New Hauler Cockpit WIP + Questions About Models and Materials

JumpGateJockey · Post by **JumpGateJockey** » Fri, 29. Aug 14, 16:43

Hey Everyone! I'm new to X3 and X3 modding but am excited to be building a custom cockpit for my first go at the game.

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Things have been going fairly well considering a lot of information on this forum is many years old. I am happy to say I have a first pass model working in the game! I have been basing my work off of PSCO1 cockpits for XRM so you can see in the image that the HUD elements are askew. My next steps will be figuring out a few "bugs" and then getting the information panels into place. From there I will begin playing the game and refining my model.

A couple of questions:
1) It looks like either the game or the dbox2 3dsmax exporter is changing the smoothing groups on my model. It looks like it is doing an angle based calculation of the smoothing. "Is this a feature"? Is there any way to adjust this or change the angle value?
EDIT: Since I started writing this post I think I figured out the problem. It looks like the exporter is splitting the mesh normals at UV seams. I just threw some auto generated UV mapping on the model for testing and the hard edges are exactly where the seams are at. This is a fairly non-standard thing for an exporter to do but hey, maybe that's a helpful feature with making space ships!

2) When I modify the master multi-sub material in 3dsmax and add my own material to it they don't seem to work. If I use the materials in the mod they show up correctly. When I examine the .bod file that the exporter outputs the materials look correct. Is there something I am missing?

3) I saw an old post talking about material definitions but I don't know where to find those.

4) Any more information regarding the proper way to create edit and store materials would be very helpful. I have done a lot of searching on the forums but haven't come up with much.

Thanks so much for the help! If my cockpit every becomes good enough for public consumption I will release it for download.

Here are some more images:

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EDIT: Resized images to forum limitations.

PSCO1 · Post by **PSCO1** » Sat, 30. Aug 14, 01:32

Good shapes, nice job!

I like screen positions and the cp position is pretty well adjusted

Abouts materials, try to ask some advanced 3d moddders, personnaly I always used the original materials of X3TC and it worked

It should be nice to see your cps with textures

MilesRS · Post by **MilesRS** » Sat, 30. Aug 14, 15:54

Looking good!!

I believe the problem with the textures is related to Material6. Open up your .bod files, you will see that each material will have its folder destination defined. I would guess that currently they are pointing to a location on your desktop. You need to change this to for example 'dds\metal_argon_simple', which is the directory in your games/mods cat/dat.

Hope that makes sense, although you may of course have already checked this!

Miles

Informer · Post by **Informer** » Sat, 30. Aug 14, 18:39

great stuff, looking great.

JumpGateJockey · Post by **JumpGateJockey** » Thu, 4. Sep 14, 21:59

PSC01: Thanks. After I get a little bit further along with my model (maybe the next revision) I will try to start tracking down people to talk to more about materials. I also have some questions for you about your workflow but I will wait for that as well.

MilesRS: Thanks for the suggestion. Unfortunately, I have already done that.

Informer: Thanks for taking the time to comment!

Now for the new stuff! I have been working on my model the last couple of nights and am getting closer to finalizing the cabin space. The windows are looking good as well as the main body of the dash. I am still working on the dash layout as well as other gadget and electronics and effects. I'm happy to have done some more texture work adding more specific material textures. I am still working on texture scale and normal map intensity. Having all of the shaders shiny kinda makes it hard to make realistic materials. I will be looking into that problem further...

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Finally here is a quick paintover of some of the changes I plan to make. I'm excited to try and add some fake lighting in areas to increase the cockpits visual appeal. Speaking of lighting is there a way to add realtime lights to my cockpit? I would love to light up some of the darker areas.

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Buck /Rogers76 · Post by **Buck /Rogers76** » Fri, 5. Sep 14, 03:07

hi, i wonder is it possible to make those chevrons not being transparent trough your ship's hull or in general and also make a visible cross hair when enabling external view?

JumpGateJockey · Post by **JumpGateJockey** » Fri, 5. Sep 14, 03:44

Hey, those are great questions. I don't know the answer to them but I sure would be interested in knowing if those things are possible!

JumpGateJockey · Post by **JumpGateJockey** » Wed, 10. Sep 14, 21:08

In this update I have cleaned up all of the windows and how they integrate with the rest of the cockpit. The screens are taken from Blender this time because its just faster when making smaller changes. I have the materials feeling better in Blender which will help me when trying to get things looking correct in X3. I have some ideas for getting a more intersting lighting result in X3 that doesn't involve realtime lights but again, I run into the question of what I can do with materials and HOW do I do it? My idea right now is that I am going to make only the dash realtime lit and the rest of the cockpit will be self illuminated with baked normals and lighting. Its a shot in the dark but with your help it just might work!
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Phraggah · Post by **Phraggah** » Sat, 13. Sep 14, 00:46

You have some nice looking scenes there.

I'm curious, I couldn't tell if you are putting the full geometry in game or prerendering them?

(In case you are using geometry, I would suggest prerendering them because the cockpit will always be at the same point in space to the cockpit relative to player perspective, meaning it would be an easy illusion to pull off)

You say you have some material questions but I'm not sure what they are. Could you be more specific?

Lone Jedi · Post by **Lone Jedi** » Tue, 28. Oct 14, 21:06

It looks much better than all other cockpits available atm. Can't wait to try it!

Killjaeden · Post by **Killjaeden** » Sat, 1. Nov 14, 23:20

I run into the question of what I can do with materials and HOW do I do it? My idea right now is that I am going to make only the dash realtime lit and the rest of the cockpit will be self illuminated with baked normals and lighting. Its a shot in the dark but with your help it just might work!

Yes that's how you can do lighting. It works pretty well (if you take a look at IMP.- 's Boron cockpits, they look pretty good).

I also made an illuminated sign texture for a pirate base in xtc... Just setup a lighted scene with textures in your modelling tool and render to texture.
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Koci · Post by **Koci** » Tue, 14. Apr 15, 12:53

It is GREAT! Just GREAT!

With Best Regards

Koci

mikhailskatchkov · Post by **mikhailskatchkov** » Fri, 21. Oct 16, 19:05

Just stumbled on this thread.

I'm Mike "Mikhailskatchkov" creator of the "Star Wars Mod" link to thread bellow.

I am also making cockpits, and i seem to have almost everything working right aside for two things,
1: Glass scratch reflections are appearing at standard reflective angle but I need to reverse this to get a realistic effect.
2: Glass reflecting everything, need it to reflect the inside of the cockpit, but it doesnt.

If anyone has any leads please help

note Scratches working

Cockpits can be with and without standard gravadar and aiids, instead integrated into cockpit.

http://forum.egosoft.com/viewtopic.php? ... sc&start=0