11-11-2013, 10:54 PM
(This post was last modified: 11-12-2013, 09:18 AM by Emor D'ni Lap.)
Ben, here's the point where I have to hand this model off to you! It's one of those things I could go on fussing with forever, but at some point one has to say "enough!", and you will be the one to make additions and improvements from here on.
Also, it's always somewhat different when you're working on a file that has to be handed off to others: maintaining a clear structure and naming conventions becomes more important than on a project where only you have to keep track of what's what (and only you will see your messy Max file!)
So, some notes on the setup for this winch-thing:
You asked for a D'ni hook, I dunno what that might look like but hope this fills the bill:
Here's the winch in-game:
And the back side, with control box and power supply:
The cable is a bunch of polys, and they're all currently aligned along a flat floor plane. So if you put all this on an uneven surface, you'll have a very busy time aligning all those edge loops to the ground...but it would be a convincing effect!
The chain that I was concerned about, because it was built of layered alphaed planes? To my surprise, it renders beautifully in-game! I even used an alphaed background of windows behind it as a test, and the chain causes no problems when seen from either side of those windows! Weird. But a relief.
I used an alpha layer on the large sprockets, to break up the big solid discs a bit. But if you find it makes it look too much like a Mississippi sternwheeler, just turn off that lower layer.
I've added colliders for it, using three Hulled box shapes with ProxyTerrain and NoShow modifiers.
This permits the avatar to walk in between the pontoons, to examine the controls and so on.
The collision boxes have sloped tops, so - with the exception of a small area at the top of the reel - high-jumpers should just wind up sliding off the winch.
The hook also has a little collider, to step upon.
The winch's objects are all grouped under WinchGroup, so any translations you need to do should happen there.
Likewise, all textures are collected in Material Editor slot #2, a multi-sub-object material called "Winch-MSO".
The colliders have a non-Plasma material on them, for convenience while working, in slot #3. I made pre-layered texture files for a few of the meshes (the reel, the motor and the battery/control mesh group); all the other textures are very heavily modified from free online textures (colorations altered, layered and multiplied with other textures, made tileable, and so on), so I can basically say they are my custom creations at this point. Feel free to alter these as you need, and if you require the pre-layered files I can send those to you as .xcf or .psd files.
I've created a very basic floor shadow map on a separate plane, for the winch, cable and hook. You can alter this as you see fit, too. But if you have time, it would be great to add some ambient occlusion maps to the pontoons, for instance, where there are not enough vertices to sustain Plasma shadow data.
Texturally, what it needs now of course is a bunch of schmutz and dings, the wear and tear a piece of gear like this would acquire in a mine. Not knowing exactly where you're going to put this thing, I'm going to leave this additional aging/schmutz texturing to you!
Plus, I'm out of time and have to move on! After all, this has only taken me thirteen months to get to this point!
IF I had more time, I would have liked to have added more decorative detail: embossings on the sprocket wheels, retainers on the sprockets and on the vertical stakes, some D'ni lettering in the space reserved above the contol slider (in/out, forward/backward, something like that). And you'll probably put a bunch of your local rocks inside the pontoons, right? But those are your decisions!
Files PMed to you....hope this works for your project!
Also, it's always somewhat different when you're working on a file that has to be handed off to others: maintaining a clear structure and naming conventions becomes more important than on a project where only you have to keep track of what's what (and only you will see your messy Max file!)
So, some notes on the setup for this winch-thing:
You asked for a D'ni hook, I dunno what that might look like but hope this fills the bill:
Here's the winch in-game:
And the back side, with control box and power supply:
The cable is a bunch of polys, and they're all currently aligned along a flat floor plane. So if you put all this on an uneven surface, you'll have a very busy time aligning all those edge loops to the ground...but it would be a convincing effect!
The chain that I was concerned about, because it was built of layered alphaed planes? To my surprise, it renders beautifully in-game! I even used an alphaed background of windows behind it as a test, and the chain causes no problems when seen from either side of those windows! Weird. But a relief.
I used an alpha layer on the large sprockets, to break up the big solid discs a bit. But if you find it makes it look too much like a Mississippi sternwheeler, just turn off that lower layer.
I've added colliders for it, using three Hulled box shapes with ProxyTerrain and NoShow modifiers.
This permits the avatar to walk in between the pontoons, to examine the controls and so on.
The collision boxes have sloped tops, so - with the exception of a small area at the top of the reel - high-jumpers should just wind up sliding off the winch.
The hook also has a little collider, to step upon.
The winch's objects are all grouped under WinchGroup, so any translations you need to do should happen there.
Likewise, all textures are collected in Material Editor slot #2, a multi-sub-object material called "Winch-MSO".
The colliders have a non-Plasma material on them, for convenience while working, in slot #3. I made pre-layered texture files for a few of the meshes (the reel, the motor and the battery/control mesh group); all the other textures are very heavily modified from free online textures (colorations altered, layered and multiplied with other textures, made tileable, and so on), so I can basically say they are my custom creations at this point. Feel free to alter these as you need, and if you require the pre-layered files I can send those to you as .xcf or .psd files.
I've created a very basic floor shadow map on a separate plane, for the winch, cable and hook. You can alter this as you see fit, too. But if you have time, it would be great to add some ambient occlusion maps to the pontoons, for instance, where there are not enough vertices to sustain Plasma shadow data.
Texturally, what it needs now of course is a bunch of schmutz and dings, the wear and tear a piece of gear like this would acquire in a mine. Not knowing exactly where you're going to put this thing, I'm going to leave this additional aging/schmutz texturing to you!
Plus, I'm out of time and have to move on! After all, this has only taken me thirteen months to get to this point!
IF I had more time, I would have liked to have added more decorative detail: embossings on the sprocket wheels, retainers on the sprockets and on the vertical stakes, some D'ni lettering in the space reserved above the contol slider (in/out, forward/backward, something like that). And you'll probably put a bunch of your local rocks inside the pontoons, right? But those are your decisions!
Files PMed to you....hope this works for your project!