The small sections that were getting stretched/shrunk and rotated were just appearing more distorted than before, so I thought maybe I was doing it wrong. I guess I'm just being overly picky. 

You can change the Unwrap UV later to make the region of the model you stretched/shrunk less distorted, or use the  soft selection (in the modifier rollout) that gives a smooth fall out on the vertices as you move them.

satans_karma wrote...
A related question: What's the difference between editable poly and editable mesh?

As I do my modeling in Blender I have no idea, they probably have different tools to edit them... but that is a question for Darth Parametric.

satans_karma wrote...
I can probably figure out proper weights for the major bones, but what about the "plates," "twists," and facial bones?

The easist way to weight the bones is loading a few game animations and make the mesh looks right performing them.

Plates and twists bones are usually to avoid the mesh shrinking too mush when you rotate a main bone, they usually have a low influence (10%) on the mesh around them and usually are not animated themselves, it is like they are trying to hold the vertices in place while the main bone is pushing them away.

The weights in the facial bones are the worst to get right, very very painful *looks at DahliaLynn*, again load some facial animations to help you, compare with other head models and play with some game head models' bones to see if you understand what vertices they control and why, try to do the same with your model.

[DarthParametric]

alschemid wrote...

As I do my modeling in Blender I have no idea, they probably have different tools to edit them... but that is a question for Darth Parametric.

Lol not really. My modelling app is C4D. I've never liked Max, nor used it any more than necessary. A quick Google search would suggest that Editable Mesh is limited to tris, while Editable Poly can handle quads (and I gather n-gons in newer releases). If you are modelling in Max you'll want to use EP to gain access to certain tools.

Btw alschemid, I see you are a fellow (former?) Lucasforums modder. Howdy!

[Eshme]

Fixed my script again v5.47 for max2013 users, OP should get it.

And should i mention, dont copy paste modifiers like that. If u need skin, you apply a new one for a new rig. Thats what you do, apply a DA2 mesh to a DAO rig, right?
Skinning isnt easy if u ask me.
I strongly recommend ,you implement a draft in your mod first!

[DarthParametric]

Copying the skin modifier seems to be the advice from the Nexus forum thread linked to earlier. I also advised against it and offered an alternative approach, but apparently satans_karma's attempts at replicating it were unsuccessful.

[Eshme]

Ah ok that is on the same rig, but defined state modified mesh. This is elite knowledge to use this to full extend to be honest, i mean "hacking" your way to success is where you should be able to follow your own steps its nothing that came to my mind now ,but i believe that tutorial stands on its own feet that i cant judge.

[alschemid]

DarthParametric wrote...
Btw alschemid, I see you are a fellow (former?) Lucasforums modder. Howdy!

Howdy! Yeap a life time ago, it was in the Holowan Labs where I corrupted my first game mesh file, good old times... poor Carth though. :innocent:

You still there, aren't you?

Modifié par alschemid, 20 août 2012 - 08:47 .

[Karma]

Darth, until alschemid mentioned getting similarly weird results during import in max 2013, I thought I was just messing up both methods somewhere because, even after I could see it in the toolset, feet were moving fingertips and left knees were moving right toes no matter which way I did it. I read and reread and then reread again both tutorials. I tried it with 4 different 3d modeling programs. I watched several hours of video tutorials about rigging models. I practiced importing, adding material, attaching, and exporting the same mesh at least 50 times, each time making sure I followed the steps of one or both tutorials as carefully as possible. I really was making the effort, and the farthest I could get was being able to see it in the toolset. I probably did replicate your method "successfully" in at least one of my 50 attempts; I just didn't realize it at the time. As soon as moving bones produced unnatural movements of the mesh, I immediately assumed that what I had done was incorrect and started all over from scratch. It's not that I wasn't heeding your advice; I just couldn't see the difference and hadn't gotten far enough along in the process where I might have seen the difference. I apologize if my ignorance caused offense.

And Eshme, I'm sure I'm not the only one who appreciates your efforts. (I'll go try out the new version now.)

[DarthParametric]

alschemid wrote...

You still there, aren't you?

Yeah, I still loiter there, occasionally harassing the locals. I haven't actually done any KOTOR modding for a long while though, basically since DA1 came out and BGR started up.

satans_karma wrote...

I apologize if my ignorance caused offense.

There's nothing to apologise for. I was merely saying you didn't have any luck with it. I wasn't implying any wrongdoing on your part. As I think I said in that other thread, generating skin weighting from a different mesh is imperfect. My own limited experiments with it resulted in all sorts of issues that could only be fixed by proper manual weighting. There's really no way of getting around it.

[Karma]

A few new questions for a different Frankenstein model I'm working on:
1) When I click on Unwrap UVW, the arms move backwards a bit. When I click Skin, the arms move forward a bit. A similar thing happens to the gloves. What could cause this, and how can I put it right? The wrists look crooked in-game I assume because of this. (I did have to move/rotate the elements of the gloves around to get the gloves to line up with the arms.) (I just started over.)
2) When I'm viewing the model in max/gmax, it looks normal, but when I open it in the toolset, it looks like a couple vertices have been deformed and stretched to the floor. How can I fix it?
3) Is there a trick to weighting the finger bones? Sometimes they deform, and sometimes they don't change to the weight I specified. Also, when I come back to them after reweighting other nearby bones, it's changed from how I had it. I'm supposing it has to do with the normalize and rigid options, but I'm not entirely sure when I should have none, one, or both checked.
4) I'm getting weird blotches that show up in the game. It happens when I attach the DAO mesh. Tessellate gets rid of them. Is that safe to use?
5) My body texture appears to be inside out. I checked the MAO and anything else that might cause the issue, but nothing I can see is wrong. Anyone else have any ideas of things to check?

Modifié par satans_karma, 26 août 2012 - 06:52 .

[Eshme]

Looks like bad normals, i would assume the cause is in the modifier stack. Likely as in Rigs there are modifiers that are dependant on topology. I dont think that is a good sign, stuff like this breaks the model easily. Fix it by avoiding it.
Tesselate reorients the normals, cause it applies new smoothing groups to the new topology on top of every other modifier. Of couse it also multiplies the facecount by no unconsiderable amount which isnt good for the game.

A model inside out is another bad normal indicator.

[alschemid]

satans_karma wrote...

A few new questions for a different Frankenstein model I'm working on:
1) When I click on Unwrap UVW, the arms move backwards a bit. When I click Skin, the arms move forward a bit. A similar thing happens to the gloves. What could cause this, and how can I put it right? The wrists look crooked in-game I assume because of this. (I did have to move/rotate the elements of the gloves around to get the gloves to line up with the arms.) (I just started over.)

In the stack modifier you have at the base the Editable Poly (how the mesh was modeled) and at the top the Skin (the influence of the bones over the mesh), and many modifiers in between them, when you select one modifier everything that is above it and changing the mesh somehow is desabled and not shown in the screen, you can enable it selecting the button "Show end result on/off toggle" the second icon under the modifier stack. Usually you model the mesh first and then apply the skin modifier, in this case nothing would changee, when we change the model with a skin modifier applied it is a good practice to move/rotate the elements to line up with the bones as you did.

satans_karma wrote...
2) When I'm viewing the model in max/gmax, it looks normal, but when I open it in the toolset, it looks like a couple vertices have been deformed and stretched to the floor. How can I fix it?

Vertices in the floor means that there is no bone controlling them.

satans_karma wrote...
3) Is there a trick to weighting the finger bones? Sometimes they deform, and sometimes they don't change to the weight I specified. Also, when I come back to them after reweighting other nearby bones, it's changed from how I had it. I'm supposing it has to do with the normalize and rigid options, but I'm not entirely sure when I should have none, one, or both checked.

I always check normalize and never rigid. With the normalize if there is only one bone controlling the vertex it will have 100% influence, you can only change the value if there is another bone that controls it too, and it won't let you have more than 100% bone influence to a vertex.

satans_karma wrote...
4) I'm getting weird blotches that show up in the game. It happens when I attach the DAO mesh. Tessellate gets rid of them. Is that safe to use?

I don't think tessellate is a good idea...problems like this could be: the piece you attached is not joined with the mesh you had in max, perhaps you have overlapping vertices in the same position a weld could fix it, your mesh has different smooth groups, or there is a seam in the UV map...

satans_karma wrote...
5) My body texture appears to be inside out. I checked the MAO and anything else that might cause the issue, but nothing I can see is wrong. Anyone else have any ideas of things to check?

The normal of the face is pointing to the wrong direction... have you tried Edit Normal->Normal and selecting the face is its normals pointing inside? If you select the normal and reset does it change? Not sure how to fix it in Max...

[Karma]

alschemid wrote...
The normal of the face is pointing to the wrong direction... have you tried Edit Normal->Normal and selecting the face is its normals pointing inside? If you select the normal and reset does it change? Not sure how to fix it in Max...

Most of the normal lines appear to be pointing outside the body; however there are a few that are going through the body. I can't tell which way they are pointing or from where they originate. I tried selecting the normals and resetting them, but it had no effect.

[Eshme]

You may flip faces inside out ,by editable poly face tool "Flip". This will flip the face and usualy the normal. However with explicit normals (they are color coded) it wont flip these normals. In max its the vertices having a number of normals, the face normal is derived from that, just btw.
Resetting Normals in an edit normal modifier, will make them non explicit, and it turns into a normal normal lol. This may help if you applied the modifier. Easy to ignore as a beginner.

If i were you and i think im slowly repeating myself ,i would fix my methods, instead of doing that crap. Im not sure why this happened but likely due a mistake with your copying and pasteing modifiers. This is so full of mistakes if you dont know what youre doing.
Fixing stuff in this state is difficult. You fix one thing, but break the other cause the model is messed up. (im just saying xform reset as n1 root of all evils) You could accidentally produce double inversions, topped with a mirror and a negative object space, mhh would be interesting to see if that exports right, not sure how a tangent is produced if the face is inverse. And you dont see these issues in max unless you render it. Some modifier settings ESPECIALLY Normal settings dont immidately take visible effect. This makes things complicated cause its no action--> reaction thing. It may produce black or white blotches on your mesh once in game. ETC ETC..
Just a advise to go from where the problem began, instead trying to fix it. Like i didnt say that before.

Modifié par Eshme, 30 août 2012 - 08:55 .

[Karma]

Eshme wrote...

Im not sure why this happened but likely due a mistake with your copying and pasteing modifiers.

You all told me not to copy-and-paste modifiers, so I didn't. I used Darth's method in this case.

Eshme wrote...
If i were you and i think im slowly repeating myself ,i would fix my methods, instead of doing that crap. ... This is so full of mistakes if you dont know what youre doing.

I hate to disagree, but I think making mistakes and fixing them is part of the learning process. (And frankly, I'd rather not throw out two weeks worth of labor if I can fix my mistakes. Other than the inside-out torso, this model is now working in-game.)

Eshme wrote...

Just a advise to go from where the problem began, instead trying to fix it. Like i didnt say that before.

I don't expect a reply from anyone, and eventually, through sheer dumb luck, I'll stumble upon the solution. I
appreciate any help to lessen the amount of stumbling I do, but if you don't want to give suggestions, then please don't feel obligated to do so.

Modifié par satans_karma, 31 août 2012 - 12:35 .

[DarthParametric]

If you can post the game model I can have a look at it to see what the inside out problem is.

[Karma]

Do you want the max file or the game files?