SweetPotato Modeller

[Ed Kolis]

Something I've been working on...
http://kolis.dyndns.org/ed/prog/sweetpotato/index.html

It's going to be sort of like DoGA, only no animation, but you will be able to assign multiple colors to a single part... and I think there's a Java-based boolean operations library out there, as well as a .X exporter, so it might even be useful for SE5, if I ever finish it http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/wink.gif

[narf poit chez BOOM]

/me heats up the sweet potato and tosses it to Kolis.

Why? Narf. Narf is a good reason.

[Renegade 13]

But not as good a reason as meat. Meat is better than Narf.

Ed, looks like a good start. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif

[Kana]

Nice...now if it would only export to .X

Kana

[Ed Kolis]

Well, like I said, there's surely an .X exporter for Java3D out there somewhere, and if there is, I intend to use it http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/wink.gif

[dogscoff]

Mmmm... sweet potato.

Take two large sweet potatos. Peel, boil and drain them. Add in a large spoonful of your favourite butter/margarine and the juice and pulp of one lemon. Mash until smooth.

Goes nicely with grilled meat/ fish.

Yum.

[Ed Kolis]

Hmm, my mom likes to bake sweet potatoes like regular potatoes, then top them with margarine, rosemary, and brown sugar...

[Ed Kolis]

New version, same location! Still not very useful as you can't save your work or modify existing objects in the scene, but you can see how things are progressing... http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/wink.gif

[Kana]

Keep up the good fight...I have my fingers crossed, that AT will soon be able to plug in his DOGA made models, and out pops a .X ready for PRIME TIME SEV action...

Kana

[Ed Kolis]

Ack, problem... there doesn't seem to be any exporter written for .X like I thought... guess I'll have to write something to export to .OBJ and use some other program to convert to .X, seeing as I'll never understand the .X format http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/frown.gif

[Ed Kolis]

SweetPotato is now up to version 0.3.0 - got the .X format figured out; it's not as complicated as I thought! http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/cool.gif
Same download link as before - I love symlinks http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/wink.gif

[TurinTurambar]

I've tried the link several times over the last few days, mate. Seems dead.

/threads/images/Graemlins/Dagger.gif/threads/images/Graemlins/icon42.gif

[Ed Kolis]

Sorry... my Internet connection is rather spotty... I think it has something to do with the fact that I'm using a USB wireless adapter on Linux... http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/frown.gif

[Fyron]

Just find better drivers. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/wink.gif

[Strategia_In_Ultima]

And I hereby declare the SweetPotato modeller, just about to slip to Page 2, to be MIA, presumed KIA.

[NullAshton]

Hey, Ed Kolis is still working on this! He talks about it on the IRC channel. So be quiet http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/tongue.gif

[Ed Kolis]

Aww... yeah, sort of... but I decided to do something even better, remember - I wrote a DirectX exporter plugin for Art of Illusion http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/wink.gif
Now all I need is some help with the 3D->2D texture baking algorithm for that plugin... http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/tongue.gif

[TurinTurambar]

Yes, but not all of us USE Art of Illusion, so....

Personally, I use gmax, DoGA L3 and Photoshop CS.

~/threads/images/Graemlins/Dagger.gif~

[Ed Kolis]

Well, I could also try to make a plugin which makes the AoI interface more like DoGA... you know, picking parts and textures from a palette http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/wink.gif

[TurinTurambar]

The program looks interesting. I'll download it as-is later today and take a look. Some of the results in the Gallery look really nice.

/threads/images/Graemlins/Dagger.gif

[Ed Kolis]

Yeah... my favorite feature is that it's got the most incredible, powerful texture editor... you can basically plug in any mathematical formulas you want into a bunch of shader blocks which determine the color, emissivity, opacity, bumpiness, etc. of your model's surface, and even tweak those on a per-triangle or per-vertex basis via texture parameters! http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/eek.gif

Which explains why I so desperately want to be able to export AoI models to .X format... currently only the 2D textures will export, but the 3D ones are way better! http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/cool.gif

Another idea I had for a plugin would be one that takes all the objects in the scene, combines them into one via AoI's boolean or CSG operations, and merges the textures as well (since AoI supports only one texture per model, but you can have multiple layers of texture each with its own opacity map, you should be able to "fake" multiple textures http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/wink.gif)
That way you could actually generate a single mesh and a single bitmap file out of some whole complex spaceship model or something built out of dozens of parts - i.e. modelled like in DoGA! http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/laugh.gif